European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - April 24, 2007, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Tuesday april 242007 stars and stripes Page 17 opinion burning to put discarded Butts in their place by Robyn Blumner St Petersburg Fla times t happened again just a few Days ago at a stoplight a disembodied hand dangled out the window of the car ahead holding a cigarette the cigarette hand moved inside and outside the car As its female owner puffed away then As inevitably As finding an earwig under a Damp Rock the exhausted butt was dropped out the window this scene can ruin a perfectly Good drive As tolerant As i try to be the littering smoker is the one person for whom i believe no punishment devised by Man is too cruel they All should be Strung up by their Short hairs or at least shouted at loudly what kind of person does this what kind of brain justifies the act of throwing any litter out a car window never mind a lit stick that could set something on fire what exactly Are they telling themselves it can take up to 20 years for a cigarette butt to be come one with the Earth so dont give me if s biodegradable in the meantime the rest of us have to look at that ugly stubby piece of garbage lying in the Street or we have to pay someone to pick it up in researching this Peeve i found it hard to believe that not a single Federal government Agency tracks americas litter problem not even the environmental Protection Agency the Best we can do to understand its breadth is to examine some organizational and state findings every year the Ocean Conser Vancy sponsors an International coastal cleanup during which volunteers from 100 countries pick up tons of debris along the worlds shorelines in 200629 per cent of the trash removed was Smon related i remember vividly being at a Florida Beach a few years Back putting my hands in the Cool Sand just to enjoy the feeling and lift ing up cigarette Butts As i pulled my hands out someone took a Public space and made it their own trash pile then left in guess ing that these Are the same people who fail to appreciate what they really look like in a Speedo despite my civil libertarian leanings i applaud Sarasota county for considering a smoking ban or designated smoking areas on its beaches so Many smokers lit Ter with such uncaring abandon that they have forfeited the right to share these Public recreation areas with their habit in 2000 volunteers in that Florida county picked up 32 pounds of cigarette Butts on the Beach the world is their ashtray and it is not just the debris on More than one occasion i have had to pack up and move to another area of a Beach to avoid the smoke whiffed by someone near by who decided to pollute the air for everyone Ive never been a smoker so i dont understand this umbilical attachment to something so nauseating though i do have some com passion for addicts of any Stripe but where my patience runs thin is with this sense of entitlement mat so Many smokers seem to have i no longer lean Back in my seat on an air plane because it is Likely to impose on the person sit Ting behind me smokers though have Little concern about who might be in their line of smoke they puff away while walking Down a Street their smoke Stream ing behind them into the face of the poor sop in the rear Nice anyone who thinks i am unfairly picking on the litter of smokers since there is so much other de Bris tossed into the streets by big Lun Heads should take a look at a Survey done by the state of Washington the 2004 study found that cigarette Butts were the no 1 most littered item at 480 million per year it hardly seems Possi ble since the state has Only about 12 million smokers but Megan Warfield of the states depart ment of ecology assured me if s a 2004 study done by the state of Washington found that cigarette Butts were the no 1 most littered hem at 480 million per year True Warfield says that in followup focus groups smokers excuse their behaviour by saying they throw the Butts out the window be cause they dont like the smell in their car i think that s so ironic Warfield says she also notes that the state has had tremendous problems with Brush and Forest fires started by tossed cigarettes an act that now carries a Fine of when i see someone drop a cig Arette butt on the ground i have an autonomic reaction whereby i ascribe a Long list of other Loath some attributes to that person selfish Jerk being the kindest they obviously care about As much about the health and Beauty of the planet As they do their own one Day we will find a cure for tobacco addiction and this filthy habit will be easy to kick Lef s just Hope the other filthy habit Dies along with it Robyn Blumner is a St Petersburg times columnist distinguish Between direct victims and the rest of us by Rosa Brooks More than a week after the Vir Ginia tech massacre the friends and families of the Vic Tims Are grieving and de spite the relentless Glare of the Media spot Light their pain is still private it belongs to them not to the rest of us but you sure  know it from the Way we talk about the tragedy in modern America theres always plenty of trauma to go around even if you knew no one involved in the shootings have never been to Virginia and cant Tell the difference Between a Hokie and a Wahoo theres no need for you to feel left out did you feel sad when you heard the news did you Ponder however fleetingly the mystery of mortality if so dont just go on with your Ordinary life As if nothing has happened to disrupt it even though Noth ing has happened to disrupt Honor your grief attend a candlelight Vigil Post a poignant message on one of myspace Virginia tech memorial pages and please seek trauma counselling As soon As Possi ble convincing ourselves that weve been vicariously traumatized by the pain of Strang ers has become a cherished National Pas time the Washington Post last week accompanied online stories about the shoot ing with a clickable sidebar where to find support apparently on the As sumption that the Mere experience of glancing at articles about the tragedy would be so emotionally devastating that readers would require trained therapists at the University of Buffalo More than 500 Miles from Virginia tech University Counselor announced that they were reaching out to students feeling affected by the tragedy Dallas area chaplains rushed uninvited to Blacksburg a to be part of the Healing process in Washington an ordinarily hard nosed corporate Law firm emailed attorneys a list of re sources for coping with traumatic events count me out theres something fraudulent about this eagerness to Latch onto the grief of others and embrace the idea that we too have been victimized this trivializes the pain Felt by those who have actually lost some thing and pathologies Normal reactions to tragedy empathy is Good but feeling shocked and saddened by the shootings Doest make us traumatized or special these feelings make us Normal our self indulgent conviction that we have All been traumatized also operates ironically to shut Down empathy for other less Media Genie victims on the Day of the Virginia tech shooting for instance army sgt Mario k de Leon of san Francisco like the Virginia tech victims died of wounds sustained from enemy Small arms fire on wednesday car bombs killed at least 172 people in Bagh dad but no one has set up a special mys Pace Page to commemorate those dead our collective insistence that we All share in the Virginia tech trauma is a form of ant politics one that blinds us to the distinctions Between different kinds and degrees of suffering on wednesday Usa today worried about the effects of the trauma this generation of Young people has witnessed the Oklahoma City bombing Columbine sept 11 the space shuttle disasters Hurri Cane katrina and now Virginia tech pre Vious generations had their allotment of world wars Vietnam but no cohort of american youth has Ever endured repeated mass catastrophes in the Media environment excuse me More than 400000 Ameri can soldiers died in world War n and 58000 died in the Vietnam War but the millennial generation is uniquely traumatized because it has watched sad things on to lumping together the space shuttle disasters Columbine and Virginia tech with terrorism natural disasters and War dangerously de contextualized these disparate events the Virginia tech massacre was Cata strophic for the victims and their loved ones but unlike War it was not catastrophic for the nation the insistence on collective mourning even operates to de politicize the Virginia tech tragedy those who made the mis take of suggesting that the massacre might Lead us to consider tighter gun regulation were quickly told to shut up because this is a moment for grief not politics but we live in a political world search ing for policies that can reduce the Vio Lence that plagues our world at Home and abroad is the Best Way to Honor the dead second Best Lef s at least Stop pretend ing that were victims too Rosa Brooks is a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center this column first appeared in the los Angeles times prickly City by Scott Stantis a actual 15