Let´s start today with a cleaned-up version of comedian Chris Rock´s devastating rap on -- hmm, what to call them? -- deadwood, I guess. Loiterers. People who sleepwalk through life taking five.

 

[Deadwood] always want credit for doing things they´re supposed to do. They´ll brag about stuff a normal person just does. They´ll say something like, "Yeah, well, I take care of my kids." You´re supposed to, you [idiot]. "I ain´t never been to jail." Whaddya want? A cookie? You´re not supposed to go to jail, you low-expectation-having [expletive deleted].

 

I´ve never been much of a proclaimer. Sign-wearing isn´t for me. It´s how I was raised. Low key. Do what you´re supposed to do. Treat people as you want to be treated. Be polite, work hard, give a good effort. And never waste energy jumping up and down yelling "Look at me being polite, working hard, giving a good effort."

 

A key corollary to treating people as you want to be treated is living and letting live. As long as no one is being harmed or cheated. Some people need to proclaim. So let them. Let them have their bumper stickers and lawn signs. Let them broadcast their allegiances to their heart´s content. I won´t snipe about them. Not much, anyway.

 

Three weeks from today a lot of people will be walking around wearing "I voted today" buttons. That´s perfectly OK. Good for them. I will vote too. I always do. I doubt I´ll put on the button, though. Voting is something you´re supposed to do.

 

(I usually give my "I voted today" button to one of my sons. They love wearing buttons.)

Recycling is another thing you´re supposed to do. So my kneejerk reaction to a story like this -- in a nutshell, a convention center in Pittsburgh hands out buttons to people who recycle -- is: Whaddya want, a cookie? But then I remember: Live. And let live. A public good is being served. People are being -- as our president likes to say -- incentivized. Incentivized to recycle.

 

If buttons incentivize people to recycle, hand them out. Proclaimers need to proclaim. So let them.

 

Would I put on the button if I had the occasion to visit the convention center in Pittburgh? I´m not sure. Probably. Maybe. I am sure I´d recycle, though. I always do.

 

Almost always. My wife, the real stickler for recycling at our house, reads this column sometimes.

 

Pete Fehrenbach is managing editor of Waste News. Past installments of this column are collected in the Inbox archive.

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