Seriously? This is the kind of verbiage that makes people go “WTF?”

In Belgium this week, 3 professional cyclists are facing criminal littering charges for throwing water-bottles on the ground during the Fleche-Wallone race in southern Belgium. The law reads:

“Any person who holds waste is required to provide or make the management conditions to limit the negative effects on water, air, soil, flora, fauna, to avoid inconvenience in general, without adversely affecting the environment or to human health.”

See, the problem with these laws is they get written to be both too specific and too vague all at the same time. First we understand that it is against the law to harm water, air, soil, flora, or fauna…but what exactly constitutes a “negative effect”? And how much are you supposed to “limit” that effect? Is 20% enough? How about limiting it to a little less than a bunch of negative effect. Is a smidgen of negative effect acceptable?

This is obviously the work of a committee of politicians that could easily agree that littering is bad, but actually being able to force people to not litter would make the politicians seem draconian. Politicians understand that firmly taking a stance usually leads to someone feeling oppressed, and oppressed people tend to be the ones that vote, cause they are pissed off.

Of course, in Arizona we have a handful of politicians that have no problem taking a stand and are proud of their draconian ways. And if you oppress people properly they don’t have the right to vote, which makes it easier to take a stand when you realize that the people you are oppressing can’t do shit about it.