By Jennifer Baker-Bent

OK, so maybe Sir Mix-a-Lot had it all wrong. One should not like big butts … nor small butts, nor any butts, for that matter. Gasp?!

Yes, it’s high time that residents of this beautiful community speak up and speak out against such a despicable display of butts — well, at least those thrown onto the ground by some careless smokers lacking ashtray locator skills.

On any given day, at any given stop light, simply glance down and look for the nicotine nuggets that have been left for your viewing pleasure. It’s like a carcinogenic game of “Where’s Waldo?”

Maybe to compensate for the lack of said cigarette butt disposal skills, some smokers were instead given the talent of perfect timing. Timing so precise, that every cigarette smoked has completely fulfilled its cigarette destiny, and is ready to be discarded at that exact moment the vehicle stops at a traffic light.

Or maybe the cigarette is lit just as the light turns red, and the driver participates in some tobacco industry sponsored “speed-inhaling-and-butt-toss event” that we non-smokers are unaware of.

Not only is this littering habit aesthetically displeasing, it’s bad for the environment and harmful to animals that may try to eat, collect and/or shadily redistribute cigarettes on the down-low, becoming an incredibly bad influence on the rest of their species.

Maybe that’s what all those flat squirrels were attempting to achieve on their last journey to the median strip. “Must…have…one…more… cigarette…” SPLAT! “He was a good squirrel. He was just trying to look cool in front of his squirrel friends.”

The problem doesn’t exist exclusively at traffic lights. One can easily find these unsightly, toxic chemical-leaching, and sometimes still-smoldering butts on our beaches, playgrounds and parking lots.

Hey smokers, you’d walk a mile for a Camel, right? How about walking 20 feet to an ashtray?

Seriously, the only butts that should be on the ground, are those of careless trash chuckers who have been ticketed and required to perform a community service — like, say, sitting on a curb and picking up litter?

Smokers, keep your butts off the ground. Do it for the environment, do it for lungs everywhere and do it for the squirrels, man!

Jennifer Baker-Bent is a homeschool mom and freelance columnist residing in the Western Branch area of Chesapeake.