3 Solid Defenses Conservatives Could Give For Smashing Keurigs

Conservatives unhappy with Keurig are littering Twitter with pictures of the single-serving brewing pods smashed to smithereens. Oh good, we thought when we first saw the #BoycottKeurig hashtag, the ghost of Republicans past has visited and reminded conservatives that fiscal and environmental conservatism are different sides of the same coin.

But no. The Keurig-smashing trend is in reaction to conservative Fox News host Sean Hannity’s interview with Roy Moore, the Alabama Republican senatorial candidate accused of pursuing teenage girls, including a 14-year-old. Keurig and several other advertisers confirmed on Twitter they won’t run their ads on Hannity’s show after he raised the specter that Moore’s accusers were lying for money or political gain.

Moore, twice elected and twice kicked off the Alabama Supreme Court, was accused in an explosive report by The Washington Post of having romantic or sexual relationships with four teenage girls when he was in his 30s. Moore has vehemently denied the allegations, and has threatened to sue The Washington Post.

Here are three defenses conservatives could offer for smashing Keurigs that have nothing to do with Sean Hannity and Roy Moore:

1. Keurig has created an environmental abomination. Environmental protection started out as a Republican value. Teddy Roosevelt created the national park service to conserve and protect America’s greatest natural treasures. Richard Nixon created both the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The current Keurig kerfuffle offers a solid opportunity for conservatives to redefine themselves as environmental stewards.

At one point in 2014, the number of K-Cups sold would circle the globe 10.5 times if placed end-to-end, according to The Atlantic. Keurig doesn't say exactly how many K-Cups have been produced over the life of the company, but what is known is that 10.5 billion of them were sold in the fiscal year that ended in September 2015, the last year public data was available before the company was taken private in a $13.9 billion buyout by JAB Holding Co.

Keurig Green Mountain plans to change its cups so they’ll be 100 percent recyclable by 2020, though it’s probably fair to ask if the people drawn to the convenience of the coffee-in-a-pod system are the same consumers whose shopping choices are dictated by environmental concerns.

“Our goal is 100 percent Keurig K-cup pods diverted from landfills by curbside recycling,” Monique Oxender, the coffee brewer’s chief sustainability officer, told The Washington Post in May. “The consumer is going to brew it, peel and empty it, and pop the pod into the recycling bin in the same behavior they would do with a yogurt cup. We want them to make it a habit.”

2. They symbolize everything that is wrong with America. We want what we want when we want it, and when we’re done with it, we throw it away. And our addiction to convenience-based products that are monumentally bad for the environment shows what shows us to be wasteful and lazy — anything but conservatives values.

A child born in the United States will create 13 times as much ecological damage as one born in Brazil, use 35 times the resources of a typical person born in India and consume about 53 times more products than someone born in China, according to Scientific American. We generate more garbage in a year — 254 tons — than any other country in the world, including China, whose population is about four times larger than that of the United States. We are serial garbage producers.

3. Even John Sylvan, the inventor of the K-Cup, kind of wishes he hadn’t conceived the coffee-in-a-pod system. He made billions off the invention, but told The Atlantic he feels badly about the environmental consequences of the appliance that became America's next best thing.

"It's like a cigarette for coffee, a single-serve delivery mechanism for an addictive substance," he said.

Sylvan, who now runs ZonBak, a solar company that claims to make the most cost-efficient solar panel in the world, doesn't own a Keurig brewing system. "They're kind of expensive to use ... plus it’s not like drip coffee is tough to make," he told The Atlantic.

And no matter what Keurig’s new owners say, “those things will never be recyclable,” Sylvan told The Atlantic. The plastic used in the four different layers “keeps the coffee inside protected like a nuclear bunker, and it also holds up during the brewing process," he said.

No worries if you've already jumped on the #BoycottKeurig trend. It’s easy to Twitter-splain it away with little effort —just start using the already existing #KillTheKCup hashtag and say it's what you meant all along.

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