Defending the litterer - walter block

So, as of late, I have noticed that more and more questions are being asked on this forum about how the market would protect the environment (I have been one such asker of this question, in particular). 

Most of the responses follow the following line of defense:

"If we were to live in a free market, where private property of everything was the core of the society, the market would take better care than the government does over its assets (rivers, roads, parks, etc.)"

This defense usually comes in one of two forms:

1) empirical defense: "the record of history is perfectly clear that every good and service out there has been provided by the market at one time or another. At the times when these goods and services were provided by the market, there has been little documentation that the providers of these goods or services polluted the environment at any near the same levels as compared to those times when the government provided these goods or services. Conversely, the record of history is also quite clear that when roads, rivers, canals, lakes, etc., have been owned by private, profit-seeking individuals, these individuals have displayed a much keener aptitude for ensuring both the prolonged usage and the over-all care and condition of the resource owned when compared to the ownership of these same resources by the state.For instance...(X, Y, and Z)" 

2) logical/praxeological/epistemological defense: "We do not need history to tell us that the market can care for the environment better than the the state can. We can deduce, based on the Praxeological axiom that humans act (and the implications of this axiom), that the the market is, at all times, more just and more efficient at performing any task, producing any good, supplying any service, when compared to the state's attempts to do these things."

For the non-knowledgable, average, economically and historically illiterate out there (excuse the tautology), these defenses, in-and-of-themselves, don't offer much in the way of persuasion. This is not to say that they aren't valid or correct. The problem with the second defense is that this illiterate would probably have no idea what you are talking about. The second argument is even less appealing to the illiterate. This is for several reasons:

1) Most obvious, it is unnecessary compared to the Praxeological defense.

2) Many of us (myself included) have a hard time recalling specific statistics, dates, and real-world examples off the tops of our heads in a matter of an instant to do so. Like many, I thrive at written debate because it gives me a chance to recall my facts, and provide sources. Unfortunately, we can't always debate like that. This certainly doesn't include everyone here (maybe not even most), I just know I have a hard time with this problem.

3) Even if we could recall all of these empirical figures, I neither think this effective nor do I believe you will have the time to do so, given the attention span of people these days. Most will not listen to a diatribe  on ten real world examples of how the market cares for the environment better than the state does. Even if they were willing to listen to these examples, they will probably reply with some other bone-headed, ill-conceived, half-truth that they heard about where the state stopped the greedy capitalist from polluting the ocean (BP, though this wouldn't even be a half-truth), then you have to give another diatribe.

4) For most people to accept this argument requires a lot of new found faith in the market. That is asking a lot of someone intellectually, given that you must do so in a small amount of time. 

So, wouldn't it be great if we could mix the two arguments into a thought experiment that is both easy to follow and doesn't take long to explain? Wouldn't it be great if they could understand the a priori reasoning as well as the empirical argument in a succinct manner? Well, Block offers one in his Defending the Undefendable: Chapter 27 - The Litterer. 

I am sure many of you have already read it...I did years and years ago and am going through it again, but I forgot all about this chapter and how totally great it is.

In short, he defends the litterer as a protester. The main reasoning goes like this: Litter only exists in the public secter (roads, rivers, lakes, parks) but never in private settings...why? Shouldn't dropping your cigarette butt on the patio of a private restaurant be littering just as much as on a highway or at a lake owned by the government? If anything, you should have more right to litter in the public areas than in the private areas in that you supposedly "own" the public areas as a tax-payer. But no, when we leave our trash in a private venue, it is called garbage, left-over, waste, all to be picked up by the owner's cleaning service or staff. Not only does the entrepreneur pick up after you, he also doesn't fine you or get indignant when you litter on his premises. In fact, the general attitude from most people is an implicit acceptance that these assertions are true. They take the entrepreneurs generosity for granted. I cannot tell you the sheer amount of times that my do-gooder, "environmentally conscious" friends smoke blissfully away on the patio of our favorite coffee shop, spitting and tossing cigarette butts on the ground like there is no tomorrow. Somehow, these butts are never there the next time we go; quite different than the public sidewalks we walk to get there, filled with more, slowly decomposing, butts than the last time we walked that path.  

It's as if the entrepreneur owning a restaurant says, "make yourself at home, and make sure to waive down a waitress to get any trash out of your way while you eat. I'll not have my customers eating around old dirty plates and used napkins. Cigarette butts? Hell, just throw them on the ground if you don't feel like using this ash-tray I have provided to you. My cleaning crew will pick it all up after you leave. The floor and the table will look brand spankin' new by the time both you and we are done with it. Do what you please...it is my job to make you happy and I know my income is contingent upon that happiness. If I don't do that job to YOUR liking, you'll go somewhere else, and I don't want that. THANK YOU for coming and making yourself at home here."

Conversely, when I litter on the highway, the state says, "That will be $100 in fines and I AM NOT PICKING THAT UP!  But, you don't have to either. I've already fined you, so it doesn't make any difference one way or the other to me if the litter continues to sit there. It's not my problem!" 

Interesting juxtaposition. 

I know I am not telling you anything you don't already know, I just thought it was awesome, and I wanted to just remind all of you about this defense because I don't see it used very often and I think it is awfully effective due to its ability to use an everyday occurrence to make it a real, almost tangible, idea for the average Joe. 

Also Block does an even better job than I did, by far.