The Politics of Tap Water

Sometimes I think I'm the only person in North America who still drinks water out of the tap. It's free and it doesn't make me sick. Every once in a while I'll drink a bottle of fizzy water but that's different. My kids don't drink tap water and apologize to their friends if that's all we have. Well, I don't apologize and David Rakoff agrees with me, so there. In his second collection of essays Don't Get Too Comfortable he flagellates the narcissism of North Americans, including their penchant for bottled water.
"'It's safe and it's good plus there is a political reason for drinking it,' he says. 'The gas and the vehicles used to transport water all over the continent to people who already have perfectly good drinking water is wasteful and destructive to the environment. Plus, I'm such a cheapskate, it seems crazy to have to buy water in a restaurant.'"