The earth, today. On Earth Day.
The earth, today. On Earth Day. bk

Each April 22 is, apparently, another excuse to circulate this wretched story about Ira Einhorn—the MC of the first Earth Day rally in 1970 (he claimed to be the event's cofounder) who was later imprisoned for having killed and allegedly "composted" his girlfriend.

You can see why people are attracted to this story. It throws a shadow across an otherwise innocuous, flowers-and-butterflies tradition—and, of course, there's that "compost" detail. On Earth Day. Some people cherish their gallows humor.

Now that Seattle is home to a serious body-composting proposition—the Urban Death Project, which is being designed as a lower-cost, less-toxic, less-energy-intensive alternative to traditional burial and cremation—I feel some small responsibility to submit an objection to this grim tradition.

And not just on the grounds that it's ghoulish (though it is). The real issue is that Einhorn didn't really "compost" anyone.

Though the NBC article most people tend to quote uses the word "composted," the original 2002 reporting says he hid his girlfriend's body in a trunk, which he then hid in his closet, which was then detected once the ceiling in the apartment downstairs began to leak.

That is not composting. That is just a sociopathic form of hoarding.

The story is hideous and depressing enough without the mildly sensationalist, not-entirely-accurate, cheap-thrill "composting" detail. So... do you think we can drop that bit?

Besides, Rush Limbaugh and his fellow professional jackasses use the "composting" story as part of their annual attack on Earth Day. You might not like all the dewy-eyed sentimentalism of April 22. You may think the Urban Death Project is total lunacy.

But you don't want to sound like one of those assholes, do you?