Nantucket Banned Helium Balloons

BG – It’s Nantucket’s party, and they can ban helium balloons if they want to.

Residents of the island this week voted to prohibit the use of the floating party favors, a measure supporters said would protect marine animals who often mistake the deflated balloons for food.

But though the measure passed handily at Tuesday’s Town Meeting, many think it goes too far in service of a goal that could have been achieved through education about responsible use and disposal.

To those in the town’s small party industry, the debate mirrored the national discussion over how to prevent gun violence.

“Guns don’t kill people; it’s the people using the guns,” said Bobby “The Balloon Wizard” Lamb, a children’s entertainer who makes balloon animals at party functions.

This is one of those stories that will probably go viral because it sounds so crazy to the rest of the country, but it makes a ton of sense to anyone that has been offshore fishing. Balloons aren’t just a nuisance on the ocean, they are a major threat. Until you’ve seen it for yourself you can’t really appreciate how many balloons end up floating around out there. It’s pretty gross.

That said, let’s talk about Bobby “The Balloon Wizard” Lamb for a second here. Did he just compare helium balloons to guns? Is he saying balloons don’t kill marine life, the people using them do? So in his eyes, a murderer killing someone with a gun is the same thing as a toddler at his birthday party accidentally letting go of a helium balloon? Seems legit.

I guess we just need to introduce the balloon Brady Bill. Make little kids apply for a balloon permit 7 days before their birthday parties. Make them get a BID card to be able to buy the balloon and a permit to carry so they can walk around the yard with them? That should drastically cut down on the amount of kids that have a balloon accidentally slip out of their hands. Remember, Balloons don’t kill dolphins, uneducated, heathen children do.

I don’t know what is worse, comparing balloons to guns, or writing an article for The Boston Globe and asking Bobby “The Balloon Wizard” for his hot take on a controversial subject… and then printing it when he draws a parallel between guns and balloons.

P.S. Seriously, stop letting balloons go, they don’t melt into the atmosphere, they land in the ocean.

P.P.S. Great band name, Guns and Balloons.