Gum

Sometimes I chew gum when I am hungry at work. My work area has recently been rehabbed, and part of the rehab is the recycling station.

Paper / Recycle / Landfill / Compost. I am stymied on where to throw my used gum. I no longer have my own trash can, and I chew too much to swallow anymore - smaller throat or bigger gum, I can't tell.

So where does gum go? Obviously not Paper. I would say Compost, but I've seen it come out of the trash at home and it is moving further from nature, not closer to it. It's like dried caulk. Also, I'm pretty sure one of these ingredients doesn't biodegrade: Xylitol, Mannitol, Blue 1 Lake, Acesulfame, BHT (TO MAINTAIN FRESHNESS) (Geez, CALM DOWN Gum Labelers), Neotame.

I'm drawn to Recycle because I get the idea that there is a large plastic component to this gum. Not from the ingredients, but the gum itself. You start off with nice soft gum and it gets harder and harder as you chew it. That's not natural.

That's why I just throw it into Landfill, since it's Pascal's Wager: if I'm wrong and it's compost, it can still degrade at the landfill, but if it's artificial I don't want it clogging up the works at the recycling place, or choking some dolphin somewhere.