By William Rivers Pitt | Truthout.org
Editor’s Note: This article, which just came in from Truthout, is an attempt by the alternative media to bring a spiritual or at least social consciousness dimension into the BP oil spill issue. Decide for yourself if the approach works; and let’s get a sense of why or why not. I think that the author, who is a knowledgeable guy, leaves out some key points. Yes, it’s your ‘fault’ if you have a car, eat or sit in a heated home in the winter. But is it your fault that oil companies for decades have been buying up alternative energy patents and concealing them from us? Is it our fault that the oil business killed mass transit in the 40s or the electric car in the 90s? And what are we going to do about that? — efc
There were hearings on Capitol Hill this week regarding the Gulf oil disaster, and virtually everyone involved – from witnesses to experts to government officials – had a grand old time throwing rocks at British Petroleum. The Obama administration and various government agencies have also been taking it in the teeth over their failure to quell the oil boiling up from the bottom of the sea. Beaches are closing, animals are dying, livelihoods are being destroyed, and unbelievable as it may seem, the worst is yet to come. New reports indicate the well may have been releasing oil equivalent to the Exxon Valdez spill every eight to ten days since this whole thing started.
BP is taking the lion’s share of the beatings, and justly so. They ran a shoddy operation out there on the Deepwater Horizon, and knew even ten years ago that such operations were incredibly risky. They lied and lied again about the scope of the disaster. They have been attempting to limit press access to the disaster zone to keep people from finding out what is actually going on. Their corporate officers have denied the existence of oil plumes beneath the surface, and have held pity-parties for themselves on television over how trying this whole situation is for them.
This mess is their fault, and the world knows it. Their stock value has cratered, and even the BP shareholders are beginning to revolt. They are going to be sued for God only knows how much money, and will be saddled with the cost of the clean-up, which may take years.
But here is something to remember: it’s our fault, too. Yours and mine.
If you own a car, it’s your fault. I own a car, so I own a share of the blame. If you own more than one car, or own some gargantuan gas-guzzling SUV, it’s your fault. If you ever thought a Humvee was cool, or ever owned one, it’s your fault.
If you ever voted in an election based on the high price of gasoline, it’s your fault.
If you ever voted for a politician who went on to deregulate the oil industry from their seat in a committee, it’s your fault. If you didn’t vote to remove that person from office after they voted to deregulate such a dangerous and polluting industry, it’s your fault.
If you eat food that is not grown locally, it’s your fault, because your food had to be brought to you on the backs of trucks that need gasoline to travel. If you eat food grown on an industrialized farm, it’s your fault, because the machines used to cultivate that food need gasoline, too. Even if you eat food that is grown organically and locally, they still use gasoline and oil, so basically nobody is safe from judgment.
If you fly on airplanes, this is your fault.
If your home has oil heat, this is your fault.
If you eat fast food, this is your fault.
For a hundred other reasons, in a hundred other ways, it’s your fault. And my fault. This is our fault, too, and that’s all there is to it.
These judgments don’t sit very comfortably. People need to get to work, need to get their kids to school, so they drive. People need to eat, and don’t necessarily have the money to eat food that is safe for the planet; spend any time in one of those high-end planet-conscious stores, and you learn pretty quickly that only rich people can afford to eat both healthy and responsibly. The rest of us have to get by on Wonder Bread.
It’s all too easy to declare that anyone who has voted Republican should take the blame for this disaster, because it is the Republicans in Washington who have championed the deregulation push that has been ongoing since the Reagan administration. But there are plenty of Democrats who are just as deep into deregulation as their GOP comrades, so voting Democratic is no safe haven.
We are learning a savage lesson in the Gulf. We are witnessing the end of a way of life we have become all too deeply accustomed to. We drive, we eat, we fly, we vote, and in doing so, we share the blame for what is happening, and what is to come. We have gone to sleep each night deliberately oblivious to the deadly nature of the fossil fuels that power the way we live, because it is too hard to even think about living a different way.
The Deepwater Horizon is the period at the end of a very long, bleak sentence that has been rolling along for a hundred years. We are killing ourselves with the way we live, with our complacency, and we can no longer ignore this wretched truth. The oil that is killing beaches and fisheries and animals of every kind is our lifeblood, the spigot on the sea floor is our femoral artery, and we are bleeding to death right there on television.
If it wasn’t BP, it would have been something else. So long as we lay back and live this oily lifestyle, there will always be some company ready to provide it, and there will always be some way that lifestyle will be killing us. The water is fouled, the clouds stink of gasoline, the ground is seeded with poison, and now the sea is dying before our eyes, and all because this is the way we live, and we just can’t seem to realize how mortally dangerous it all is.
This must change. Until it does, it’s our fault, too.
I mentioned the trillions of dollars in minerals and gems in Afghanistan that was recently mentioned on yahoo and my son reminded me that he told us that 10 years ago, that it was reported on prison planet. Have to follow the money.
Once you rich bastards get your trillions, will you let us have our alternate energy?
To whom do Eric’s counterparts at CNN and MSNBC answer? Let’s see …
CNN is owned by Time Warner, which is the biggest media conglomerate in the world – that’s print, online, electronic and film media. Time Warner owns tw telecom (a major cable TV and Internet service provider in the US), numerous large- and small-scale movie production companies and publishing houses, TV and radio stations worldwide, HBO, Cinemax, Warner Brothers, numerous media and entertainment websites, and scads of magazines. In other words, they serve up this world of illusion and sleight of hand that we’re living in.
MSNBC is owned 82% by NBC Universal (the global media and entertainment company that is owned 80% by General Electric) and 18% by MicroSoft. That’s GE, which is the world’s second largest corporation; the first being JPMorgan Chase.
GE has big tentacles in just about every industry imaginable: global financial services and lending; aircraft brokerage and leasing; railcar and truck leasing; shipping and transportation management; energy production (water, wind, oil & gas, etc.); and of course, manufacturing: military equipment and weapons, jet engines and diesel and electric motors, train locomotives, electronics, security equipment, medical equipment, and electrical equipment (capacitors, for example). GE also is a major international player in media and entertainment. In addition to MSNBC, it owns a mass quantity of cable TV channels, including A&E and The Weather Channel, numerous TV stations, and Universal Studios.
For a detailed list, go to wikipedia and search “assets owned by Time Warner” and “assets owned by General Electric”. It’s interesting that we’ve been talking about connections the past few days here at PW, since here’s a whole bunch of them.
Well, we could have a good conversation about my role as an editor here: as one who keeps my hand on the gate of what you read [here], who sets the tone for the other writers and who has a strong influence over what they write, as an adviser and collaborator. I do all of this based on my editorial agenda, which is an extension of my personal values. I suggest you ask yourself who is doing my job at CNN or MSNBC and what agenda they have, what they actually know and to whom who they answer.
Will Pitt’s article is subject to critique, as is everything that appears in the media. It’s the same critique that I subject myself to when I enter my ideas into a public forum.
I’m not asking you whether you think we should be critiquing anything (but feel free to chime in). Rather, I have set that agenda as an editor. In this forum, I take any opportunity to look critically at the media and what it says and does, and define that as one purpose of this space. Television, the Internet and newspapers are safe, as long as you look or read from two or three angles at once.
My intention with the current post is to focus a discussion on what is the most effective way to relate a certain message about personal responsibility, and to ask ourselves how the form of the message affects the content and vice versa. The theme of the 2012 era is personal responsibility and what one reader called “mandatory integrity” (Uranus square Pluto). So we are going to be seeing a lot of this as global issues are finally brought down to the level of personal choices; and then we’re going to see lots of news entities and writers “selling” this agenda back to us as if it were some new cool thing they just thought of themselves.
Pitt’s piece stood out because it was one of the few I’ve seen that calls on any level of personal responsibility. But to me it was so over-laden with parent-child language, and concepts, that you’re left, at the end, feeling like you have very little power or freedom of choice.
When you tell people that they’re wrong for eating from agribusiness and wrong for eating local food, then you’re telling them not to eat — which is just the kind of no-win that sends many people into such despair that they are lucky to ever find their way out of that feeling. Or you do as most of us do in the Western world and decide either: my contribution can’t possibly make a difference or why the heck bother, I may as well enjoy myself.
I am singling out Pitt’s article as supposed activism that hurts the cause it purports to advance.
Here is a little something from an old PW article:
The problem I have with Eric’s commentary on this article is that he’s critizing Mr. Rivers Pitt’s article based on his preconceived notions about how an article should be written. Expression is vast and varied and should be allowed to live. If a man is trying to give a voice to the problem, I believe that to be positive. However it is done. It gives a voice. Whether you like it or not is up to you. There is the “seed” impetus here and that’s what matters. Not whether it is adult/child, parent/child etc. To me it’s like Eric being a painter and upon seeing a charcoal sketch, dismisses it. If an article states facts than are untuths they should indeed be brought to light and criticized.
Excellent DVemer!
Wrapped within the veneer of the ego which has written this article there is spirit. And that spirit is showing us something – will you look past the ego and see what spirit wishes to share , or see only the ego and in so doing negate the message?
It seems very adult/child to me. Over simplified and somewhat condescending.
Well I don’t know about tone, but if I see or hear the word ‘fault’ used, and the implication is blame, then I instantly perceive that as ‘parent’ and the critical one at that. And it’s usually going to put the other in the child mode.
To take responsibility has such a different meaning and tone somehow…than say…it’s your fault, or you’re to blame. But that’s just me. H.
I suggest we be more analytical than this.
For example: is the tone of William Rivers Pitt:
Adult to Child
Parent to Child
Parent to Parent
Child to Child
or
Adult to Adult
The tire pressure post is excellent. i really liked it.
As far as the revised comments go, I still think it’s a waste to berate Mr. Rivers Pitt’s way of presenting information. I believe he’s trying to wake readers up, to get them to change. He’s on the right side. When criticism is applied, it creates division, and weakens an effort. The target needs to be the enemy not your fellow soldier. Energy is wasted infighting while the evildoers remain. We need to gather forces to bring down the behemoth. In fighting distracts from what is important
I have updated and revised my comments below.
I have an illustration of how certain popular species of “leader” in the United States responds to the idea of conservation: with derision, as if it were communist infiltration, not enough or a stupid idea. We could say: this is a great idea and here is how we can do more. We can respond with derision or empathy. We have a choice.
Here is a well known story from the ’08 campaign that shows how this works. Candidate Obama stated a scientific fact, that checking and correcting tire air pressure saves of fuel. Underinflated tires create more resistance against the road and thus cause cars to use more gasoline. Republicans responded with mockery and ridicule, turning it into an us and them issue without serious consideration. It is like we’re leaving important household decisions up to three-year-old children, and wondering why all we have is toys and soda.
How much fuel would this small move save? On average, every pound per square inch of pressure that tires are low wastes 4 million gallons of fuel per day. It is cheap and easy to check tire pressure, it works, and yet it’s subject to mockery and belittlement. If we look at this we can see how political rhetoric gets in the way of simple solutions to real problems. If you believe Department of Energy statistics on fuel economy and tire air pressure, having correct tire pressure would save 1.46 billion gallons of gasoline per year in the United States alone.
Because one 42 gallon barrel of crude makes 19.9 gallons of fuel, that’s close to a savings of 3 billion gallons of crude per year in the United States alone. Would that help? Gee, 3 billion gallons of crude from one small change, in one country, in just one year?!
That’s a heck of a lot of crude oil — that we would not be purchasing from someone or pumping out of the wilderness somewhere. With the price of crude oil at about $75 per barrel…well, you get the idea. The savings to the US economy would be $109.5 billion a year from checking and correcting tire air pressure. This is a conversation that needs to be taken seriously. And to do that we need to change our religion from waste, waste, waste to let’s all chip in what we can.
Then we can figure out: how much fuel would we save from switching from red lights to blinking red lights after midnight? Then we start mounting real progress.
Here is a version of the tire air pressure article from ABC news.
Here is a quote:
The article is simply a call to awareness. A call to recognize that there is no ‘other’ to point at, that this is the result of a collective narcosis. It is an important ingredient to add to the media soup around this event. Otherwise the flavour would simply be the bitter one of “who else can we blame? We have nothing to do with this.” And that’s not true – it’s our world and the way it is is the result of how each and every one of us thinks, responds and behaves in each moment.
The call to power we’re currently experiencing is a call to our personal power and how it influences the outcome of the reality we experience. Go dumb and ask other’s how you should think and what to believe and what to buy and wear and drive? Then you’re giving your creative force to the rich guy in the suit – you’re asking him to tell you how your world should be – and he’s going to make it so that he gains from what he gives you…
You create your reality through how you think – your beliefs. Start thinking for yourself again – reign in your creative force and change your personal world – so that the collective changes. Take responsibility for how your loss of consciousness has played a part in what is happening around you.
i like the article. A soft sell for activism is okay in my view . It personalized the issue for me and got me to consider what I’m doing and where I stand. We’ve been getting answers for too long from journalists who think they know best. The best reporting gives the facts, the real facts. That type of reporting is long gone. It’s all about the opinionated take on things. News items that hang us out to dry emotionally. Dead babies, shootings, innocent victims. This Gulf of Mexico disaster is being controlled by BP. There is no real reporting. Scream all you want from the fringe but the real change needs to begin from the inside. I feel people are so disempowered they feel they can’t do anything. This soft sell slips them something that isn’t a balloon popping behind their head. People are frazzled, so demanding change in an irate manner is too much in a lot of cases. You only motivate yourself. We need everyone involved. I can start by interpreting information in a way that empowers me. Trying to dismantle this man’s article is like Democrats arguing with Republicans. It’s mud slinging and nothing constructive is happening. I say let it live. If people find it useful, terrific. If you don’t like it write something in your own way. Lording over people and making them feel small what got us here in the first place.
In a nutshell, this article demonstrates my issue with the media and how it frames an issue. This is an attempt to “personalize” the story. It is an attempt to bring knowledge to the level of some form of personal activism. But I think he misses the mark entirely, in terms understanding the issue (the relationship between what is sold and what is bought); of understanding human nature (what motivates us to change); of understanding the personal dimension of this situation (or dependence on oil versus a reckless oil well blowout); and for the lack of any actual call to action (it is one thing to say it’s or fault, and another to suggest ways that we can simplify our lives and gradually shift to the use of other forms of energy or products).
The author in my view portrays the problems in a way that it cannot be solved. It is not even going so far as to say that (for example) regarding plastics, we are in a difficult situation because nearly everything we purchase comes wrapped in plastic, nearly every product is made of plastic, and our trash goes out in plastic. So what if we were to start with one concept: plastic. One concept of plastic: bags.
Psychologically and motivationally, there’s a difference between saying: it’s your fault if you use plastic vs. take a look at how much plastic is around you. This is why you don’t want it in your life, Here are some alternatives.
I take particular issue with him saying: if you don’t buy local produce, it’s your fault, and if you buy local produce it’s your fault too. (That translates to: it’s your fault for being alive, unless you learn how to survive on air.) I think there’s a big difference between shipping vegetables 2,500 miles and shipping them 25 miles. We could start by admitting that we need to consume some energy. The idea is to do that as efficiently as possible. Small improvements would go a long way as we allow/enable alternative fuels and new ideas to proliferate. With a little challenge, I believe we could cut out energy consumption in half — just by eliminating gross waste.
To state fault is not to state an issue clearly or comprehensibly. Someone is likely to say: I live in rural Oregon and my job is in the closest city. If I don’t drive, how am I supposed to get to work?
This is why we need a new approach to these issues and the attempt to focus them on a personal level: an integrated approach that exemplifies adult responsibility, that raises awareness in a way that is appealing, even if the issue at hand is difficult; and that approaches questions like this with a devotion to balance.
I see what he’s trying to do here, and I see precisely where he is not doing it — and to me this points to a wide opening in a philosophical approach to the news. I give him some credit for the seed impulse, but in truth its a basic observation that needs to be matched with a presentation of alternatives.
I thought “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” (!988) framed up these ideas nicely albiet barely disguised by cartoons and gimmicks. that is, conspiracy theory and the red line etc.
If we listen to our artists, in whatever way they may be disguised (like stories within corporately sponsored movies) we can usually find reflections of truth.
I’ve not read the original novel but understand that it was flavored with a theme of ‘censorship’ – also a corporate control tactic.
It is time we say outloud that we are done with corporate rule. Our problems are steeped in weak government (aka of the people by the people) and strong (global) corporations (aka of the greed of few)
Another point to be aware of and one that I have taken a huge stand on, is that we have been lied to about the poisoning of each and person through the chemicals and toxic goo that has been added to our food, our water, our ground. Mother Earth’s current experience in the Gulf is just a huge example of how we have been poisoning ourselves for many years – thanks to those who believed they could improve upon Mother Nature but it also had to do with the evolution of technology and transportation of goods and services. Monsanto is just one company who has been outrageously greedy and our government has allowed this to continue with their manipulation of the DNA of seeds which then affects all living creatures who eat this substance including humans.
When are people going to wake up, become aware and take responsibility for their choices as well as doing their own research to discern the truth?
I watched AC360 last night in which Anderson Cooper interviewed the few survivors willing to speak their truth. One of the men stated that when the explosion happened, it was as if a huge being was hissing its way out of the earth and into the atmosphere… interesting. Another said he had felt a certain doom was going to happen the entire time he worked on the rig and that they were messing with Mother Nature by drilling. Why is it that we ignore or fear the ability to act upon such inspiration?
This is a huge spiritual awakening for humans in the middle of a huge evolutionary process, one that I know and trust will be for the betterment of all of life. But in the meantime, the truth is being revealed one catastrophe at a time which I hope that people will take the opportunity to look within. How are we poisoning ourselves, not just physically, but also mentally, emotionally and spiritually?
In this video, Dr. Elisabet Sahtouris talks about the current state of human ecological and social crisis and how this condition relates to the larger picture of planetary evolution: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_immL2m1tg – quite informative and also a positive inspiration. We are truly one, and what we to do ourselves, we do to others and what we do to others, we do to ourselves – be it human, animal, bird, or plant species.
this reminds me of a story…i met a bloke in a bar down under once who carried in his pocket a (worn) piece of paper with this message;
Whose job is it anyway?
This is a story about 4 people, everybody, somebody, anybody and nobody.
There was an important job to be done, and everybody was sure somebody would do it.
Anybody could have done it, but nobody did it.
Somebody got angry about that because it was everybody’s job.
Everybody thought anybody could do it, but nobody realized that everybody wouldn’t do it.
It ended up that everybody blamed somebody, when nobody did what anybody could have done.
Which one are you?
yep. we are all [bodies] response-able.
I don’t think this approach works very well unless someone wants to feel bad about themselves, and there are plenty that do inclined that way.
How many times do we read the word “fault”? And then there’s mention of judgment, too. What ever happened to the good news?
He says, “This must change.” When do the solutions enter the foray?
No, not very effective in my opinion.
I see the point that it’s not our fault that we’ve been misled and deceived, but I do believe that taking personal responsibility is of utmost importance. That means right now. Can’t lay blame on our parents (an analogy here) forever, or shouldn’t anyway. It caan be a difficult shift.
xo
Patricia MoonRose
There is a book called TOWARD AN AMERICAN REVOLUTION by Jerry Fresia that my bud Steve Bergstein gave me years ago. It’s about how the flaw in the Constitution is that it does not mention, or regulate, or give the government power to regulate, corporations.
http://cyberjournal.org/authors/fresia/
I love his © notice.
I also suggest you Netflix a film called THE CORPORATION and see what this is all about, really. I am an uncredited contributor to this film: my office was contacted when they were in production and I was asked for samples of my document collection pertaining to Monsanto, which I happily provided.
WHO KILLED THE ELECTRIC CAR is also a killer – Neflix has this as well.
We need to understand the whole matter of the car and the highway and what happened to light rail and why those overpasses on the highways leading to Long Island and the norther NY suburbs are so low: to prevent buses from going there.
Kids, there is a conspiracy and it goes on till this day. Don’t blame yourself for what is not yours. Take responsibility for what is yours, and make sure you know who is responsible for what is theirs.
Blame is not helping. Guilt is self-judgment.
When I live according to my deepest values within the constraints of a messed up system, I find a way to balance.
Gaia is our mirror. She shows us our deepest selves.
There is toxicity in pent up human emotions. I’m practicing speaking the truth of my emotions, while owning them; I feel because I am a feeling being. They are my feelings, I choose them. I choose to share them with you, and ask for what I need.
I am learning to own my whole life. Finding a way to balance in the beauty of love and the illusion of reality.
I think this idea is just and extension of the “victim” theory of non-living that keeps everyone with head bowed – which is no way to find solutions which are more generally found by looking up and around with un-victimized intentions.
Let us then un-flog ourselves.
was it really BP?
i heard someone saying that haliburton (with ties to intelligence ops etc) could have triggered the explosion without anyone at bp knowing
of course, there’s also the insider trading angle where both goldman sachs and bp ceo(?) sold off a bunch of stock in the immediate run-up to the spill
and try not to get caught up in the ‘oh its my fault cause i use oil’ fallacy … things are designed a certain way and then people adapt/adopt whatever makes sense in the given design … our society is designed that we drive, eat food grown with petrochemical fertilizer, etc … are we the ones that designed it that way?
maybe we can have some part of re-designing, but really you have to think about who is actually in positions to accomplish that change, and most people are not in / have not maneuvered themselves to be in the position to really impact how society is designed … we’re told that it’s our personal lifestyle when it is not, it is a systemic problem
@jparoby… well said.
it’s all a chicken and the egg thing, isn’t it? which is sorta no longer the point. did demand create the market or did the market make us lust for the product? at this point, does it matter which? we f**cked each other and now here’s our deficient offspring. (this may be interpreted badly. it may be a VERY BAD metaphor… and feel free, please to yank it off.)
i am obviously obsessed about diamonds. but, for me, they are the perfect example of consumer demand/marketing. we don’t EVEN need diamonds. but for those that want them, there are international companies that will gladly wall up a portion of a pristine lake and kill 50 % of the fish in it… and proceed to dig as deep into the lakebed as need be. when the diamond market crashed… why was that? because the american economy crashed and the american populace are the hungriest in the world for show diamonds. and they just couldn’t afford them… FOR A WHILE.
meh. i’m going back to smiling at the people around me. blaming gets us nowhere. even as i just fell prey to it. i don’t happen to think anger is a solution, either. but i’m feeling pretty pissy right now.
Protection of oil may simply be about the tax revenues. The personal income tax is only a small portion of the the treasury. Not only that, but pensioners around the world rely on oil income. How many of us have 401k plans? We not only use oil for everything, it makes up a big part of our income too, either in pre-retirement or post-retirement.
Oil may be every bit the vampire bait that drugs are. How many have died for the oil cause? Not even counting the oceans, streams and fish – how many families have sacrificed a son or a daughter? How many families in the middle east have done the same?
Can you imagine how Wall Street would handle legalized hard and soft drugs? There would be a committee of 3 or 4 people who would determine (ie, bet on) availability and quality and future weather patterns to decide the pricing. There would be enough controls in place to make it even more expensive. So giving up oil may mean that legalized drugs are just around the corner. How else will we pay 100 million in interest per day to China?
My guess is euthanasia would follow close behind. Remember the famine of North Korea that no-one ever mentions? An entire city is said to have starved to death in the North Hamgyong province because of being urban and with no agricultural products. Estimates range between 600,000 and 3 million people starved in the one province (1995-1997) as the government left them with only the grass to eat.
No oil means no crops. Bad weather means no crops.
This winter and next? The weather was already crazy before the oil spill. The Amish are using tunnels to plant crops for early harvest or winter harvest to take to market. You’ve seen the gardens with large hoops and covered with plastic or cloth? Inside of the large hoop, you put smaller hoops over the beds to insulate the vegetables. This supposedly takes you to a temperate zone 500 miles south, and you can harvest most of the winter. You can house chickens inside the large hoops for added warmth, and they can eat the greens and worms. There are always drawbacks, but by and large it is a very doable system that can fit in most yards.
Maybe we should all convert to Amish, and put away our weapons and modern necessities. I sure do enjoy my computer though.
This article totally works for me.
It’s been a cumulative effect.
For whatever reason, in the beginning people decided to dismiss problems and in doing so, so began the snowball effect.
Within my own person there was pain and anguish due to suppression of important parts of myself. Specifically Artistic talents. My Artistic talents were banished by my mother who stated I could not make a living at it. My mother, an artistic personality herself, was assured by her mother that being an artist was ridiculous. She became a teacher, as she was told. Her mother, my maternal grandmother was sexually abused by an uncle. That’s as far back as I have knowledge.
What I am suggesting here is a pattern of pain and misalignment that continues generation after generation. In our self loathing and fear, which causes us to escape any way we can, of course we miss sign posts of disaster. We have lost sight of ourselves and therefore our direction.
I had been taught to believe in anyone but myself. It is my fault because I gave my power away. In doing so, gave up my orientation of right and wrong. I feel we’ve all surrendered in some way.
That’s how I see this as being my fault.
Just to take automobiles for example, there’s been only one reason that the cars available to us still utilize gasoline – and utilize it inefficiently to boot. We’ve had armfuls of technological advances that would’ve long ago increased efficiency and reduced gas usage and many breakthroughs in the last 30 years that would’ve phased out petroleum based energy altogether. And all of them have been systematically squelched by corporate interests that knew these innovations would make their own monopolous industries obsolete.
Our real culpability is not in our continuing use of petroleum based energies, but in not waking up to what’s created the faux ‘necessity’ of having (still, after all these years!) to use them to begin with.
Understanding what’s actually going on is exactly the sort of awareness that ‘waking up’ really entails. Indeed, demands. Especially of readers here. Let’s be more accurate, more discriminating about culpability. Let this article be the last gasp of the Piscean Era’s muddled thinking and self-sacrificial disposition towards unwarranted wholesale ‘mea culpae’.
Amen.