Christopher Hayes Totally Once Gave Me The “Is This Guy An Idiot?” Look
June 14, 2010
I’ll admit to being in a post-college, well into the night stupor while we were talking, but still. Not overlooking the fact that he was and totally still is a fucking sweetheart, I couldn’t help but notice he felt like his deep thoughts weren’t sinking in. We were at a mutual friend’s house watching the Daily Show and if I had known then what I know now, I would have tried a little harder to let him see I wasn’t a total idiot. These days, Christopher Hayes is a regular political pundit on various news programs, subs for Rachel Maddow when she needs it (she even nick named him Lambchops on Twitter!) and writes for various publications. I still don’t know how he fits all the info into his brain, but at least now I can aborb his wisdom without feeling like I need to respond with equal insight.
I’ve been SUPER depressed over the oil spill. I have NO idea how to help given my distance from the situation and my lack of personal funds to donate. I do wish, at the very least, to stay on top of information, and am doubly determined after actually having a real life conversation with someone the other week wherein I asked her about the poor fucking pelicans and she said “Oh yeah, I heard something bad happened down south–what was it?” and she was NOT kidding.
Christopher Hayes wrote this piece for The Nation, call to action for all of us to reflect on the injustice that is going to inevitably result when BP’s stock rises again and the public consciousness moves on to newer, bigger (rounder, firmer) issues.
A punitive society is not the best kind of society: there’s a real virtue in forgiveness, in second chances. But for years we’ve been applying Rand Paul’s “accidents happen” principle to those at the top while heaping blame, scorn and draconian punishment on those at the bottom. Punitive damages are capped for corporations, while punitive policies proliferate for citizens. This tears the social contract apart, and the only way to repair it is to apply the same principles of accountability up and down the social hierarchy. We should start with BP.
I often find myself engaging in similar conversations. I am a huge proponent of dialogue as a means of providing grounds for progress and change. However, it becomes so easy for us to sit on front porches, at kitchen tables and on bar stools over crisp cool libations in the hot Chicago summer and discuss the great troubles of our world. The oil spill, the war, the economy, etc. We want to do something about it, but are relatively small figures for action in the great scheme. What do we do? Should we stop talking?
I have found that talking – for as limited an effect it may seem to have on change as the oil continues spilling and the death toll rises and unemployment (viva!) rises everyday – still has an impact. There are those who have such little knowledge or concern for what is going on.
Can we care enough in a globalized immediately interconnected world like today? I think when addressing accountability we can definitely look to our grand corporate monuments that dictate so much of our energy needs and political agendas, but we can also turn that mirror on ourselves.
We must be accountable to our effect on the planet, to our effect on one another and to the effect on ourselves. Im a big fan of grassroots and homegrown change. So while BP is in charge of taking responsibility of the major shit, lets look to one another for instincts on future progress. If we do not care, who will?
I am forever indebted to you for this inofmtraion.