If you cant stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen

[dydan]

Well, predictably my "Boycott BP" LJ/FB friend de-friended me this morning. She never once even approached me to have any kind of conversation - not during ANY of this. How adult! Sad, really because up until now I actually LIKED her. Ah well. If you're House of Cards is so fragile that it collapses under the weight of an opposing viewpoint and makes you have a tizzy, then by all means dont let the door hit your ass on the way out.

Late last night I saw an article about how poorly BP is doing financially since this whole thing happened. Their stock is plummeting and there's already a flood of lawsuits being filed. The article even mentioned the possibility of BP declaring bankruptcy. It made me consider something I had not thought of before. Let's just say for the sake of the argument that boycotting BP is a great idea. And let's just say that the campaign to boycott them is so wildly successful that people manage to put BP out of business. Who is going to handle the clean-up of the worst ecological disaster in human history? What, should we to tell Exxon or Shell that they need to cough up some dough? That would be like telling McDonalds they have to pay for the aftermath of thousands of people being poisoned by Burger King's shitty fries! So who pays for that? WE DO.

Makes me wonder how much bitching those boycotters will be doing when they learn that little lesson. If they thought bailing out the banks and the auto industry was bad, wait til they see the price tag on the Gulf cleanup!

Comments

[peaceful-fox.livejournal.com]

I had the same thing when I said I was against fox hunting...people dumped me faster than I could keep up with. One person even sent a nasty note. How mature. As I state and stated in many of my posts - "My views aren't always your views."



Of course I know my views are better. ;-) JUST KIDDING!

[dydan.livejournal.com]

haha that's right! The whole world would run a lot smoother if people listened to ME!

I am just amazed at how so-called adults behave. Really? Fox hunting is GOOD? I'm all for hunting for survival, but I really dont see how making a bunch of dogs chase some poor panicked creature who has barely any meat on them qualifies as survival hunting. I dont know much about fox hunting in general but it always seemed to me to be something that bored wealthy people do as a social engagement. Sip a martini, compliment your friend's new riding crop, let's go terrorize a 10 pound animal! wheee!

Now you have me curious. What sort of argument do the pro-fox killers have?

[qt3-14159.livejournal.com]

I didn't reply to your post yesterday, because I thought you'd said it all. Now I see that you hadn't. ::grin:: You're right, of course.

But even if I thought you were wrong, I'd still love ya bunches. :o)

[dydan.livejournal.com]

aww thanks! I have my moments LOL

[qt3-14159.livejournal.com]

I think you probably have a lot of moments. The good kind. You're intelligent and know how to get your point across...and I've never seen you put anyone down for not knowing something (which is good because there's a lot I don't know). You would rather teach them what you know...and possibly learn something new yourself. :o)

Me? I have entirely too many senior moments. I forget EVERYTHING!!!

[wndrdr.livejournal.com]

i also think of all those out of a job..

i dont think these companies are E V I L, i think they sadly sometimes dont do some things they can do to prevent major disasters in order to save money.. only to have the environment suffer

but people all over do that.. we could easily ride bikes to work as long as work is within a ten mile area, and furthre we could use carpooling.. but how many of us want to wake up earlier in order to do biking? and how many of us are just to lazy and come up with every excuse we can, including heat? (forgetting 100 yrs ago pple in deserts walked 4 and 5 miles every day to work and came home with no running water or air)..

sadly i am one of them.. so i dont blame the big companies for EVERYTHING.. but BP is responsible for the cleanup and horribly enough our taxes will do it..

I just

think pple need to get off their high horses and use common sense and people in control should think of and enforce new ways to prevent/lessen these disasters..

but all those pple who will be out of work of the company goes bankrupt.. children on welfare.. maybe some homeless (yuo know how the economy is)

it is sad sad sad

[dydan.livejournal.com]

IMO, what it really comes down to is that people, whether they like it or not, are simply going to have to start thinking about giving up some aspects of our fat lazy American consumer lifestyle. The average American really has no idea just how much oil is present in their lives and naively think that driving less is going to have an impact. Less than 1/2 of a barrel of oil goes into gas tanks. The rest is used in every other thing imaginable. So when you tell people they have to give up things like ohhh...electricity? Clothing? Your meds? Food that doesnt come from your garden? Its just too scary and big for anyone to want to deal with.

Sadly, our days of acting like ostriches and hiding our heads in the sand are coming to an end much faster than most people realize. Though I am sure when that day comes there will be no shortage of whiny babies saying "Why didnt someone tell us sooner! We would have done something!!"

[5251962.livejournal.com]

Al Gore, since the freaking seventies, man. Someone was telling us before I was even born. :(

[dydan.livejournal.com]

haha right!

I'm old enough to vividly remember watching Jimmy Carter give his "Moral Equivalent of War" speech. In 1977 he urged that we needed to cut our oil imports in half by 1985. Instead we doubled it.

I think a large part of why Carter failed as a President is because people did not like hearing that speech. He was advocating some pretty unpopular things that are still unpopular today.

[whitecrow0.livejournal.com]

Jimmy Carter is one of my favorite presidents, precisely because of that. And he actually practiced what he preached.

[dydan.livejournal.com]

I remember when he took office. I am the same age as Amy Carter so our whole class wrote her letters. We all got postcards in the mail back from her.

I very vaguely remember Nixon, and I remember some of Ford. But Carter was the first time I really paid attention to that sort of thing.

[whitecrow0.livejournal.com]

I very, very vaguely remember my parents watching Nixon on television - it was probably his resignation?

Carter was the first time I paid attention, too. I have a picture of myself in hideously loud 70s garb holding up a handmade "Vote for Jimmy!" sign.

[5251962.livejournal.com]

I'd rant but you get way too much of it at work.
I didn't say anything because I agree with you, sorta.

I also pretty well think TOOL's Aenema sums up my opinion of this and pretty much the last half century. So, take that as you will.


Thing about the boycott is this- you fuck with the wealthy, it's the poor who pay. Always has been. Boycott your local BP, and you're going to put some poor asshole working at minimum wage, living paycheck to paycheck out of a job- which if you are living paycheck to paycheck means, you're going to end up homeless.
But by all means, anyone boycotting (I'm preaching to the choir here, I know sorry! LOL) you get that warm snuggly feeling 'cause you did right and you passed that station by and you went on TO YET ANOTHER BIG FUCKING MONEY CORP WHICH WOULD SCREW THE EARTH if given half a chance to do so. Palin's already using this as a push to drill up Alaska.


Boycott, it means you don't have to change a fucking thing about how you live your life and how you're part of a society that brought all of this one and made it possible! Huzzah!


Crap, did it anyway, sorry. The sedatives have not kicked in yet. XP

[dydan.livejournal.com]

People point to drilling up ANWR like its going to save us all for centuries to come. Its not.

Here's a good, concise ditty about that I pulled from Matt Savinar's site:

While some folks desperately cling to the belief that oil is a renewable resource, others hold on to the equally delusional idea that tapping the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve will solve, or at least delay, this crisis. While drilling for oil in ANWR will certainly make a lot of money for the companies doing the drilling, it won't do much to help the overall situation for three reasons:

Reason #1. According of the Department of Energy, drilling in ANWR will only lower oil prices by less than fifty cents;

Reason #2. ANWR contains 10 billion barrels of oil - or about the amount the US consumes in a little more than a year.

Reason #3. As with all oil projects, ANWR will take about 10 years to come online. Once it does, its production will peak at 875,000 barrels per day - but not till the year 2025. By then the US is projected to need a whopping 35 million barrels per day while the world is projected to need 120 million barrels per day.

[5251962.livejournal.com]

Yeeeeep, but you talk of windmills and it's like...well, tilting at windmills.

Everyone thinks of ways to find more of this crap which ultimately is going to die out and be gone. Kinda curious how everyone thought that was going to go, really.

[dydan.livejournal.com]

There's a scene in "A Crude Awakening" where they interview the Mayor of McCamey, TX. It was a HUGE oil boom town and now all their wells are tapped dry and its a ghost town. She was talking about how nobody ever thought they would run out of the stuff and that it would last forever. Now, of course, they know differently. She ended the interview saying "They arent making a lot of dinosaurs these days..."

What amazes me is that there are actually people out there who truly believe that oil is a renewable resource and that we will always have a cheap, abundant supply. I'd really like to know what color the sky is in their world.

[5251962.livejournal.com]

Yeeeep.

OR they seem shocked when something like this happens. 'Cause you know, nothing bad ever comes of being totally dependent upon something.

[dydan.livejournal.com]

Oh, dont you know? Oil is God's gift to mankind for conquering all the other species! And God loves us so he'd never take a gift away!

[bkwrrm-tx.livejournal.com]

I can put a personal face on BP, because my sister has worked for them for about 15 years now. She's a senior wells manager in Alaska but some of her friends work the wells in the Gulf of Mexico. She has two 2 year old daughters, and just bought a house in Anchorage.

She may lose her job, her house and everything she's worked so hard for, for so long.

I *hate* what is happening down there, but I also don't want to see her lose her job because people further up the ladder screwed things up. :-(

[dydan.livejournal.com]

Your poor sister!

I can only imagine what the corporate climate is like right now there. She must be a bundle of stress!

[thejeweledhorn.livejournal.com]

Bottom line, I feel like everyone's at fault for the spill. And I'm irritated with myself for being a part of that everyone, and irritated at everyone who is both boycotting or trying to save BP. We are all greedy mafahs.

[dydan.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. If we wanna find a villain here, we only have to look in the mirror.

And I lump myself in that category as well.

[magnifelyn.livejournal.com]

Wowie, I have opinions. I have a tendency to not want to state them on LJ however. It's always been my habit to be non-political in journaling land!!

*big breath* Maybe tomorrow I'll feel like really commenting. ;-P

[dydan.livejournal.com]

I'm tired of being afraid to use my voice. I dont expect everyone to agree with me, but I do expect people to maintain some civility.

[5251962.livejournal.com]

The way I see it is this- and I have quite a number of very, VERY outspoken conservative friends I very often do not agree with- livejournal. Ergo- man, say whatever, why do you need permission? This morning my usual anti-abortion person is ranting hell for leather and you know, I just scrooooll on by. Didn't hurt me to do it, and likely she'll post something I can actually discuss with her later on, but you don't have to agree with everything everyone says all the time- and nobody's got to do that with you either, is how I see it.

[miintikwa.livejournal.com]

You are so right. Augh.

[ellierachael.livejournal.com]

ahh it's her loss hun!

[samuraigrrrl.livejournal.com]

Newsweek agrees with you http://www.newsweek.com/2010/06/07/boycott-bp.html and pretty much all of the writers at Grist and anyone with a brain. For the record, Shell is far more evil than BP ever thought about being. The Niger river Delta has been coated with oil for decades and something like 46% of that oil comes right here to the U S of A, baybee. If you're going to boycott one, boycott them all, I say. Enjoy your hollow log and your grubs. But seriously, we can do so much better than this. We have physicists who can smash teeny bits of nothing together really fast to see what makes matter and anti matter on a quantum level, why can't we have clean energy?