#usblogs

... and what are you doing about it?

The thing I am most afraid of is what I think of as "responsibility diffusion." That is when no one takes responsibility. When an event is so large and bad, that we are collectively paralyzed to stop it.

I lived in Germany for a long time wanting to understand how a nation, as well as individuals, deal with the question of responsibility in the face of massive, catastrophic evil. A lot has been written about the Nazi period and I have nothing new to add, so I won't try to here, but rather look at the present.

There is a mass of plastic sludge 300 feet deep and about twice the size of Texas swirling in the Pacific Ocean. Considering how recent the use of consumer plastics is, the size of this mess is terrifying. It takes 2 weeks to get there by boat and cannot be seen from the air. There is no master plan to clean it up, much less stop its growth. Even if there were, who would pay for it? This doesn't belong to any one nation, although it is clear that no one consumes more plastic than the United States.  A group of scientists were lucky just to get funding to go research it on site.

Who is responsible for The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (cute name for a massive disaster?!): Everyone. No one. Me. You.

How did we get here? Can I do anything about it? Am I helpless?

I am afraid that I do not do enough when faced with the massive issues we have to deal with (economic, environmental, humanitarian). We do try to live more simply, without debt, without insatiable consumerism, but there is the occassional plastic bottle and even more crappy Chinese kids toys floating around our house.   And what about the hungry families in my community? What have I done to address that need? If I lived smaller, could I do more? Let's face it, our current idea of a standard of living in the US is obscenely high and without precedent. In the 1950s the Vice President of my grandfather's employer lived in a three bedroom house in his neighborhood. Today, McMansions for one and all!  If I had been in Germany in the late 1930s would I have taken a stand against the Nazis or tried to avoid my own discomfort and fear? What will my grandchildren (and even my children) face in the future and how will they feel about my part in it? Lucky for me, I married the happiest German Dude alive. He reminds me that

Unresolved guilt is a useless emotion that accomplishes nothing

Moderation is chronically undervalued

We must be patient, particularly with ourselves

There are heros, like the scientists and engineers who doggedly pursued funding to research the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, like my Grand-father-in-law, who sabotaged Nazi bombs he was in charge of designing, putting himself and his family at risk.