Over the last couple of years, I have wondered how so many of my friends could seemingly ignore what was happening in this nation. It is as if they are oblivious to anything that is outside their own little world, as if they were wearing blinders and could not see the atrocities happening in our nation, but instead focus exclusively on what’s for supper, what concert they will go to next weekend, the cute little things their kids or grandkids said yesterday. As if … nothing has changed, life goes on, it isn’t their problem that kids are kept in cages, that more than a thousand people die every day from the coronavirus, fires are raging on the West Coast, climate change is taking a steep toll and we are doing less than nothing to stop it, and there is a madman at the helm who will soon drive this ship into an iceberg. None of that seems to bother far too many of the people I know. Where is the outrage? Do they simply not care?
The following by Charles Blow in yesterday’s New York Times mirrors my own thoughts, only much more eloquently than I can state them.
When Good People Don’t Act, Evil Reigns
Stop thinking that the horrors of the world will simply work themselves out.
Charles M. Blow
By Charles M. Blow
Opinion Columnist
I have often wondered how major world tragedies and horrors were allowed to unfold. Where were all the good people, those who objected or should have? How did life simply go on with a horror in their midst?
How did the trans-Atlantic slave trade play out over hundreds of years? How did slavery thrive in this country? How was the Holocaust allowed to happen? How did the genocides in Rwanda or Darfur come to be?
There is, of course, nearly always an explanation. Often it is official policy; often it is driven by propaganda. But I’m more concerned with how people in the society considered these events at the time, and how any semblance of normalcy could be maintained while events unfolded.
It turns out that our current era is providing the unsettling answer: It was easy.
As I write this, nearly two hundred thousand Americans have died — many of them needlessly — from Covid-19, in large part because the Trump administration has refused to sufficiently address the crisis, be honest with the American people and urge caution. Instead, Trump has lied about the virus, downplayed it, resisted scientists’ warnings and continues to hold rallies with no social distancing and no mask requirements.
Things are poised to get worse: Models now predict that the number of Americans killed by the virus could double between now and Jan. 1. According to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington:
“We expect the daily death rate in the U.S., because of seasonality and declining public vigilance, to reach nearly 3,000 a day in December. Cumulative deaths expected by Jan. 1 are 415,090; this is 222,522 deaths from now until the end of the year.”
And yet, Americans still flock to Trump rallies, Republicans continue to defend his pandemic response and it is not clear that he will be defeated in November. We are, in many states, back to restaurants and bars, schools and churches, gyms and spas. It’s not as if we don’t know that there is a deadly virus being transmitted through the air, but it seems as though many Americans, weary of restrictions, have simply made their peace with it.
We have a climate crisis that continues to worsen. Storms are getting stronger. Droughts are severe. Rivers are flooding. The sea level is rising. And yet, we don’t do nearly enough to stop it and may not do enough before it’s too late to do anything.
Right now much of the West Coast is ablaze with hellish scenes of orange skies, and yet too many of us entertain climate change deniers, or, perhaps worse, know well the gravity and precariousness of the situation and still haven’t changed our habits or voted for the candidates with the boldest visions to save the planet.
Right now, China has detained as many as one million mostly Muslim citizens, in indoctrination camps, hoping to remold many into what The New York Times called “loyal blue-collar workers to supply Chinese factories with cheap labor.”
And yet, the world does little. Many look away. Life goes on.
This is how these catastrophes happen — in full sight — and people with full knowledge don’t revolt. People sometimes think that the issue is far away, or if it’s not, that it’s too big and they are too powerless.
They think provincially, or even parochially, concerned with their own house, their own street, their own community.
“It’s too bad that those children are in cages, but I can’t worry about that now, the clothes in the dryer need folding.”
“It’s too bad that an unarmed Black man just got shot by the police, but I can’t worry about that now, the yard needs mowing.”
I guess in some ways this impulse is self-protecting, preventing the mind and spirit from becoming overwhelmed with angst and rage. But, the result is that evil — as a person or system — rampages, unchecked, taking your personal laissez-faire as public license.
If you don’t complain, you condone.
But this mustn’t be. Stop thinking of yourself as weak or helpless. Stop thinking that things will simply work themselves out. Stop thinking that evil will stop at the gate and not trample your own garden.
Gather the energy. Gather your neighbor. Fight, vote, email, post. Do all you can to stand up for the vulnerable, for the oppressed, for the planet itself. Don’t let history record this moment as it has recorded too many others: a time when good people did too little to confront wickedness and disaster.
As Edmund Burke wrote in his 1770 “Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents”: “When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.”
But you may be more familiar with another quote often attributed to Burke: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
Nineteen years ago. It seems so much longer … another lifetime. And yet … and yet, it seems like such a short time ago. I remember the morning well. A key staff member was on vacation and I had to cover, so I arrived at work well before dawn, but I stepped outside sometime between 8:30 and 9:00 for a smoke break. The sky was the bluest I could recall ever seeing it and I thought it must be the most perfect day ever. Within a half-hour, I would be left in tears, cursing the day, hoping to awaken from this nightmare.
I went back inside from my smoke-break, and an employee, Susie, came up to me and asked if I had heard about the plane that crashed into the World Trade Center. If the building I worked in then had not since been demolished, I could show you the exact tile I was standing on at that moment, just as I could tell you that when we received news of the assassination of JFK, I was at home plate with bat in hand, waiting for the pitch that would never come. Just as my grandfather often told exactly where he was and what he was doing when the news of the attack on Pearl Harbour came over ‘the wireless’. You think it is a literary trick when an author says “time stood still”? Well, I can tell you … for me, time did stand still, as I must have also. I seemed to have lost all feeling, all senses shut down … I could not hear nor see. After that, it all blurs into a series of news updates … a 2nd plane, then the Pentagon, then a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, the name Usama bin Laden. A gathering in the cafeteria, a television rolled into another room where we all gathered. Financial statements, payroll, printing presses and the like forgotten for the moment. Tearful phone calls home to the girls. Then day after day, glued to the television every waking moment. In my household, we had a then-6-year-old and finally had to turn to Nickelodeon, but the images remained in our eyelids, in our hearts, in our souls. And the tears never stopped.
Today we mark the 19th memorial of that awful day. We do so in many ways, but the saddest thing for me is that we did not learn the lessons we needed to learn from that tragedy. Today, our nation is more divided than ever. In the days and weeks that followed what would become known simply as 9/11, it seemed we were on the right path. People from all over the nation and Canada traveled to Ground Zero to help with search and rescue, and eventually cleanup operations. Shopkeepers gave out free food and water. People helped neighbors, friends and strangers. We all empathized with each other, treated each other a little kinder, gave a bit more freely of our hugs and kind words.
One Wal-Mart, in conjunction with Coca-Cola, erected a display to “commemorate” the 9/11 anniversary. It was taken down after much criticism. And other companies have also tried to use 9/11 for sales and profit. It is not a commercial holiday. We do not celebrate with hot dogs and beer. It is a day of national mourning. It is a day of solemnity. Commercialism has no place on this day, no right to use it as a gimmick. Can you imagine Pearl Harbor, or the assassination of President John F. Kennedy being commercialized? There was one commercial ad that truly was a tribute to the day. It aired only once, in 2002. I still find it to be a beautiful tribute and it still brings tears. Please take just one minute to watch it.
By Nicholas Kristof
The surgery was performed a month-and-a-half ago, and Officer Potter is doing well, grateful to Ms. James, who says it seemed only right that she could save his life, for she believed that he had saved hers all those many years ago.
“I’m not trying to let anybody go hungry and if I can do anything you know to feed one or two individuals, then that’s what I want to do. So many people were very, very receptive and were asking me, ‘How do I help? How do I donate and how do I volunteer? It started out kind of being like just three, four, five and then it grew to 120 delivered during our first round. Now, it’s blown up. I’m very, very grateful for all the help from my volunteers, all the donations we’ve received, and we will keep doing this as long as this pandemic continues. I don’t even have to receive any ‘thank yous.’ I just want to help people “
