I happened to be playing around on YouTube and saw this commercial put together by a bunch of celebrities.
It was disturbing.
Okay, not completely. Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51kAw4OTlA0
First, I gotta say that the abject hero worship of Obama is, well, disturbing. He's just a politician. He's a good politician but a politician nonetheless.
He is not the end all be all. He will not wave a magic wand and cure the world's ills. He will not give all children who lose a tooth a pony.
This doesn't mean I think he insincere about wanting to change things for the better. I actually respect him and have been impressed by his first acts as President.
I'm just weirded out by the unabashed hero worship. I'm a fan of history. People got this worked up about characters like Stalin and Hitler.
Clarification: I am not saying Obama is anything like Stalin or Hitler.
However, when people start drooling like idiots around a politician, I get the heeby geebies. Why? Because, it edges into blind devotion. Blind devotion to a leader doesn't typically end well.
However, I'm still loving the message of the video, even though the beginning and ending kind of creep me out.
Yeah, I know. I never claimed to make sense.
Anyway, if you followed the link you saw a bunch of celebreties pledging to do simple things that will make the world better. Things like getting to know their neighbors, recycling, not using plastic bags at the store.
The thing is, most people don't do these things because they know that individually, it doesn't do much good.
For example, I Pledge to continue riding my bike and the bus to and from work during the week and I Pledge to work from home as much as is allowed by my company.
I've been doing this for about four months and it hasn't been easy. The riding itself was hard because, when I started, I was "flabby, fat and lazy". But just a few weeks of pedaling got rid of the sore muscles, if not all the fat...grumble, grumble.
Then there's the fact that my husband can't drop off the monkey (my son) at daycare AND pick him up. The daycare doesn't open until 6:30 and my bus arrives at between 6:50 and 6:55 and is a fair distance from my house. It's also unreliable. Since I can't be sure to pick the monkey up, I drop him off in the morning. My hubby leaves early and drives back home in time to retrieve the monkay and all is well.
So, I drop off the monkey in the car, drive back home, get on my bike and pedal like the Furries are after me. (That's not a typo.) Translation: my morning isn't a leisurely ride. It's pedal to the...um...it's just a lot of pedalling. If anything, and I mean anything goes wrong in my morning routine I will miss my bus and have to wait a half an hour for the next one which makes me late, late, late.
But none of those things have been my biggest problem. The biggest problem has been the nay sayers.
The people shaking their heads and looking at me like I'm insane are annoying. The fact that my office doesn't have a bike wrack, won't let me lock my bike by the front or back entrance and make me park on the loading dock by the dumpster is really annoying.
But it's the people who talk to me about how it doesn't make a difference that are truly discouraging.
Why? Because they're right. Me doing it all by myself doesn't really make that much of a difference.
However, I think that if I keep doing it, I might, just maybe encourage someone else to do it or something similar. If more people ride the bus, there might be more buses and bus routes. If there are more buses and bus routes, the public transporation system is more convenient. If it's more convenient, even more people might use it. If more people use public transportation...
Well, it would make a HUGE difference.
I think that's the problem with most small steps. Individually, we often don't see the point.
The thing I love about that I Pledge video is that it shows us other people doing the little things. If we see enough people pledging and doing the little things, maybe we'll all do those little things and they can grow up and be the big things we always hoped they'd be.
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Here's the thing I think about the hero worship bit:
ReplyDeleteFor eight years, people have lived with a president who felt their opinions didn't matter in the least. While he might have thought he was doing good, all this behind-closed-doors and wire-tapping and Gitmo and approved torture was enough to make anyone feel like a criminal and lose faith in the government they thought they could believe in.
Now we have a guy who is doing the opposite. He's shutting down Gitmo and declaring transparency in the government and promising that we won't give up freedoms for security...to a lot of people who felt their government was turning into the worst possible version of itself, he does seem like a hero.
I can't imagine it's any easier for him to be put on that kind of pedestal. It's a long fall...
Add to the fact he's the first African-American president and suddenly the word "freedom" takes on a whole new level, especially after the last eight years.
I'm not saying all this hero worship is right, but I think that's where it's coming from. It's just the fact people are forgetting they are the ones who voted him into office which makes them the real heroes.
"It's just the fact people are forgetting they are the ones who voted him into office which makes them the real heroes."
ReplyDeleteOoooh! Awesome comment!