American Apologies

During His inauguration speech, President Barack Obama declared: “We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense.”

Hmm…if His Holiness is really defending my way of life, he’s slaughtering civilians and wasting billions in taxpayer dollars in the name of atheism, anarchism, veganism, and so on. How odd…

Here’s a news flash for the Pope of Hope: “Our way of life” (in the more general sense) not only needs to be apologized for, it needs to be permanently altered…in a major way. Americans constitute 5% of the world’s population but consume 24% of the world’s energy. On average, one American consumes as much energy as two Japanese, six Mexicans, 13 Chinese, 31 Indians, 128 Bangladeshis, 280 Haitians, and 307 Tanzanians.

Ponder this: a human born in America will have, on average, 370 times more of an environmental impact than a human born in Ethiopia. Let the president of Ethiopia eschew lifestyle apologies (for now). Here in the United States of Consumption, we lack that luxury. As Paul Hawken sez: “Really going green, means having less. It does mean less. Everyone is saying, ‘You don’t have to change your lifestyle.’ Well, yes, actually, you do.”

To borrow from the Situationists, in May of 1968: The future will only contain what we put into it now.