With Election Day looming around the corner in November, Americans across the country will be encouraged to get out to vote to effect change. Rhetoric and campaign ads will fill the airwaves and our mailboxes. Hordes of letters to the editor will flood newspapers and websites. Buttons, bumper stickers and yard signs will become ubiquitous. And sadly, for the most part, it will be nothing more than one grand charade!
Year in and year out, we cast our votes to send people to represent us in Washington and state capitols around the nation, and we wind up with the same results. It's gotten to the point in which you really can't tell a Democratic administration from the Republican version. For example, over the last two years, the Obama administration has performed just as poorly as its predecessor in the areas of war, torture, the economy, bailouts to fat cats and responding to a cataclysmic disaster.
Consequently, the vote is among the weakest tools the American public possesses to influence REAL change in the direction our nation is headed. So, what's the alternative?
Remember not so long ago when apartheid gripped South Africa? A slow movement began to develop in which average citizens began to apply pressure to companies large and small to divest from investments in that country. In time, the movement picked up enough speed to get the attention of the South African wealthy elite. This helped to usher in the end of apartheid simply because it was hurting them where it hurts the most -- their wallets.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the tool that even peons like us can wield. It is through boycotts and strikes that we stand the best chance of making an impact and finally having our voices heard. When the lifeblood of corporations or governments (like Arizona) is threatened -- their profits -- they stand up to take notice. It's about the only thing these days that will cause them to pay ANY heed to the public interest.
For example, take British Petroleum (BP). Do you think that after the worst environmental disaster in US history that this giant corporation will change its cost-cutting ways? Do you think it will be more prepared for the next man-made disaster coming down the pike, one caused by putting profits before everything else? Not if they can help it!!
They might rethink their selfish position IF consumers decided to quit buying their products. In fact, if more Americans would drive a little less each month, we could cut back on purchasing fuel from all the wicked petroleum companies. As their profits went down, there would be a mad scramble to try to woo consumers back. One of these giants might voluntarily institute greater environmental protections out of the need simply to survive and, before you know, all the rest would follow suit for the same reason.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that boycotts often hurt small businesses. When the first boycotts of BP gas were announced, independent gas station owners cried that they would be hurt and this would hurt the communities in which they operated. Employees would need to be let go and some stations might go out of business altogether.
It's true and I won't deny it. There would be many small mom-and-pop establishments that would be pulled under. It's not that I don't have sympathy for them -- I do -- but it's the only effective means that I know of that has a chance of getting the attention of the bigwigs. Almost any other strategy, short of armed revolution (of which I don't advocate), will be treated as a tiny blip on the radar screen.
In this day of global capitalism and giant corporations no longer beholden to any one government or constituency, the only thing that matters to them is the bottom line. So, if that's the only thing that matters, that should be the target of the consuming public.
Year in and year out, we cast our votes to send people to represent us in Washington and state capitols around the nation, and we wind up with the same results. It's gotten to the point in which you really can't tell a Democratic administration from the Republican version. For example, over the last two years, the Obama administration has performed just as poorly as its predecessor in the areas of war, torture, the economy, bailouts to fat cats and responding to a cataclysmic disaster.
Consequently, the vote is among the weakest tools the American public possesses to influence REAL change in the direction our nation is headed. So, what's the alternative?
Remember not so long ago when apartheid gripped South Africa? A slow movement began to develop in which average citizens began to apply pressure to companies large and small to divest from investments in that country. In time, the movement picked up enough speed to get the attention of the South African wealthy elite. This helped to usher in the end of apartheid simply because it was hurting them where it hurts the most -- their wallets.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is the tool that even peons like us can wield. It is through boycotts and strikes that we stand the best chance of making an impact and finally having our voices heard. When the lifeblood of corporations or governments (like Arizona) is threatened -- their profits -- they stand up to take notice. It's about the only thing these days that will cause them to pay ANY heed to the public interest.
For example, take British Petroleum (BP). Do you think that after the worst environmental disaster in US history that this giant corporation will change its cost-cutting ways? Do you think it will be more prepared for the next man-made disaster coming down the pike, one caused by putting profits before everything else? Not if they can help it!!
They might rethink their selfish position IF consumers decided to quit buying their products. In fact, if more Americans would drive a little less each month, we could cut back on purchasing fuel from all the wicked petroleum companies. As their profits went down, there would be a mad scramble to try to woo consumers back. One of these giants might voluntarily institute greater environmental protections out of the need simply to survive and, before you know, all the rest would follow suit for the same reason.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that boycotts often hurt small businesses. When the first boycotts of BP gas were announced, independent gas station owners cried that they would be hurt and this would hurt the communities in which they operated. Employees would need to be let go and some stations might go out of business altogether.
It's true and I won't deny it. There would be many small mom-and-pop establishments that would be pulled under. It's not that I don't have sympathy for them -- I do -- but it's the only effective means that I know of that has a chance of getting the attention of the bigwigs. Almost any other strategy, short of armed revolution (of which I don't advocate), will be treated as a tiny blip on the radar screen.
In this day of global capitalism and giant corporations no longer beholden to any one government or constituency, the only thing that matters to them is the bottom line. So, if that's the only thing that matters, that should be the target of the consuming public.
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