"The way you support yourself can be an expression of your deepest self, or it can be a source of suffering for you and others. ... Our vocation can nourish our understanding and compassion, or erode them. We should be awake to the consequences, far and near, of the way we earn our living."
--Thich Nat Hanh, Vietnamese Buddhist Monk
"I had my eyes opened. I saw that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero-accountability. I came to realize that I had more to offer this world than just making things that blow up. And that is why, effective immediately, I am shutting down the weapons manufacturing division of Stark Industries."
--"Tony Stark," Iron Man
Dear Mr. Hayward:
We have never formally met, but in the fall of 2000 I attended BP's annual shareholder meeting in London at which you -- though not yet CEO -- were present. At the time, I was there to raise concerns over BP's investment in a PetroChina pipeline across the Tibetan plateau, which many individuals of conscience around the world felt would be an environmental and political disaster. The investment, no surprise, went through, despite widespread shareholder concern. And the results, no surprise either, have been pretty much as predicted.
That was an important and exciting year for your company. In a massive makeover, the archaic and somewhat intimidating BP shield morphed into something far fresher and more consumer friendly -- a blooming green and yellow sunflower, indicative of the company's dedication to moving "beyond petroleum." The campaign worked well. Up until last month, when consumers were asked to name the "greenest" oil company, yours continually came out on top. Amazing what a little splash of color can do.
However, those of us who were at that meeting were privy to a very different reality -- namely the admitted fact that your company actually had little intention of truly moving "beyond petroleum." At one point during the meeting, when fielding questions over the level of BP's commitment to alternative energy, the chair of your board -- bizarrely underlit like Dr. Strangelove and seated in a futuristic looking plexiglass pod -- proudly stated: "Just because we have changed our slogan to Beyond Petroleum does not change the fact that our primary function as a company is and will remain the extraction and distribution of hydrocarbons."
Nothing like telling it like it is.
Fast forward ten years. Today, your company's failure to move in any meaningful way towards greener practices, environmental safeguards, and alternative energy sources has directly resulted in what can only be called an unmitigated disaster. A disaster which -- beyond the immediate and long-term environmental repercussions -- represents a far deeper crisis in basic human ethics. The crisis is this, Tony: your livelihood is directly based on the distribution of a substance that poisons, kills, and destroys. And ultimately, in the face of a mounting global crisis of climate change and environmental degradation, for anyone in your industry to continue business as usual is 100-percent morally indefensible. It is beyond time for humanity to get off oil. That change has to start quickly, and it has to start with with people like you.
In the complex web of economic interconnectedness, it is easy to remove responsibility from individual people, since it is rarely one individual who directly causes a disaster like the one in the Gulf of Mexico. It is also easy to point to a company's responsibility to its shareholders and mark quarterly profit as the ultimate measure of appropriate action. It is easy to divorce ethical concerns such as the environment and human rights as secondary to this prime responsibility. It is easy to point to the large global demand for oil and to feel comfortable that your company is supplying that demand and that it is therefore not you who are responsible for the consequences of your poisonous tar, that it is a burden of responsibility we all share as an oil-dependent society.
Yeah, it may be easy to think this way, but it is wrong. You are responsible. You are directly responsible.
Systems are made up of individuals, and individuals have choice. History is full of individuals who in the face of ethical dilemmas chose the higher path. History fondly remembers such Schindlers of years past. Those who continue on with business as usual and therefore become accomplices and instigators of unthinkable destruction are also remembered by history, with quite different names. Quite often they are called traitors.
How will our children, and their children, and their children generations beyond remember us if our greatest defining legacy is that given all the facts we had on the table about the environmental consequences of our actions and our lifestyles, we continued on as if nothing was wrong? More to the point, how will they remember you?
In the Buddhist worldview of my upbringing, the livelihood of a human being must be based on one basic criterion -- do no harm. The more complex the economy of our world becomes -- and the more fragile its environment -- the more vital it is for individuals to personally adopt this ethical outlook and this way of living. When trapped in a system of quarterly profits and immediate demand, individuals of vision must take action and carve a legacy rather than wait for one to be written for them. It is your ethical responsibility, as the CEO of a company that is, as I write, committing unimaginable harm in the oceans and wetlands of the Gulf of Mexico and among its fishing communities, to re-earn the trust of the people of world by changing your company to one that does no harm.
How does this look in the real world? It means a far more aggressive, far more substantive move to alternative energy investment, starting now. Our oil policy can no longer be one of using it until its gone and dropping a few research dollars in place along the way. We need a comprehensive plan to get us off of it. It means calling for a moratorium on offshore drilling. It means shutting down the Atlantis rig in the gulf, which your own internal investigators have concluded is a safety risk.
But more than this, it means adopting the basic worldview that is the only real hope that humanity has -- the fundamental recognition of the fragility and interconnectedness of all life and the compassion for it that is a by-product of that recognition. Only when individuals commit to do no harm can corporations and governments follow suit. Only when you truly grasp that it is not in your best interest as a human being to put other life in harm's way can real change be made.
Every one of us is responsible for our own course in life, and each of us determines our own moral and ethical guidelines. Some of us accept the basic rules of religions without question. Others determine our own version of what is and what is not acceptable in order to help us sleep at night. No one -- yet -- is going to force us to adopt individual ethical and moral standards. It is up to each of us. It is up to you, Tony. A man of your stature has clearly gotten to where he is through hard work, intelligence, and motivation. But as of now, your legacy is washing onto the shores of Louisiana in the form of a complete and total mess.
I personally invite you to be more than that.
Don't be a mess. Do the right thing. And do no harm.
Josh Schrei
May 27, 2010
Follow Josh Schrei on Twitter: www.twitter.com/brooklynjosh
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No drilling for oil. No burning coal. No splitting the atom.
Stop the madness.
Solar cells and a windmill on every building in the world.
If that's not enough power, then too bad, make due with what you have.
People, just shut up and do it.
There is a lot of evil to point at here. Greed. Systemic corruption. But ultimately the American people themselves have chosen to be entitled to the developed world's cheapest gas. They refuse to do what it takes to end their addiction to a product that is transferring our national treasury to the Middle East. They refuse to do what it takes to fund alternitive energy. Religious interpretations miss the point. Take a look in the mirror and you will find the problem.
This is reminiscent the airline industry some 20-30 years ago figuring out that putting in safer seats exceeded the cost of a all on board being killed in a crash and the families suing the airline. The used insurance actuaries to determine the average cost of a law suit and then the cost of the seats or other safety additions. Found out, it wasn't worth the extra outlay.
Until BP finds that the oil spill hits the bottom line, i.e., wiping out billions in profit for several years, they are not going to change one thing in their drilling procedures. To the corporate world, there is only one God and that is Profit, and BP is only one its minions.
Believe nothing merely because you have been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings - that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide.
In a modern context, consider this from the first of the 14 Mindfulness Trainings:
Aware of the suffering created by fanaticism and intolerance, we are determined not to be idolatrous about or bound to any doctrine, theory, or ideology, even Buddhist ones. Buddhist teachings are guiding means to help us learn to look deeply and to develop our understanding and compassion. They are not doctrines to fight, kill, or die for.
I'm not sure I know what the basic rules of religions are. If I did, I would not accept them without considering them deeply, in each and every circumstance.
In the Buddhist worldview of my upbringing, the livelihood of a human being must be based on one basic criterion -- do no harm.
Certainly doing no harm is a goal, but none of us reach it. As Thich Nhat Hanh has said, even a committed vegetarian will eat some living creatures. All of us do some harm. In our livelihood we can choose a path that minimizes harm, but we cannot avoid it completely. The key is once we have done the harm, do we continue on a path that continues causing harm, or do we change? I do not question that someone who buys and sells oil, which can be used for good, can have a right livelihood.
Some of us accept the basic rules of religions without question. Others determine our own version of what is and what is not acceptable in order to help us sleep at night.
Continued...
The more immediate issue, is that even BP does not have a clue as to how to fix the problem. Nor does anyone in the oil and gas industry.
THAT, is a sobering thought .....
I read somewhere that the reserves in the Gulf of Mexico are so large that the oil will gush out for seven years if the hole is not plugged.
Alison
www.healthjournalist.com
Maintaining that if every human being could recognize the power of Her "Love and Forgiveness Principle" Kuan Yin contends that all consciousness on earth would change instantaneously.
dishonest puppet.
They were the company behind Britain's badgering of the newly formed CIA.
To do what?
To overthrow the democratically-elected prime minister of Iran.
Who did what?
Nationalized Iran's oil.
The big surprise is, it's really not flexible at all. Right action as espoused in the 8 fold path is pretty clear. Most things in life have shades of gray. Not this.
In order to have equanimity towards all sentient beings, does one have to know each and every one of them personally? Is it not sufficient to understand that they are just like us in wishing to have happiness and be free from suffering? Knowing exactly how each and every one of them is experiencing happiness or suffering is not a pre-requisite for our having equanimity towards them.
Thank you. I wish every CEO would understand this.