Awfulizing in America

"That's awful." I hear these two words coming from the mouths of a lot of people lately.

"Did you hear about the kid from Tipton who died in Iraq?"--"That's awful"
"Did you hear how the city gave TIF to the developer to put up that building?"--"That's awful."
"Did you hear what happened on American Idol to Melinda?"--"That's awful."

Usually "that's awful" is followed up with "it's a shame" or "that's too bad."

And maybe it is. Maybe it is a shame that the people we elect do not do more to end the war or be more responsible with our tax money (or that people don't recognize talent).

But maybe what is awful is that we aren't more outraged and demanding action in an organized way, in the right amount of numbers, with enough intensity. Maybe we are awful--Awful busy, awful distracted, awful overwhelmed...

Think about this, never has Congress received more mail (electronic or otherwise) about situations that concern people, but the acts of civil disobedience have decreased (and I don't mean sit ins, necessarily). Politicians poll us to identify the things we think are awful so that they can get our votes.

Maybe it is a product of a 24 hour news cycle that goes from one "ain't it awful" event to another, but maybe it is our own attention spans that should be called into question.

Raging against the machine, perhaps, used to be easier when the machine was easy to identify and take on one at a time--Civil Rights, Vietnam, Women's rights, etc.

But the world we live in now is complicated. We have people relations problems for sure, but we have this pesky global climate change scenario, bees disappearing, shorelines eroding, and vegetation doing all kinds of strange things. We are engaged in a dangerous conflict that has no easy answers for those living there. We have a mounting national debt that is being avoided by all of us. I know--that's awful.

But, it is my thought that the more we are paralyzed by what is "awful" in our lives, the more we look to avoid addressing what we can deal with. While many of us are not climatologists, we can turn off our lights when we leave the room. While few of us are military strategists, we can choose to treat our own relationships in non-violent ways and remind our nations leaders that they got us into this mess and they have got to get us out.

We also have to acknowledge that as "awful" as things are, they will get better or worse based on what we are doing. So what are you doing?