Notes from the Trail: The oil spill and the blood spill

By Steve Bhaerman

by Steve Bhaerman

Same problem, same solution.

bhaermanThere is nothing funny about oil hemorrhaging in the Gulf of Mexico, or blood flowing in the Mediterranean—just the sad joke that we humans are largely the cause of our own suffering. And we are largely clueless as to how and why. For millennia, we have been under the spell of the lowest common dominator, the notion that it’s a you-or-me world, that to survive we must dominate or be dominated. Never mind that at the root of every religion and ethical system is some version of the Golden Rule. We have as a species chosen to apply this law selectively to those in our own family, tribe or nation. When we feel threatened—not necessarily are threatened, but feel threatened—we very easily adopt a conveniently modified version of the rule: “Doo-doo unto others before they can doo-doo unto you.”

 

 

This article was originally published on June 30, 2010.