Every once in a while, it pays to run the rhetoric to earth.
To wit, Jen Sorensen’s latest ‘toon might seem aimed at Republicans, especially if you just hang with the “not a scientist” detail we offer here. But it’s not really so direct a criticism of the GOP; where that sneaking suspicion comes from is the (ahem!) “accidental” coincidence between conservative rhetoric specifically and irresponsible rhetoric in general.
If Sorensen really wanted to make it about Republicans, the swimming pool frame would not be about biodegradation but, rather, blaming Democrats for the lack of undocumented immigrants to clean the damn pool.
Sure, it’s a little thing, but details matter.
And, certes, we would acknowledge a certain weakness of this sort of rhetoric. After all, the home is different from the world at large in the same way the family budget is different from the business budget is different from the government budget. Still, though, the only reason we put up with treating the world around us this way is because we don’t see it so directly. If all the waste we’ve dumped into the ocean was instead piled up in the streets, people would actually give a damn. Of course, they would just vote to dump it all in the ocean, which in turn leads us back ’round the ouroboros.
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Sorensen, Jen. “If people treated their homes like they treat the earth”. Daily Kos. 17 February 2015.
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