I am sympathetic to the call for a boycott of BP — corporate irresponsibility should have consequences and there are few better ways to make corporations pay in our capitalist culture than by voting with our wallets. The problem is that for the boycott to be effect, the message must be clear and I’m just not sure that withholding my gas money from BP while giving to Exxon (Valdez oil spill), Shell (a host of injustices throughout Africa, including the death of the Nigerian activist Ken Wiro-Siwa), Chevron (unsavory activities in the rain forest, Burma and elsewhere), and so on, sends much of a message.
The real boycott would be of gasoline altogether, but that is an impossiblity given how tightly woven into the fabric of our lives the poisonous fuel is (not only do we drive, but everything we buy relies on gas).
I’m not advocating doing nothing — we hve to move as quickly as possible to end our reliance on fossil fuels and nuclear energy (which relies on extraction of uranium and requires disposal of toxic material, making it as bad environmentally as oil or coal), boost our use of renewable energies and conserve, conserve, conserve.
A boycott might make us feel good, but it won’t do much damage to BP and, even if it does, it only means redirecting our money from one nefarious actor to another.
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- Read poetry at The Subterranean.
- Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.
Hank Kalet 