Jeremy Piven-in-Grosse Pointe Blank voice: “Twenty years, man. Twenty years.”
From February 14, 2010, “All are responsible“:
Snowfall in America brings with it, inevitably, a blizzard of “jokes” about the alleged absurdity of global warming. All of these jokes have two things in common: 1) they mention Al Gore, and 2) they’re not actually funny.
Being funny isn’t the point of these jokes, so it’s not surprising that they fail to achieve funniness. What is surprising, though, is that so many people feel compelled to tell “jokes” that aren’t actually jokes — jokes that neither attempt nor achieve funniness. What is the point of such “jokes”? They’re like cars without wheels — why on earth would anyone bother making such a thing?
I have a theory. This is just speculation, and I might be wrong. But then again, I might be right.
The great philosopher and activist Abraham Joshua Heschel said, “Few are guilty; all are responsible.”
That’s a wise and important distinction, but it’s also an eminently practical one. The good rabbi, I suspect, arrived at this formulation partly as a way of inoculating against the otherwise inevitable knee-jerk defensive response which prevented anyone from hearing his claim of inescapable responsibility. Before arriving at this statement, I imagine he experienced the dishearteningly repetitive conversation that would otherwise unfailingly ensue:
“All are responsible.”
“Well I’m not guilty.”
“I’m talking about responsibility, not …”
“You can’t blame me!”
“Blame isn’t the issue here, we’re …”
“You’re just as guilty as I am!”
“But the point was …”
“Al Gore is just as guilty as I am!”This seems to be the depressingly predictable result of any invitation to, argument for or assertion of collective responsibility. “Responsibility” is heard as or translated into “guilt” and thus produces an instinctive, angry rejection of blame that, in turn, becomes an instinctive, angry embrace of irresponsibility.
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