Australia Is "Unprepared."

Rupert Murdoch says Australia just isn't prepared.  Much as I love Australia, I have to agree with him. We're used to the idea of "them" fixing everything for us.  By "them" we tend to mean the government but also insurance companies, banks, restaurants, councils, committees, and the lawn mower bloke.  We tend to think that external things control and moderate our lives, when in fact that's a myth created by decades of "nanny-state" mentality, which the government sought to actively promulgate and bolster at every opportunity.  Like every other chicken the government ever laid, this one to is now going to come home to roost, as hundreds of thousands of Australians sit back, live the lifestyle, and expect the government to "fix it all, a bit down the track..."

K-Rudd, much as he is showing us that he's environment-savvy and ecologically cool and an economic saviour, is continuing to try and both stay on as the moderating nanny, and at the same time, make businesses responsible for being the nanny also.  The one person he's discounting is the general voter.  Our part is to sit back and take what they shove into the trough in front of us...

I will hammer and hammer this point - take personal responsibility.  Don't - under any circumstances - leave it all to the government and businesses.  Whose interests will they have in mind?  Do you think that you're important to the company accountant of a big supermarket?  Really?  The CFO is only there to care for one group of people - the shareholders who pay him.

Imagine this - purely imaginary! - scenario:
In another three years, and knowing about the melamine poisoning scare, if you and 5,000 people die from melamine poisoning because the supermarket bought the cheapest shit milk products it could source worldwide, that's collateral damage to the CFO and to the people in the supermarket making money from your purchases.  Tough.  People will sue the supermarket for damages but that's small potatoes compared to the profits the company made selling 5c/litre milk for $3.00 for the last three years before people started dying...

But if you take a personal responsibility for yourself, do some research, and decide not to just take whatever crap that supermarket shoves at you, they will drop that product like it's hot, and not only will you have saved yourself, you'll have saved other people who might not be into reading labels as closely as you, and you've also saved the cost of all that litigation...  It may not amount to much if you only boycott milk - but if you apply this personal responsibility ethic to all your purchases, the effect will quickly turn into a habit.  And a lot of people with this habit will quickly turn into a tsunami of activism.  And that will prepare us better than anything else.

Visit The Body Friendly Zen Cookbook and help support my work!