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Can we please stop pointing fingers and just mop up the oil???
By Lauren | May 3, 2010
As the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico continues to grow, it’s hard not to indulge in a lot of useless finger-pointing. The Obama Administration, under fire for failing to move faster to contain the spill, is blaming British Petroleum. BP CEO Tony Hayward has promised that the company will pay all reasonable claims, but is already blaming another company, Transocean, for running the rig that blew up and started this mess. Undoubtedly Transocean is all set to foist the blame on somebody else. Meanwhile, the oil keeps bubbling up, the spill keeps growing, and Heaven only knows how much damage will be done to Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida before someone finally figures out how to shut off the spill.
What an ungodly mess.
When I listen to news reports about the oil spill, the subtext is always the same: “who should we blame?” There’s probably plenty of blame to go around, and no doubt a whole lot of lawyers are going to make one heck of a lot of money portioning it out. For entirely too long, business has focused almost exclusively on the short-term bottom line. In the interests of wringing every last dime of profit out for the shareholders, too many businesses have taken enormous risks. We saw it on Wall Street with the subprime mortgage debacle. It seems we may be seeing it now in the energy industry, with coal mining companies facing charges that they played fast-and-loose with employee safety standards and oil companies failing to use state-of-the-art equipment to make offshore drilling safer for the environment. Norway and Brazil, two other major oil-producing companies, require offshore drill platforms to be equipped with automatic shut-off valves. Why doesn’t the United States? And why wouldn’t oil companies use them even if they aren’t required to do so? Maybe those valves cost extra money, but I’d bet my life savings they cost a lot less than BP will end up paying for its share of the cleanup.
Frankly, I’m too heartsick about this whole thing to care very much who’s to blame. It’s high time business worried a little less about profits and a little more about conducting business safely. It’s time for the government to write and enforce meaningful rules to prevent environmental catastrophes. And it’s time for the rest of us to care a little more about the world we’re creating for ourselves and our children. There’s precious little good to be said about this calamity, but maybe something positive can come of it if we take this opportunity to reconsider the attitudes that made it happen.
Topics: Apologies, Business Ethics, Legal Ethics, Social Ethics, corporate responsibility, ethics |
May 3rd, 2010 at 9:49 pm
I agree entirely. I feel that a lot more problems in the world would get fixed if people put aside their politics and actually tried to get things done. And big business needs to stop worrying about grabbing for every last penny and start caring about its customers and the world around them. This catastrophe illustrates both issues only too clearly.
May 4th, 2010 at 3:57 am
[...] Can we please stop pointing fingers and just mop up the oil??? | The Business Ethics Blog [...]
May 4th, 2010 at 6:34 pm
When accidents happen, it seems that the appropriate thing is for EVERYONE take responsibility, not NO ONE. If everyone took responsibility, then no one could point fingers!!
May 11th, 2010 at 3:59 pm
I enjoyed this! Well done!
April 27th, 2011 at 10:17 am
I like the helpful information you provide in your articles. I listen to news reports about the oil spill; the subtext is always the same: “who should we blame?” There’s probably plenty of blame to go around, and no doubt a whole lot of lawyers are going to make one heck of a lot of money portioning it out. For entirely too long, business has focused almost exclusively on the short-term bottom line. In the interests of wringing every last dime of profit out for the shareholders, too many businesses have taken enormous risks. We saw it on Wall Street with the sub prime mortgage debacle. I am quite sure I will learn plenty of new stuff right here! Best of luck for the next!