| The following column appeared in The River Reporter on January 26, 1989 and was republished on February 4, 1999. |
is for good men to do nothing."
Edmund Burke (1795)
By Bert S. Feldman
The Recusant Reporter
As proof positive of the absolute truth of the above quotation, an incident occurred last week in my town. On a road parallel to mine, at a distance of about a half-mile, the owner of a sandpit asked the town’s zoning board for a variance so that he could erect an asphalt plant.
Naturally we were somewhat upset at the prospect of a smelly (and possibly smokey) processing plant in our neighborhood, and a few, very few, people tried to rally support for a big turnout at the public meeting in the town hall.
We started phoning around the neighborhood, but the usual happened. No one could be bothered to come out, but unanimously agreed that it would be a bad thing if such a processing plant would come to pass.
The excuses were the usual line of bullfeathers. "I plan to wash my hair." "There is a special on TV tonight that I want to watch." "I have to take my mother to bingo." "There is no one to watch the baby."
And so on, ad absurdum, ad nauseum. The most common excuse, of course, was "I don’t want to get involved."
What is wrong with people that they don’t want to get involved? After all, this is their town, the place where they live. Would they want an odiferous and sooty neighbor? No. Would they care to do something to insure that they don’t get such a neighbor? No. Will they go to the polls on Election Day to make sure that they get the best possible man or woman into office? No. Would they rather stay home and watch a rerun of "I Love Lucy"? Yes indeedy!
What is wrong with the American people that they don’t give a healthy hoot about their government, and those who run it? And why is it, about a month after the elections they are the first to gripe, whine and complain about the "dirty crooks running our country/county/town?"
It is a national disgrace that this, the greatest democracy in the world, can only attract less than 50% of the eligible voters to the polls to select a person to head our country. Why, of the 20-and-some-odd governments in the United Nations that offer the people free elections, only the government of Botswana has a poorer turnout at the polls than the United States of Apathy?
Note that one of the reasons offered above for non-attendance is the pressing need to watch a particular television show. Is television the culprit in the decline in numbers of participating Americans in the running of their government? In part, yes; but the numbers have been on the decline since the beginning of this century.
Television has only accelerated the process. Why are almost all fraternal, social, civic and like organizations complaining about shrinking membership? Have all Americans turned into couch potatoes? Yep. Look at the reports of the President’s Program for Physical Fitness. Our American kids are largely overweight and both physically and mentally soft. When the ancient Romans spoke of a sound mind in a sound body, they knew of what they spoke.
Perhaps the constantly diminishing number of places in this world where true freedom still exists might stir Americans to change from the "gimme" generation to the "we can do it" generation, but we doubt it. We had hoped that the sight of Czechs and Hungarians and Aighanistanis and Nicaraguans spilling their blood for the commodity of freedom, a jewel which we seem to hold to be nothing, would shake a few people out of the dreamland they choose to inhabit, but the snores drowned out the cries of pain.
Wake up, America! Start participating in the affairs of your community, your country, the world! Wake you giant, whose armies made the tyrants tremble, who could out-produce, out-fight, out-everything there ever was.
We’ll elect local governments come this fall. Get your toes wet; take part in the affairs of the party of your choice. Keep tabs on those presently in office. Once again read the quotation at the head of this column.
Get involved in America, (once) the land of the free and the home of the brave.
