The Blame Game

Fix the problem, not the blame.
- Japanese proverb

If we can find out who is to blame for our lot in life, then maybe our lot in life isn't our fault.

We are fat because we eat foods rich in trans fats, we get lung cancer because the tobacco companies sell us cigarettes, alcoholism is a disease and our kids are on drugs because they watch too much violence on television. Our lives are someone else's responsibility, and if we can find someone to sue for it, then more's the better.

Smoking is a horrible habit, and lately, smoking has become social anathema. Smokers are forced outside to consume their devil weed, lest they infect the rest of us who have chosen to lead a healthy life - in a bar drinking or in a restaurant eating fatty foods full of creamy sauces. Smoking is bad, and you'll do it outside.
Millions of dollars in lawsuits are filed every year against tobacco companies because smokers die from lung cancer. It was not the smokers' fault, it was the fault of the tobacco company for selling them the cigarettes. The blame goes where the money is.

If alcoholism is a disease, why do people yell at you for having it? I've never been told I was stupid because I caught a cold or had an ear infection. If I check into rehab, I'm a horrible person, and I have blamed alcohol for my wretched state.

Five years ago, who knew what a trans fat was? If you had asked me then, I would have guessed it was a really wide subway car or a ZZ Top song. Now, the scourge of the earth is trans fats, and companies like McDonald's are spending millions to remove the fat (and presumably, the taste) from their foods, lest we get fat from eating Big Mac's and fries. It's the trans fats, stupid.

Our children are overly violent because the television programs they watch contain too much violence. Never mind that most of us grew up watching the Coyote try to blow up the Road Runner 50 times in ten minutes, or that Moe slapped Curly silly every five seconds; the TV is to blame because kids are either stupid, violent or can't pay attention to anything for longer than it takes to read this post. It's impossible that your kids are violent or stupid because they're violent and stupid - the TV made them that way. Here's a news break: Kids have been violent and stupid for as long as there have been kids. If someone does something rotten in your neighborhood, who's responsible? The elderly?

Taking responsibility for our own actions is a fate worse than death. We find more things to blame our lives on and more ways to sue the people we feel are responsible, that if we took the time we spent fixing blame and fixed our lives, we would all be happier. At least, I think so.
It's cleansing, and when you find the fault in your own behavior, rather than the random acts of people you do not know, you are able to look inside yourself and figure out where the blame really lies.
Your life is your responsibility. It is not the responsibility of R.J. Reynolds, Anheuser-Busch, Wendy's or even Fox News.

Finagle's Eighth Rule:
Teamwork is essential. It allows you to blame someone else.

It is comforting, if not hugely profitable, to fix blame on others for our reckless behavior. A bad education, advertising, the entertainment industry or the Internet all conspire to ruin our lives, and they will eventually be made to pay. The fact is that people have been fat, dumb and reckless forever, and merely because there is new technology or new products doesn't make the products faulty.

Free will is perhaps our greatest freedom and our worst enemy. When we realize that what we do is a direct result of our own wants, needs and desires; we will have no one to blame but ourselves.

So sue me.