Aquarian Weekly 6/9/10
REALITY CHECK

AN OPEN LETTER TO BRITISH PETROLEUM

To Whatever Incompetent Asshole It May Concern,

Jesus Bar-Hopping Christ, what the fuck is going on?

Plug the fucking hole already.

This is beyond irresponsible corporate shenanigans now. Sure its criminal, but I don't give a shit about criminal. I expect most of you oil skags to rape land, price fix, bribe officials and other business-as-usual stuff. But I also expect when you drill into the ocean that you have a method to plug the goddamn hole when it leaks or explodes or some other fiasco within, say, a month's time.

What is this now; fifty days and counting?

This goddamn catastrophe has gone on so long I have been unable to avoid writing about it. I figure spinning outrage on oil barons fucking up the environment is akin to whining about the Catholic Church covering up pedophilia. I mean, let's apply some selective creativity in subject matter here. But this is beyond ridiculous now. This, I dare say, and I am hardly a purveyor of hyperbole here, may be the worst environmental corporate disaster in my lifetime.

I repeat, upon reviewing your abysmal record, which shows "760 willful safety violations" as charged by the Occupational Health & Safety Administration in the last three years alone, and horrific EPA toxic release data dating back to 1991, along with massive fines for 104 oil spills in a one-year period between 1997 and 1998, I really don't give a hovering shit. I need oil. I like heat and my car and I don't care how many Arabs and volunteer armed forces have to die for it.

Just plug the fucking hole already.

Shit, I expect a company that in 2005 had its largest refinery explode killing 15 poor Texans and injuring 180 more to be a callous conglomerate of money-hording scum. But these are Texans we're talking about, after all. No one outside of that god forsaken desert patch of yahoos cares a lick about Texans, especially those who expire from its leading export, which, let's face it, and has regurgitated from its diseased womb an alarming number of vapid rich and powerful mediocrities. Those saps would have likely shot themselves in the street anyway.

So I hope I am making this as clear as possible; I am not your run-of-the-mil environmentally compassionate, anti-big business, head-in-the-sand, sign-waving troglodyte. And I am not being facetious when I state emphatically that I worry not a lick about your sordid past or your spectacularly criminal business model or the millions you use to purchase chunks of my government. I accept that this kind of knuckle-grinding immorality comes with the territory.

At least I'm willing to admit it. There may be hardheaded, wise-ass sarcasm peppered with miserable cynicism here, but you won't find an ounce of hypocrisy. Whether the rest of us shake our heads in disgust or moan on talk shows or whip off poetic disdain for the evils of Big Oil, we all need it, jack. We need to drill for it. Thus, we accept the consequences. We're all adults here. Our patience and standards have a variety of weird levels that are hard to press when it comes to getting the stuff. We may get all pissy and boycott you guys and buy it from someone else, but it changes nothing, really.

Do you see anyone boycotting the colossal piles of crap made by child slaves in Chinese basement sweatshops? I have more shit from China in my house right now than not. We just had an Olympics there. It was our best joke: A celebration of the human spirit in the home office for human misery. Never mind that, they poisoned our children. Forget that, we borrow money from them so we can wage wars all over the Middle East for our oil. Honestly. We get it. You're the worst. We're the worst.

Just plug the fucking hole.

Do you think we've forgotten the horrors of 9/11? Nah. It came and went and we still pump the oil. A badly formulated and ill-conceived war to kick a half-assed dictator out of Iraq, and we still keep on truckin' and SUVin' and well, you get the picture. You guys are our sugar daddies and we'll take our beatings and eat your dung and turn around and thank you so very much. We sleep with the great whore and we sleep well.

Hell, we slept right through your 2006 oil operations in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, when neglected corroded pipelines unleashed five-thousand barrels of oil all over our nation's most pristine landscape. But you know what? Fuck Alaska. Its last goddamn governor is a pox on our collective IQ and quite the proponent of drilling-baby-drilling as I recall it. Let Alaska burn.

Just plug the fucking hole.

And if you can't plug the thing, at least cop to it. Jamming mud and garbage down there and hiring dweebs to build robots to piddle around is embarrassing. I can take greedy, apathetic monsters for my Oil Men, just not ineffectual boobs. Those guys get into government. You guys are supposed to be coldly efficient with the occasional wink-wink environmental hazard or easily explainable and paid-off faux pas, not this incredible clusterfuck. People mock the media all the time, but right now online there is a submerged, 24/7 video surveillance of this disaster constantly pumping bilge into he Gulf of Mexico. It's really quite inventive and ingenious and it kicks like gangbusters. The camera works great. Your shit doesn't, and therein lies my problem with the situation.

And forget the government intervening. People down there are not too keen on the government helping with disasters. Chances are the people "helping" were probably hired because they were someone's drinking buddies. We already know the fuck-ups we're dealing with up there. Leave them out of it. Private sector will fix it. It's the American way, or some other tired bullshit. We make it up as we go along, but it works in some strange way, unlike your company, which cannot plug a fucking hole in fifty fucking days.

Plug it. Damn it.

Now.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

jc
Oil Whore

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