Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by cmn32480 on Friday August 28 2015, @04:07PM   Printer-friendly
from the somebody-should-invent-a-cleaner-world dept.

Ever more the light seems to be shining in dark spots, and the cockroaches scatter. The Huffington Post reveals today that DuPont has knowingly been poisoning a small farm and community for decades, desperately trying to dump and hide the environmental, social, and medical fallout of their chemical C8. Despite their efforts, the scandal behind C8 cannot be so easily pushed down inside a landfill and forgotten like a painfully produced Atari video game. From the TFA:

That May, a group of DuPont executives gathered at the company's Wilmington headquarters to discuss the C8 issue. According to the minutes, attendees discussed recently adopted plans to cut C8 emissions at Washington Works, such as adding scrubbers to vents that spewed the chemical into the air. But they decided to scrap these initiatives. The additional expense was not "justified," the executives concluded, since it wouldn't substantially reduce the company's liability. "Liability was further defined as the incremental liability from this point on if we do nothing as we are already liable for the past 32 years of operation," the minutes read. "From a broader corporate viewpoint the costs are small."

One might think we would have learned our lessons from poisoning the world with lead, but clearly these executives never got the memo. Quite strange, given they're from the same company. I'm almost speechless at the scope of the harm and damage, knowingly and premeditatively, performed against all of humanity worldwide. The Chinese government announced today the arrests, and more than likely inevitable executions, of a score of executives and officials responsible for the Tianjin port explosions.

At what point does the harm that executives, in companies such as DuPont, meet thresholds high enough to discuss special prosecutions and the death penalty? When even China, who lacks a strong history of supporting human rights and consumer protections, recognizes that some executives and officials need to be "criminally detained" and ultimately dealt with, when can we in the so-called civilized Western societies perform the same? We've yet to even slow DuPont down.

[More after the Break]

DSM-IV Definition. Antisocial personality disorder is characterized by a lack of regard for the moral or legal standards in the local culture. There is a marked inability to get along with others or abide by societal rules. Individuals with this disorder are sometimes called psychopaths or sociopaths.

From the quote in the article (emphasis mine), can any reasonable person conclude that these executives do not need to be handed life sentences in prison at a minimum? It's not hyperbole to say that I could walk into a church, make racists statements, kill a half a dozen people, and receive a much harsher sentence than a group of executives that knowingly caused birth defects, miscarriages, cancers, among a myriad of other serious health conditions, up to and including grisly and pointless deaths. More maddeningly, to be commensurate, I would need to have children and begin a multi-generational attack on my fellow citizens to come close to what DuPont executives have done against a single community, much less the world.

It may be time to seriously, and a civilized manner, begin discussing how to bring these executives up on criminal charges, and even executing them. Especially helpful to remember in these discussions, that it is now TWICE that DuPont has knowingly poisoned the world and harmed MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS of our fellow human beings . Forget about our reputation in the world now; We're the country that has deliberately been destroying the world for profit, and all of the documents and science exist to prove it.

So.... do we need a third time from the same company before we can start talking about preventative measures and justice?


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2) by Alfred on Friday August 28 2015, @06:40PM

    by Alfred (4006) on Friday August 28 2015, @06:40PM (#229114) Journal
    Let me fix this up a little...

    ... it is now TWICE that we know of that DuPont has knowingly poisoned the world and harmed MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS of our fellow human beings.

    ... do we need to discover a third time from the same company...

    Maybe that is why I am not an Editor

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Friday August 28 2015, @07:11PM

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Friday August 28 2015, @07:11PM (#229125) Journal

    Please do volunteer to be an editor. More editors means any given editor can spend more time on a given article that's prepped for publishing to the front page.

    It's a community site that gets better the more members of the community pitch in to build it.

    --
    Washington DC delenda est.
  • (Score: 2) by edIII on Friday August 28 2015, @10:52PM

    by edIII (791) on Friday August 28 2015, @10:52PM (#229218)

    I kind of wish you were. I'm not a journalist, or a writer.

    I appreciate the help and the suggestions.

    --
    Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
    • (Score: 2) by Alfred on Monday August 31 2015, @04:17PM

      by Alfred (4006) on Monday August 31 2015, @04:17PM (#230246) Journal
      I am not a journalist or writer either but I have worked with some at a newspaper before. I never liked how they had to preface everything with "allegedly" to CYA. I don't like political correctness. These attitudes do not fit well with a conventional journalistic style guide. (If SN wanted to start a style guide that cuts crap and caters to the community that would be cool, though a lot of work.)

      Most of all I am glad you didn't take my comments the wrong way.