"It Ain't My Fault !"

         "Responsibility" . . . now, there's a BIG word  whose application  seems to be largely absent in contemporary American society.  "Credit" ? Now, that's another matter altogether. 

    Two of President Harry Truman's observations capture the distinction:  For 'Credit": "It is amazing what you can accomplish if you don't care who gets the credit." "Responsibility": "The buck stops here", the motto that he kept on his desk while President.

    While on these 'big words', here is another similar one : "Accountability".

    When the Holy One asked  'Adam' why he had eaten the forbidden fruit, he answered that 'the woman you gave me caused me to do it.'  When given the opportunity to own responsibility for her part of the drama, she answered that she had acted at the urging of 'the snake'.  At that point, the serpent 'didn't have a leg to stand on'.  The comedian Flip Wilson drew laughs with his line: "the devil made me do it !'

   'Pass the buck' of accountability or responsibility to someone else is a  frequently sung song with a long history.  As an example, listen to "Gee,  Officer Krupke !" from West Side Story. And, we all do (have done) it.  There just seems to be an overabundance of the trait these days throughout our society, beginning with the institutions that ostensibly promote the common good: the worlds of politics, institutional religion, education, health care,  justice, and on it goes.

    Decades ago when I was in grammar grades, our school had weekly assemblies in the auditorium.  Often the 'program' was a local clergyperson urging some moralistic platitude, all long since forgotten . . . except one:  Our Methodist minister told a story in which someone acknowledged their culpability and clearly said, "I was wrong."  Then Mr. Walton invited us to repeat, "I was wrong." When we had done that, he noted something to the effect that having said that  'didn't break your jaw', which I understood to mean we can survive honestly accepting responsibility for our behavior.

  "It's his (her) fault!"; "You are the one to blame !" ; "You think I'm bad? Just look at my predecessor!"  This all seems too much a part  of news reports these days.  On the other hand, "Let's work together for peace, justice, respect, etc " gets crowded out by the push of weak egos searching for public applause to 'make themselves look good' by getting the credit which rightfully belongs  elsewhere.

   The late Rabbi Edwin Freidman excelled as a psychotherapist and teacher.  His definition of maturity:  "The capacity to take responsibility for one's own emotional processes and behaviors."
God, give us more adults . . . beginning with me.

    Satchel