Inter-Galactic Memo
To: All Personnel
Fr: W. Leavitt
Re: A New Sensibility
8-6-2010

We drove over to a big, brand new Good Will store today (yes, we shop at thrift stores) and we saw two reserved parking spaces we had never seen before. They were not for handicapped cars, (I think it’s irresponsible to let handicapped cars on the road anyway) instead, they were for environmentally aware cars-slash-people. The ink was green, and it said:

Preferred Parking
Parking for Environmentally Friendly and/or fuel efficient vehicles only.

Took me completely by surprise. But it did elicit one or two questions. Like . . . who decides which vehicles are friendly to the environment? What is the minimum allowable level of friendliness? And what is the criteria (if any) for fuel-efficiency in this particular parking lot?

I did not see an attendant standing by to offer helpful consultation as to who might qualify for these coveted spots, so close to the entrance to a thrift store. I did not see a list of acceptable makes and models, which would have been helpful. Nor did I see a comprehensive list of attributes and characteristics which would render a given person acceptable.

We were driving a 2007 Dodge Grand Caravan. It has a six cylinder engine and gets around 20 MPG. I doubt that would qualify. But we had 6 people in it, which brings passenger MPG up to 120. Do you suppose that would qualify?

I didn’t really want to park in one of the spaces anyway, because I can’t think of anything more pretentious and disingenuous than setting aside parking places for such meaningless, unquantifiable reasons. I mean, think about it—there is no discernable criteria involved in the message. As close as anyone could get is something like; “If you think of yourself as an environmentalist, or if you drive a hybrid, or electric car, or gas or diesel engine that gets pretty good mileage, or if you really like trees and clean air, or if you believe in Gaia, or are maybe pagan—but only the good kind—or you think the stock holders of BP should be taken out and shot, or you liked “Free Willy”, or “Ferngully”, or are really sad about Katrina, or think Obama and Biden are doing enough for the planet, or you believe in only wearing natural fibers, or are a vegan, or . . . well, you get the picture. All of the above please feel free to petition for an environmental parking space. (Hey, shouldn’t such a space be grass, rather than paved? And if it is grass, should anyone really be driving on it?)

Here’s what bothers me about this. Someone had to have had the idea to do this, and their internal censor must have actually let it pass. Not only that, they had to have talked to someone else about it, and everyone had to have agreed it was a good idea—not in the sense that there was any kind of reasoning for it—because clearly, as written, there was not—but because it would make everyone involved in creating the policy “feel good” about themselves, as well as whoever decided to park in a space. It’s all about feeling good these days. Remember when it was about being good, or doing good? Now . . . all we gotta do is feel good, and we’re part of the in crowd.
I saw this happen in the public schools too. For years the growing focus was on kids feeling good, until finally, every minute of instruction time was geared towards the students “feeling good” about themselves, until there was no academic rigor left, no scholarship, no sense of achievement—no need in a world where feeling good about oneself is the ultimate goal.
And now we can do it while we park our cars. Feel special. Feel exclusive. As long as we are kowtowing to the PC world of the newest sensation, the latest craze . . . the self-esteem addict.
It’s a brave new world boys and girls.