Maxwell's Silver Hammer

It's Thor's Day in the blog, and today Thor is wielding Maxwell's silver hammer, that pretty little tool Paul McCartney evidently used to symbolize "when something goes wrong out of the blue."

Earthquakes themselves may come out of the blue, out of the deep blue ocean and out of the earth's multicolored crust, in the natural course of events.

But nuclear disasters have a manmade component. We always have another choice. I won't get into arguments here about energy sources, but, as the human community, we always have choices on how to generate and use energy. We can choose to close down nuclear power plants, as Germany did. We can choose better safety regulations and oversight agencies for existing plants, as the United States recently didn't. We can choose to build no more. We can choose to use less energy, and/or to make more efficient use of energy.

We can choose to put human energy into innovations that do not harm the land and its creatures, including us humans. So often, "we" don't make that choice, and "we" know perfectly well why.

I won't speak for anyone else, but I will vote and act according to my choices on this. And I hope we will come together at least as far as 1) helping Japan 2) changing our practices enough to avoid similar disasters in the future. You can choose your own charity or private/public action.

My dad was laying out his ethical system (again) when I visited him Monday, and it is based on choice. (I grew up on this.) Any government or individual or boss that takes all choice away from its citizens, fellow individuals, or employees is using its power unethically in my interpretation of my dad's system. Working out the details and complexities is important, of course, but you can easily see that the boss taking away the employees' collective bargaining option is unethical in this system, and you can see from protests in the U.S. that many workers agree.

I stopped watching 24 for many reasons, but mostly because Kiefer Sutherland kept saying, "I had no choice" to justify doing whatever he wanted to do. (He had a choice, and he made it. Why say he didn't?) I kept watching the original Star Trek for many reasons, but partly because Captain Kirk kept insisting there was another choice, even in a really tough spot.

And, hey, just because stuff went wrong out of the blue for Maxwell doesn't mean he should bang other people on the head with his silver hammer.

You can hear or read this fabulous poem, "The Beatles," by Dorianne Laux, at The Writer's Almanac.

If you want to see Steve Martin as Maxwell Edison, crazed plastic surgeon from the film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, starring the Bee Gees and Peter Frampton, there are many clips to choose from at Youtube.

And I don't think it's right to be a serial killer, but I am fascinated by Dexter, who is trying to work out his own, er, ethical system. Maybe someday he will put away his silver tools for good.