The Lost Art of Accountability

Uninspired and unapologetic. A place where one person can not succeed without the bluntness of the naysayers raining down almost immediately . A place where your opinion is often crushed by the critics that for whatever reason always seem to know more then you. A place where people do what is wrong even if what is right is staring them square in the face, and then ask themselves the question “what am I doing wrong?”

We have been conditioned to think a certain way, a selfish way, but it wasn’t always like that. As a society we marvel at the superstar athlete who keeps bringing home the championships and disregard all the other ones that work just as hard as the champion, but never end up with the same results . What happens when that same superstar stops bringing the championships home? We immediately cast them to side to be forgotten and swear our allegiance was always with the next best thing. Why? Why isn’t a “bandwagoner” held accountable for things they say or ways they react? What is it that one feels they gain from such behavior? Why can’t somebody you once knew (or anybody for that matter ) actually be able to succeed in their life and have your best wishes instead of your envious resentment? Is it that hard to believe that that person in question just happens to work harder than you, and always has throughout their life? Accountability for oneself is a long lost art, and the problems that come with that are now spilling out into this generation, and it’s scary at times to witness.

We as people have to be accountable for ourselves and held accountable for our own thoughts and actions. I’ve always been so curious as to why a person is told over and over the consequence of an action and still manage to perform like center stage in a broadway musical. Why are we so selfish in the way we carry ourselves? We are not being held accountable, that’s why.

For over 40 years (January 11, 1964 was the first report by Luther. Terry, M.D.) the U.S Public Health surgeon general has warned us about the dangers that come with smoking tobacco long term. No matter how grave (literally) the heavily researched warnings are, it never matters in the moment. 264 billion cigarettes were sold in 2015, about the same as in 2014. In my local state the price for a pack has gone up, I remember talking to a friend that smokes about it and this was his thought process about the price hike “ It won’t stop me , gas (prices) go up all the time and we still pay for it, it’s something that people need”. Accountability.

We watch the commercials, see the ads and here the story of why being distracted while operating a motor vehicle can have deadly implications. Do you think that changes anything? According to madd.com In 2014, 9,967 people died in drunk driving crashes — one every 53 minutes — and 290,000 were injured in drunk driving crashes. Now take a look at these scary statistics, it’s not just drinking. 11 teens die every day as a result of texting while driving. According to a AAA poll, 94% of teen drivers acknowledge the dangers of texting and driving, but 35% admitted to doing it anyway. 21% of teen drivers involved in fatal accidents were distracted by their cell phones. Let’s not even bring up the fact that as a society we know the importance of wearing a seatbelt, that it can save your life, but yet the majority don’t seem to care to wear it. Accountability.

As a former three-hundred pound individual I can go on about the trials a person with obesity has to contend with in life. Health care cost sky rockets, increase chance of Diabetes, hypertension even the Socioeconomics of an obese person’s life is highly affected. According to Stateofobesity.org Individuals with lower income and/or education levels are disproportionately more likely to be obese. It goes on to state more than 33 percent of adults who earn less than $15,000 per year are obese, compared with 24.6 percent of those who earned at least $50,000 per year. Obesity in Latino males once was 15.7 percent in 1980 and now sits at a staggering 40.1 percent today, as a latino male that stat hits close to home. Around 17 percent of children and more than 30 percent of adults are currently considered obese. With an estimated 324 million people in the U.S, that breaks down to close to 56 million children and 97 million adults respectively that are obese. Accountability.

This brings me to my final example and arguably the most important one, the police. According to The Washington Post in 2015 965 people were fatally shot by police officers, 564 were armed with a gun, 281 were armed with another weapon and 90 were unarmed. Those numbers would lead me to assume that more than half the time the victim was armed and probably expressing lethal force towards an officer or an innocent bystander- in those cases the officer was absolutely doing there job. However we are speaking on the topic of people’s actions and consequences here. Let me clear the “race card” before I continue here and play devil’s advocate, in a New York Times article it was reported that 49 percent of those killed by officers from May 2013 to April 2015 were White, 30 percent were Black, and 19 percent were Hispanic. It’s not just black people, unfortunately some of the most publicised cases happen to be. For the sake of speaking on society taking blame for their actions, let me continue. Alton Sterling , Philando Castile, Eric Garner even further back Amadou Diallo (and so many more), Why were the officers involved (all were acquitted) not held to a higher standard as our protectors? How can these situations with police officers and any civilian encounter; white, black, hispanic etc be avoided in the future? You guessed it Accountability.

If a person or group is not held accountable for their actions it doesn’t present the opportunity for the learning experience. The learning experience that is needed to power the ability to change in life. In the bigger scale of things accountability is the grease needed to get the gears moving in people believing in each other again, achieving again. I gave a handful of everyday examples backed by statistics to show how accountability for oneself is a lost art. People would rather die in the long run then have to work a little harder to change there mindstate, that is apparent by smoking cigarettes and obesity. The thought that a person would pretty much drive around blind folded putting themselves, their loved ones and innocent lives in peril danger for something as unimportant as a text message or a few extra drinks always boggles my mind. A police department(s) that would rather hundreds of people to gather in protest (sometimes violent) instead of holding a few obviously (video) -in the wrong- police officers accountable for taking an innocent civilians life, the same civilians they took an oath to protect.

If you hate a certain athlete for certain things such as what team they play for or championships they win it’s probably because of envy. I mean think about it, you don’t even know these people. If you scroll through your social feed and applaud people’s downfalls and ignore and gripe people’s achievements you’re most likely bitter and envious. There’s a reason you feel those emotions whether you want to believe so or not. I’m going to bet somewhere along the line you lost all accountability for what you do from minute to minute, from day to day and eventually snowballed from year to year. You just don’t care anymore, and that is poison.

So I pose a challenge to anybody reading this. Whether you are one of the examples above or not, from this day forward hold everyone you interact with in your day accountable for their actions, whether big or small. Most importantly hold yourself to the standards and accountability at the very best you are capable of and you will find that your life will positively change. Start with the small changes because they will undoubtedly lead to the big ones. You will gain patience, good health, longevity and success to name a few but most importantly you will care again… care for yourself , your loved ones, and your peers and that in part will make this world a much better , safer place to live.

With the return of the long lost art of accountability our children will live in a better space than the one we currently find ourselves in, just the thought of that alone puts my mind at ease.

Written by Jose A. Burgos