Gross Stupidity? If this guy was unable to pay a bill or make a phone call then he is not capable of living on his own. My point was not that he deserved to die for this. My point was that it wasn't the power company who failed, it is society that failed.
As far as public utilities being regulated by the public, that is a laugh. They are regulated by the government. This is not exactly the same. I'm sure the power company followed every requirement set by the "public utilities commision" for turning off somebody's power before they did so. Maybe the people responsible for setting up the steps for shutting of somebody's power should be brought up on manslaughter charges. They don't shut it off because you missed one payment. They don't even require payment in full to keep the power on. There are safeguards in place to keep things like this from happening, yet a man is still dead.
Everybody always wants to place blame, find a scapegoat. It makes us feel better. It isn't just the power company's fault. However it is easy to look at this big corporation and say "shame on you". Its easy to say somebody at that company should be punished for this mans death. In the end, nothing has changed. The real problem here is why somebody, unable to use conventional means of participating in society, is living by himself? Online banking is fairly new, checking accounts are not. E-mail is fairly new. Phones, not so much. There is nothing new about paying bills.
If your car runs out of gas on some railroad tracks, and a train hits you because you are waiting for somebody (who you haven't asked) to bring you gas, you took your own life. You could blame the people who drove by and didn't pull you out of your car, you could blame the gas station for not selling you enough gas to make it across the tracks. you could blame the train conductor. If you don't have enough sense to get out of the car when the train is coming, what the hell were you doing driving in the first place?
The idea of comparing what happened to this man and running out of gas, getting hit by a train, etc is ridiculous.
The cold hard facts of the matter has been and still is staring us right in the face.
The man had unpaid bills.True.BUT, as has been established by wiser heads than ours, the electric company had the SOLE ability to establish contact with the man before shutting of his power. The neighbors, the community, etc had no way of knowing that fateful morning that the power was to be shut off, thereby sealing his fate to a certain death.
By shutting off his power in sub-zero temperatures, the electric company failexd to implement a simple and effect safeguard. Warn the man in person that he now faces the temperatures of mother nature unaided by electricity.
Here again, the electric company made the SOLE decision to cut the power.
If you want to compare a train accident to a freezing, then establish the same principles. If the train had the capacity to stop, but did not feeling that the crossing was adequatly marked, and therefore he shouldnt be there to begin with, and then proceeded to run someone over.
Then you would have a fair comparrison.
Do I believe that justice should be sought for this man?Yes I do, but not for the reasons that you may assume.
History has taught us that corporations and often people in general only change their behaviour when they are delt with in a serious manner. I truly believe that if this had not been brought to a national level, then the electric company would not make any effort to change their ways. After all, if they had placed human life above profits, they would have never turned off the power in the middle of winter to begin with.
The electric company should be charged with a crime, not as punishment, but as a way to make them change their policies.
It is truly saddening to me to see this constant barrage of negative attitudes towards this topic. A man died only because of an uncarrying public utility, driven by one thing only.
The almighty dollar.
opcorn:
