Keystone Pipe Line Leak Spews Oil Into Kansas' Water

[immortalfrieza]

Do you consider it the fault of the passengers of the Titanic that they died?

Considering they chose to board the thing rather than countless ships available at the time under the assumption that it was unsinkable yes. The very concept of an "unsinkable ship" was idiotic from the word jump and thus should've been obvious to everyone involved something bad was going to happen sooner or later. The Upper and Middle class people of the time in particular should've been educated enough to know better and had other options available to them.

This isn't property damage. The oil is contaminating drinking water sources. What exactly do you think the residents should have done to minimize that.

Not choose to move into an area where an oil pipeline already existed. If they did, build channels and waterways to divert the water away from the pipelines to keep it from becoming contaminated. Build a water treatment plant equipped to remove oil from their water sources in case an accident did happen.

There's plenty that could've been done on both sides of the fence here.

Let's cut away the fat, all your contributions to this thread boil down to "poor people get what they deserve for being poor."
Didn't move away from the pipeline? Poor.
Moved near the pipeline? Poor, moving where they could afford.
Residents should have done more to prevent damage to their local water supply? Poor. The ways to protect the water supply are through lobbying or massive infrastructure projects.

So yeah, kindly fuck off with your oil industry apologist, anti poor, advocating.

I honestly don't know what the problem is here. How is, hypothetically I might add, taking residents to task for the consequences of their own choices being a "oil industry apologist? Absolutely nothing I've said absolves the oil industry of ANYTHING, not the accident this thread is referring to or any other. It's a complete non-sequitur. That's like being called a "NRA apologist" for pointing out that the people who got guns then didn't practice basic gun safety and shot themselves in the head as a direct result are at fault for the fact that they got shot in the head, not the people who designed or sold the guns.

At some point people have to recognize that A will lead to B, so if you choose to do A, you accept responsibility for the result when B happens. The fact that these oil companies should've taken far better measures to prevent things like this doesn't change the fact that if people decided to build their homes near an oil pipeline they had to have known that an accident was going to happen eventually and screw everyone over, yet they chose to do so anyway.

Hey everyone, it's time to start boiling your drinking water again - the water company are no longer responsible for keep the faeces out. You thought that was their job?! What are you, an idiot?!

It's more like:

#1 Person A: Doesn't get any means of boiling water because they assume an accident will never happen at the water treatment facility.
#2 Accident happened at the water treatment facility.
#3 Person A: Dies of dehydration because they can't get drinkable water/drinks contaminated water and dies of disease.

No one, ever, should assume that nothing bad can ever happen. Responsibility falls on We the People as much as it does the companies. The companies can be 100% responsible and take every possible measure that exists but if We the People just assume everything will always be hunky dory and act as such rather than taking measures on our end something bad will happen and We the People will have to suffer the consequences of our lack of action.

I'm not surprised by the reaction I'm getting though. People just do not want to take personal responsibility for anything anymore. Does anyone think that the oil company CEOs are going to accept the blame for this? No one will ever admit that they have to accept their share of the blame however large or small it might have been when something bad happens, much less actually have acted to prevent the problem.

 

[immortalfrieza]

Name 3.

Not choose to move into an area where an oil pipeline already existed. If they did, build channels and waterways to divert the water away from the pipelines to keep it from becoming contaminated. Build a water treatment plant equipped to remove oil from their water sources in case it did happen.

There you go.

 

[Baffle]

I'm not surprised by the reaction I'm getting though. People just do not want to take personal responsibility for anything anymore. Does anyone think that the oil company CEOs are going to accept the blame for this? No one will ever admit that they have to accept their share of the blame however large or small it might have been when something bad happens, much less actually have acted to prevent the problem.

Do you keep a spare boot to lick for when the boot-machine at the factory breaks down? Or just sit there tonguing the air forlornly?

 

[Elijin]

Personal responsibility? ALL your listed solutions are multi-million, or billion, dollar infrastructure projects which would require government approval. Jesus fucking christ. We get it, you hate the poor.

You're being called an apologist because you suggest things like that were the PEOPLE'S RESPONSIBILITY, not the oil companies. Not to mention you've accepted the half assed safety standards and that "spills just gonna happen bro".

Take the boot out of your mouth and consider you might have confused personal responsibility with giving billion dollar industries a free pass with your "solutions" and blame passing.

So no, the poor people who live where they can afford are not the ones responsible here.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Considering they chose to board the thing rather than countless ships available at the time under the assumption that it was unsinkable yes.

What? There wasn't some big sign saying the Titanic would sink and that other ships would not. Lots of ships other than the Titanic also sunk, people didn't know in advance which would and which would not. Now, some lines were noticeably dodgy (at least to historians in hindsight), but the Titanic was supposed not to be one. It was sheer bad luck that the maiden voyage was the last one. Most sinkable ships don't end up sinking due to maritime disaster (excepting time of war).

Not choose to move into an area where an oil pipeline already existed. If they did, build channels and waterways to divert the water away from the pipelines to keep it from becoming contaminated. Build a water treatment plant equipped to remove oil from their water sources in case an accident did happen.

If the private individuals we rich enough to build their own channels and waterways and water treatment plants in case of emergency, the pipeline wouldn't have been built there. It'd only be built if the people in the area are poor enough not to have any power.

 

[Buyetyen]

There you go.

To the first one, they were there first. The pipeline came later. So fuck off with that shit.

To the second two, with what money? Those are expensive infrastructure projects beyond the means of over 99% of the population.

 

[Silvanus]

Considering they chose to board the thing rather than countless ships available at the time under the assumption that it was unsinkable yes. The very concept of an "unsinkable ship" was idiotic from the word jump and thus should've been obvious to everyone involved something bad was going to happen sooner or later. The Upper and Middle class people of the time in particular should've been educated enough to know better and had other options available to them.

LOL

That's it, I'm out, this take is just so brazenly ridiculous.

 

[Chimpzy]

A reminder that the Keystone pipeline had somehow received special permission to run at pressures higher than allowed by agency regulations. Despite repeated warnings by federal regulators that operators aren’t doing enough to prevent corrosion and don't follow proper construction procedures. Despite over 20 spills, which have increased in both frequency and severity over its 12 year lifetime, causing a total of $111 million in property damage.

 

[Baffle]

A reminder that the Keystone pipeline had somehow received special permission to run at pressures higher than allowed by agency regulations. Despite repeated warnings by federal regulators that operators aren’t doing enough to prevent corrosion and don't follow proper construction procedures. Despite over 20 spills, which have increased in both frequency and severity over its 12 year lifetime, causing a total of $111 million in property damage.

After the first 20 spills the local residents should really have built another pipeline on the outside of the original pipleline, some sort of twin-wall system if you will. You know what they say: if you want something doing right, take on a massive infrastructure project despite being an accountant the rest of the time.

 

[Kwak]

Responsibility falls on We the People as much as it does the companies.

We The People So, that would be, The Government, the institution meant to represent that concept.

 

[davidmc1158]

I'm not surprised by the reaction I'm getting though. People just do not want to take personal responsibility for anything anymore. Does anyone think that the oil company CEOs are going to accept the blame for this? No one will ever admit that they have to accept their share of the blame however large or small it might have been when something bad happens, much less actually have acted to prevent the problem.

I hate to break it to you, but the reason you are getting the reaction here that you are is this:

Story is shared on how Native Americans, living on their tribal lands, had been attempting to fight off the building of an oil pipeline through their lands for decades, They had warned that any such pipeline would run the risk of destroying their water supply, on their tribal homelands. However, because Native Americans hold almost no political or economic power in the U.S.A., the oil companies were able to wield their economic and political influence to override the wishes of the Native Americans and skirt around safety regulations and get the pipeline built anyway. Pipeline leaks as expected and the Native Americans are left with nothing more than the ability to say "I told you this would happen, and you didn't listen."

Your reaction to this was to ask, "Well how much blame do the Native Americans deserve in all of this? Obviously, they fucked up somehow and should be held accountable!"

You have attempted to qualify the statement in later posts, but the fact remains, YOU injected the idea that the local aboriginal peoples who were shat on, kicked aside politically and had their legal rights gutted somehow needed to be blamed for what happened. You stepped in the pile of shit, immortalfrieza, and now seem to be complaining that others have noted how badly your shoe smells.

 

[Asita]

Considering they chose to board the thing rather than countless ships available at the time under the assumption that it was unsinkable yes. The very concept of an "unsinkable ship" was idiotic from the word jump and thus should've been obvious to everyone involved something bad was going to happen sooner or later. The Upper and Middle class people of the time in particular should've been educated enough to know better and had other options available to them.

While the Titanic was touted as unsinkable (a product of it having design innovations - albeit flawed - that were supposed to let it seal off breaches more effectively than its peers), to claim that the passengers were at fault for their deaths because such a claim was tempting fate is as pretentious and asinine as it is spiteful. It's the exact same logic as saying that any given plane crash victim is at fault for their own demise on the grounds that they shouldn't have believed that commercial airliners are one of the safer forms of long distance transit.

It's pure hindsight bias wherein you're saying - coming from a time when the now-historical disaster is common knowledge - that the people from before that disaster should have seen it coming and therefore have nobody to blame but themselves.

 

[Kwak]

Libertarianism's a hell of a drug.

 

[Chimpzy]

I hate to break it to you, but the reason you are getting the reaction here that you are is this:

Story is shared on how Native Americans, living on their tribal lands, had been attempting to fight off the building of an oil pipeline through their lands for decades, They had warned that any such pipeline would run the risk of destroying their water supply, on their tribal homelands. However, because Native Americans hold almost no political or economic power in the U.S.A., the oil companies were able to wield their economic and political influence to override the wishes of the Native Americans and skirt around safety regulations and get the pipeline built anyway. Pipeline leaks as expected and the Native Americans are left with nothing more than the ability to say "I told you this would happen, and you didn't listen."

Your reaction to this was to ask, "Well how much blame do the Native Americans deserve in all of this? Obviously, they fucked up somehow and should be held accountable!"

You have attempted to qualify the statement in later posts, but the fact remains, YOU injected the idea that the local aboriginal peoples who were shat on, kicked aside politically and had their legal rights gutted somehow needed to be blamed for what happened. You stepped in the pile of shit, immortalfrieza, and now seem to be complaining that others have noted how badly your shoe smells.

The native people from Standing Rock Indian Reservation would not have any blame for this particular Keystone pipeline leak by default, because it happened in Kansas, and Standing Rock is in South Dakota, at least 400 miles further north. The pipeline the natives protested was a different pipeline, the Dakota Access Pipeline.

They are unaffected this spill aside from confirming their fears and letting them say 'told you so"

Not so for the (most likely white) people living near the spill who now have to worry about the possibility of their drinking water and the farms they make their livelihood from getting contaminated, despite being there first, and which might take months or even years to fully clean, because cleaning oil spills is a *****.

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Hey everyone, it's time to start boiling your drinking water again - the water company are no longer responsible for keep the faeces out. You thought that was their job?! What are you, an idiot?!

*looks at 50,000l rainwater set up* Nah, I'm good as long as no one decides to shit in the tanks.

 

[Baffle]

*looks at 50,000l rainwater set up* Nah, I'm good as long as no one decides to shit in the tanks.

Yeah, but who's fault would it be if someone did, really?

 

[RhombusHatesYou]

Yeah, but who's fault would it be if someone did, really?

*grabs shovel, tarp and bag of quicklime* No one's. Nothing happened. What are you even talking about? Now excuse me but I've got to go for a bit of a drive.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Responsibility falls on We the People as much as it does the companies.

We the People, as in the citizenry, do not have the time, the expertise, or the money to all protect ourselves from every last corporate fuckup. That's why we have a government which creates regulations, as well as a legal system that punishes companies for their fuckups.

Your "you should have known how to test your daughter's doll for asbestos powder" stance would lead to societal paralysis, financial ruin and mass deaths.

 

[Chimpzy]

We the People, as in the citizenry, do not have the time, the expertise, or the money to all protect ourselves from every last corporate fuckup. That's why we have a government which creates regulations, as well as a legal system that punishes companies for their fuckups.

That's the rub, innit? Remember when I said the Keystone pipeline has had 20+ spill incidents? Owner TC Energy was punished for that. With fines. For a total of €300 000. The agencies tasked with enforcing what little regulation exists have no teeth. The companies lobbied the government long and hard to ensure that. The Trump admin in particular stripped a lot of regulations and protections pertaining to oil/gas/coal.

It's why this shit keeps happening. Petrochemical companies don't care, because they don't have to.

 

[immortalfrieza]

We the People, as in the citizenry, do not have the time, the expertise, or the money to all protect ourselves from every last corporate fuckup. That's why we have a government which creates regulations, as well as a legal system that punishes companies for their fuckups.

Your "you should have known how to test your daughter's doll for asbestos powder" stance would lead to societal paralysis, financial ruin and mass deaths.

Since I do have personal responsibility I will admit this: I should've known better than to actually look at this from a objective viewpoint. I should've just gone along with the narrative of everybody else and blamed the corporations 100% for absolutely everything.

Accidents do not always happen to everything that has ever been run by human hands in the history of mankind. No one aside from the corporations is culpable for this or any other accident that has ever happened. No one else besides the corporations can or should do anything to reduce or completely mitigate the damage of accidents like this one before they happen. We the People in particular are completely helpless to take any action whatsoever so we shouldn't bother to. We should just trust that a corporation only concerned with it's profits and a government that has never given a crap what the People want or even need and never will has their best interests at heart.

There, now I've fallen in line.