Yellow Vests

Who's in charge, here?

photo by Pixabay

Yellow Vests

My wife and I went on a bus tour of the western national parks, featuring Yellowstone National Park.  If you haven’t been, try to get there, and try to stay at the Old Faithful Inn.  It’s not just a nice place to stay, it’s an experience.

But that’s not what this is about.  This is about our tour guide, Bobby. And specifically, about his yellow vest. You know those vests.  Road crews wear them to make them more visible to motorists. If you encounter one of them as you drive, you do whatever they signal you to do.

But Bobby wasn’t road crew, he was a tour guide on a tour bus. So why did he have one?  THAT’S what this is about. I’m sure you’ve never thought about it, but yellow vests have no official status.  Anybody can buy one, and you can wear it wherever you like.

Here’s why Bobby had one, and why he wore it.  The Park can be very crowded.  Big buses must maneuver thru tight spaces, around multitudes of other vehicles and people.  Bobby would get out of the bus and direct the other vehicles such that his own bus could get thru.  He told us that, prior to getting a yellow vest, when he tried to direct traffic, nobody paid attention.  They knew he was there, they just didn’t care.  Ah, but the magic yellow vest!  When he started wearing it, people did as he directed!  That yellow vest gave him authority!

It's funny, when you think about what ‘authorities’ we accept, and what we don’t.  Once upon a time, a police officer in uniform was reason enough to do as directed.  Today, not as much.  Various people accept the authority of government unquestioningly, while others question all of it, all the time. I suppose there is some middle ground that is the right place to be. I keep thinking about how readily we can accept some stranger’s authority based on nothing but their yellow vest, while rejecting the authority of duly appointed officials enforcing the law. It makes sense, to a degree.  A person in a yellow vest can’t raise your taxes, he can only direct you to move your car.  Why fight him over it?  Just move the car. But an elected official?  We all know the things that they can do. Question THAT authority, all the time.

Yet, some people accept so much, based on so little. Historically, the USA has become less and less free and more and more authoritarian. We all know the story of the frog in the pan of water being brought to a boil.  Well, the water in the USA is really hot right now. At some point, it is too late for the frog.  At some point, it is too late for us. Russia may never see government by the people ever again.  Really, it never did have it.  They went straight from czars to dictators. China may never see freedom again.  Venezuela and Zimbabwe were very well off and very free.  Now, they are neither. And there is little that the citizens can do.  Honest elections are a thing of the past for therm. 

Couldn’t happen here?  It IS happening here.  Too many citizens accept the authority of people who have no inherent right to that authority.  They put on a figurative yellow vest and many instantly do as they are told.  They go whatever direction the guy in the yellow vest leads them, mindless as to where they are being led. 

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