I agree with Tootsie on the dog. I live in a big city and I rarely leave my dog tied up to anything though she’s a big, tough looking thing (it’s just the look, she’s masking her inner scaredy cat) for more than 2 or 3 minutes at a time. If she’s somewhere that I can’t see her I get antsy. When we travel I do occasionally have to leave her in the car so I roll down as many windows as possible to the extent she can get air without being tempted to jump out, make my trip to the rest area bathroom at a run and again, try for a spot where I can see her as much as possible. From the way this guy left the dog in the car with the windows down I can surmise that he figured a dog would be a theft deterrent device. If the dog is deterrent enough to keep the car from being stolen then he’s deterrent enough to keep himself (or herself) from being stolen, too, and could therefore have been tied up outside and the car safely locked and turned off.

I submit that this guy is probably not only not much of a citizen of earth he’s likely not much of a dog owner either. He’s not alone. Maybe it was just a one time deal for him, who knows, and it doesn’t really matter. He happened to be in a place where someone saw him and used him as an example of a whole slew of mindless behavior that we’re all seeing. He’s just one little man and maybe he can’t stand up under all that weight but on the other hand by giving himself up as an example for Aaryn’s post this great discussion and hopefully for the change of just a few more people he is perhaps offsetting his galumphing carbon footprint from the other day. I often feel hopeless about our progress but I still think every person counts.

I also think he’s damn lucky she didn’t post his name or at least his license plate number.

With due respect, I think your whole argument misses the overarching point (though in a sincere and thoughtful way, I should add). Yes, we never really know what’s going on in other people’s heads or hearts. To prejudge someone based on the ephemeral data we collect on the street is risky and potentially misleading indeed

But let’s at least differentiate between “gray” behaviors and “black-and-white” behaviors. If the woman in the grocery store cuts you off in the frozen food aisle and gives you a snotty look, maybe she’s just a shrew and behaves like that as a rule. Then again, maybe she’s been demoted at work and her husband forgot their wedding anniversary. Should we cut her a break? Sure, I’ll go with that.

Yet clearly there are behaviors that don’t require much interpretation: A father slapping his four-year-old child at the mall. A guy throwing a McDonald’s bag out of a moving car. A perfectly healthy woman parking in a handicapped parking space (with no plate, no tags). Susan, how much more information would you need to reach a moral decision in these cases? Is every human action subject to interpretation? Can’t bad behavior just be … bad behavior?

The gentleman in Aaryn’s original post left a car idling for at *least* 32 minutes. It could’ve been 40 minutes. Or an hour. We’ll never know. I do know this: there’s no justification for leaving a car idling for 32 minutes. Are there are reasons to do so? Sure. But there are no justifications.

Susan, I agree with your implicit premise that we should focus more on setting high standards for ourselves than on judging the people around us. All meaningful change, even on a societal scale, comes from within. That doesn’t mean that peers and neighbors and, yes, total strangers can’t provide a valuable stimulus for the rest of us. Again, let’s look at the civil rights movement. Much of the progress in the ’60s was due to conscientious whites standing up and saying, “Enough. I will not by my inaction enable the continuation of a system that treats black Americans as second-class citizens.”

Aaryn is a modern-day Howard Beale, railing in her own unique way (via admittedly tough language) that she’s mad as hell and she’s not going to take it anymore. Hers is one of many voices we need in a healthy, evolving society. Some voices are thoughtful, others provocative, still others incendiary. When combined, they are the roar of the engine of change, which while not always pretty, is the engine that allows America to continually reinvent itself.

As George Bernard Shaw once said. “Progress depends on the unreasonable man.”

All of this is just my windy way of saying: Let’s not be afraid to step on a few toes where the future health of our nation is concerned.

I understand this is a column and you are voicing your opinions here. I do hope their is a fair amount of drama added to make your point.

Though I understand the outrage; the hostility and hatred emanating from your words is a little concerning. I would dare say that spewing hatefulness upon our Mother Earth is another poison we could all do without.

It’s amazing what we justify in our little worlds to make us feel better about ourselves. The security guard is wrong to leave her car running while she’s not in the car and is sitting someplace flipping through a magazine! The irony, of course, is that she left her running vehicle in the breezeway of your country club locker room where all the ladies who lunch could choke on her fumes after being served clean towels by the only brown people in that town. That alone seems like a little poetic justice.

The thing is, her car would cool off again once she finishes her reading and restarts it. 110 degree temperatures in the desert is a handy excuse but remember, those kinds of temperatures are only going to get hotter with global warming and your security guard (and the guy I refer to) are extra helpful in making sure that the damage done to our planet is irreversible.

Of course, the security guard is a blue collar gal, probably making minimum wage or barely above it, subsisting on far less than you or I are accustomed to. While she protects your gated community, I’d wager to guess that putting food on her family’s table is the more immediate concern than is her carbon footprint. Change always begins with the wealthy and educated, and that means you and me and the BMW driver, Susan (going out on a limb to assume he’s educated). Which is what I’m talking about: Changing our behavior until that behavior becomes the socially accepted norm.

I’m keeping the windows (which are not low-e, unfortunately, I cannot afford that) in my glass house as clean as possible, Susan. What about you?

One day I posted on my blog that our nation should re-institute the 55mph speed limit. A commenter said she would drive 65 and I could drive 45 and we’d have it covered.

Don’t you know it is always somebody else’s job to to the right thing?

Oh, yeah, this idling thing is rampant in Florida, and it seems it is always large vehicles. Idiots.

The guard was sitting in the locker room, flipping through a magazine. Was she on her break? Was it a 5-minute break, 10 minutes, 30 minutes? Or did she just sit down for a second to rest, and I happened to walk in at that moment? I don’t know and I’m not going to ask.

For me to jump to the conclusion that she’s doing the wrong thing is just… wrong. I’m not her parent, her boss, her teacher or her moral compass. She’s an adult. I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she’s capable of making reasonable decisions. Better that I should pay attention to the things within my control: turning off the water, shutting off the light, making some small talk to acknowledge these actions, and setting a good example.

I remember Aaryn’s story about a woman who drove recklessly in order to get her child to the hospital. We don’t know what’s going on in other people’s lives. We don’t have all the information, and to assume we do is arrogant. No-one appointed us the Social Police. Let’s clean the low-e windows in our own glass houses before critiquing everybody else.

On the car thing, it can be a little bit hard sometimes with the kiddos. We just got a car and it was wayyy tougher to find something that fit the twins and their stroller than I thought it would be. BK (before kids) my Passat was my idea of a dream car. But the *&)_ stoller (the narrowest double one out there) didn’t come close to fitting in the trunk. We searched high and low and wound up with something, while smaller than a minivan and SUV, is still bigger than that with which I am comfortable. I call it my guiltmobile.