The Denial Disease

Wikipedia actually has a page dedicated to, “Denial.” The simple definition of denial is the disbelief in the existence or reality of a thing (like oil). Kind of reminds me of that Shaggy song, where he got caught butt naked, banging the girl next door, on the bathroom floor. But he continues to stick to his story, by constantly repeating, “It wasn’t me,” to his girlfriend.

A second type of denial is minimisation. That’s where one might admit a fact, but deny the seriousness.  The third is a the kind of denial where the subject admits both the fact and serousness of a given situation, but denies the responsibility, called projection. Thus, denial is a negative characteristic.

Addicts are a consequence of denial. It plays an important role in recovery, via the twelve-step program. And the American Heart Association blames the delayed treatment of heart attacks on denial. Furthermore, the first of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grieving is denial; then anger, bargaining, depression and finally acceptance. So you see, even victims are not immune to the disease of denial.

But when your self-preserving denial begins to cost innocent people their health - I call it lying! What happened to the Gulf of Mexico hinders on the unforgivable. Not simply because it happened, but because of how the general population behaved afterwards. They were way more concerned with how many tourist weren’t on the beach, instead of how many were on the beach. The oil spill itself tore apart at my very soul; the beach stank, it was gnarly, and there was nothing natural about it. I have lived the five stages of the grieving process. Moving well past denial and into acceptance.

Fact: the oil is still here. It is not safe to swim in Gulf, due to the dousing of toxic dispersants, as well as Corexit. Where there is oil, there is a lethal dispersant of some sort. That’s what makes the oil sink.  There are oil matts along the shoreline of the Gulf Coast. And there are toxic pockets throughout Pensacola Bay, as reported by Marine Biologist, Heather Reed to The Pensacola League of Women Voters, on May 7, 2011. Although there are different types of crude and a variety of toxicities attached to each, what Heather Reed describes coincides with what Dr. Riki Ott (Exxon Valdez Spill in Alaska) describes in her book, Sound Truth and Corporate Myth$, at page 243: “Without oxygen, the oil had not weathered and it still contained measurable levels of PAHs - over four parts per million in the mussel tissues and ten times that in the underlying sediments.”

Ott also warns the word “Weathered,” is often used, by the industry, to downplay the toxicity of oil that is still harmful. And as I mentioned in my blog before, Dr. Ott reported the highest concentrations of PAHs were found, “at the waters edge at the lowest reach of the tides,” adding, “the residual oil in the intertidal sediments was potent enough to kill test animals for two years” (at page 195).

Now tell me, with the “Facts,” that I just presented to you, do you truly believe it’s safe to swim along our coast line here in Pensacola? It seems to me, if you support tourism in this area of the Gulf, and you continue to tell people it’s ok to eat the fish, and swim our waters, or sit silently by and allow this sick behavior of greed to continue, then you are contributing to the deaths of thousands of people, and you are no different than the Germans who allowed Hitler to rule.

Be Real! You live with dis-ease when you deny, lie and pretend. Only when we accept the truth can we begin to heal ourselves, as well as the Gulf of Mexico. The truth being, she needs our help, not our denial.

VIDEO POSTED MAY 7, 2011: