Accountability: Part I

The word accountability has nearly faded into the dust of the American culture. The meaning of the word itself, it seems, has died from the sword.

There are certain people in our lives that we are inherently expected to hold ourselves accountable to:  parents, teachers, spouses, and peers in positions of authority in the workplace as a few examples. However, accountability has fallen like that of an avalanche of snow from the highest peak of human imagination.

One may ask, as I do, "How did this happen?" And even further, "At what point did this happen?"

For many of you reading this, you would agree that it is not a problem in understanding the meaning of the word. Our parents understood; for certain our grandparents understood, but the reality remains that accountability has drifted far into the vast ocean toward becoming abolition, generation by generation.

The "millennial" generation is a perfect example. I readily admit that some of Generation "X" and even some people in Generation "Y" fall into this category, but by-and-large, the current generation is completely oblivious to the idea of accountability.

If the larger majority for Generation "X" and Generation "Y" were labeled, one might say they appropriately fall into the category represented by the acronym "WIIFM," better known as "What's in it for me?" Millennials might as well be called Generation "E," or Generation "Entitlement." Technology is partly to blame, but the brunt of the problem to the death of accountability falls squarely on the shoulders of parents.

In Asian culture, it is unacceptable to, and not even an option, to disrespect or defy your parents. Their word is gospel. Their words are not to be challenged. They are the ultimate authority. And if there are grandparents in the household, the same rule of hierarchy follows. They are the ones with the "trump card." Husband over wife. "It is what it is," so they say.

Personally, I would like to see a one-hundred and eighty degree shift. There is no reason not to return to the philosophy where accountability is the rule as opposed to the exception, prevalent, followed and inherently understood by all. That being said, "No man is an island." It will take a dramatic and drastic shift in perspective for any small, much less monumental, shift to occur. Perhaps if all people were separated simultaneously, at all the earth's fault lines by a swift and ferocious quake it might help; or perhaps even dramatic separation renders the idea of accountability a "pipe dream."

The question becomes, "Are we too far gone to return to, and embrace accountability?"