Imagine a situation where two people are supposed to contribute to something, for instance cleaning an area, every other weekend. Person A is very committed to doing their turn though they are not fond of the job any more than the other person. Person A has a ton of work over the week and still conscientiously remembers their turn and does it to the best of their ability. Person B appears to be clearly doing a show of the job. For instance, they might do a bit of hoovering so people can hear they did something but nothing more. They leave out a lot of aspects, and even frequently forget their turn. This is another sign that they don’t particularly care or take their turn seriously. When they forget their turn altogether, they don’t bring this up at all. The only reason one knows is that one doesn’t even hear the hoovering which is the only indication they even bothered with it. The area never looks any cleaner when they are done. Once Person A did happen to mention that the cleaning was missed when it occurred the second alternate weekend in a row. Person B instead of being apologetic seemed to be offended. Person A also did not like the bad air this generated in general and has since tried to simply digest things the way they are.

Now, this state of affairs rankles Person A quite a bit. I am not entirely sure it should nor am I entirely sure it shouldn’t. On the one hand, I feel like if I want to do my duty or my bit of work then I should just do it. It shouldn’t matter to me if others do their bit or not. One the other hand, it annoys me no end that others can shirk their responsibility so easily and they face no consequences for their actions or lack of. Then again I feel that perhaps they are people who would have happily lived in a state of disarray and if I care more than them for the job getting done, then perhaps I should just do it for my own sake. But, on the other hand, if nobody did anything ever that would eventually lead to a point where something would certainly need to be done, and by doing my bit I was avoiding the situation ever reaching that head. In other words, they are benefitting from my diligence instead of getting penalized for not being responsible enough.

I have been wondering, taking this example to a more general level, that a lot of people tend to coast through life without following through their commitments or by doing shoddy jobs or not taking up their responsibilities. And I guess that is what bothers me because fundamentally I want to live in a world where people who do show up and do what they do to keep the whole system running instead of collapsing are rewarded. However, it seems to me that that is not really the case. There is too much randomness and chaos in the world and it’s quite likely that the responsibility shirkers actually manage to live a rather happy-go-lucky life completely oblivious to the annoyance of everyone who bear the brunt of their irresponsibility. It makes me sad that this might well be the case. I suppose the other, more positive, way of thinking about this is that one is responsible or conscientious because that’s who one is. Maybe one will be rewarded or maybe one will not… but one is what one is because one cannot be otherwise… and as I have said on so many posts, virtue must ultimately be its own reward.

Be that as it may, I will be out of this rota very soon so that's a comforting thought :)