BIWT

“Because I wanted to.”

In my family, that is one of the most common answers to the question:

“Why did you do that?”

“Because I wanted to.”

Here we are, legally landlocked. Our little neighborhood is cut off through the actions of the very people you’d expect to be devoted to preserving our lives, not ruining them. Why have the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, California Department of Fish and Game, and Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy blocked our community’s legal access to the world, while our own Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich stands by pronouncing that there is nothing he can do? They are not telling—not in a believable way. But we know.

Why are the people who run Metrolink, Fish and Game, and the conservancy working together to render our property worthless?

Because they want to.

The explanation that my own two little girls have given me over the years, and sometimes even my own grown up wife—“Because I wanted to”—really says it all. My girls’ explanation is a non-explanation, but is really the only true one. “Because I wanted to,” augmented by an examination into just what she gets out of her actions, tells more than she wants to admit. It tells that her bottom-line motivation is selfishness.

And don’t give me that hogwash that every action is at bottom selfish, or that we do good just to make our own selves feel good. That may be—very trivially—true; but there is such a thing as good and evil. You know it, I know it, my girls know it, even Michael Antonovich, the SCRRA, Fish and Game—and even Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy knows it!

It’s just that they calculate to gain more out of selfishness than they stand to lose feeling crappy about themselves. We don’t know what they calculate to gain. They won’t say, but it must be of more value to them than right action.

Personally I hope I am a healthier human being than that. And I imagine that I am in that regard much closer to average than public officials are. The degree of crappy I would feel for ruining the property values of a dozen families is much greater than almost any monetary gain.

Do you wonder where you stand between selfish gain and right action? Aren't you just a little tempted to dash off an email or note to Michael Antonovich or your favorite legislator or the newspaper, or us?

There is another non-explanation for dirty behavior: “Because I can.”

Who says, “Because I can”? A wise-ass. Someone with no regard for the feelings of others and the consequences of his actions, right?

Why would Metrolink close our railroad crossing and leave others open? Why would Fish and Game allow culverts all along the Santa Clara River, and even assist a movie company to install one near our old crossing, but prohibit us from crossing? Why would Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy quietly acquire property at the end of our only other access route and refuse us an easement through it? Why?

Because they can.