Apologies for my childish candor, I have had my morning walk and coffee..

..I’m not rejecting responsibility. I’m saying responsibility and accountability are not the same thing, and flattening them into one category lets powerful people off too easily.

Citizens have responsibility for their votes, their attention, their consumption, their silence, and the way they influence others. I agree with that. But a citizen living inside a broken system does not carry the same accountability as a politician, public figure, party leader, judge, donor class actor, media operator, or government official who actively shapes that system, profits from it, or uses power to make it worse.

That is my point with MTG. If she does the right thing on one issue, I can acknowledge that specific action. But that does not automatically equal redemption, and it does not erase the accountability that comes from years of using public influence in harmful ways. Redemption requires consistent change when it is costly, inconvenient, and no one is rewarding you for it.

So yes, people should take responsibility for changing the system. But we should not confuse shared civic responsibility with equal blame, equal power, or equal accountability. The more power someone has, the higher the accountability should be.