Of course, as individuals, we feel helpless. We know the system is fucked. And we are all participants in this system — a system that is making the air unfit to breathe and our food unfit to eat, that is slowly sucking the resources from entire impoverished continents, that is treating living creatures like commodities, that is treating human beings like commodities, that is prepared to mow down thousands of people to keep the price of oil in check. It’s appalling. And we are all participants in it. How can we keep a clear conscience in light of the fact that we are the cogs — however small — driving a machine that commits atrocities? How can we reconcile our desire to be good people with an awareness that we, in some small way, share responsibility?