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They Should Do Something About It

There is a phrase that appears everywhere once you start listening carefully: “They should do something about it.”

It comes up in conversations about politics, climate, litter, health, corruption, food waste, education, pollution—almost anything. Something is wrong, something is clearly not working, and the response is immediate and almost automatic: they should fix it.

But who exactly are they?

Governments. Politicians. Corporations. Institutions. Experts. The council. The authorities. Someone somewhere with power.

Almost never the person speaking.

This small shift in language reveals something deeper about the way we think. Responsibility is pushed outward. The problem belongs to them. The solution belongs to them. The individual stands outside the situation as an observer rather than a participant.

Yet when you look closely at everyday life, most of the problems people complain about are the accumulated result of countless small personal decisions.

Food is thrown away in enormous quantities. Not because of a single government policy, but because millions of individuals buy more than they need and discard what they do not eat.

Rubbish appears in streets and parks not because “society” threw it there, but because someone dropped it and walked away assuming someone else would clean it up.

Dog waste lies on pavements not because of a failure of global governance, but because a dog owner chose not to bend down for five seconds.

People complain about unhealthy food while continuing to buy and consume it. They worry about pollution while purchasing endless disposable goods designed to be used briefly and thrown away.

Each of these actions seems insignificant on its own. One piece of litter, one wasted meal, one unnecessary purchase.

But multiplied by millions of people, day after day, they shape the world we live in.

The strange thing is that most people know this perfectly well. Yet the mental reflex remains the same: they should do something about it.

Even among people who speak about awareness, personal growth, or responsibility, the pattern often persists. It is easy to talk about principles, much harder to apply them consistently in daily life.

Take something as simple as commitment. A program, a project, or an effort to help others may be scheduled. But if another event appears—something more attractive or more exciting—the responsibility quietly dissolves. The assumption is that the work will somehow continue anyway.

Again, someone else will take care of it.

This way of thinking is deeply rooted. It allows us to avoid an uncomfortable truth: real change begins with the individual, not with institutions.

Politicians did not appear from another planet. They are products of the same societies that complain about them. They reflect the habits, fears, priorities, and compromises of the populations that elect them.

Expecting governments to solve problems that individuals are unwilling to address in their own lives is a little like expecting a mirror to change the face it reflects.

Of course large systems matter. Laws, policies, and institutions shape societies in powerful ways. But they cannot substitute for personal responsibility. Without it, even the best structures gradually fail.

History shows this repeatedly. Systems deteriorate not only because of corrupt leaders, but because of widespread everyday indifference.

Someone else will fix it.

Someone else will clean it.

Someone else will take care of the consequences.

The uncomfortable reality is that there is no “someone else.” There is only us—millions of individuals making decisions every day.

The world we see around us is the cumulative result of those decisions.

If rubbish fills the streets, it is because people dropped it.

If food is wasted, it is because people bought and discarded it.

If pollution spreads, it is because people continue to consume what creates it.

If politics deteriorates, it is because societies tolerate it.

Real change rarely begins with grand speeches or sweeping reforms. It begins with much smaller moments: a decision not to throw something away unnecessarily, to clean up after oneself, to keep a commitment, to make a conscious choice rather than an automatic one.

These actions seem trivial compared with the scale of global problems. Yet they represent something far more important: the acceptance of responsibility.

Once that happens, the phrase “they should do something about it” begins to lose its meaning.

Because the question quietly changes.

Not what should they do, but what am I doing?

And from that point onward, change becomes possible.

Cuba: When History Begins to Repeat Itself

When Cuba appears in the news today, the discussion usually begins with communism, sanctions, and geopolitics. But the story really begins earlier — in the decades before the Cuban revolution.

In the 1940s and 1950s Havana was one of the most glamorous cities in the Western Hemisphere. American tourists flocked there for gambling, nightlife, music, and a kind of freedom that felt unavailable at home. Casinos, cabarets, and luxury hotels lined the waterfront. The city had the atmosphere of a tropical Las Vegas.

But beneath the glamour was a system of corruption and organised crime.

Much of the casino economy was controlled by American mob figures, particularly Meyer Lansky. Working closely with the Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, Lansky helped turn Havana into an offshore gambling empire. In exchange for bribes and a share of the profits, Batista granted casino licences and hotel permits to mob-backed investors.

In 1946 leading figures of American organised crime gathered at Havana’s Hotel Nacional. Among those present was Lucky Luciano. The meeting was essentially a strategic conference for the American mafia, and Cuba was central to their plans.

New luxury developments soon followed. One of the most famous was the Riviera Hotel and Casino, opened in 1957 with mob connections and huge investment. Havana’s nightlife attracted celebrities and entertainers, including Frank Sinatra, who performed in mob-connected venues and helped reinforce the glamorous image of the city.

For foreign visitors Havana looked dazzling. But the benefits were unevenly distributed. Much of the wealth generated by tourism and casinos flowed to foreign investors, criminal networks, and a small political elite. Meanwhile many ordinary Cubans lived in poverty, especially in rural areas. Corruption was widespread and political dissent was often suppressed.

To many Cubans it increasingly felt as though their country had become a playground for outsiders.

It was in this atmosphere that the revolutionary movement led by Fidel Castro gained support. Castro and his followers framed their struggle not simply as a political uprising but as a fight for sovereignty — an attempt to reclaim control of the island’s land, economy, and future.

When the revolution succeeded in 1959 the casino economy collapsed almost overnight. The mob figures fled the island, the casinos were closed, and foreign-owned assets were nationalised.

The United States responded with economic sanctions that eventually grew into the long-standing embargo that still exists today.

More than sixty years later the consequences of that conflict are still felt. Economic restrictions make it harder for Cuba to obtain medicines, spare parts, fuel, and access to international finance. Shortages and power cuts periodically shape everyday life.

As is often the case in geopolitical struggles, it is not the policymakers who carry the heaviest burden.

It is ordinary people.

There is also a striking historical irony. Much of the system that provoked the Cuban revolution — the corruption, the casino economy, the organised crime networks, and the exploitation of the island — was closely connected to American interests and American actors.

Yet the Cuban population has spent decades living under economic punishment imposed by the same country.

Recently Donald Trump predicted that Cuba’s government would “fall pretty soon” and said he would “put Marco Rubio over there.” Rubio, a Cuban-American politician from Florida who has long supported a hard line toward Havana, would presumably play a leading role in whatever Washington imagines might follow such a collapse.

Whether such rhetoric leads anywhere or not, it reveals something important. It reflects an attitude that has appeared before in history — the idea that Cuba’s future can be decided somewhere else.

And that is precisely the mindset that helped create the revolution in the first place.

History rarely repeats itself in exactly the same form. But sometimes the patterns are close enough to recognise.

For Cuba, the danger may not only lie in its past.

It may lie in the possibility that the same story is beginning again.