Boycott BP? Why?

[DisgruntledVirus]

I can think of one reason I would boycott BP.
During an interview one of the BP execs said that the accident could have likely been prevented had the workers reacted to the warning signs hours before the accident.

That the workers ignored warnings the system provided. To me that is shameful. To point the finger at people that are now dead and cannot defend themselves and use them as the scapegoat is disgraceful.

Boycotts never work effectively enough to do what they intend. Also, in this case a significant amount of BP stations are not actually owned by BP. That means you're effectively boycotting the small buisness owners, and BP will sell their oil to some other company.

 

[AeroEngy]

I am not sue why you would boycott BP. Of the 126 crew on the rig there were only 6 BP employees. The rig was owned and mostly operated by Transocean. And boycotting Transocean is mostly impossible because they contract with several other big oil companies.

 

[vi edit]

I just simply have to ask...what would Shell, Exxon, Valero, <insert oil co of choice> do differently than BP at this point? It's a disaster that has never been experienced before at these extreme depths.

If you want to boycott something...boycott oil. That's why were are in this mess. Drive less. Use less.

 

[bobdole369]

Boycotting BP isn't going to affect the corporation much.

This.

It will only hurt (if anything) the local fellow who owns the station. All BP stations (in the USA) are franchises and they all don't absolutely HAVE to get fuel from strictly BP. In fact you could very likely stop buying fuel for your car from a BP station avoiding fuel from Shell Oil, then go down the street and end up fueling up with BP fuel at a Hess station.

Want to hurt the company; Walk, Ride your bike to work, get a (real) moped or even a motorocyle or a scooter and use less fuel, Encourage others to do the same.

 

[meltdown75]

boycott boycotts

also God Bless America

 

[Crusty]

Are you kidding me?

Can you point out someone more qualified to take on the task? It's not like the government has the equipment and technology to fight this sitting in a broom closet.

 

[AstroManLuca]

I'm not boycotting BP stations. It won't have any effect since they make very, very little money from gas stations. It'll only hurt the people who own those stations.

 

[SP33Demon]

Buy the new hybrids and PHEVs and stick it to em.

And to the morons who claim boycotting BP is going to hurt small biz owners, that's a stupid rationalization because your business is going from one gas station to another. There is no economic loss in the community as a whole. By boycotting BP and making such a statement you will force the BP owner switch to a different franchise which sends a direct message to BP.

 

[Aharami]

I think your reasoning is sensible. Everyone associated with the BP name is going to pay. I just hope the govt. charges them up the @ss for this.

BP will be paying, either via a formal fine by the govt, or via how much they have to stuff the politicians' pockets. They will pick the lesser of the two. My guess, the latter

 

[JulesMaximus]

Buy the new hybrids and PHEVs and stick it to em.

And to the morons who claim boycotting BP is going to hurt small biz owners, that's a stupid rationalization because your business is going from one gas station to another. There is no economic loss in the community as a whole. By boycotting BP and making such a statement you will force the BP owner switch to a different franchise which sends a direct message to BP.

This am Amerika! Land of the stupid and the god given right to drive big gas guzzling stupid useless vehicles and pickup trucks.

 

[rudder]

because they keep dragging their ass about cleaning their fuck-up.

they should have manned up and took care of it asap rather than try to blame other companies. now, lives have been ruined, jobs have been lost, careers have been destroyed, countless wildlife has been irreversibly affected, etc.

fuck bp. i'd rather pay a few cents more at the pump per gallon someplace else.

Amen to that!

39 days and lying about how much oil was spewing out. They should have thrown whatever they could... 10 ships, army of engineers, etc. instead of trying one thing... fail... try another... fail... wait... fail... oh try filling with mud... 39 days later! On top of that... paying off inspectors... and knowing something did not look right prior to the explosion.

They have cash reserves. Screw BP.

Now obama has stopped all new permits while russia and china are free to tap into the gulf oil reserves from cuban waters.

 

[BoomerD]

Boycotting BP isn't going to hurt their bottom line. It's a "feel good" reaction to the gulf disaster.

Unfortunately, because of the laws in effect at the time of the "spill," they'll only get hit with $75 million in fines. The clean-up costs will be higher, and I'm sure the collateral costs from various lawsuits will cost them quite a bit as well, but like most corporations, they'll just write all of it off of their taxes and we the taxpayers will end up footing the bill.

Exxon walked away from the Exxon Valdez spill with nothing more than a slap on the hands.

 

[Meghan54]

Are you kidding me?

Unfortunately, BP along with Exxon, Shell, Chevron, Conoco, and the oil platform operators like Transocean are the experts. They are the ones who do this stuff daily, the government is not. The government might have some people who are regulators that can offer advice, but the government does not have the equipment or technology to be able to do jack shit.

As much as it sucks, the oil & gas companies are the experts.

DV, you can try to explain reality to partisan idiots like geno, but it's to no avail.

They'll only blame whoever is not to their liking politically, facts and reality be damned.

To expect the gov't to react in any way to this disaster other than what they're doing, which is depending upon the true experts in the field.....the oil guys.....is stupid.

And this disaster, the oil platform explosion and leak, is in no way comparable to the Katrina disaster. One is in a very specialized field of work, deep water oil drilling and needs the experts in that field to fix the problem (which are the oil guys exclusively), and one was post hurricane disaster relief, something the gov't supposedly has resources and agencies aplenty to deal with.....food, temp housing, etc.

 

[SP33Demon]

Boycotting BP isn't going to hurt their bottom line. It's a "feel good" reaction to the gulf disaster.

Unfortunately, because of the laws in effect at the time of the "spill," they'll only get hit with $75 million in fines. The clean-up costs will be higher, and I'm sure the collateral costs from various lawsuits will cost them quite a bit as well, but like most corporations, they'll just write all of it off of their taxes and we the taxpayers will end up footing the bill.

Exxon walked away from the Exxon Valdez spill with nothing more than a slap on the hands.

So if BP franchise owners switch to Texaco, you think it's not going to hurt them? GTFOOH. Just like the people who said the recalls wouldn't hurt Toyota, reputation is still very important. Maybe it won't hurt their bottom line in the long term but they will still take a hit.

 

[shortylickens]

because they keep dragging their ass about cleaning their fuck-up.

they should have manned up and took care of it asap rather than try to blame other companies. now, lives have been ruined, jobs have been lost, careers have been destroyed, countless wildlife has been irreversibly affected, etc.

fuck bp. i'd rather pay a few cents more at the pump per gallon someplace else.

They already lost 150 billion of their 200 billion stock.
Do you really think a handful of people not buying gasoline at their pumps is going to affect them?
Most of what they sell goes to other brand stations anyway. And only about a third of a barrel of oil gets turned into gasoline anyways. Another third is diesel, and the last third goes into a variety of misc uses.

And as other folks have stated, no one gave a shit when they were pumping it out and selling it to us. The folks who were always railing against oil were blown off as wackos.

 

[bobdole369]

So if BP franchise owners switch to Texaco, you think it's not going to hurt them? GTFOOH.

It's a fairly big deal to switch. The person who I know that works at a BP station also worked at the same station when it was a Citgo. It took about a month of construction. It's not just "throw up some paint and a banner" - in most cases.

 

[Blackjack200]

Is there any quick and easy way to figure out if a gas station is independantly owned or BP owned? There's a BP station on the way home from work and it was empty the last time I drove past it. If it's independantly owned I'll start shopping there. Won't help much, but I feel bad for those guys.

 

[Crusty]

Is there any quick and easy way to figure out if a gas station is independantly owned or BP owned? There's a BP station on the way home from work and it was empty the last time I drove past it. If it's independantly owned I'll start shopping there. Won't help much, but I feel bad for those guys.

Ask them?

 

[bobdole369]

Is there any quick and easy way to figure out if a gas station is independantly owned or BP owned? There's a BP station on the way home from work and it was empty the last time I drove past it. If it's independantly owned I'll start shopping there. Won't help much, but I feel bad for those guys.

Ask them?

Is the BP Station in the USA?

Very VERY good chance that it's a franchise, aka independently owned.

I think I recall hearing something about a "BP Connect" which is the corporate owned store.

http://www.bp.com/managedlistingsection.do?categoryId=9031085&contentId=7014114

Shows that they seem to own am/pm, arco, and Amoco as well.

 

[eits]

They already lost 150 billion of their 200 billion stock.
Do you really think a handful of people not buying gasoline at their pumps is going to affect them?
Most of what they sell goes to other brand stations anyway. And only about a third of a barrel of oil gets turned into gasoline anyways. Another third is diesel, and the last third goes into a variety of misc uses.

And as other folks have stated, no one gave a shit when they were pumping it out and selling it to us. The folks who were always railing against oil were blown off as wackos.

a handful?

there are hundreds of thousands of people worldwide boycotting bp. when you consider the price of gas and how much they need to sell per day to keep their profit margin, that could be a jab. yeah, a jab doesn't hurt, but anyone knows that you jab someone enough, their legs start to buckle. the goal of the boycott is not to end them, but to force damage their public image enough to where it's hurting them financially to drag their ass in their efforts.

 

[shortylickens]

a handful?

there are hundreds of thousands of people worldwide boycotting bp. when you consider the price of gas and how much they need to sell per day to keep their profit margin, that could be a jab. yeah, a jab doesn't hurt, but anyone knows that you jab someone enough, their legs start to buckle. the goal of the boycott is not to end them, but to force damage their public image enough to where it's hurting them financially to drag their ass in their efforts.

Again, if they lost 150 billion in stock, the cleanup will cost 760 million, and the fines are going to be hundreds of millions, do you really think boycotting will matter much?

 

[mb]

I don't think I've ever filled up at BP anyway. They are $0.15 more per gallon than the Shell station right across the street so why bother?

 

[shortylickens]

I don't think I've ever filled up at BP anyway. They are $0.15 more per gallon than the Shell station right across the street so why bother?

As has already been pointed out, you could go to a Hess or 7-11 and be getting gasoline that was originally BP oil.

 

[Blackjack200]

a handful?

there are hundreds of thousands of people worldwide boycotting bp. when you consider the price of gas and how much they need to sell per day to keep their profit margin, that could be a jab. yeah, a jab doesn't hurt, but anyone knows that you jab someone enough, their legs start to buckle. the goal of the boycott is not to end them, but to force damage their public image enough to where it's hurting them financially to drag their ass in their efforts.

You understand that gasoline is a commodity right? Oil companies routinely buy and sell huge amounts of oil to each other to balance what they're drilling vs. what they're selling at the pump. Hundreds of thousands of boycotters won't have any affect at all.

Oh, except to the indepenant station owners, who will get destroyed.

 

[mb]

As has already been pointed out, you could go to a Hess or 7-11 and be getting gasoline that was originally BP oil.

I always fill up at Shell anyway.. every once in a while Exxon if I'm on E and can't wait.