Exxon Letter
A few have told me I should post my thank you letter to Exxon-Mobil, so here it is. First a little background: about a year and a half ago, I applied to some Hispanic Scholarship Fund engineering scholarship, with little hope, in my mind, of actually receiving it. I was in Brazil a few months later when my mom told me I had received a letter back home from HSF. They wanted to congratulate me, as they were awarding me the engineering scholarship I had applied to, and by the way, Exxon-Mobil funded the scholarship, so I had better write them a thank you letter. I did, and they were so impressed they decided to renew my scholarship for one more year, and they really want me to drop Volume 2 of my infamous thank you letter. Also, I gotta give props to my man Checkmate, for polishing my rough note of gratitude into a dC blog worthy thank you letter. Now without further ado, the letter:
Dear Exxon-Mobil,
I would like to express my sincere gratitude for your generous support of the HSF/Exxonmobil Foundation scholarship, which I humbly and most gratefully received this year. It fills me with joy to see Exxon doing it’s part to support the higher education of young Latinos throughout the United States, empowering us to one day make our own personal contributions to society. If only the mainstream media would focus its attention to this kind of philanthropy! Instead, unbalanced journalists have subjected your firm’s record profits (a natural product of efficient management and operation) under the glaring scope of its harsh, partial scrutiny. Leave it to the liberal media to attack good old fashioned American entrepreneurship, as if there is a moral obstacle standing between conscientious firms and Exxon-level profits. As a profit-driven firm (which firm isn’t?), Exxon has simply succeeded unequivocally. Politicians are trying to tar and feather Exxon with threats of investigations and the consequences of alleged price gouging. The notion of Exxon-Mobil being afraid of tar is laughable; you should be the ones selling it to them! And as for feathers, just take one look at those marine birds in Alaska—Exxon-Mobil is clearly not afraid to get a little plumage ruffled!
Some opportunistic environmentalists are trying to create problems out of thin air by claiming that Exxon-Mobil’s policies are exacerbating the already serious problem of global warming. They use such evidence as the recent study by Science Magazine that analyzed 928 peer-reviewed papers published between 1993 and 2003 on global warming, and concluded that 100% of them were in agreement that the Earth’s temperature is rising due to human activity.
Again, this is a clear demonstration of the huge gap that exists between the real world and the esoteric research, baseless theorizing, and untenable moralism that takes place in isolated ivory towers. Luckily, we have men in office such as Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla) who still have the guts to stand up against elitist intelligentsia and tell us the truth that “global warming is the biggest hoax perpetuated on the American people.” He would know. Never mind that his campaign is the second biggest recipient of donations from the oil and gas industry (only second to that of the honorable senator from Texas, John Cornyn), Inhofe is on the Environmental and Public Works Committee—he must be well informed to do his job.
Once again I would like to express my thanks for the $2500 scholarship. I genuinely hope its funding did not negatively affect Lee Raymond’s $190,915-a-day salary last year, or from his subsequent $400 million retirement package. I suppose making record profits allows for fiscal flexibility—your success has made Mr. Raymond and I both better off! I’ll use this money to help finish my engineering degree, and then, if the whole Iran problem has been “taken care of” by then, I could perhaps offer my technical knowledge to help build a pipeline from Tehran straight to Houston. Hopefully then, I won’t have to fill up my SUV at $3 a gallon.
Sincerely yours,
June 3rd, 2007 at 6:21 pm
Well Said!
June 3rd, 2007 at 7:20 pm
to exxon:
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June 3rd, 2007 at 9:39 pm
wow, you clearly need to grow up a lot.
June 3rd, 2007 at 11:25 pm
You have many reasons to be proud, Andres. Your sarcastic jewel was breezed over by some PR flack who failed to savor your wit and decided to throw more money at you because you’re a wetback with vocabulary skills, so there must be some ROI there.
That money must have come in handy to a poor honest scholar such as yourself, lying on some beach in Rio in your micro-thong trying to sweat the coke toxins out, when mommy calls to tell you you got some bonus bong money coming your way next semester.
Meanwhile, some poor cholo on the up and up won’t be graduating CalPoly this year because Senor Black is obviously a much better bet to turn around and give something back to the community. But hey, you mouthed off to the Man. Send me a photo so I can paint a barrio mural with you applying for free money while Cesar Chavez looks on approvingly.
June 4th, 2007 at 3:04 am
That’s a great letter! ^_^
June 4th, 2007 at 3:59 am
So… you accepted the scholarship form them, and then had the cheek to write them a snotty letter?
So… what? You’ll be donating the scholarship money to environmental causes? Or refusing it altogether?
Oh, no… wait, you’re accepting the scholarship, knowing (and disapproving of) where the money came from. But you thought you’d get cool points by biting the hand that fed you?
Here’s a clue: Principles 101
If we’re offered a gift by a group we disapprove of, we either:
1. Swallow our pride, accept the gift and stay silent, optionally working for good causes to offset the guilt we feel at abandoning our principles, or
2. Don’t accept the money, and then feel free to sarcastically criticise the company for their wrongdoing.
Taking a gift for yourself and then turning around and badmouthing the person or group that gave it to you is called hypocrisy.
I know you were hoping for “hip and socially conscious”, but what you actually achieved was “ungrateful, hypocritical child”.
Not quite the object of the exercise, right?
June 4th, 2007 at 8:11 am
Thank u Shaper - you couldn’t be more right about this guy, and his 5 seconds of network fame.
If he didn’t want to take $ from an oil company to get through school, he didn’t have to. And don’t roll off the ole ‘but i’m too poor’ line when you’re wearing $165 Nike kicks!
June 4th, 2007 at 10:09 am
I particularly enjoyed Ernie’s response. Micro-thong? Bonus bong money?!? CESAR FUCKIN’ CHAVEZ!! Bravo, Ernie.
The Internet: where someone more clever than you is always on call to upend your short-lived fantasies.
Even if he did spend a few hours writing a three-paragraph response to a whimsical thank-you letter.
June 4th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
another spoiled brat like me. bravo!
June 4th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
Ernie, you big silly:
You were almost really biting there.
But here’s Mr. Black situation: he applies to a huge number of scholarships yearly because his family is in a difficult financial situation.
He was studying abroad in Brazil because he applied to a scholarship, got it, and it was cheaper to go than to continue a semester of his undergrad education at his school.
It’s one thing to attack a well-publicized global conglomerate that you can do research about and make substantiated claims.
It’s another to attack someone whose personal details you know nothing about and then end up looking stupid.
I like how you mimicked Mr. Black’s writing, but you can’t possibly make parallels between the two because there’s a huge difference.
Your assumptions were completely wrong, but at least you got whatever it was off your chest. Too bad there was a more clever person on the Internet who was on call to upend your short-lived fantasy, to borrow the words of another comment.
And by the way, how does giving back to the community, barrio murals, CalPoly, and Cesar Chavez have anything to do with Exxon Mobil. Just wondering.
Thanks for reading though!
June 4th, 2007 at 3:13 pm
Hey Blax,
You have an ENORMOUS mouth.
By the way, everybody, calm down. THE INTERNET IS FOR PORN
June 4th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
Indeed, he did it for teh lulz.
________________________
Also, how does taking money from the company negate his ability to criticize its practices?
If one wishes to criticize the government, is it necessary to refuse all state services, such as road maintenance, firefighters, etc?
Rather, his position as a beneficiary of Exxon lends him a rather credible position from which to criticize, because it is against his financial interests.
June 4th, 2007 at 9:20 pm
I don’t mind looking stupid if it makes people laugh, and you know my prosody makes me “look” anything but. Shaper wrote what any logical person would think about the situation. I just felt Senor Black deserved a little lambasting for missing out on what a tool he’s being.
The murals and Cesar Chavez, et al, have nothing to do with Exxon and everything to do with a gabacho claiming money from the more qualified and more deserving. Black’s no impoverished hispanic, ese.
June 4th, 2007 at 9:52 pm
Right on, Ernie.
Wetbacks get money for being fucking born, money that should go to the more deserving and more qualified. Senor’s boy checkmate prolly “polished” his scholarship essay too. Obviously the gabacho has no vocabulary skills (which is truly the best indicator of a person’s usefulness) and is completely undeserving of this aid.
Wait, Ernie, are you sure you’re using gabacho correctly? Urban Dictionary seems to indicate that you’re the gabacho after all.
June 4th, 2007 at 10:19 pm
Clearly, you are a sarcastic fool - and we know that’s the lowest form of wit. It’s not very GOOD sarcasm though - that’s the real issue. The whole tar and feathers thing could have been handled by a 9-year old. The salary dig was a bit more to the point, but you didn’t really drive the point home.
In comparison to “I come to bury Ceasar, not to praise him” it is bloody pathetic.
You have your “facts” all fucked up about Global Warming being entirely Anthropogenic too. Do some research in future, huh?
June 5th, 2007 at 1:11 am
I’m a gabacho; so is Black, and so is any “Hispanic” who only labels himself as such when it’s time for handouts, and the rest of the time is as latino as a diet Slice at Taco Bell.
Yours,
Ernie Diaz
June 5th, 2007 at 1:23 am
Whoa whoa man, I wasn’t gonna write anything here because I don’t like to get involved in flaming internet comment wars where people are just mentally masturbating by trying to humiliate others, while not really bringing anything constructive to the arguments. Among the stuff you’ve said you’ve made some valid points, and I accept them even if they don’t reflect so well on me. But you pretending to act like you know me, and calling me a gabacho, and saying I’m as Latino as a diet slice at taco bell is crossing the line. You have no idea who I am, or what I do, or how I behave. Infering that I am a so called ‘gabacho’ from this letter means you don’t think an ‘authentic’ Latino is capable of winning a scholarship from the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, or that I’m not an ‘authentic’ Latino. The former is some pretty racist bullshit, and we won’t tolerate that on the blog. The latter is you making unfounded attacks on my character, when you know nothing about me. That will also not be tolerated. So either say something constructive, or at least something funny like your first post, or don’t say anything at all. Oh and by the way, don’t let it be my last name that fools you into thinking I’m not Latino,.Just because it’s Black doesn’t mean my parents aren’t Latinos, nor does it alter the fact that I was born in Latin America.
June 5th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Yo, Ernesto Pancho Diaz. Andres is more Mexican than you’ll ever be. He loves nachos, Sabado Gigante, tilling the white man’s soil, and illegally crossing the border. You might be a pasty gabacho, but Andres is as Hispanic as a churro.
June 5th, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Thanks, anthony. Someone finally made me laugh. Relax, Senor Negro. Your original post wasn’t about constructive argument [I hope], it was about entertainment.I don’t want to know who you are and what makes you tick - I want people to have something entertaining to look at while they’re supposed to be working.Inflammatory racist comments are one of the few proven ways to make a thread poignant. You are a goober for taking hand-outs from people and then making fun of them, though. I hope we’ve all learned a valuable lesson here.Now go get your shine box.