[1172] Ooo Ooo Child

There’s a strain of rationalization that’s coming from the most “polite” corners of the “What really happened!?” podcast universe, TV hosts, and pundits I think is worth highlighting. Not because it’s more or less correct than any of the dozens of reasons that are somewhat true. I think it’s worth highlighting because it shows how bad we are at talking broadly or framing things in terms of genuine personal accountability.

The shorthand versions will sounds something like, “People really do vote on the economy.” Or, “If you tell them a man can now compete in girl’s sports, that really puts the fear of god in them.”

There are “obvious” indicators of what pisses people off. It doesn’t take long for a normal average person to think they don’t want a trans woman competing against their daughter. That’s throwaway simple for anyone but the ones who were in power and with the microphone. But, the issue isn’t the “real” issue. The issue is we are really really dumb when it comes to discussing or understanding what the science, if it has anything to say, is at all.

This happened with covid. Instead of saying, “We’re constantly collecting more data and will update you on what to do next,” they came in and mandated things catch-all style and then downplayed the consequences of the downstream effects. The problem wasn’t our “covid response.” The problem was an unwillingness if not sheer inability to message honestly and effectively about how the scientific process works and the reasoning behind an informed decision.

You know the problem isn’t the problem when old talking points still make their way into the excuse grievance narrative. People were still complaining about gas prices, for example. It will never sink in that presidents have nothing to do with gas prices, but even when they’re low, “gas prices” turns into “eggs” or the infinitely broad “economy.” “Inflation” is invoked, as though it’s not a global phenomenon and self-confessed consequence of opportunistic greed.

If you want to lay claim to the fleetingly small “rational” part of the human animal, you can’t dismiss the linguistic context within which they are operating. People do not know how to articulate what they do or don’t feel, think, like, hate, etc. The smart people don’t, the dumb people don’t, it’s just not a thing we do well, at all. This is how children of immigrants will vote to have their family members deported. This is why poor people will vote to have their taxes increased. They “feel” desperate and angry and are genuinely victimized. They glom onto the avatars of that. That’s not “rational.”

People “really” only vote on their feelings and impressions. There’s roughly a dozen people who will methodically calculate the policies and implications. I’ve felt, my entire life, at the ass-end of shitty republican policy that makes it hard to get assistance when I’m super poor, fucks with how much I should be paid for my time, increases my taxes, destroys the ecosystem, and endangers the lives of my friends. I don’t “feel” that, that’s their stated mission and regularly acted upon agenda. My new governor of Indiana was as complicit in the insurrection as they come. The Christians, the fascists, the ideologues of every stripe want you under heal.

This includes the oft-caricatured “radical Leftist.” The infinite sea of irony is that “the media” or the “proud” ones on the Right who own and make a show of that shittiest of all behaviors get to be viewed as more “honest” and “telling it like it is.”

NONE OF THESE CUNTS ARE TELLING THE TRUTH.

Worse than that, when you hear someone in the media say that exact same sentiment, or you get it reflexively from the no-information non-voter, they won’t be using it like I am. They aren’t going to be implying that we’re all scientifically and historically illiterate. They aren’t going to have a list of psychology and rhetoric resources for you to start gaining insight on your behavior.

I think back to economics classes. They literally presume a “rational consumer” who is going to make decisions about what to buy based on simple and boring calculation. They have the balls to then develop a whole mythology around this that you can major in, and then they wonder why people on the outside don’t trust their “expert” analysis of why prices or goods look the way they do. The theory behind democracy and having an “informed populace” suffers the exact same issue. There’s not simply too much information, it’s that to be “informed” you need to be able to trust the information altogether, do so for long enough to see and carry the consequences over time, and have a basic respect and defense for discerning truth and evidence in the first place.

We don’t have that. “The media,” wants clicks, not genuine information connecting and motivating informed behavior. “Public intellectuals,” personalities, influencers, and moralizers want money, attention, and to feel as special as they’ve always knew they were with their big brains and big hearts and ability to heard sheeple. As individuals, we’re not expected to live up to any standard beyond the ho-hum stupid fascism of our friends and families. So, what on Earth would make you think there’s a desire to “preserve democracy?” You don’t put any of your ideas up to a scrutinized and informed vote, except maybe occasionally where to go to dinner.

I already can’t count the amount of empty generalized platitudes the “adults” are offering to the people who are scared, desperate, and confused. We’re more prepared this time? Cool. We know what to expect? Right. None of us can individually cure a cultural psychosis. We’re all drinking from the same stupid language Kool-Aid. Our visceral instinctive reaction to any truth about the actual work and the descriptions and directions of where we need to go garners a doubling-down attitude.

Hey man, if you wanna stop doing that drug, you need to surround yourself with people who have many sober years and mindsets.
   Okay, fuck you, I can do this alone.

Hey man, if you want to connect with “the other side,” you need to recognize that your bleeding heart vibes have not once been curious as to the detailed Israeli operations.
   Fuck you! Genocidal maniac!

Hey man, when you don’t understand the science of fetus vs zygote vs embryo…
   ALL UNBORN LIVES MATTER!

The onlookers and “reporters” and pundits will remark on this dynamic as “People are deeply divided and have personal views they vote on as their one issue.”

Except, they’re all united by how unwilling and unable they are to process and parse information. We’re all very, very dumb and using superimposed narrative impressions to do the actual work for us. The language of modernity is our Suboxone or methadone. That is what we get when we go to our feeds and favorite “news” outlets. We get the script to not do the work.

We get the excuses so we don’t have to believe that every word we use, every disposition we bring into a space, and every thing we share or choose to stay silent or opine on matters. We don’t want that responsibility. We haven’t been taught how to wield it responsibly if we did. We don’t have the patience. We don’t see the point. “We” aren’t “me,” so what do you know? In the immortal words of a Surrounded idiot Trump supporter challenging an equally unhelpful Destiny, “Were you there?” Somehow, your infinitely limited, incomplete, and incoherent experience alone trumps everything, forever.

[875] Oh Beautiful

“I feel sick.”

The votes aren't completely in, but as of this writing, 67 million Americans are proud to be Nazis. They're proud to be fascists. They are proud to be "white." They are proud of the story they have told themselves about why they are better or smarter than you.

You see people talking about how sick they feel that so many of their brethren could somehow justify this behavior. You see people literally getting sick and dying from covid. Still, after 4 years, we have not learned the mechanism for preventing someone like Trump like we could have prevented the worst from covid. Still, the story is at the mercy of all-out chaos and destruction, and we're waiting to be subsumed by a hail of bullets or alcohol when the misery won't put us quite over the edge.

For however many words this turns out to be, I'm again “at a loss.” There are no words, there is only death. There's been so much death for so long that it's now time to culturally celebrate it. That's what this “election” tells me. That's what years of campaigning tried to convince you to do. Celebrate the death of the middle class. Celebrate how much you hate yourself and how that hate comes out as racism. Celebrate you get to start “owning” people again for being dreamy or high-minded about what a proper piece of crusty shit you are.

I don't hear people “getting it” that the behavior exhibited from Trump isn't “the other side.” On a universal and indifferent scale, yes, any and all “merely changing” words or behaviors is going to build or destroy. Human, though? “Democracy?” It's not the held-harmless position of a functioning person. It's the stuff that would get you fired. It's the things they used to prosecute and jail for. It's too simple.

The psychology papers abound telling you about sunk-costs and cognitive dissonance. These people haven't lost anything nor wrestle with demons psychologically. They are proud. They want to die and they want to kill you and those feelings empower them further. These people are a collective lynch mob, wondering where the beer and barbecue are so they can top-off the carnage.

There was no rebuke. There was no persuading the country that Biden would be “easier” to convince and push in the direction of what we need. There was only the continued anger, hopelessness, and fear. There were only more lies. There were only whines and excuses and a moment arrested by how you think you might survive in spite of it all. We are not a country, we are a bubbling pit of blame and insecurity. We are a legacy of perpetuating around the world the rot we're suffering right now.

Obama touted “hope” as he deported families back to countries where gangs targeted them. He was the droner-in-cheif. Bill Clinton signed as much legislation as he could to bankrupt the working class. Jimmy Carter was shit on for his foresight and frankness about the forces taking over. The people in power now have spent their entire lives picking away at order and gaining power for its own sake. The real war has never been “close.” The underlying circumstances doomed you from birth.

I'm 32 years old and never had a person represent me in my “democratic republic.” My degree meant I could make less than minimum wage and feel better than most if I lived in a shed in a holler. I've never seen a democratic candidate even sniff at the shit hole county I live in. This country isn't for me. This country was a set of lies predicated on even worse actions to perpetuate the pretense.

The way I figure it, I have maybe 6 months to get my affairs in order and figure out how to buy a humble plot somewhere in the world that can at least pull off “boring” for a while. Until I die, I'll need something to look forward to and invest in. I need to stop believing I can make this country into something it's aggressively decided it is not.

[840] Corona Made Me Do It

I don't know what to say.

How long have we lived in the 24-hour “news” cycle with everything “the war on” and “breaking” from Justin Bieber entering the country to how so-and-so “slammed” and “eviscerated” so-and-so with their legendary commentary?

How long have we had to study the various eras in how civilizations thrived or fell?

How long have we known that we've lived beyond our means, in selfish isolation, screaming “fuck the world” with all of the jaded wisdom of every teenager?

How tired have we been? How fat have we gotten? How many “School of Life” videos and existential memes have been shared?

How many times has “Get out the vote!” been parroted? How many silent wishes for death upon generations of those not as “with it?”

First, I was indifferent to the coronavirus. Then, I went to Wal-Mart and felt the low key panic of people's shifty eyes and odd choices on what to stock up on. I'm not panic buying, but I wanted to make it a couple weeks for if and when the shit really starts hitting the fan.

Next, I'm a touch curious about 1 out of every 50 articles that pop up about it. The prevailing theme is that we're, obviously, unprepared, defiant, and going to make things incredibly worse before they get better.

Then, I want to exploit the crisis. I email my investment guy. I tell every single person I can find in the office, now is the time to lobby for work-from-home and more money. I'm energized to do a little more land walking and mapping, because space away might cost a premium.

Now, I'm “generally angry,” that for all of the hullabaloo, for all of the cries about how things should go or the ways people are “stepping up” in a crisis, it all feels like bullshit. I subscribed to some “we'll get through this!” groups for central Indiana where pleas to find ways to get food, rent, or even cars towed stream in.

FUCK. ALL. OF. YOU.

As we speak, the neoliberal mess of Joe Biden wins Florida by a landslide. The narrative on Trump's response is morphing from his general perpetual lies to the handful of reactive and scared shitless plays he's making to appease anyone and anything that resemble “the market” or “his base.” The edifice, even while crumbling, is dedicated to the shine. The mouth pieces stoke the fear. The half-truth minute by minute scare pieces flood in. Catch-phrases repeated, finger waving the moral turpitude, and self-promotion acts of solidarity abound.

We've lost even the capacity to recognize it as an act. We used to have location-based relationships, or short and incidental ones. We might've built “professional” verses “personal.” A “brand” was something independent of the things you did in service to making it profitable. Now it's just this all the time everywhere. Wait until you hear someone a little quicker on the take say it or do it first, shop it around. Don't create or plan in service to the genuine betterment of something, “make a statement” and tell people to follow a dead link and flooded, incorrect, phone number.

This is how it ends. Probably not with coronavirus, but with this sheer inability to ever recognize the real again, even as death stares you in the face. Trump is death, and we voted for him. So was Sarah Palin. So were the celebrities and lobbyist narratives and daily capitulations we made in service to keeping our own heads above the shallow waters we were still allowed to swim in.

What kills me, what floors me to no end, is that for all of my constant and perpetual bitching, I've struggled so fucking hard, not to piece together a house or cope with one meaningless waste of my time after another in trying to get a little more of my indulgent American dream. No, I've fought and fought and fought to speak as though there is something better to be doing, and you, me, us were not doing it, and even during a fucking crisis, I can't get the conversation, the plan, or the disposition that can treat this shit LIKE WE ALL KNEW IT WAS FUCKING COMING.

I don't feel like I exaggerate when I claim people long for death. I don't think that the emotional burden of the silence is overstated. I don't think the ho-hum, literal fucking shoulder shrug I got today, is less deadly than the deadliest virus. Our minds are poisoned. Our spirits don't bite. When the panic truly sets in, there won't be enough news outlets to cover it. When the ship really starts taking on water, you're gonna feel hungry, starved, from all the bullshit we've been feeding on. There won't be land to swim to as we cramp up and drown.

When we come out the other side with 2 whole extra days of half-paid sick leave, that's when you kill yourself. Don't do it as you lose your job, run out of Hotpockets, or think too hard about how sick your grandma got after you came back from spring break. Do it when you realize it's never getting better, and you don't even know how it could. Do it because you're already dead, and there's nowhere left to go. The virus seems like it's trying to force the issue, but at least it wants to live.