Dream to Nightmare

The followin' is my response to a day that consisted of a Deluge of Commentary, Partisan Spin, and Dead Up Bullshit and Ugliness surroundin' the efforts to take advantage of the anniversary of a particularly eloquent and influential speech delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial by Dr. Martin Luther King, fifty years ago.  I failed to scratch up a suitable image to pair with it until recently.  Unplanned, but...

  

Ya know, we all know Pieces of Shit of all colors, shapes, and sizes.  This is a statement that few would deny, at least at the beginnin' of a conversation.  Hell, some of 'em may be family or friends, somethin' worthy of self-deprecatin' remarks to be met with laughter.  And yet, when we choose to piss and moan about Percieved Injustices, the Conversation all too often devolves into some kinda Proclamation regardin' Race.  

Whether this is due to Culture, or Upbringin', or somethin' else, I ain't smart enough to say.  I would really like to believe that most of us are above a thing such as this.  But, alas, more often than not, things seem to travel the Short Circuit that leads back around to Color. 

Sure, we like to claim that it's "not just that", that we're experiencin' a legitimate reaction to unfairness and abuses rife through programs of Public Assistance, Affirmative Action, even maybe just a percieved sense of ingratitude, of entitlement.  Or, maybe it's mumblin' kids with their caps on backwards, their boxers showin', or roofers that work too damn hard and make the rest of us look lazy that we find annoyin' and embarrassin'.  The Race Thing?  That just happens to be an incidental (though legitimate) device that assists us in our attempts at self-expression and validation of a particular interpretation of the Current State of Things.  Just another simple concept makin' its home in our Sociologic Tool Belt.

The Civil Rights Movement was not some knee-jerk reaction to Make-Believe Slights or Exaggerated Tales of Injustice.  The Civil Rights Movement arose in response to Real Events-  ugly, brutal events, perpetrated by the Base, the Ignorant, the Intolerant.  Events that didn't just simply serve to perpetuate the callous marginalizin' of a particular demographic in respect to Opportunities and Fairness, but crossed into the Dark Theater.  The Civil Rights Movement was a response to the Untenable and the Unacceptable- includin' Terrorism and Murder.  Atrocities Committed in the Name of Racial Purity.  Cowardly Acts, ofttimes takin' refuge behind the Flowin' Robes of Christianity.  The Civil Rights Movement was a valid reaction by people that had been subjected, or were witness to the subjegation of others, to Hate and Intolerance.  Swollen, fevered Hate.  A Cultivated Cancer.

I don't know if the laws enacted by our Government decades ago were exactly what was needed.  If the original intent was to hopefully offer up somethin' a little more fair and honest to a people for whom bullyin' and intimidation were a part of everyday life, it has probably helped to a degree.  If it was intended to help bring that same group into the political process that is promised to all citizens of this great country, some progress was made.  If the intent was to foster Tolerance, Understandin', Acceptance, then it has proved to be a Catastrophic Failure.  

Perhaps the assumption was that if all Men (and Women) were viewed as equal in the Eyes of the Law, then all reasonable people would accept it as Fact and move forward accordingly.  Sadly, this assumption does not take into consideration that the Concepts of Contempt and Hate have no basis in Objectivity, Rational Thought, or Reason.  These are Vulgar, Primal Concepts.  These are Instincts.  Cold.  Selfish.  Calculatin'.

And, as much as most of us would like to believe that such Vile Concepts are all but extinct, they are quite alive and thrivin' in our America.

Damnit.

Fish

NO PROFIT IN PEACE

Huh.  So, contractors are bein' paid to do what could be done, and used to be done, by our military and even local law enforcement?

Dang.  Who are these folks and just who is it they're workin' for?

Hired thugs- free of the burden of a code of conduct that might be set by the state or our federal government, are unleashed on our Citizens and the rest of the World, and given carte blanche to harass and intimidate.

So goes the Privatization of Governmental Duties that could be handled by the men and women that are already gettin' paid as members of our Armed Forces, sans the oversight, direction, and accountability.

And yet, laws have been passed and processes have been modified over the past couple or three decades that give over more and more lucrative work to private companies.  (Companies that just happen to be in place and poised to go after it, for profit.  Boy, weren't we lucky!)

Prisons- Privatized for Profit.  The more citizens incarcerated, the bigger the payoff.  (I suppose this helps to explain shit like six years for Manslaughter, sixteen for Cultivation With Intent To Sell.  Who would you rather have in your prison- Killers or Stoners?  Yeah, that's what I thought...)

Border Patrol- Outsource it.  Why should the Government be tasked with the actual function and responsibility, the administrative drudge, when we have private companies that, amazingly, are standin' here just waitin' to bid for the opportunity.  (Okay.  So those given opportunities to bid are actually owned by the same corporation.  It's almost competitive, if you don't actually pay attention.)

War- Logistics, Services, Security- "Farmed Out"...  There is no Profit in Peace.  (Now, this one is the Big Money!)

The Ultimate Business Plan: Create a Need, then friggin' fill it.  Dead up brilliant.

Gotta hand it to 'em- Absolute Evil Genius.  These guys make Goldfinger look like a nine year old swipin' a freakin' Butterfinger.

Halliburton, Blackwater, Brown and Root- all manifestations of the same group of people that wormed their way into Politics as early as the Ford Administration (our only Unelected President- talk about opportunists!) and pushed for the privatization of countless aspects of Government Spendin'.  (And they're still pushin'.)

Cheney and Company- They're not really for Smaller Government.  They're for the Privatization of Government, includin' Military Functions, for which they have positioned themselves in order to soak the One Purse that is the Middle Class Tax Base.  They are not Patriots. They are not Leaders. They are not Good People.

These are Monsters.  Creatures addicted to the Rush of Power and Wealth, consumed by Unfathomable, Insatiable Greed.  These are the Ones for whom everything is Potential Collateral Damage.  They are the Soulless Ones.

No longer are they satisfied to look down from their Mansions, while the Common Folks raise children and set alarm clocks in neighborhoods made up of rows of tidy bungalows.  No.  In their eyes, the Common Man in America is now livin' beyond his position.  His lot, his birthright, is to be subservient to the Privileged, the Elite, the Royalty of Capitalism Unchecked.  And the Common Man would do well to not forget it.

We are all bein' systematically reduced to no more than service workers for the Preferred Caste.  The New Aristocracy.  The Kings of Business, Industry, and Commerce, to Whom All Others are Indebted.  Those that are determined to be incapable of supportin' the Golden Machine through their surplus value will be abandoned and left to perish.

And we are expected to subsist on the scraps they abandon on their plates, the crumbs they brush from their laps as they push back from the table.  Stuffed.  Lethargic.

The New Slaves.  That's where the Middle Class is headed.  And our Poor, our Elderly, our Feeble? A Goddamn Liability.  The sooner dead, the better.

Damnit.

~Fish

IS IT BULLSHIT? WELL...

So, been sorta broke down for the past few days, hangin' around the house, completely non-productive.  Bluesy.  A Stationary Front, somewhere between the Top and the Bottom of a Depressive Swing--just ain't exactly sure of the direction, up or down.  (Odd.  The direction is usually pretty damn obvious.)  But, this afternoon, feelin' better (up?), I thought I'd kill a little time by diggin' up a few thought-provokin' (emphasis on "provokin'") historical quotes that I could drop out here on the Ol' Interweb.  (I call it "Stirrin' the Pot...")

With not a lot of time or effort, I soon gathered several bits that I found interestin', even topical.  You know--Venerable Statesmen, Foundin' Fathers, that kinda stuff.  Bona fide--or so some might have you believe...

Never intentionally wantin' to be the Purveyor of Bad Info (though I have been guilty in the past) I set about the task of vettin' my Chosen Slices of Flowery Dead Man Rhetoric.  However, the actual content of these particular Pearls of Wisdom ain't exactly what I've wound up feelin' like sharin'.  Nope, not exactly.

It ain't that tough to do a little fact-checkin'.  Just copy a relevant snippet of text, drop it in the tiny window, search, cross-reference and compare.  (With somethin' as specific as quotes, the results of a query are fairly free of irrelevant material.)   More often than you might expect, results may render strong evidence, or downright proof, that information peddled as Truth is, in reality, a Falsehood. Or, what is better know by it's more descriptive common name--"Bullshit".

So, I shifted gears and went lookin' for it.  (For Bullshit.)

Curious as to just how broad a swath this phenomenon cut, I began to pull up random quotes and claims and statements.  Even dumb stuff;  Stuff you wouldn'ta thought anybody would ever bother to lie about or have any reason to misrepresent.  (I suppose my original pursuit--quotes from historical figures--would be placed in the Dumb Stuff Column by some.)  I found that, with suprisin' frequency, after a little diggin' and the application of some Common Sense...  Yep, some Bullshit.  Sometimes, it's hard to question the validity of a statement or postulation, particularly when it's comin' from somethin' we may consider a "trusted source", or if it should happen to fit a particular pre-conceived notion we may personally hold in favor.  (This would be a polite way of sayin' "what we want to hear.")

"Where'd ya hear that?"

"Read it out there on that Internet."

"Oh.  Well Hell, then it must be true..."

If you can find additional reasonable points of proof, arrived at independently from one another, that either support the original information or contradict it, then you have attempted to do due dilligence when it comes to acceptin' somethin' as a point of fact.  (One nail in a board- not very secure and easy to spin.  A second nail--more secure, much harder to move.  Three nails--damn secure.  Ad infinitum...  A simple, succinct analogy.)

First, I started drillin' down on the really easy things, the kinda stuff saddled with histories rife with subterfuge and manipulation:  Partisan Politics;  the Media--Left, Right, and Center;  Big Business;  Advertisin';  Religion--all of it; the Obvious Bullshitters; Those with Agendas Clear as Chrystal.

Some things were blatantly suspect on the first read, quick and easy to refute.  Other Bullshit was more cleverly disguised.  Some deceits were so subtle, so camouflaged, they were virtually transparent, invisible.  Arguably, Works of Art.  I'm confident that, if confronted, many of the more adept Authors of Bullshit would refer to their "manipulation" of information (I'm bein' extremely gracious) as "Spin".

The more I looked, the more Bullshit I found.  Everywhere.  Absolutely dead up everywhere.  Did I learn anything?  Did I experience an epiphany?  Have a revelation?  Maybe feel just a tiny bit smarter...?

It would appear that the Internet has become the New Roost for all manners of Bullshit: Hate, Commercialism, Religious and Political Dogma, even a place for the promotion of an authoritarian and nationalistic system of government and social organization with a contempt for Democracy.  (Okay, that last one is Fascism.  Just felt like slippin' in a quick definition...)  

Perhaps, regardin' the Distillation of  Legitimate Fact from a Churnin' Sea of Bullshit, it may actually be better, simpler, smarter in this particular scenario, to view the information in question with the help of metaphoric blinders, or as through the center of a narrow philosophical tube.  Somethin' that would assist us in shuttin' out some of the Noise and Flashin' Lights, increasin' our capacity for Focus, intensify Concentration, assist in avoidin' the Intentional Distractions designed and constructed to Influence and Sway.

We have all become active, unknowing participants in a Global Exercise in Gullibility, deployed on the Grandest of Scales.  Suspicion?  Sure.  Paranoia...?  Maybe...

The Internet, in so many ways, has become (relative to Conflict) a reflection of our Contemporary World.  On issues of Morality, Religion, Politics, All Things Devisive, it has become the Forum of Choice, where anyone (includin' Yours Truly) can inject their personal version of "Fact" and "Truth", in almost any style or form they choose, while enjoyin' near-total anonymity.  (Or, even more fun, under the cover of a fictitious personality purely of our own design.  How freakin' cool is that?!  Huh?  Whoa...)  

Yep.  The metaphysical Blunt Instrument of Propaganda.  The Information Highway:  our New Frontier--devoid of the Virtues of Honesty and Civility.  Unencumbered by the Rule of Law, Matters of Conscience, or the Burden of Fact.  Even the very Laws of Physics themselves fall before the Power of Bullshit.

Gotta say--this is startin' to get a little Crazy...

And, you know, a funny thing about Bullshit:  Whether well-intentioned or malicious, it's still Bullshit.  And, Bullshit is Dishonest, Dishonesty is Wrong.  Right?  Wrong ain't Right, right?  It can't be--it's wrong.  That's right, ain't it?  Ain't that a constant?  Wrong is wrong?  Anybody...?

Regretably, this has led me to what appears to be an Inevitable and Unavoidable Conclusion:  To blindly trust anything, anyone, is to do ourselves an injustice most grave.  Even dangerous. 

And yet, it seems that many of us consistently choose to embrace even the most suspect of statements, no matter how absurd or illogical.  Why?  Is it Intellectual Sloth?  Zealotry?  Plain Ol' Dumbass?  All these things, and more?  

Hell, I'll be honest--I ain't got a freakin' clue.  That's an admission of Ignorance and Confusion.  You ain't gotta vet that.

~Fish