I’d planned my next post back for next Monday, but sometimes I can’t wait. Happy New Year…?
If you voted based on the binary Democrat/Republican line, you’ve likely thought many times in the past “I don’t like either of them, but I will vote for the lesser of two evils.” I’ve thought this myself before. I get it.
But either way, the decision we made was to accept evil.
No matter which one you voted for, you voted for evil. Period. Should you be sitting there in disagreement of that statement, it’s little more than a rationalization created by the prefrontal cortex of your brain to make sense of things. It’s the same thing it does when putting dreams together after you wake up.
I realize you may think I sound arrogant in telling you this. I don’t care, I’m correct, and some part of you knows that. Few people can be honest with themselves, so they can’t be honest with anyone else. You don’t really believe your candidate isn’t evil, do you? You’re smarter than that, I know you are.
But I suppose I haven’t been honest with myself either. Did I really think that reason and compromise would prevail?
Here’s another arrogant statement – I feel like I’m trying to have a conversation with a brick wall 99% of the time. The vast majority of people either:
A. Don’t want to hear opinions that oppose their own; what they want is to hear their own opinion coming out of another person’s mouth. I mean, it’s fun for all of us to hear confirmation that we are right sometimes, but that shouldn’t really be the goal, should it?
OR
B. Don’t actually have much information or opinions of their own, they are just repeating that of their tribe members.
It’s exhausting. It’s exhausting trying to talk to people who don’t want to hear. It’s exhausting listening to people who only repeat someone else’s words verbatim with no added critical thought. It’s exhausting constantly fighting the urge to say “fuck integrity” and give in to one side or the other just to belong somewhere.
It’s exhausting hearing from people I love that, “we need to get out of this two party bullshit” and then scoff when I suggest they actually VOTE differently. “That won’t work, they have to do it.” “They” being the government that is currently running our asses via the illusion of the choice between two parties. Why would they do such a thing? There is no “they” in this scenario – the people to get us out of this two party bullshit is US. This is our responsibility.
Sometimes there’s good reason to choose the lesser of two evils – but the political theater that we have been audience to for decades is not a good reason. Because we are not really the audience – we are complicit. Yes, we. Me, you, us.
We chose to lie to ourselves to stay comfortable. We chose cowardice over bravery in the face of the unknown. We voted for evil, over and over. And that evil has been festering and burning, and that which had been slowly oozing for a very long time finally began to erupt in 2020. As we go into 2021 the fact remains; we deserve what’s coming to us. What’s here.
We did this – collectively.
The third parties aren’t innocent either – organize, believe in change for once, and stop being literally crazy for fuck’s sake. And people who like to complain an awful lot (like yours truly) need to put up or shut up.
Both the Democrats and Republicans have fallen. They may only appear in the process of collapsing, and you may even think the party you identify with is salvagable, but they are gone. We are dealing with a single corrupt system run by money and power, not separate parties. They are aided by media conglomerates also run by money and power (meaning they will absolutely lie through their teeth and create drama for views – “if it bleeds, it leads” as they say). The media you watch is owned mostly by 6 corporations, and the majority of the big news outlets in the U.S. are owned by three of those. Additional stats to make you vomit are here and here. We are being played against each other, every second of the day.
So, what about me? Am I going to do anything more than complain? Am I going to put up or shut up? There’s a part of me that thinks its just too late. But ever the cranky, reluctant optimist; I just can’t let it be.
The problem to solve is that we are human.
Humans need to belong, no matter how much some of us may think it doesn’t matter to us. For people to belong, that means that some must not belong – deny it all you like, but it’s how we’re wired. In the absence of another option, we will choose whichever group the majority of those around us choose. Because we want to belong.
We are tribal beings, but we have few real tribes anymore. Most of us don’t live in communities that we feel responsible for; many of us don’t live near family or simply don’t have any. So we have to seek out other tribes. Identity politics fills this void for many, in a most dangerous way. And here we are.
But we are not each other’s enemy, no matter how much it may feel that way. The person next to you, with a different political ideology than you, is being played too.
So rather than fighting a losing battle against that instinct, lets redefine the tribes.
To be continued…