Screaming into the void

I am not sure what I’m going to write here. With everything going on in the world right now (cliche phrase, but COME ON), I decided to try and write down some off my angst and stress and depression. As it is, I’m fairly lucky right now, and not heavily effected (yet). Many people are much much much worse off than I am from this, but this is just the beginning, so it’s about what’s coming down the road as much as it’s what’s currently happening.

I’ve been listening to The Orb a lot lately, specifically the album I first bought of theirs back in the mid-late 90s: Orblivion. Besides being good ambient, spaced out music, I have fond memories of listening to this while trying to get through Hazy Maze Cave in Mario64. It’s funny/good how music and smells can associate to specific memories like that. Anyway, I wonder if I am subconsciously getting back into The Orb, and this album in particular, because it brings my brain back to a quieter time of sitting in front of the TV playing video games and not giving a shit about anything else, although I was a teenager and probably had all the teenager stresses back then. They haven’t filtered through, though. I have Orblivion on right now as I write this, as it seems like good music to write stuff too. No real lyrics to pay attention to. Anyway….

The US is dead, it just hasn’t realised it yet. It’s been dead for a while, but everything seems to have amped up to a million in the last month, and it was already running hot before that. I think I want to try and examine how it died from my view, all the signs along the way that the wheels were coming off, and the killers who would ignore or even exploit the signs in order to get rich, or the myopic fools who had a genuine belief that a short-term fix was going to be a stepping stone to a better America (and world, being the world’s leading superpower).

I believe it started in the 70s with the rise of neo-liberalism as a backlash to the good life (for a majority, DEFINITELY not everyone) that seemed to form after The New Deal, but I am writing this from my view of the world, and that didn’t really hit until the 90s. I would say I was a know-nothing back then, but I remember in a debate class mentioning American Exceptionalism (although I didn’t know the term back then) to the surprise of my teacher when we were debating gas prices in class. I wasn’t a debate nerd, I just needed an extra class to fill, but that memory sticks in my head and makes me think “oh maybe I’ve always been disillusioned by America” even though I came from a white middle-upper class family, what America was heavily benefiting at the time.

Anyway, the turn of the century really crystalised stuff for me. This may be because of various things:

I think a combination of all that really started giving me a different view of the world. I got out of the bubble of “America is the best!” that most Americans were/are insulated in, even unknowingly. It’s constant propaganda on TV, driving down the highway, etc. Some people embrace the nationalism, even more-so now, but the US is deadly to so many and is not a thing to be celebrated. I still had it ingrained in me. Right after 9/11 I remember setting my MSN Messenger name to “Operation Enduring Freedom”, encouraged by “our” response to Afghanistan. I remember my Dad messaging me saying “so I guess you’re for it, then?” or something along those lines. I think he knew it was bad, but I had to figure it out for myself.

So while I was being “deprogrammed”, I was still learning about the world in general. And every time I learned something new, it’d incorporate into my world view, and bit by bit, the patriotic love of the US was fading. Instead I was discovering how other countries aren’t worse than the US just by virtue of not being the US. In fact, I was learning how horrible the US was, and how cruel it was to large swathes of its people, and how they were even worse to people that weren’t Americans. But hey, the Daily Show was helping us sort this out.

I question if The Daily Show (and later The Colbert Report) was a net gain or net loss for the US. It was real good at pointing out the hypocrisies and shittiness of the US politicians, but it also promoted the West Wing-type (I’ve never seen the show, just know from context) debate of “well if you just point out where they are assuming something incorrectly, they’ll fix their view.” The Daily Show (and Colbert Report) were not prepared for politicians to be complete shitheads for ideological or greediness reasons. They thought everyone had good in them, and that if they were just given a kind hand, they’d come good. That is clearly not the case. They also promoted the idea that politicians would accurately vote or represent what their constituents wanted. That is also clearly not the case. So for a long while in the 2000s the answer to the creeping death of the US was “vote harder and debate the shitheads, giving them a voice”. Meanwhile, the US and the world got worse. As long as we vote for the Democrat, we’ll end up being OK! Was the DS/CR promoting solutions within the system because that’s all the writers could see? They were still owned by a major conglomerate (Viacom) which was profiting nicely off the status quo… so maybe they were directed to gin up outrage, but only so much, and only on one side, so there could be a steady flow of money. I don’t know, but either way, the time of the 2000s lead to an angry base for the Democrats to motivate and organise. Enter Obama.

If I had to pick one person who has convinced me the most that the Democrats are a lost cause, it’d be Obama. He ran an amazing ground game in 2008. Hope and change and all that, amazing grassroots organising. The people were fired up. The people were ready to change America! He won by a good margin! Let’s fix the US! Then he ripped up his grassroots network. The Great Recession was happening (not his fault) and his response was to reward the companies involved and jail no one of value (100% his fault). He completely capitulated to the exact same companies that ruined the lives of millions of US citizens (and non-citizens, that shouldn’t matter). Meanwhile, he pushed the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Originally a good concept, it included a provision for single-payer, meaning universal health care. This is unambiguously a good thing. But the GOP fought back and held his feet to the fire, and he crumbled. Suddenly the insurance companies are involved and have a say in what it will look like. In fact, they were courted. The Democratic curse of “run to the right in compromise” poisoned what could have been truly groundbreaking legislation. Obamacare did ultimately pass, and it was OK, and it helped some people. Ironically, a lot of the people it helped would never vote Democrat, so even as a vote-getting exercise, it was mid. It could have been so much more, though, if Democrats had stuck to their guns. But that’s not Obama’s style. This is the man that had a “beer summit” when a racist cop arrested a black guy in his own home. His solution was to kowtow to the right, whether out of cowardice or he just sucks, and make the guy that was FULLY THE AGGRIEVED PARTY sit down with the racist shithead that arrested him, like both were at fault somehow so both had to swallow some pride and sit down together. Bullshit.

So that defines a lot of Obama’s term. Constant capitulation and minor improvements that help a few and give the Dems something to try and differentiate themselves from the GOP, however slight. Meanwhile, the right is getting more conservative, more racist, more selfish. The overton window is heavily drifting to the right, by a base that is more angry and more ruthless about getting what they want. So we’ve got weak Democrats with nothing good to show, at this point running off their own smugness, and a strong, angry base in the GOP. Hello, 2016.

A successor to Obama was a big thing, he was a breath of fresh air to many who didn’t really have any dogs in the fight and were more worried about civility. The Daily Show/West Wing attitude of “we can debate” is now firmly in the minds of the Democratic party leaders, and most of the non-leaders, while the GOP is stripping copper from the walls. Who can pick up the mantle and lead the Democratic party, and the US, into a world were things don’t get worse, and maybe, just maybe, improve a little? How about the wife of an ex-president from another era? Someone who defines “civility politics”? Hillary.

The scheming of the DNC to place their chosen successor on the throne probably doesn’t need much detail, but I will say that by doing this, it satisfied the people within the DNC, but on the outside, it really showed the raw corrupt core of the Democrats to the world. The Dems saw Trump as an easy win, so took the opportunity to try and cement their power in the DNC, as obviously they would be the leader of the US next, and should be able to run their party how they want. This didn’t go well, of course. They couldn’t beat a multiple-bankruptcy game show host who was on the record of sexually assaulting women (and maybe even rape? I can’t remember at this point). The Dems were right, this SHOULD have been a slam dunk, but internal power plays and a disconnect from the people of America spelt their doom. I could have told you it was coming. People were screaming from the rooftops that it was coming, but the Dems at this point just ran off smugness. They want all the same money-making corruption the GOP has, but to appear above it… it doesn’t work. They’re shown to be the very hypocrites Daily Show had spent a decade showing us in the GOP. Panic mode set in, and the Democratic party decided to handle it how they always do: no new ideas, double down, capitulate further. Suddenly they are paring down bills before they even get to a vote. Then of course, these neutered bills are sent out for a vote, and the GOP demands even more concessions. It’s an unending cycle of weakness and pushing rightward.

Now is about the time I am completely disillusioned with America. Seeing the black heart of the party that is supposed to be the progressive party kills all hope. The GOP has won. America is in trouble.

Since then it has been more of the same. Fetterman, Sinema, Biden, Pelosi, Schumer, Feinstein. The Democratic administration was actively encouraging and supporting a genocide, and was proud of it. People like “The Squad” try to give a vaguely left voice, but are constantly sabotaged by their own party, even when what they’re pushing has already been cut down. The same playbook the GOP used against the Dems is now being used by the Dems against anyone who doesn’t support the corrupt core of the Dems.

What has their response been? More smugness, no self examination. People saying we need to vote more, need to get out the vote, need to SEND THE DEMOCRATS MONEY. These people are millionaires or billionaires off legalised insider trading, but they need my $20. You’ve gotta be kdding me.

So now Trump et al is in charge, and no one is around to fight him. AOC posts some good stuff but it’s just words. The Dems are lining up to support GOP picks for positions, no resistance, no fight. It’s over. The US is dead, it just hasn’t realised it yet.

OK maybe it’s not dead, but its salvation doesn’t lie in the Democratic party. What comes next is anyone’s guess. Every day Trump and team are stripping more and more rights from people, and destroying lives. Sometimes even with the encouragement of the so called “progressive party”. I don’t know what comes next, but I now the Democratic party won’t be the thing that stands up to it, that fights it. If anyone, it will be grassroots mutual aid communities that provide the most resistance. The Democrats will try to co-opt it like they do any popular movement they think they can profit off of, but they need to be rejected in the strongest possible terms. At this point the Dems are experts at poisoning a movement from the inside, it’s most of the career DNC members strive for. They cannot be allowed to get a foothold on what comes next, or it will all be for naught.

While all this is happening, and the US makes stupid move after stupid move, where it sits on the world stage will change. It’s been declining for a long time, but has still generally been the de-facto world leader. China has been making major inroads though (literally in some places). They’re providing other countries with actual infrastructure and support and help, not demands. When the US recently left the World Health Organization, China said they’d step in and give the funding that the US was withdrawing. I believe that since then some US-based billionaire has stepped in and said he will kick in, which I gotta assume he sees as a protective play from letting China take over the world, where his status would be greatly diminished. What’s amazing is people are lining up to thank the billionaire, like he didn’t make all that money off exploiting people. Capitalism is built on exploitation. The more money you have the worse you are. Billionaires are the worst.

Anyway, all this to say that time is ticking, and the US is accelerating its decline, both internationally and nationally. I think at this point I welcome it, however I don’t know how badly people are going to be fucked over in the meantime. I don’t know what China would be like as a world leader. They have problems, but I don’t think they’re any worse than the US at this point. It’s hard for me to accurately judge them because of the years of western propaganda we’re given about them, but the more I learn about the western world and how this supposed “better than china” utopia works, the more I see the (western) emperor has no clothes. I am curious to see what the world looks like under China, and hopeful that a change of that magnitude could lead to better outcomes, because right now there’s nothing.

At the end of all this is people. People have been getting the rough end of this, and will continue. People are suffering. People will continue to suffer. The US won’t save us. The Democrats won’t save us. China won’t save us. Target, Costco, AOC, Musk, Bill Gates, etc.. no one is saving us. It’s up to us to try and support each other. Mutual-aid networks are what keep people going. It can feel overwhelming, so many people need help, but mutual aid is where every little bit helps, much more-so than some millionaire politician’s slush fund. It’s hard to know who to help, how to help, and how much to help… but those are personal decisions that you make yourself, and the answer is: “whatever you feel comfortable with”. You are the only one to answer to. So give, help people, and feel good you’ve made a concrete difference in someone’s life. Do what you are comfortable with, don’t let yourself get bullied about what you do or don’t give, but by that measure, no bragging about what you do or don’t give. How you contribute is your business and should be done for your own desire to help, not for recognition. Mutual aid is how we fight the shitheads. It’s how we help each other. It’s how we shine a bit of light in a face of overwhelming darkness.

OK, I think I’m done screaming for now. Orblivion is almost at the end of the second CD (full of remixes and stuff). Do I feel better? I don’t know. The world is still horrible and getting worse, but we all do what we can to get by, with a emphasis on helping others who are currently worse-off.

❤️