You are someone else - I am still right here
Well, good folks, it's that time of the year. The Asmo returneth with His by now traditional Random Return Ramblings. Let's get right into it.
On politics and the expanding Universe
I've talked about this before, probably at length, but the fact remains; as the world gets ever smaller, and the news, sensations and stories get ever closer, it seems like people -
ordinary people - are further apart than ever before. Lately, I've come to realize that I've more-or-less lost yet another... Friend, I suppose is the correct word by its common application. In any case, lost me another one of those to the growing chasms caused by, on a personal level, rather irrelevant bullshit of political and ideological persuasion.
It's kind-of like the expanding Universe model - the galaxies are "where they've always been," there is just more space between them. If you ask my pretty-much former pretty-much friend, he's still where he has "always been," and I have moved away from that place. If you ask me - you'll get the same answer, with the roles reversed. I'm pretty sure I can construct a good argument for my position having changed little, simply by virtue of not caring enough for most of the divisive issues for it to be relevant in my everyday interactions, but one has to wonder; can he construct my exact same argument and apply to himself? If so, and if at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter... Then why the ever-increasing distance? And if that distance is not overly relevant, why the increased exclusion?
Right, Left, Libertarian, Authoritarian, Traditionalist, Progressive, Atheist, Muslim... I'm happy to break bread with any of them. Yes, even the Communist and the Fascist. I'll happily have a polite, if blunt and overly verbose from my side, conversation with any-one who wants to engage - if nothing else, for curiosity and a chance of good company. I can and will. The "larger world" can't and won't. Not anymore. Being a curmudgeonly feller with a new gray hair appearing in his beard almost daily, I fail to understand the fashion - the
need for being a victim, for externalizing blame, for ever looking to
them for all things bad, and to
us for all things good. I'd rather
talk about why I'm wrong - and why you are.
Brexit, Trump, the rise of Populism in Europe... They are all a backlash - symptoms of... It's difficult to word precisely. A weakness, I suppose. Individuals and therefore their societies lacking the strength required to face the hostile Universe with their head held high, in stead attempting to mould it to their utopic ideals, to which they
feel entitled. And where there is backlash, someone will always lash out against
that, and so we get the rabid but utterly impotent counter-culture movements like Antifa and the more potent, insidious forces of "new-wave" Marxism, Intersectional politics and racial supremacy.
Historically, the war of counter cultures was reserved to the fringes of cultural, political and economic sphere. In the Universe which has expanded so much that no other galaxies are even in view, however... Those fringes are now the quadrants of our own - of mainstream. Thus, the bland Centrist who does not oppose abortion being legal is Communist scum and the equally-bland Centrist who refuses to use your weird-ass pronouns is a Nazi swine.
I wonder how long it will take for the dust to settle on this new reality, and if the settling of said dust will reveal the world of Mad Max rather than that of Star Trek Federation. Here, today, it certainly looks like the former. I don't blame the politicians, nor cops or the wealthy, the migrants or even The System™ - I have a mirror. Get one. You may not like what you see, or not see what is there, but you not seeing it does not diminish its reality.
While waiting to see if I need a bigger V8, here I am, at the centre of my Universe, which will ever continue growing away - in every direction. One is the loneliest number. Also, a legion. An army. One... Suits me.
Disclaimer: Not talking to or about any-one specific. Them's general
ramblings.
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