Dr_Fetus_Jackson

Duly noted, and I appreciate your not relegating my opinion to snorting self-sourced methane expulsions.

The harder notion for me here is that I have been voting since Bush Sr. / Clinton. This toilet keeps spinning faster as we get closer to the drain.

Until recent years, I believed that voting was exercising my rights and fighting the good fight. Maybe I'm jaded, which I think is fair, but I do think, in light of the circus we've watched the the past 8 years, that we've entered a new arena where violence ultimately is where this is headed. Someone responded here that I have permission to be something other than sad. Unfortunately, I disagree. When the shots ring out in political rage, we've effectively lost our civility.

I will reconsider my decision to not vote, but the bitterness might win out.

You may well be correct on all counts.

A question was asked, and I answered honestly from my perspective.

Ok.

Unfettered capitalism has masterfully created a self-serve corporatocracy that filters money straight to the political parties who, in turn, pose puppet leaders in front of the masses to grant a semblance of choice. No good will come of this "Weekend at Bernie's" farce of an election. Under current auspices, only more greed, lies, and violence are to follow.

Sorry, disenfranchisement and apoplexy are all that remain.

We prefer you call him The Great Pumpkin, thank you.

I would take those and the adhesive rubber feet that you would get with switches and make coasters out of them to give away.

I concur with all of your statements, to include the one concerning the realization of being a cog in the machine.

I have several errands to run, and would love to continue the discussion when I return, if you're amenable, of course.

You have a great points, though your scenario is a bit too simple.

It's not that we're so fat and lethargic that we can't be bothered to get off the sofa long enough to effect meaningful change. It's that "the media" is gargantuan and goes far beyond the synthesized news cycles and reports. The OG social media outlets like churches, work culture, family structure, regional Identities, and every other socialized structure you can think of manifests itself into these ideals that have been pummeled into our head since the first time we stood up in preschool and recited the pledge of allegiance.

Making it more complicated is that our real concerns like, paying our bills, feeding our families, getting Timmy to soccer practice, protecting our kids, being a good employee so we don't lose our job, being a good dad, being a good son, keeping our relationships healthy, etc., etc. is condensed into an infantesimally small amount of time. When you finally get to stop you've only got the bandwidth for bullet points. It's not laziness, it's exhaustion. It's not lack of self-reflection, it's overclocking. We have an entire backbone population that's absolutely exhausted and still feeling like failures because somehow the American dream is feeling like a greasy, over-hustled nightmare that we're constantly struggling to live up to.

This cycle does lend itself to your headlines of gun violence, gladiator arena us v. them politics, and on, and on. The system with which we now live is a constant grinder that no longer leaves time for, nor praises individualism and ideas. It's a finely tuned revenue machine built on an overhauled slavery model that instead praises corporatism, classism, ruling parties, and residual monthly income... with a smiley face of nationalistic exceptionalism posted on the packaging.

Apologies for being so long winded, but some sympathy for the devil might be in order. We're largely not a bad people. Most of us are kind, optimistic, and try very hard to change the things we see out of place. The problem is we're becoming more and more just white noise in the background. A sort of spectre of idealisms past.

The avocado toast is fan-fuckin-tastic here.

I bought bidets for the house during the COVID toilet paper lunacy and it's likely the best personal hygiene investment I've ever made. I still get upset when I have to poop somewhere that doesn't have a bidet.

I must confess to missing the vastness of Reddit, but I'll never go back. The company I keep here is better, by far.