(no subject)
I do not understand why Americans pretend to be upset about the family separation thing.
They chose this. Repeatedly. Over the last few decades. If you keep supporting and voting for sociopaths, that is consent to sociopathy. If you keep participating in and validating and defending cruel systems, that is consent to cruelty. This didn't happen in a vacuum.
It's just...I was 20 years old when 9/11 happened, and when we chose to bomb and destroy and terrorize and murder in response to it, it was clear that this kind of thing would be the end result. I could see that when I was 20.
But no one ever did anything to stop it. People gleefully participated in cruelty. We chose this. We freely and knowingly chose this. We decided that we preferred hate and cruelty and judgement and evil to anything good. You can't scream hate and spit at anyone who's different from you and make memes laughing at young people for getting shot at school and support torturing anyone whose skin tone is different from yours and then say oh hey, where did this cruelty come from? It came from you. It came from your choices. Own it, and either redeem yourself or admit that you're a horrible human being and you're okay with that.
I have watched this happen my whole adult life. So no, I'm not surprised by this, and as always what I am surprised by is the people whinging about "This isn't who we are!" It is who we are. It's what we chose. It's what we've been for decades. Centuries, really. If you haven't seen this, it's because you chose not to see it.
And I'm tired. At this point it's either let the humans go or just leave the world that they run, and I have cats and a spousal person and a mother and a best friend and writing to do, so that's not an option. Although after watching my childhood nightmare come true for two decades and being unable to stop it or get anyone to listen to me about it, I have to admit that getting out while the getting is good is really really attractive sometimes, and I don't have the resources to leave this country and as far as I know other countries aren't accepting Americans as refugees, so I have no other way out of this. And I want out. I want out so desperately. I can't take watching this anymore. I can't take living in it anymore.
Something happened to my right arm a few days ago, but it's not like going to see a doctor about it was an option, because we can't afford it. It turned out to be an annoying sprain and not a break, but still. This is no way to live, but it's clear that the people I am forced to live with want us all to live like this. I imagine they felt joy in their hearts when the suicide statistics came out. Why create a system that drives people to suicide unless you want that to happen? Why defend that system unless you like the results? Why refuse to stand up to it unless you like living like this?
I understand a single individual staying in an abusive relationship. I do not understand a society as a whole choosing to stay in an abusive relationship. You have the power of numbers. You aren't alone. If all of Germany had not consented to the Holocaust, if they had all stood on the train tracks and refused to move, the Nazis would not have been able to kill all of them. And those that were killed would have died with honor and meaning.
But my collective shows no signs of wanting to act as a collective to stop the cruelty. If you are the only person standing on the tracks and the train runs you over and goes on to deposit humans into gas chambers, what is the meaning and honor in that? You may have done what you believed in, and that would have been good and it would have had some meaning, but it also means that there would have been one less person to help hide Jewish people and smuggle them out of harm's way. If people won't stand on the tracks with you and so you are unable to stop the train, you have to find some other way to lessen the damage.
So my only option is to let it go, let the humans do what they want to do, and take care of me and mine as much as I can. Help others if conditions allow it. Try to find some meaning in this wasteland. Like the skyline downtown looked really pretty in the sunset tonight, and that's something.
When I was nine years old and reading about the death camps, I always wondered what the prisoners felt when they saw a bird flying in and out of the camp, free to go where it wanted and do as it pleased without having to worry about human bigotry and cruelty and sociopathy and hate and violence.
I want to be a bird.
They chose this. Repeatedly. Over the last few decades. If you keep supporting and voting for sociopaths, that is consent to sociopathy. If you keep participating in and validating and defending cruel systems, that is consent to cruelty. This didn't happen in a vacuum.
It's just...I was 20 years old when 9/11 happened, and when we chose to bomb and destroy and terrorize and murder in response to it, it was clear that this kind of thing would be the end result. I could see that when I was 20.
But no one ever did anything to stop it. People gleefully participated in cruelty. We chose this. We freely and knowingly chose this. We decided that we preferred hate and cruelty and judgement and evil to anything good. You can't scream hate and spit at anyone who's different from you and make memes laughing at young people for getting shot at school and support torturing anyone whose skin tone is different from yours and then say oh hey, where did this cruelty come from? It came from you. It came from your choices. Own it, and either redeem yourself or admit that you're a horrible human being and you're okay with that.
I have watched this happen my whole adult life. So no, I'm not surprised by this, and as always what I am surprised by is the people whinging about "This isn't who we are!" It is who we are. It's what we chose. It's what we've been for decades. Centuries, really. If you haven't seen this, it's because you chose not to see it.
And I'm tired. At this point it's either let the humans go or just leave the world that they run, and I have cats and a spousal person and a mother and a best friend and writing to do, so that's not an option. Although after watching my childhood nightmare come true for two decades and being unable to stop it or get anyone to listen to me about it, I have to admit that getting out while the getting is good is really really attractive sometimes, and I don't have the resources to leave this country and as far as I know other countries aren't accepting Americans as refugees, so I have no other way out of this. And I want out. I want out so desperately. I can't take watching this anymore. I can't take living in it anymore.
Something happened to my right arm a few days ago, but it's not like going to see a doctor about it was an option, because we can't afford it. It turned out to be an annoying sprain and not a break, but still. This is no way to live, but it's clear that the people I am forced to live with want us all to live like this. I imagine they felt joy in their hearts when the suicide statistics came out. Why create a system that drives people to suicide unless you want that to happen? Why defend that system unless you like the results? Why refuse to stand up to it unless you like living like this?
I understand a single individual staying in an abusive relationship. I do not understand a society as a whole choosing to stay in an abusive relationship. You have the power of numbers. You aren't alone. If all of Germany had not consented to the Holocaust, if they had all stood on the train tracks and refused to move, the Nazis would not have been able to kill all of them. And those that were killed would have died with honor and meaning.
But my collective shows no signs of wanting to act as a collective to stop the cruelty. If you are the only person standing on the tracks and the train runs you over and goes on to deposit humans into gas chambers, what is the meaning and honor in that? You may have done what you believed in, and that would have been good and it would have had some meaning, but it also means that there would have been one less person to help hide Jewish people and smuggle them out of harm's way. If people won't stand on the tracks with you and so you are unable to stop the train, you have to find some other way to lessen the damage.
So my only option is to let it go, let the humans do what they want to do, and take care of me and mine as much as I can. Help others if conditions allow it. Try to find some meaning in this wasteland. Like the skyline downtown looked really pretty in the sunset tonight, and that's something.
When I was nine years old and reading about the death camps, I always wondered what the prisoners felt when they saw a bird flying in and out of the camp, free to go where it wanted and do as it pleased without having to worry about human bigotry and cruelty and sociopathy and hate and violence.
I want to be a bird.