[I’ve been trying to focus on happy fun time topics. I hope you’ve been enjoying it. For the greater good of American society, I’ve deliberately ignored politics (with exceptions and caveats) for a few years now. That said, in 2019 it’s hard to ignore the elephant in the room. I’ve got some ideas that need to be released from my pointy little head. Forgive me as I touch the third rail.]
One needs audio distraction for long road trips. I don’t do payments so satellite is out. FM music programming sucks donkey balls and I don’t like the fidelity of AM music. The shrillness of AM talk radio is mildly embarrassing and FM talk is limited to boring sportsball meatheads. America’s Pravda (NPR) merits special mention. NPR is the Godzilla of domestic American radio propaganda. It dominates the airwaves on virtually every square inch of our vast nation. They’ve got FCC licenses that blanket the continent. In addition to being the loudest clearest station everywhere they never stop “the narrative”. They could talk about the weather or play Jimmi Hendrix or discuss soil composting methods but that doesn’t serve their “mission”. 24/7 they ooze elitist signaling groupthink that only sounds deep to a stoned 19-year-old freshman. (In particular, Terry Gross says “have a discussion” in ways that indicate sentient beings can’t have alternate viewpoints.) I hate NPR’s propaganda because it’s sloppy and obvious. People trying to manipulate me should at least try subtlety. Hear that NPR? Before you grab my ass, I expect dinner and a movie!
My solution to radio’s suckitude is an MP3 player laden with history lectures.
History has the “clarity of distance”. In 2019, folks who benefit from a populace that’s freaked out have done an excellent job of freaking us out. We’re so deep in the weeds it’s hard to think (which is probably the point). History reminds us that everything has happened before. Today’s hyperventilation is not the end of the world; it’s just a time of flux. I’ve heard it called a “transition”, “interregnum”, or “shitstorm”. Choose your vocabulary at will.
With distance can one dial down the hype, engage the thinking cap, and see the forest for the trees. I listen to and (given an equally nerdy counterpart) engage in reasoned discourse about the pros and cons of Diocletian’s reforms to the Roman Empire in the third century. Nobody will care. If I have the same level discussion about a recent event, folks go ape. Only “that thing from long ago” won’t ruffle feathers. (This is probably why competing political interests try so hard to act like history started in 1965, or 1776, or 2016.)
Mention events that happened recently and reason is gone. Much of the populace starts braying like farm animals and the rest run for cover. Collectively we don’t weigh results so much as claim victory. Talking heads don’t assess costs or consider alternatives; they assign blame and decide which horse is winning today’s race. The media emits sounds that resemble thoughts but they’re just mantras for their team’s faithful to repeat on Facebook. Wandering amid a populace driven just shy of madness, most of what I hear are programmed responses to expected stimuli
For now (and perhaps many years in the future), Americans are (and will be) frantic. We’re only human. We had limits. We’ve been misled, mistreated, harangued, harassed, indoctrinated, coaxed, crushed, forced, and fucked. Most of us are chained to a perpetual motion machine of polarized nothingness. Ford versus Chevy, Coke versus Pepsi, Packers versus Vikings; my team is awesome and your team sucks.
It’s enough to convince a guy to build a little boat and sail around a lake.
That said, I’d like to mention some thoughts derived from history lectures and autodidactic rumination. I see hints of the iceberg under the seas. Stay tuned and see if you have experienced what I’m trying to describe…