Man, I struggled with what to write today.
There’s just so much to swear about. Attacks on free speech, attacks on the free press, attacks on homeless people who a certain asshole of a fox anchor think need to be put to death, the smugness of certain individuals as they continue to survive the fall out.
I kind of feel like the Grandson in The Princess Bride as his Grandfather reads to him that Humperdinck survives. He is aghast and troubled about the continued existence of such a rotten antagonist. The one who has killed, and lied, and lied, and lied, and continues to survive. And survive and lie and kill.
Same, kid, same.
My advisor chair knows that I have been struggling with this nonstop shitshow. It is sapping my concentration. Concentration that I desperately need to finish my PhD program.
I have concentration but it is fragile. Because I feel like someone, anyone, needs to be documenting this shit show. Witnessing is a form of protest. Because those who go bump in the night would rather not be seen, thank you. It is very much go away, there is nothing to see here.
It is time to look past the shadows. It is time to find Joy. This will depend on the eye of the beholder. My joy is not the same as yours. Because we are different, you see.
Joy can be found in a baby’s laugh, or a perfectly made dinner just to make someone smile. It can be found in the soft fur of our beloved cat or dog. It can also be found in a movie that makes you laugh. This weekend I am determined to watch the Cornetto Trilogy by Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost. Simply because I find joy in laughter.
The shitshow will go on. But there is joy in protesting for some.
Does the administration not realize that certain someones can seek out other platforms after they’ve been attacked and denigrated and next to fired by the administration’s yes men? If one platform is threatened, find another. The internet will be their playground. If anything they’ve been constrained and shackled to an industry that seeks to profit above all else. If the last five years has taught us anything there is gold in the internet.
Remember that someone has to pay witness to this continued insanity. Someone has to be able to explain to the next generation that most of society fucked it up and we lost the most precious prize of the last 249 years. Our freedom.
But find the joy in the everyday.
This will ease the pain of the witnessing.
It goes back to the thought experiment that was going around as I was growing up. If the tree falls in a forest, does it make a sound? My answer was always yes. The tree doesn’t care if there is anyone to perceive it. Sound happens in the absence of someone to hear it. It is arrogant of us to consider the tree as an extension of our consciousness when it should be the other way around. The tree doesn’t care or need us but Democracy needs us to be able to bear witness when/if it falls. And to help if we can.
After all, in the Lord of the Rings when Théoden asked “Who was there “Where was Gondor when the gates of Westfall fell?” This really was a question of Théoden’s son, Theodred, falling in the battle and the grief that paralyzed a nation that followed.
Maybe I will watch the LOTR trilogy next weekend. Just to remind myself that this has happened before and good has triumphed over evil. We see you, Sauron, and we do not care for it.
Dispatches from the Evening Shift 