Category Archives: News

Is the United States Heading Towards a Civil War?

News, Politics
licensed from Adobe Stock

As someone who did his doctoral work in political science (and then subsequent graduate work in communication), let me tell you a secret that people almost always miss when it comes to the concept of civil war: No one EVER sees it coming. No one.

During the US Revolutionary War (which could be considered a Civil War as it involved fighting amongst Americans against Americans (as well as the outsiders who were theoretically in charge of the insiders at the time). For the sake of this essay, I’m referring to the people who fought against neighbors. And to make things even more complicated, most neighbors may not even known they were in the middle of a revolution until it was practically over. They were living their normal lives, farming or making products, and their only brush with the knowledge there was fighting might have been Revolutionary soldiers or British conscripts who crossed their lands at one time or other.

Forward just a few years after our conflict, and the French were in the middle of a civil war, often called another revolution. Some say it started because they had seen what had happened to the United States, but regardless, when it happened to the French, most were taken completely by surprise. Even the people who should have been knowledgeable. You know, the people who ended up getting their head chopped off for being in the parties of the people who lost. When Marie Antoinette said: “Let them eat cake,” she was not suggesting a desert choice for dinner. She was oblivious to the fact that things were going to come at her and come at her fast.

That’s kind of how I see things happening right now. The United States has had the luxury of nothing truly bad happening on its shores for over two hundred years. Sure, a bunch of religious fanatics, with connections to ideologies in foreign lands, flew a bunch of airlines into some or our largest buildings. But that’s not what I mean by bad happenings on our shores.

For over a hundred and fifty years, we’ve had nothing serious consume our homeland that threatened the very nature of what we stood for. Other than World War II, which was basically a challenge to Europe and the Pacific Rim, we’ve had it pretty lucky with most of our conflicts stemming from U.S. attempts at enforcing Marshall Plan-like proclamations. But those rarely threatened the daily lives of American citizens.

However, right now, we seem to be heading for conflicting territory in our future, the kind of mixed narrative where no one knows where it might end up, and any guess might just be more dangerous than saying nothing at all. In most civil wars, and I’m talking about a history of them from all corners of the globe, they happen for reasons you can never predict, and they explode in ways that no one can be sure they won’t end up under a guillotine or at the end of a firing range.

Civil Wars in Africa and East Asia have resulted in some of the worst atrocities imagined where common citizens were picked out of common groups and executed. Sometimes, people are killed for just looking one color or for having an occupation that someone believes to be a future threat.

But here’s the secret: The usual response is that “oh, that’s just in Africa and East Asia!” But here’s the thing: It’s not about where these things have happened; it’s about how they’ve gone from military targets to civilian targets. And what people don’t want to believe is that it’s not relegated to Africa and East Asia.

The United States’ citizenry has a unique history of murdering its own. In the United States, we have gangs that coordinate racial, ethnic, racist, religious and sometimes just local bullies. Historically, they have targeted less defended populations and harassed and/or killed them.

What is to stop anyone from thinking that these types of organizations, once there is rationale for the elements of civil war, won’t take it upon themselves to target those same demographics now that they have a justification for going after them? That’s pretty much how it’s always happened in the past. There are documented cases during a 19th century Civil War in France where shopkeepers used their ties to the leaders of a winning side (at least during two year periods of control) to target shopkeepers who were in competition with them, killing them so that they would no longer have to compete. That’s pretty much capitalism at its worse attribute.

Right now, the United States has split down the middle in a way not seen in the 1860s. Sadly, most people don’t realize that this isn’t new. The U.S. has always had this division. We just didn’t have the capability of recognizing it with some amount of immediacy. Up until now, we had mass communication, but that mode of speed was contained mostly by media and academics. Now, everyone, through social media, has instant communication. People who hate other people are now in contact with people who feel the same way, and they’ve become quite vocal.

For a few decades, we were generally okay because at least our politicians weren’t stupid enough to exploit this hatred Americans have towards other Americans. Now, that cat is out of the bag. And I don’t think anyone can figure out how to put the cat back into the bag, or even if America might bounce back to the way it was before the bag was opened.

We’re heading for a Civil Awakening, and whether that leads towards a Civil War is anyone’s guess, but from what I can see, NONE of the politicians trying to lead the country are capable of keeping it from happening. What we need right now is a completely different voice from what we’ve been hearing. We need someone who has a future vision of America where everyone benefits, not just one group of people rather than another group of people.

Our political parties are part of the problem. The Republicans represent a party that’s only desire is to benefit very rich citizens. Pretending to be for the people, specifically Rednecks that drive pick up trucks and wear baseball caps, has been dishonest for the last 60 years when they might have had an argument to make. Unfortunately, the Democrats have a similar problem. They advocate that they are for the lower classes, the middle class, and every disenfranchised demographic that is conceived by all sorts of parameters, but once elected to higher office, they immediately enact laws that protect specifically banks and very rich people. Meanwhile, a minority of their party still tries to advocate for the downtrodden, but not enough of them do in order to justify the appeal for 50 percent of the available votes.

The problem is that the people ONLY have a choice between these two parties. And this leaves a lot of people truly feeling disenfranchised when they become smart enough to realize what is really going on. Sure, they could vote for third parties, but in a two party system our country was built around, most of us are screwed.

And when people recognize they have no voice (and never will), the idea of revolution or civil war starts to sound appealing.

But like I said: If someone new with a completely different vision comes along, and at least one of the parties buys in, we might have a chance. Otherwise, we’ll exist on co-pilot until someone like the orange bufoon comes along with a more serious agenda that takes us right into the arms of an autocracy. And then it’s too late to care because those who do will end up being rounded up.

That’s how it usually happens. And you’ll never see it coming.

America Has a Problem, and We Refuse to Face It

Healthcare, News, Politics, , ,
licensed from Adobe Stock

On June 30th of this year, America achieved a milestone that set this year apart from previous years. And no, it had nothing to do with eating contests or Celebrity Jeopardy. No, this had everything to do with how many mass killings we achieved in the first half ot this year. We had 28 mass killings (more than four deaths in one instance) wheras in 2006, we had 27.

27 of those deaths involved guns (4 of which involved AR-15s) and one involved an arson, so this could easily be one of those articles about how guns are out of control. But I’m going to spare you from that. Instead, I want to talk about something more important, a factor that we should have been talking about a long time ago.

I’m talking about mental health.

One thing I’ve always found to be interesting is that after one of these minor massacres, politicians tend to stake them out on specific platforms. Liberals will generally commit themselves to the idea that guns need to either be removed or regulated while conservatives will pretend guns don’t exist at all and say either we need more thoughts and prayers or they will talk about the need for mental health focus.

And then they’ll never mention mental health again.

The reality is that we need mental health coverage and focus for a lot of people who have been targeted as needing such coverage, but in reality that costs money, and one thing conservatives won’t do is spend money, unless it’s to cover defense spending.

And while liberals are generally for mental health coverage, they’re generally not interested in focusing on it as long as their energy is centered on controlling or eliminating guns.

The biggest problem we seem to be facing is that neither side is capable of focusing on more than one issue at a time. But it shouldn’t be hard to see that if we started to focusing on mental health, we might solve one of the bigger problems that has reared in American society.

Let’s look at mental health in recent history: In 1967, the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act allowed for those struggling with mental health to be placed in mental hospitals in hopes of improving their mental health. But there were a lot of problems during this period, including horrible methods of treating those in custody. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter created a presidential commission on mental health with the idea of reforming a lot of these procedures. In 1981, when Ronald Reagan became president, he ended the Lanterman-Petris Short Act and pretty much kicked all of the people with mental health issues back onto the streets. Today, we don’t have much of a process with dealing with mental health issues unless police or medical officials can get a patient to admit that he or she intended to cause someone else or themselves some type of bodily harm. Then, and only then, can they admit someone into a medical facility as a danger to themselves.

That’s where we are today and why police services have such a hard time handling risky cases of potential mass killings. Their hands are tied, and the citizens are left fending for themselves.

Unfortunately, the only way to solve this is to either be viligent all the time (which is practically impossible) or for our elected leaders to do something to protect the people. Either this has to happen from Congress, which is the entity that in all theoretical terms should be the one to make such a thing happen. However, the president can do so as well through executive order, although ironically such an order would be constitutionally appealed by members of Congress and then sent to the Supreme Court, which in today’s environment, would probably reject the order on those grounds. That would leave a challenge to the Supreme Court, but if there’s no court case that is making the grounds to the Supreme Court, then they have no grounds to hear one. It is doubtful another fanciful cake bakery case would make its way to the Supreme Court covering this issue, so that’s not an option either.

In the old days we’d argue that if we wanted to get such a thing done, you’d need to write your member of Congress, but our country now exists within a vacuum, meaning that our representatives rarely respond to our interests any more these days, so one can only wonder if the second half of 2023 is going to lead us to reach another zenith in numbers of mass killing deaths.

For context, in 2019, there were 46 mass killings. We’re now at 28, which means we’re 18 away. I hope we don’t continue this trend. But all I have is hope, which isn’t much considering both hopes and prayers haven’t helped us in the first six months of this year.

America’s Values Are Competing With Our Desires

Economics, News, Politics, , , , ,
Licensed by Adobe Stock

Years back, I was wandering down Powell Street in San Francisco. If you’re not aware of the nuances of San Francisco, Powell Street serves as the Bart connection for most people in the corridor between downtown and the financial district. When the homeless situation started to get out of control in the city, you would expect this corridor would also serve as their hangout as well.

I remember a couple of suits walking down the street when one of the homeless confronted them, asking for money. One of the men seemed flabbergasted that one of the city’s homeless had addressed him and turned to his friend for encouragement after he cursed at the homeless guy. His friend turned back to him and said, not even waiting to take a breath: “When did people become so callous towards other people?”

I’ve often remembered that conversation because I think it was the last time that I heard someone actually evoke concern for those living on the street. Oh, sure, I’ve heard aid organizations talk about needing to help the homeless, but that was the last time I heard it said out loud by someone on the street. Nowadays, if someone tends to see a homeless person, or any person in need, I see them avoid that person, even to the point of crossing the street, if that will help avoid that encounter.

Yesterday, in the New York Times, there was an article about how the heat wave has been affecting Texas. I figured it was probably getting hot in a number of states, but they also reported that 10 people had died in Texas the other day, all because they didn’t have access to air conditioners. I seriously thought about driving to Lowe’s and buy ten air conditioners and drive them to Laredo, TX, the place where the 10 had died. And then I read more. Some of them had air conditoners but were scared to turn them on because of the prohibitive cost. The others just couldn’t afford air conditioners and roasted in their homes with air fans on, not realizing that it just wouldn’t be enough.

But here’s what caused me to want to write this article: Tano Tijerina, the county judge for Webb County (where Laredo exists) said about handing out air conditioners to citizens: “If you’re going to start giving out air conditioners, where do you stop?” he said. “We are an aid, we will help, we’ll assist.” But he added, “we’re talking about people’s tax dollars here.”

And that’s the problem right there. It’s a problem that has been growing for about as long as the United States has been a country.

You see, before the U.S. came along, most countries were monarchies or empires, and it was through their benevolence that they bestowed charity upon those they ruled over. When we came along, we promised to be a rule of the people, for the people and by the people. If you unpack that, what we promised was that our government would be ruled by the people and that those people would take care of the rest of the people.

But notice, that promise didn’t come from the original founding fathers, even if they might have meant it. Those words didn’t come into a hundred years after our nation was formed, from a speech given by Abraham Lincoln, detailing a new America after the Civil War. While his intention may have been that no people should be enslaving other people, he also meant that people with means should look after those who have needs.

And for many years, the country has moved in that general direction, but throughout all of those times, there has always been a group of people with resources who have tried to stand in the way of helping anyone who has needed assistance. Years back, they argued that people should lift themselves up by their bootstraps, even though those of means rarely ever had to lift any bootstraps; they were lifted long ago by families that were rich that allowed them to inherit immense wealth.

Throughout our history, whenever those in power have tried to give a lift to those in need, there has been that swift boot of injustice that tries to intercede and stop it from happening. During the Depression, when many were destitute, there were those who had wealth that did everything to stop FDR from enacting programs to help those in need. They used the Supreme Court to stop every move FDR made. And then FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court, which caused the very rich to realize that all of the gains they had achieved from a favorable Supreme Court might end, so the Supreme Court allowed FDR’s reforms to go through.

So, why am I talking about something nearly a century ago? Because those people never went away. Oh, sure, they’re different people, but they are acting in the same ways their fathers and grandfathers did. That county judge shows us that those people are still around.

What’s important to think about is what do we consider to be important to the American system of values? On one hand, we have those people who honestly believe that profit is more important than the well-being of our fellow citizens. We’ve been fighting this battle as long as most of us have been alive. It’s so convoluted that at times those with wealth have figured out ways to pitch the fights between groups of people without anything, so that the majority of the attention is spent on irrelevant fights while those with everything laugh while they’re counting their money.

As long as citizens of the United States care more for money than they do their fellow citizens, the point of the United States is irrelevant. We could be any location on the planet and it wouldn’t mean a single thing. People sailed to this country in hopes of starting a new and wondrous life. They didn’t do it because there was new land across the ocean. They risked their lives for something greater than that.

And for centuries, that’s just what we offered them. Now, not so much.

And that concerns me.

The Problems We Solve Are the Problems We Don’t Have to Face

News, Uncategorized, , , ,
Licensed from Adobe Stock

There was an article today in the New York Times titled, “For Ex-Prisoners, ‘Second-Chance’ Jobs Can Be Hard to Come By”, and I think it’s something important enough for us to discuss now, so instead of focusing on billionaires in sinking submarines near the Titanic or on international affairs/wars like in Syria or Ukraine, let’s focus on something a little closer to home, and something that may affect each and everyone of us.

Now, the chances of any of you reading this ending up in jail is pretty slim. Actually, I’m being kind of nice. Statistics from the Brennan Center for Justice indicate that one out of every three adults in America has a prison record. Yeah, I double checked that on another site, and it was correct. Doing some math myself, about a quarter of those arrests were for felonies, which means we have a lot of ex-cons in this country, and if you read this particular article, that’s a real problem.

One of the problems in America is that we’re not a very forgiving country. Oh, we say we are, but we’re not. You spend time in jail, and America kind of turns its back on you, kind of like the Klingons did to Worf when he was banished from Klingon space. Yes, that moment hit me hard, almost as hard as when I realized going for humor in a very serious piece is definitely reading the room wrong. If I was a Klingon, you’d be turning your backs on me and waiting until I left the room. Please don’t do that.

Getting back to seriousness, mainly because this issue is quite serious, I would like to ask the generalized question of “what should we do about this?”

One thing I’ve noticed from a lot of the pieces written and distributed on this site is that people have a tendency to complain about something that’s wrong and then advocate for nothing. Or worse, they advocate for something that’s ludicrous, as in something that’s never going to get done. I read an article the other day that argued that men tend to treat women horribly in relationships; then the writer advocated for all men to be nicer. Really? That was the solution?d I’m sure all those bad boys out there doing bad boy stuff are thinking about cleaning up their acts now.

One of my favorite moments in the Marvel movie Ant Man was when he got out of prison and took a job at Baskin Robbins, serving ice cream. And then he was fired once they discovered his prison record. His friends kept saying “Baskin Robbins always finds out.” And we in the audience all laughed.

I wonder if any ex-cons were in the audience and laughed as well. Well, they probably did because it was absurdly funny, but after some time I started thinking that perhaps there’s something wrong with the way we do things in our society.

The idea of prison is that it is punishment for transgressions. When your sentence is up, you are released and your crime is considered paid for. Sure, there might be probation and all that, but if they let you out of prison, it’s supposed to mean your debt to society has been paid.

But it doesn’t work out that way. Whenever you apply for a job, there’s almost always that section you start to fill out that starts to ask you if you’ve ever been arrested for a misdemeanor or a felony. And if you’ve been lucky enough to not have ever been arrested, I’ve even seen applications that ask if you’ve ever been accused of a felony or a misdemeanor.

I’m waiting for the application that asks me if I’ve ever imagined doing something that might land me a felony or a misdemeanor.

The point is: If you’ve paid your penalty, the punishment should be over. There are very productive citizens who had been locked up for years who are released and find themselves in situations that are impossible to improve. Not everyone comes across a reclusive millionaire who gives him an antman costume to fight crime. No, most ex-cons end up in situations where they can’t even find a job, so the most obvious next step for them is to do exactly what they did that got them the felony in the first place.

So, they end up back in jail.

What deranged mind thought through a system like this that makes it inevitable that someone who commits a crime is always going to end up in a vicious cycle that keeps that person in prison for life? There are some ex-cons who immediately commit another crime that is easy to solve, just so they can get back into prison, a place they at least know how to maneuver with some modicum of success.

And what this problem has led to is an overpopulation of prisoners across the country. And that has led to something extremely unique to the American prison system: For-profit prisons. Realizing that we have so many prisoners, independent contractors made their own prisons and farm their space out to cities, counties and states. Not only that, but they use the prisoners to conduct for-profit labor (the profit going to the guys that own these prisons). Had these prisoners been released into society upon the conclusion of their first incarceration, and been able to find productive jobs, they might never have seen the inside of a prison again, and they might be productive members of society again.

But America isn’t about forgiveness. Just watch an election debate, and you will see both sides of the political spectrum arguing to convince the voters how rough they will make life on prisoners and anyone who transgresses upon anyone. If one candidate talks about reforming the prison system, it’s instant political suicide, and you will never see that candidate again.

I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase: “Doing the same thing over and over again and getting the same bad result.” Usually, they add that this is the definition of insanity. They’ll also say it’s a quote from Albert Einstein. Well, he never actually said that, but if people keep repeating the same lie over and over again, people start to believe it, which is kind of similar to the quotation in the first place.

The problem isn’t that we do the same thing over and over again, get the same result, and then repeat the sequence. The problem is that we do the same thing over and over again and then never check on the progress, cause if we did, we would realize that our prison system doesn’t work and needs reform.

So who can we turn to if our politicians can’t fix it without being run out of office? For that, I suspect the answer is awareness that there’s a problem because I don’t think people are even cognizant that there’s a problem in the first place.

But there is a problem. So what do we do?

School Shootings in the Lone Star State and the US of A

News, Politics, , , ,
Revolutions can sometimes look like this

There have been a few serious shootings in Texas recently. There have been a few serious shootings in the USA as well. To put it bluntly, there have been too many shootings in places there really shouldn’t be any shootings. And sadly, this probably doesn’t surprise a whole lot of people.

You see, we’re getting used to this sort of thing in the US of A. Random people kill random people for no reason. And we don’t bat an eye. We moan and we speak out and we offer thoughts and prayers. And then a few days later, someone does it again.

Do we change the laws to make it tougher for people to do it. No. We don’t even dare attempt to think about that. That would take away our freedoms…to kill random people, I guess.

But that got me thinking about this whole thing as it’s been happening a lot in Texas. You would think that people would sit down and then start to realize that something needs to happen. IN TEXAS. But no, the mindset is that this is a national thing, so the answer needs to somehow come from the national area, whatever that is. We could solve this sort of thing on a local level, and then perhaps the national level would start to get better as more and more local areas responded with the right legislation to make sure this stuff doesn’t happen. But we won’t.

So, that means we need to solve this on a national level (or a state level, if that really exists as well). But state level won’t happen because Texas is Texas, and as long as guns are involved, Bob with the gunrack in his pick-up is going to reject any such plans to make Texas safer. Instead, the answer is to arm more Texans with higher powered rifles, and then somehow that will solve the situation with a sense of a “good man with a gun is there to stop a bad man with a gun” that only ever works on television shows where writers decide who wins and loses in a showdown.

But we won’t do anything nationally because we kind of suck nationally. The NRA has managed to pay off enough people on one side of the house to do nothing long enough that another election will come along and then the NRA will pay a new group of people to make sure enough don’t do anything. Look, I’m all for the idea of guns and the 2nd Amendment, but right now we’re trying to counter children killing children because of perceived reasons and threats that none of us have any control over stopping.

Our country is kind of screwed up right now, and no one seems to want to address that. Our leaders don’t lead any more but respond to the other side as if people who believe differently than we do are dangerous and must be put down. I don’t remember it ever being like this before. When I was growing up, if you were liberal or conservative, you didn’t think the world would be a better place if all of the people on the other side of he aisle were dead. You came up with either better ideas than the other side, or you came up with compromises that would cause the other side to say “hey, that’s good enough for me” and then we all went home and watched Jeopardy or whatever show we liked at the time.

Today, the two sides don’t even have a friendly conversation any more. That’s bad.

If we want to solve our problems, we need to do a few things going forward:

  1. Stop thinking of the other side as the enemy. Progressives want to change things for the better, and conservatives like to keep things as they are or as they might have been at some period in the past. Historically, both sides were against fascism, communism and genuinely evil people. Now, both sides are convinced the other side is one of those negative things I jus mentioned.
  2. We need to remember what the purpose of this country was from its foundation. It was designed to be the shining light in the midst of darkness all around us. Becoming the darkness doesn’t somehow make America better or great. We seem to have forgotten that in lieu of short-term goals.
  3. The gun lobby needs to be put back in its place. It was never meant to become the overriding lobby to end all lobbies. It was meant to be one of many different ideas that people would consider whenever it came to legislation and directions for the country to take. As a lobbyist that has full control, all we’re ever going to see going forward is shootings that kill so many loved ones that we’re never going to stop going to funerals and wondering why Washington can’t put a stop to it. We need to pull back on this string and put America back on it proper course.

I say this with mixed thoughts because I’ve become so used to us doing nothing and hoping for miracles. The truth is that miracles don’t come unless you’re willing to put forth the work to make them happen. Sure, you can pray for one. But look where that’s gotten us so far.

Dents in the Man-O-Sphere

News, Podcast, Relationships, Social Networking, Uncategorized, , , , , ,

There’s an interesting dynamic going on in the manosphere, which, if you’re not following this kind of content, you’d be very likely to have no idea it’s actually happening. But as I’ve mentioned in previous posts (and a few Youtube podcasts), I’ve been fascinated by this area of information, for both great content and some of the worst media I’ve come across in quite some time.

For those not familiar, the mansophere ranges from men going their own way (MGTOW) to dating strategies to a woman-hating rhetoric that resembles Calvin in Calvin & Hobbes with his “No Girls Allowed” Club. One of the more popular segments of this genre has been the whole “high-quality man” concept, where men purport to be the most valued type of men because they meet extremely unspecific checkmarks on female dating desires (i.e., six figure income, six feet tall, washboard abs, etc.). So, it’s not surprising that there are several podcasts out there where men claim to be exactly what these “high-quality men” are claimed to be. One of them happens to be a podcast called Fresh & Fit (which, if interested, you can find by searching for them on Youtube).

So, as I was researching a lot of this information (as I do with a lot of really strange topics), I started following this Fresh & Fit feed, and to make a long story short, it’s basically two African-American males in their young adulthood ages who sit around a table and ask questions of guests who came on their show. In most podcasts, they will have a large group of young women who all appear to have visited right before heading out to the Miami club scene, and then the two guys will continue to ask them questions about what they seek in men. And as you would expect, as their guests are almost always young (in their early twenties), generally attractive and quite often street stupid, they’ll go through their laundry lists of what a man has to be in order to attract their attention. After a while, you start to just hear their responses as noise because quite often a 19 year old girl who has done absolutely nothing in her life, other than have a somewhat lucrative Only Fans page where she sells her body for quick profit will indicate that a man needs to make at least $300,000 a year to even get her to blink, which basically translates to “hey, here’s a future cat lady who hasn’t bought her first cat yet”, meaning almost all of them are so in dreamy land that doesn’t exist, so that it becomes more comedy than anything else. Some of the men would prefer to go through online sites and check out the Best Platforms for Private Affairs in the UK that can ease their doubt of their self-worth.

But the main point that you finally end up with the Fresh & Fit podcast is that the two guys pretend they are high-value men that women should be fighting themselves over to even have a chance with them. In reality, they come off as desperate beta males, cosplaying as cool dudes, but it’s their schtick, so let’s just leave it at that. However, their approach to their podcast is that they are giving advice to the men out there (dating advice) and helping men to become their better selves. And while sometimes they do just that, most of the time, the podcast serves as a vehicle to allow the main guy of the two (Myron) to insult the women on the show, and women in general while acting like he has all of the answers because he has a podcast. The amount of times they try to raise their clout by talking about how many subscribers they have becomes very tiring and gets very old, almost like telling a potential girlfriend that she should date you because lots of women like you.

Anyway, one of the other podcasts I also watch is called Aba & Preach, and it involves two guys who basically address social topics and give their spin (or approach to them). What makes them unique is that they are very down to earth, really know their stuff, and basically call things as it is without ever turning childish in their approach. After a few years of watching their podcast, I’ve come to the conclusion that you can generally trust what they have to say because their worldly view rarely steers me wrong.

So, fast-forward, or reverse backwards, depending on your observation, Aba & Preach called out Fresh & Fit for some very specific content, pointing out that there were records of Myron actually telling women they had to give up sex if they wanted to be on the show and a bunch of other behaviors that went against the whole narrative of them being alpha males, and especially high-value men. The next day (or it might have been that night), Fresh & Fit did an episode where they acted like children and started making ad hominem attacks on Aba & Preach, and even went out of their way to start talking smack about Preach’s wife, who had nothing to do with the podcast whatsoever. This, in turn, led to a much more introspective criticism by Aba & Preach, which was both powerful and went over extremely well in the Youtube community. At the end of it, due to threats that were made from Fresh & Fit, Preach accepted a dare from the two Youtubers to box, and began to physically prepare to travel to Miami to do exactly that.

I should point out here that if you’ve ever seen Preach, you would not want that guy coming to your city to do any type of harm to you. He’s a big guy, and he has a certain disposition that indicates that he would back up everything he says with an equal amount of force. Myron and FreshPrinceCEO (his partner) seem to put off an air of being all talk, in comparison.

What happened next is kind of the point of this write-up. Fresh & Fit did a podcast the next day where they made a political apology, which if you’re not aware of what that means, they apologized to their subscribers for taking the wrong approach to this altercation. Aba & Preach responded with no intention of accepting the apology, stating, “the apology needs to be as loud as the insults” or something close to that. And they were right because at no time did their “apology” actually appeal to Preach, whose wife had been insulted, amongst other insults centered on Preach’s character, and even on his nationality and heritage. So, Preach has further indicated that he is moving forward with concluding the altercation as Fresh & Fit offered, in person and physically.

Today, FreshPrinceCEO made a podcast where he was buying a gun, kind of an out of the blue podcast that had no connection to any type of content either he or his partner has ever made. As expected, Aba made a statement on Youtube calling out FreshPrinceCEO on horrible optics and timing for such a podcast.

What’s really fascinating about this whole thing has been the response of the viewer base. For the most part, Aba & Preach have been hailed for direct, levelheaded responses and the commentaries have been nothing but positive. The commentaries on Fresh & Fit’s response has been horrible. Just yesterday, they lost 11k subscribers, which if you ask me, was the reason the “apology” was even attempted in the first place. They seem to be hemorrhaging members from their subscribers and while their most diehard followers support them, even on their own podcasts they are receiving all sorts of back and forth, rather than blanket support.

I find this whole thing to be really interesting because for the most part, what happens on the Internet rarely has ramifications, almost as if the realm suffers from the old adage of “any publicity is good publicity” or the opposite which is more of a cancel culture when you’ve upset the status quo and lose everything. The Fresh & Fit podcast seemed to be benefiting from the first axiom without realizing that ramifications can suck, and once they start to emerge, it’s like a slippery slope that doesn’t end until you’re at the very bottom of the hill with no way to get back up again.

So, over the next few weeks it should be interesting to see if they can survive this backlash, because I suspect that they are a lot like Hong Kong declaring war on China without realizing that might not bring the outcomes you want in the end.

Coming Under Fire…trying to achieve the honor of being placed on the highest court in the land

News, Politics, , , , , , , ,

Years back when I was in the Army, a grizzled NCO pulled me aside one day and explained something to me. Now, if you’ve ever watched an old Clint Eastwood war movie, or one of the many like it, you’ve heard this story before, so I’m not telling you something you probably already shouldn’t know. But I’m going to tell the story regardless, and even though you’ve heard it before, I’m going to explain how hearing the story doesn’t mean anything until you’ve experienced it. Anyway, it goes like this:

Two new lieutenants or two new privates come into a unit for the first time. They’re fresh out of combat training and ready  for their first assignment. Soldier A is gung-ho and looking for a fight. Soldier B is scared of his or her own shadow and looks like the one most likely to run from a fight. And then shit goes down for the first time and the whole unit is under fire. Soldier A marches into the theatre of battle looking ready for the fight, but when the first shot is fired, finds he or she can’t even move, freezes and basically fails everyone, including oneself. Soldier B, realizing that Soldier A is under fire and unable to move, jumps into the fight, drags Soldier A from the battle and fights back oncoming forces in the process. Soldier B proves to the be hero, and Soldier A has disappointed everyone.

Trial by fire we call it.

People often tell this story, thinking it is specifically about battle but fail to understand what it actually means. It means that everyone lives within their own narrative and tells their own stories.  But until something happens that tests one’s own abilities and shows that person that everything you’ve prepared for doesn’t explain a current dilemma, and you have to develop a new narrative based on walking through fire, you don’t really know how you will ever handle the stress of having to pull yourself out on the other side. Will you honor yourself and others? Or will you fold and prove yourself to be a complete failure? You can tell yourself you’re going to do one or the other, but until you’re truly tested, you never know what you’re going to do to get to the other side.

I’ve been fortunate, or unfortunate, to have had that test come across me a few times in my life. And each time has helped me to build upon my beliefs of what I thought might happen.  So far, I’ve been lucky in that I’ve not had an encounter turn out to be the opposite of what I hoped it would be. Sometimes, the outcome hasn’t emerged as best as it could have, but at the same time, I feel confident in the sense that I’ve not humiliated myself or brought dishonor upon anyone else in my care. Sometimes, that’s all you can hope for.

So, let’s talk about Brett Kavanaugh. A few days ago, he was undergoing his trial by fire as he was made to face a past accuser and to confront a hostile Senate that wasn’t about to let him just play legal games when answering their questions. Instead of just owning up to simple failings in his past by saying: “Yes, I drank a lot, and I made a lot of mistakes back then, but I’m trying to be a much better person these days. That’s all anyone can do.” he took the frat boy-no consequences approach and from what could be seen just bullshitted his way through the entire confirmation hearing, hoping that partisanship would keep him from having to take any responsibility.

And that hurt a lot.

As a veteran, my one thought watching this whole disaster on the screen was that I’d never be comfortable under fire with this guy backing me up. To be even more blunt, I wouldn’t be comfortable getting drunk with this guy in a bar. This is that guy that breaks a crime while drunk and then blames you, even though you were throwing up in the bathroom the entire time, telling the cops he only had two beers.

The trial by fire moment in this man’s life put him in front of the nation and asked him to make the right decisions. To quote the grail knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: “He chose poorly.” While he may still get a chance to get on the Supreme Court because of partisanship alone, most cases of trial by fire only get one chance to get it right. In a combat unit, he’d be that one soldier relegated to holding up the rear until the colonel can transfer him out of the unit where his actions won’t threaten to get any other soldiers killed. You rarely get a second chance to prove you’re no longer a coward. That first time is all a group of soldiers will allow; they may never trust you again.

While even if he was denied the Supreme Court pick, he’s proven he doesn’t even deserve the lofty position he already has, but he’s life locked into that position as well, meaning that he snuck his way into the elite unit and there’s really no way to usher him out. He’s now like that brigadier general who got his position by doing administrative work his entire career and once discovered to be a complete failure at combat is now being sent to some office in a corner of the Pentagon where he can’t affect anyone again, at least until someone can convince him to retire.

But I fear we’ve not seen the last of him yet.

And that should frighten a lot of people because the only reason this guy will ever be allowed a second chance is to fulfill a quota of people who just want a slot filled by someone on their side. And even they know he’s a horrible pick for the position they’re going to pigeon him into.

And the sad part is that there are so many other better people who should have been considered and seriously vetted instead of him. But they probably won’t be, so we’ll be stuck with him for decades.

If You Want to Make America Great Again, Have Media Outlets Stop Using Tweets As Actual Stories

News, Politics, Social Networking, , , ,

I don’t even think people realize the problem that exists today with media. It’s not that media is wrong, false or lying. It’s that it’s lazy. And yeah, I know a big reason behind it is the consolidation of media outlets to get rid of people and save money. So, the problem has emerged to the next logical step: Find media anywhere you can get it.

And tweets is where they’ve found it. Because, let’s face it: It’s easy, it’s free, and it requires absolutely no work to put together a story that consists of someone’s response on Twitter.

But let’s also face the fact that it’s not actually a story. It’s a reaction from someone to something. And most likely, it’s irrelevant to practically everything.

Let’s take the Tweeter-in-Chief that gets quoted on Twitter the most. Instead of paying attention to actual policies the president is enacting or proposing, we get knee-jerk reactions from him at 3am in the morning when he’s just watched Fox & Friends and wants to let the world know that we must stop illegal aliens from stealing the world’s toilet tissue. or whatever stupid idea the bottom of the barrel commentators on that show have proposed at whatever time they actually air.

But the media eats this stuff up and actually reports it as a legitimate news story.

When news is dull or boring, we suddenly start to see “news” whenever one of the Kardassians picks a fight on Twitter with Taylor Swift, or whatever other shenanigans occur during that news cycle. The “famous for being famous” celebrities plan these stories for maximum coverage, and our media, realizing they don’t have anywhere near the amount of coverage to fill a 24 hour news cycle, eats it right up, and suddenly a turf war between two aging rappers ends up being a leading story. So, instead of reporting on something legitimate, or important, like anything written by Nicholas Kristof, or Rebecca Solnit, we get nonstop nonsense about the Kardassian sisters or “news” about toddlers in beauty pageants.

This morning, I woke up to read a “news” story about a Tweet from the president saying how much he believes that….

Not a story. It’s a moment of thought about something that is not a story. A story would be something actually happened. Legislation got passed, someone died, someone was arrested, an accuser was heard and listened to, a country declared war against another, a country attacked another, etc. Someone’s thoughts on something, especially something that came as a reaction to hearing an actual news story IS NOT NEWS.

So please. Stop passing drivel off as news.

And people, stop listening to it. When you hear it, turn it off because you didn’t get news. And better, contact the news agency and complain. Otherwise, it’s ALL you’re ever going to see and hear.

Just saying. I’ll tweet it for you, if it might cause you to think of it as real news.

Kavanaugh, Boys Will Be Boys, and Why This Problem Will Never Go Away

News, Politics, Relationships, Social Networking, , , , , , , ,
I was watching Vice News Tonight, and they were covering some of the Kavanaugh garbage that we’re seeing on a daily basis right now, and it just sickens me that we have a bunch of men in charge of our government who apparently don’t care one iota that they’re about to empower (with enormous power and responsibility) someone who may have tried to rape another woman. And even more allegations are starting to emerge. And they’re trying to railroad him into the position so fast that NO OTHER WOMAN can possibly come forward in time to stop it.
 
One thing that was interesting was that they brought on a woman who was literally halted from testifying during the Anita Hill hearings for Clarence Thomas who ALSO had a sexual harassment story about Clarence Thomas, but she was shunted away by the people who wanted him put into power until the hearings were over. They made sure that atrocity happened, and THOSE SAME PEOPLE ARE STILL IN POWER TODAY. They’re the same people trying to push through the current guy.
 
But you know what really got me? At the end of the whole segment, four or five other women were giving their own stories of when men attacked them sexually but they were also never believed when these things happened. And it got me to thinking: How many of these types of guys have I known my entire life? The cool guy in high school. The jock in college. That guy who got all the girls. And now the weird guy who no woman ever talked to but is now in an office establishment with all sorts of other women who are forced to be around him all day long. So many people, and so many stories, which could mean this happens all the time.
 
Because that’s what I’m getting from all of these stories. These incidents aren’t rare. They’re more the norm. And if you are brave enough to hold a conversation with a group of women and just let them start talking about it, what you’ll discover is that almost ALL of them have a similar story of when this happened to them. Not one or two out of a room of 50. But 49 or 50 of them all have a horrifying story of some guy that violated them in some way.
 
And this is what we should be facing.
 
But we won’t. We’ll shuffle it under the rug, pretend it only happens with really bad people who, oh I don’t know, must not go to church or something equally ridiculous. And it will continue happening because we choose to let it happen.
 
Like people shooting up schools with guns. Because we choose to let it happen.
 
We’re all responsible, but we will blame a boogeyman who doesn’t exist, or just might exist. But we’re all responsible. And we’re responsible because we don’t do anything about it but act shocked and surprised.
 
Right now. Instead of doing something about this, the people who CAN do something are saying: “This is just a political witch hunt. Get him in the office and the problem goes away.”
 
And that’s what’s probably going to happen.
 
Or, we’ll get brave this one time (honestly, I don’t believe that will happen), but we’ll do nothing about the larger problem because it’s too hard. It takes too much work. We can never solve this. Or whatever weak excuse we will give, including my favorite: “It’s not me, so I don’t see what trying to stop it will do because there’s no way to tell who is responsible.”
 
I already told you. WE are responsible.
 
And WE will do absolutely nothing.
 
Now, I’m going to go back to killing aliens in a video game because at least there the world makes a lot more sense.

The Problems of a Young People’s Movement

Business, Education, News, Politics, Social Networking, , , , , , ,

Recently, there’s been a lot of attention being paid to a group of high school students who were survivors of a horrific gun attack in Florida. While they’re not the first students to suffer from such a crappy situation, what made this tragedy even more significant was that the students didn’t remain the backdrop of the event but have now taken front stage and are literally the movement itself.

This has resulted in a number of unexpected outcomes. First, the “usual” response of “this isn’t the time” to discuss gun violence was completely drowned out by the survivors themselves who refused to allow pro-NRA pundits to dictate the terms of the conversation. And the opposite side, the political operatives who have been screaming into the wind for decades about gun violence, were also taken a bit by surprise because as much as they have wanted to do so, they’re not dictating the message but having to listen alongside everyone else who is seeing this dynamic group of young people demand and focus attention.

And this is part of the problem that I fear because as Mancur Olson pointed out in “The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups” (1965) and reinforced by Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward in “Poor People’s Movements: Why They Succeed, How They Fail” (1977), getting a movement started is a lot easier than sustaining one over time. The reasons are varied, but there’s both a free rider problem (people think others will do the work for them so they sit out the movement, convinced someone else will take up the slack) and an age problem, which I’ll talk about it a moment here.

The first problem is not easily overcome. People organize because of personal motivations, and they quite often are faced with the belief that they’re climbing a mountain that has no footing. When they realize there’s a group of others with similar goals, they become motivated and feel the sense of belonging that makes them put themselves out there for hopes of a solution. What can often happen is that solidarity may actually lead to a limited success because their opposition is also overwhelmed by the numbers gathered in such a short amount of time. So, they go home, armed with the knowledge that they succeeded. But they don’t often get everything they wanted, so when they take to the streets again to achieve the rest, they find that a fraction of their comrades appear the second time around due to that pesky free rider problem.

Which brings me to the second problem: age. One of the advantages of the current movement is also its biggest liability: Children eventually stop being children. Right now, young high school students are rallied around the idea of wanting to fix things for the youth of America. But there’s a time stamp on how effective they are going to be because of the fact that once they stop being high school students and are then perceived to be adults, their message practically disappears overnight. People tend to care when children are affected, but when those children grow up into adulthood, it’s amazing how society quickly turns their backs on those same people.

Which means, if anything is going to happen, it’s going to have to happen really soon. The NRA, conservatives and those who like the status quo are very, very good at kicking cans down the road. This is kind of the origin of the phrase “thoughts and prayers”. The term “thoughts and prayers” has only recently been debunked to reveal it means “we’re not going to do anything about this now, so all we’re willing to do is pretend we’re thinking about it, but we’re not.” Historically, they’ve been really good at ignoring huge calamities with infamous responses of “now’s not the time” and all sorts of other bags of wind, knee jerk reactions. Therefore, if anything is going to happen, it’s going to have to happen during the next few weeks, or at least before the next atrocious event occurs because once the next geographically named event occurs, Florida will be yesterday’s news, and those who want to do nothing will breathe a sign of relief that they never actually had to do anything to make things better.