Sometimes, I Dispair.
There are times when the human race amazes me. There are also times, like this morning, when I just want to leave the race and sit on the sidelines until all this unholy malarkey is good and over with.
People elected Obama in the hopes that he would be able to fix things. Then the people woke up and realised every last politician has been sold to corporations. Now we expect a politician [sold to the highest bidder] to fix things? Um. He can’t. Sorry. He’s legally owned by the corporations who paid for his campaign. He has to do what they tell him to.
Especially when that means not saying a word or doing a thing about the actual problem - the corporations who bought him.
Is anyone getting the irony that corporate greed essentially put a slave into the white house? And they’ve been doing it for years, not just with Obama. Black, white, brindle, male or female… whoever the POTUS is, if they are funded into office by corporations, they are a slave to corporations.
You are bought and sold, America.
You should be angry.
Right-wingers should be angry at the establishment because corporate-endorsed bully-boys have abused at least one pregnant woman and caused the baby to miscarry. According to your own abortion-is-wrong gospel, those police officers are as good -or bad- as murderers. You should also be angry because corporations are the worst kinds of welfare cheats. They own most of the country, they earn most of the wealth, yet they pay no taxes and get massive handouts from the government teat! That’s got to be worse than thousands of welfare mothers. Come on!
Left-wingers who somehow don’t support the occupy movement [statistically, they must exist] should be angry because the very rights America was founded on are being routinely ground into the dirt. They destroyed books in those camp raids. They deliberately smashed computers in a vain attempt to silence the people. You have a right to be as mad as hell! Stand up!
Anyone who is not rich and somehow believes this is not their problem because they’re “getting along okay” is only doing so because it’s just a matter of time before some company decides to fuck them over. If you don’t do something now, the corporations will have bought the right to do so. If you honestly believe that playing by the rules gets you ahead, then why are you not as wealthy as your corporate overlords? Blame yourself? Why not? That’s what the corporations keep telling you to do.
Gotta do what Massuh tells you.
Yes, I just did the race card. Yes, I just called you a slave. No, I don’t care what colour you are. No, I don’t care how you worked your ass off to fulfil your American Dream.
The people who own your rights are changing the rules of the game. They are cheating. They are buying your voice and freedoms and stealing justice from all around you and you apparently don’t give a shit because you’re “doing okay”.
Wow.
The only thing America can really do at this stage in the game is this:
Stop. Feeding. The Beast.
Don’t use your credit card. Hell, pay off your credit card and leave a little extra in there. That really annoys them. Move your money to a credit union. Make gifts for this Yule season. Spend your time. Use your love. Make an effort.
It’s the last thing they expect from you.
It’s the last thing they want.
Starve the Beast.
Stop giving them your hard-earned money and start valuing yourself.
Perhaps, together, America can buy its freedom back.
It’s my only hope.
Slogans From My Back-Brain
I keep thinking of things to chant, even though I’m currently unable to participate.
Stuff like this:
All day! All night! Occupy our rights!
We want (clap clap) us free (clap clap) to build a better e-con-o-me!
You had your fun! You got your bonus! Now pay us back! The banks owe us!
Yeah, the last one’s a little complicated for chanting and marching. It’s more of a last minute thing. I’ll doubtless think of more, long about 1AM…
I should share more when they’re ready.
A modest proposal for OWS.
Give the CEO’s these kinds of stocks and bonds >:)
Cherry Lollipop: I know this has been going around, but I want to reiterate
The pepper spray used at UC Davis was 0.7 rating. The normal formulation for police is 0.2. 0.7 is military-grade stuff. There are only two formulations more powerful. One is used in training exercises for the Marines. The other? Primarily intended for use on bears. You normally use pepper…
(via luchagcaileag)
Open Source Freedom
I had one of those ideas that can only get better the more you share it, so I thought I’d throw this out there. I hereby give it free and clear to the world. Just please, if you implement it, keep it honest and transparent.
What is Open Source Freedom?
Open Source Freedom, or OSF, is an organisation and system by which citizens help other citizens help each other out of debt. Not for any kind of profit, but for the simple notion that debt is a form of legalised slavery.
The money you put in stays that amount of money. At any time it is not working, you can have that money back.
OSF is not a new system of handouts. It is citizens giving citizens a hand.
How Does Open Source Freedom Work?
People in debt sign up for a hand and state honestly how they got into debt and how they plan to repay the citizens who help them out. People who have a little money to spare pool it through OSF to help out a citizen in need.
When your money is given to OSF, you can check on its status by logging in and seeing how it’s doing. You can browse through the stories of people in need and check a tick box saying “I would like to help free this person”. You can check as many tick boxes as you like. There are no limits to the good you can do.
Once you sign up for help from OSF, you can log in to check the progress of help coming to you. You can see how much is pledged to help you out, and how many people are helping you. Once the pledges meet your debt, the money you need becomes yours to borrow!
Remember, it’s never yours to keep. You can pay off the debt you owe to the interest-charging corporation, and pay back OSF at your own speed. Just the amount you owe. No interest charged. Ever.
You can pay your debt back at a dollar a week if you want to, but remember, it is other people’s money. The sooner it’s back to OSF, the better for everyone!
We want to help everyone get out of debt, not just you.
What if I Can’t Afford to Give Open Source Freedom Money?
If you don’t have any money to spare, maybe you have time to spare. You can become an OSF volunteer! Based on your skill set, you can help represent OSF in numerous fields.
OSF needs people to run it. People to maintain the website, people to keep tabs on whose money is doing what. People to check up on people taking a long time to pay OSF back and see how they’re doing. People to make certain that nobody is doing anything unethical. Even people to create advertising or awareness art for OSF.
What if it Turns Out I Paid for a Bad Debt?
Not everyone is honest. There are some people who will try to take advantage of a system like OSF.
Since this is a system geared towards freedom, some serious decisions have to be made. You, and the other citizens who have lost your money to a bad debtor have a say! You can vote together on whether or not to declare the debtor as “lost”.
Once a debtor is “lost”, OSF takes out a loan in that debtor’s name, with the information they provided, and returns the money to the people who lost it. The “lost” debtor no longer receives any help from OSF, and is back on the treadmill with all the other debt slaves.
I know, it’s not nice. But neither is taking people’s money, given in good faith, and never giving it back.
Who is in Charge of My Money?
You are. If money is speech, then you should have a say about what gets done with it. All OSF does is bring it together to help people.
What Can I Do Once I’m Free?
It’s your choice. OSF would like to see you give a little towards helping another citizen get free, but if you want to walk away, we won’t make pests of ourselves.
The most you’d see from us is an email on the anniversary of your freedom, congratulating you and asking politely for you to share a little for someone else who is in the same trouble you once were.
What if There are No More Debts to Pay?
Wouldn’t that be wonderful? OSF would love to see that day arrive. However, there are still lots of good things to be done with your money.
OSF can take on Green Projects, to help free the entire planet from its dependency on petrochemicals! Fund local factories to produce products for the people and by the people! Subsidise organic farming or fund some research. Perhaps even create some Open Source Medical Care!
Wouldn’t it be nice?
BREAKING: Jeniffer Fox, the 3 Month Pregnant women who was pepper sprayed at Occupy Seattle has miscarried.
“I was screaming, ‘I am pregnant, I am pregnant. Let me through. I am trying to get out.’” At that point, Fox continues, a Seattle police officer lifted his foot and it hit her in the stomach, and another officer pushed his bicycle into the crowd, again hitting Fox in the stomach.
Well fuck everything
And the reason the pro-life folks aren’t screaming about the violent police fetus murderers is….?
Nostalgia For Never Was
Remember all those sitcoms where people helped people out? The dream worlds like The Waltons or Leave It To Beaver? If a Neighbour was experiencing trouble, the whole neighbourhood pitched in to help.
I’m more convinced than every that it was just a dream. An impossible utopia that everyone pretends was real so they can say, “things were better when…”
In the real world, some busybody Neighbour would have reported the Cleavers to CPS because their kid was out of control.
Yeah, I’m still a bit bitter about the fence thing.
I watch some shows for fun. I watch one to escape my worries. That one, I wish was even a little bit real.
That show is My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.
It’s the same kind of dream world, where mean people - narrow minded people - are rare, if not nonexistent. A place where anyone can find employment based on skill and aptitude, rather than academic qualifications. A place where any personal quirk is accepted and tolerated.
If everyone on the planet actually worked towards some kind of mutual acceptance, mutual help, etc. then the world might just be a nicer place in which to live.
I guess that’s why they had to destroy the OWS camp. OWS were showing the world that they didn’t need the infrastructure we’ve been told we depend upon. They were living outside of The Holy System. Thumbing their noses at Authority and not backing down, giving up, shutting up, or going away.
If we lived our lives like the never-was Cleavers, Waltons(disregard the anti feminist stereotypes, please), or even ponies, there wouldn’t be a need for OWS in the first place, because people who got too greedy would be condemned instead of praised.
I’m not saying it’s perfect. I’m saying it’s something to strive for. Act better towards each other. Act with compassion, empathy and tolerance. Think a little about what other people might want before you take for yourself.
OWS made a functioning city within a city. We can make a functioning society out of the tattered remains that selfishness and mean minds have left us. It all comes down to three words:
“Need some help?”
Practice using them for a better tomorrow.
My thoughts on the morning of the 18/11
I live in Australia, so the 17th is still happening in the US as I write this. There’s plans currently in motion that will come to a close before this article ever reaches anyone else’s eyes.
I can’t help feeling that I’m watching an empire collapse.
All the signs are there. Demagoguery, fascism, numerous attempts to silence the increasingly pissed off masses and trained ditto heads claiming, in spite of all evidence to the contrary, that everything is fine and Big Brother loves you.
Take a moment to read a couple of books. 1984 and Animal Farm by George Orwell.
Yes, they’re allegories against communism, but fascism isn’t just the bailiwick of communists. It’s an egalitarian evil. It whores itself out to any demagogue who wants it.
America, who once supported rallies of this ilk against a clear and definite evil, now attempts to silence them when they happen on its own soil.
I understand it. I do. It’s called “schadenfreude”. Avenue Q did a song about it.
Basically, it’s all right for the people to fight for their freedom, so long as they’re doing it away from here.
Yes! Any downtrodden citizen of the world can battle to raise themselves into true democracy, just… not in America’s back yard. We already have that stuff.
And when the people cry, “not any more”, America does the only thing it can to try and save face.
It becomes the very monster it has been morally opposing in the past, by smacking down the very people they’re supposed to support.
Naturally, this has the opposite effect and makes other nations notice America’s hypocrisy. How long will this go on before the UN peacekeeping forces have to invade America to bring justice, freedom and democracy back to a nation currently boiling itself in ignorance and hatred?
Will America be forced to invade America and re-establish its own highest ideals? Or will America eat itself and struggle back up to a world power by its bootstraps once more? That long journey will take decades.
And -hey- maybe it’s time America got a kick in its massive ego and realised that it’s been looking at a portrait of its glory days and not, in fact, a mirror.
Maybe America will wake up and realise that the corporate vampire latched onto its metaphorical jugular is not the sparkly and romantic path to glory, but instead - a vicious bloodsucker out for every last drop.
Either way, something needs to happen. It will not be easy. It will not be neat. It will not be peaceful. It will not be cheap. But all the same, it needs to happen.
The revolution is coming.
It always does when a few have ultimate power over many and too many luxuries in an environment of deprivation and debt.
Excuse me?
This guy had an interesting rant. What it boils down to is: Do what you like, just don’t ruin Christmas.
What.
The.
Fuck.
You have corporate assholes quietly and insidiously ruining your kids’ future, and that’s fine, just so long as no-one yells about it during a fucking Santa Claus parade?
We’re not allowed to speak because someone made your kid cry? What?
I’d image macro this with Professor Farnsworth saying “I don’t want to live on this planet any more”… but I have better things to do.
Like, making a better tomorrow for myself and my kids and everyone else on the planet.
/rant.