Reading the daily news disgusts me. There, I said it. It’s reached the point of where I feel like I’m living out the abattoir metaphor whenever I do. Which I’m just making up, right now, but hear me out.
Do you eat meat? And if you do, do you prepare it yourself—“harvest” it from scratch—or do you get your steaks, burgers or wings from Ralph’s, McDonald’s, Applebee’s or any other grocery store, fast food joint or sh—y, cardboard cut-out family restaurant like them? Most of us of the mass-consumption mindset—we have it served up from the latter. And we have no idea what it’s like to be on the inside of the industry that takes it from field to freezer, or from pen to plate.
Until we do. Somehow get access to the inside.
Great way to convert to vegetarianism, by the way, watching one of those undercover videos made by animal activists who sneak into those joints and document what it’s like. Seriously, factory employees have reported changing their gastronomic tunes to something more on the leafy green frequency than hoofed or clawed mammal after working there. Or the tenor of their own lives, for that matter. And I don’t blame them.
Don’t believe me? Have you tried watching one yourself? No? Go ahead. I dare you.
But back to the news, you don’t even have to be on the inside of a newsroom to have reached a similar point of disgust. I’m not. I just follow the news religiously, have come to get how it’s all produced, and, most importantly, why. All you need is to be someone who just, well, metaphorically watches undercover videos to get abjectly repulsed and put off by it: slaughterhouse life, life in prison, life in a refugee camp, life in a temperate, Third World village where there literally is not enough water to support life.
Life in a digital newsroom.
Still don’t believe me? Find that video yet? Seriously. I double dare you.
The worst part is, production doesn’t stop as long as the demand is there. Which is why the abattoir is the best metaphor. You can eat meat, not eat meat, eat meat that’s “ethically” or “humanely” sourced, eat certain kinds of meat, eat only eggs, eat that sh– they grow in a bioreactor, but mass consumption is going to be there, regardless, all up in your grill (no pun intended), and it’s going to be difficult to seek out the best avenues for or to bypass that consumption entirely, because of the heaps of offal and carcasses and waste (and crap news) you have to metaphorically wade through to even find the streetlights.
But after all that nonsense, I’m going to do a summary this week, and I’m going to make it as short as I can. A conspectus for the rest of us. As it were.
China’s taking over the world—did you know?—much in the same way America tried to during the Cold War. And, much as America did, they’re succeeding, less through strong-arming, threats and covert intervention and more through investment, loans, trade agreements and giveaways. In short, burning up their cash, most of which they get from the U.S., stemming from all the cheap crap they sell to Johnny Walmart and Kaydalene Dollar General, who just can’t get enough of the stuff.
And this takeover is pretty much all on condition that you do what we say when we say it, leave us alone to oppress and bully who we want and don’t ask us any questions while we bug the sh– out of this multi-million dollar building that we’re building for you. You know, the usual.
And the world? It happens to be burning up like the real life Love Shack. The hottest days in the history of days came and haven’t quite went yet, starting just this week—like, three of them, crashing your figurative summertime house party. And they’ll be bringing more of their homies to bust in on that life kegger of yours. Like several coked-out undercover cops who just came from a “party” in the evidence room at the station. And who found out their wives are cheating on them. And need to vent some of their frustrations. Just you wait.
And also, the fundamental right of clean drinking water isn’t guaranteed anymore. Did you know? Meaning that life keg of yours is actually full of horse urine. Or, more factually, per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances. As long as big businesses need it to dump their byproducts in. Despite what 3M wants to tell you. Or legally can now avoid having to tell you. And despite anything you have to say in the matter.
The fourth of July came and went this week, and what better time to remark how people keep manslaughtering each other because of a lack of emotional intelligence, or outright retardation of emotional cognition, and somehow think the Bill of Rights gives them the legal right to.
Speaking of retarded emotional cognition, a flailing, fascist Ron DeSantis is showing the world why the Republican party was always the party of people like Trump, and that being as much of a repressive hard-ass as DeSantis is will only every seat you a distant second among the party’s presidential favorite, as long as Trump still lives and breathes. Which really shouldn’t be for that much longer, medically speaking.
And it’s also showing that politics in America isn’t by and for the people, it’s by and for the people with the most money and influence, who have the most influence because they have a lot of money. Just ask the inner circle of the Horatio Alger Society, and their golden boy Clarence Thomas.
Or ask the special interest groups who can draw up and then quasi-dropship bigoted, extremist legislation for conservative U.S. lawmakers to wave around and champion, which can totally change the political and social landscape of America. And do because they’re right, and they have the money and political support to prove it.
And speaking of special interest groups, those of the hard-right, Christian-influence persuasion are trying to infiltrate much of Sub-Saharan Africa to stop abortions from taking place, emboldened now by the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade here in America. Their reason? Sex-ed and an open-minded education is hogwashing and/or brainwashing. Which—of course they think that. Teaching someone how to better one’s self is the devil’s work. Without the faintest hint of irony.
So, then what? Are people actually doing anything about all of this? Besides going on Twitter or TikTok to try and gain more followers? No, they’re just packing up and moving to different states where their neighbors don’t give them the political stink-eye, or start moving in and physically threatening them, telling them to go someplace else, when they were the ones who were there first. Or, God bless them, are looking to infiltrate state and local politics, and seeking to burn down the Reichstag from the inside.
