An Opinion

By Christopher A. Holder

Preface

            I will start this work of non-fiction (I suppose one could argue to the contrary) with a disclaimer and a warning. I have been bent out of shape, for the last decade or so (maybe longer depending on when I finally finish this), with aspects of society; at first that which only affected me but, crazed as I am, exposing my mind to as much as possible has repeatedly shown me new levels of my own foolishness, forcing attempts out of me to grasp concepts larger than mere personal perspective. I imagine most that happen across my work will stop before the prologue’s end. The reason for this statement is due to my belief that what I write here will spark feelings of hurt, anger, and/or helplessness at some point in all who venture forward. I admit this with my own feelings of indignation and agony; I know that there will be subjects I write out which will immediately ignite disagreement, disgust, and denial just within myself alone. Continue at your will/desire keeping this in mind so when you are filled with wrath/disapproval/affirmation/joy at my words, you seek only to step away from this blasted book rather than turn your thoughts/feelings/opinions into action.

            Now, I can almost hear some say, “Well, what’s the fucking point of continuing one second longer if you’re only purpose is to piss me off and get me to quit.” A more honest statement could not be made. My only response is, “Do whatever the fuck you want.” While I do not intend to cause harm, validate injustice/evil, sound bigoted and/or even hateful, I do not write this warily, nervously, or with caring intent of other’s feelings or ideals in my efforts to relay my experiences for any still reading/listening after dropping the “horrific f-bomb.” The “first of many tests” as the reader/listener, is what I guess you could call that. If simple words deemed “uncouth, immoral, disreputable, or foul” are the line in the sand for you, I do not know how to write my perception of truth in a manner that you will choose to listen. I make these statements not to judge who you are, nor judge myself above or below you, but to draw attention to the instinctual behavior I witness of human beings to reject a truth, while engaged in some form of communication/function/daily interaction, because A word (or phrase, statement, unrelated action, etcetera [etc.]) an individual uses that we relate to differently. What power does fuck have? What physical existence/action does the WORD, spoken or written, possess in and of itself? This is just one of the messages I hope my scribblings will contain.

            I have grown tired of hearing words used to manipulate, misunderstand, label, judge, misrepresent ourselves, as if those very words utilized are truth. The whole process reeks of hypocrisy, elitism, despair, naivety… as I will sound throughout these pages. When I finally forced myself to sit down and begin this endeavor, it was after a few years of perhaps inadequacy, incompetency, apathy, ill-fated days; honestly, you could insert any number of excuses. I don’t doubt I felt the emotions of all listed above and more, but my hope was I wanted this book to be perfect. I had a plethora () of research and wording and subject matter and at the end of it all, I decided it was entirely worthless. Just opinions, trying to validate my own opinions, hoping that would authenticate these opinions in your mind. As if that is what defines or determines truth. What horse shit. I think I finally came to this conclusion (in a far less dramatic fashion) when I was reading the autobiography of Ozzy Osbourne. He made statements about the trials of writing his own book, and, while it inspired me for sure, I think it helped me see that what I was doing (in procrastinating/putting off the actual writing) wouldn’t change the point I was trying to discuss.

            So, I guess what I’m saying is, don’t take a fucking thing I say as truth. Do not believe one word or support one phrase or perceived idea. All of it is my perspective and more than likely, inaccurate. I do not have anything else, in this format, that I know how to communicate, and I hope you’ll see why I think this. Because of haste, lack of experience, education, (whatever and etc.), I will no doubt play loose and fast with subjects further on, speculate where I have little understanding, and make absurd statements that intelligent, sane, moral human beings will find hilarious, moronic, and/or, probably at least sometimes, appalling. I’m also sure every individual will have their own opinion on every idea, action, and environment so long as there are individuals and records of them. While all these statements may seem antagonistic and/or ludicrously vague, I really don’t want people to think I know what I’m talking about because, honestly, I don’t think I understand, comprehend, or even on a basic level grasp the most rudimentary principles of the upcoming topics. I think all people should question every narrative, opinion, and/or action using critical thinking; comparing it to truth; bringing their own ideas to further expand the comprehension of truth for every human being. Any claim even vaguely related to history, fact, science, or culture that I make should be double checked by you, all of us, and not just the ones I make either, but certainly those written here. Hopefully, you see what I see, the feeling of being on the brink of something revolutionary, game-changing, insert whatever cliché for “hope in change making things better” that you like. I swear my mind wants to believe it is right there, but I can’t seem to figure out a satisfactory way to draw attention to it. It’s why I don’t think I’m the best choice for this undertaking. Man, just thinking of how pathetically contradictory I will sound throughout this…need a cigarette.

            Sorry about that. As I’m sure you can see, my writing will fluctuate wildly at times… all the time. I catch myself hoping someone reads this that can make real sense of it all. That isn’t the right way to consider it, though: can’t control others, the future, or even my own life at times. I just gotta do the best I can; right here, right now. Yes, of course, I will be editing (just myself, so you’ll have to look past some glaring mistakes here and there, I’m sure) frequently and at the end, but I have yet to meet a perfect human being, and I am not an exception. I will try to fix spelling, grammar, and even errors of interpretation, however, I think that removing the natural progression of my thoughts, opinions, and/or feelings would only undercut the message I seek to put forth. From what I have experienced, all human beings will feel something, sometime, about anything, you name it; and I think some of the worst reactions to these feelings are made when we don’t want to recognize them. So, I’ll sound a little crazy at times, saying one thing than, even maybe next sentence, calling myself out on my own shit. Just another warning of what’s to come further in (and for those listening to the audio version, an even further apology. I can barely [insert any common technological or just any skill in general here], so audio/video editing is a little beyond my means, but, so long as you can endure my oration, it should be coherent).

            One last thing before getting to the heart of the prologue (HA! I’d bet some of you thought it was almost over).  I do apologize for the methods that I’ve chosen to circulate this book. As I will detail further in, I desired this work to be free of monetary influence, motivation, and even compensation (depending on how you define that). However, when you break it down, the fundamental core of that idea is a little daunting. I mean, if the goal is to receive literally no funds from the publishing and/or creation of this book (not just talking about profit either), then how do you market it, or produce it for that matter? With that in mind, after typing it all up and editing the audio version, (hopefully) I have posted the document files on a website I pay for and on free social media websites/applications. Now, without further ado, let’s get started with a little personal autobiography.

(You’re not the only one groaning) While I’m sure the last thing anyone wants to do is sit through my self-therapy session/life story time, I believe that I have absolutely no right to compare the actions/opinions of others in current/past affairs with my own views – as if I possess truth because of intellect/excellence/authority/wealth/virtues/genealogy/perspective/insert whatever word you feel fits someone believing they “have more rights” or “are above/greater than” another. Of course, I will inevitably do this whether intentionally or not due to the shear fact that all I can use in this medium are words and there is only I.  So, first things first, got to jump under the eighteen-wheeler myself to kick things off. There will be a lot of moments that… are not good, certainly in my mind, and I’m sure if any do read this, a few will find atrocious injustices that perception may lead to the conclusion of correction being necessary. So be it. Again, I can’t control others (in my opinion, shouldn’t even attempt it either), the future (equally futile and problematic in my eyes), or even my life at times. I think that last one though, you shouldn’t ever stop trying. I can’t allow failures of the past and present to predetermine what failures I reap in the future; I will fail in this area daily whether I like it or not. I don’t think humans will ever be perfect in the way I comprehend the word, but striving to achieve it, honestly and with a reflective/open/patient mind, is the only successful common denominator I see in our history of trying to improve/advance/evolve.

            Obviously, being as this is my recollection of events, others involved in their occurrence may disagree with my interpretation of them. I won’t even try to pretend that I am more correct than they or that I am even close to accurate in the slightest. Memory can be a funny thing. Also, obviously, for the sake of those same individuals, all names that do get used, except immediate family and culturally relevant ones (i.e. those in the public eye to some degree already), will be changed in this account. I do this to protect all those who I may cast in a negative light, because of the reasons stated previously, and I know I wouldn’t take too kindly to being blasted publicly after minding my own damn business. That being said, I am positive the description of events will leave no doubt in those individuals’ minds as to whom I refer.  Then, if they so choose, they can shine a light on the matter. Let’s be honest, yah, I think this has a 99.99…% chance of going unnoticed, and unread by 99.99…% of people. I could also be wrong, so I shouldn’t play around with the impact I might have on other human beings lives for my own selfish whims. However, I also suck-ass at just about everything I have ever done.

            When you read/hear that, you may think I’m being hyperbolic or exaggerating to some degree. I honestly think to the contrary, and I like to think I’ve swayed a few to my side, here and there, in some fashion over the years.  Literally from birth, I apparently had a death wish, placing myself in situations that were more than likely to end in disaster. Whether it was playing in fire ant hills, dog food bowl at the end of an unfinished porch, butter knife in the socket (more than once), or just the good old-fashioned drink chemicals trick. My natural attraction to Murphy’s Law is apparently inherited, according to my parents.  We, before I can rightfully remember, lived in Texas and slowly moved our way up into Missouri. Our house in Raytown, beautiful ocean blue with white trim and big fenced-in yard, is the first memory of a house I can actually picture. The nostalgia of the oldest maternal first cousin and I finding a dead racoon, going to my first Royals baseball game (that I could recount), and the first taste of mom’s homemade donuts, man… but these are not the most vivid in my mind’s eye. I was around the three to five-year-old range at the time and a late-night pillow fight went wrong. My dad and I got a little overzealous and I broke my leg, having absolutely no coordination and placing it at an awkward angle to brace for impact. Pretty sure I even told the nurse/doctor it was my dad’s fault, which I imagine was totally non-anxiety inducing to reassure the nurse that a pillow fight had been the cause. Yes, I know, this has nothing to do with putting your mind to a task and failing or physically/mentally having no talent.

            I suppose, from what I am told, I learned to walk fairly young – which I guess could be a contradictory point to the statement I’m defending – but I never really felt it was that spectacular of an accomplishment. I was pretty proud of my reading ability for a long while but that’s just because (I feel) I mistook lengthy, over-x-amount of time, trained skill for talent.  However, I’m genuinely grateful to my parents for their dedication to encouraging my love of reading.  While I can’t remember anything else, even environmental details, I do recall, before the broken leg and Raytown, my father reading Dr. Seuss and its kind to me frequently. He would follow the words with his finger, reading slowly and precisely; desperate to impress (I guess), I would act as if I too could read when it was only mimicry. I think this gave me some of the passion I have for knowledge, reading, and writing that I maintain to this day. I attacked books with fervor when I was younger, especially those of a fantasy/science fiction nature. However, I also had a much larger and more influential book during those same years, also thanks to my parents.

            God/Religion or the Bible (reality of course being that it was THEIR specific institution) is pretty much the end-all-be-all to my family, extended included. This sucked especially hard, I feel, because it was two alternate Christian religions that they REALLY wanted me to see the “vast differences” between. Some of the not so fond feelings I remember from those same aforementioned years are those of incompetence, dejection, and confusion. You see, my mother is Restored Latter Day Saints (I think it was specifically called Restoration [Mormon basically {sorry mom}]) while my father is Roman Catholic. What’s the difference? The whole fucking world to them; not a single god damn thing if you asked me then and if you ask me now. Sure, as a kid 8+, I would have spun you the narrative of the three books mom had versus just the one in my dad’s religion, or the “ancient traditions” of my dad’s religion versus the persecution of my mom’s religion by my father’s religion or the many off-shoots of Mormonism as opposed to the solidarity of Catholicism. Even then, however, I still had doubts about the true essential differences between the two. What I did know for certain was that it was a major source of stress, and, looking back, potentially the cause of the overzealous manner I felt I was raised.

            While my parents were (I guess still are) the classic definition of Midwestern fundamentalist Christian, my upbringing wasn’t just a string of human rights horrors like memories would play in my head at times (and I’ve noticed certain mediums of media love to portray being raised as such is). I remember us being poor but not destitute when we lived in a duplex, also in Raytown, and I had a good friend, Keldar (yes, I’m taking it there), who I try to focus on when looking back. We did all the silly, nonsensical actions boys 5-7ish get up to. We explored the neighborhood making up wild stories and eating bugs (him usually tricking me into eating them that is; fearless and gullible are a pretty bad match), built a fort where a small portion of trees and brush grew, played sports, nerf guns/toys, and occasionally my parents allowed me over to his house where I got to watch him play his Sega Genesis (or play with, depending on the game). A lot of the stuff we did was usually his idea or because he had it; not because his family was wealthier than mine, though they could have been, I didn’t pay attention to a whole lot at that age. I believe it had more to do with where my parents spent their money. Private schools, Christian especially, will not be overlooked in this book. Regardless, it was mostly fond memories though short-lived as we couldn’t live in a duplex forever. Growing family, it wasn’t very close to the school, so on so forth. I hope those were the reasons at least.

I had never witnessed nor heard my parents (or extended family) be racist in any direct manner. I thought my time at that duplex was solid evidence against this kind of perception in general as there was perhaps one other kid as white as I was nearby, and it didn’t seem to mean a thing. We didn’t see him as much, maybe because he was more than a block or so over, who knows. This being some of my earliest real memories, I sometimes wonder if age just blinded me to the harsher realities I deemed as lies armed with the talking points I was sold… sorry told. Like my first harsh reality encounter (that I really recall) with the authoritarian aspect of humans during this time. My ass still hasn’t forgotten what happened when, instead of checking in, I decided it would be okay to go inside Keldar’s house real quick and play his new Power Ranger game with him (it was co-op, which was a big deal). I was not allowed to go into ANY house or even off the block, hell not out of sight of our house meaning from the window, just so were all on the same page. Sometime later, the sun had started going down; his grandmother informed me that my parents were waiting outside. I’m sure you can surmise the rest.

            Ah, Center Place Restoration School (C.P.R.S.), how I fucking loathe the institution with every fiber of my being at times. I think I should thank them though. I believe they helped me develop a serious distrust of popularized figures and tropes. As I said before, while I don’t believe my parents ever made what could be considered low income; they did spend a good little chunk of change on sending my younger siblings and I to a private school, specifically a Christian one (pretty common theme here I’d just settle in on that). I definitely hold the opinion that our lives would have been just a hair simpler if they hadn’t blinded themselves to the drawbacks… sorry benefits of private education. Mostly because I don’t see a true difference between private and public education. What I did see during those years was my parents trying to make ends meet, by whatever means they felt they could (ethically in their minds of course), being at one another’s throats (I don’t think ever literally) over honestly name it. Once again, I wasn’t concerned enough to figure out the details behind the volume. As for distractions to this, not many; my parents really didn’t give much leeway when it came to television and video games during my early childhood, so books took its place. I found that books could take me anywhere, especially fictional places, make me someone different, and change my perceived reality, albeit for a short time. I would also discover that they were a gateway to any knowledge I so desired. So long as I could read, I could learn.

            This, of course, was not what C.P.R.S. was about. No, no. They followed the standard educational format of “shove our version of our opinions on what education you need down your throat” – except! being religious, got an extra class in there. Not that it was necessary, religion pretty much coated (and I mean permeated) every damn class to some degree…this is gonna be a tough subject, still gets my blood boiling. As if, somehow, I have a right to preach about this at others. Moving on. Kindergarten, to the best of what I recollect, felt awkward but not all bad to any degree. It could have been 1st grade, but I’m fairly certain it was a Wednesday prayer service in kindergarten I recognized a lie, consciously. C.P.R.S. was like most private schools with a strict dress code or in their case, a uniform. Every Wednesday, all the students got gussied up in slacks/skirt, a button-down shirt, a tie and a cardigan sweater. We would then gather in an auditorium, sit in the pews according to class, listen to a, more often times than naught, dry sermon, then share prayers and testimonies. For any unfamiliar with the concept of testimonies, it’s the practice (my opinion here people) of finding an excuse to “prove” god wherever you see the smallest opportunity to tell a “faith affirming story.” Not a very nice assessment that. I would come to loathe growing up as the fence between two overbearing “obey” religion(s) represented by my parents. All the while, hearing from all sides the “proof of God’s eternal presence, power, knowledge, love, etc.” I couldn’t ever think of a single thing, that I had witnessed, I could classify as god speaking to, impressing upon, or even “stirring my soul”, but everyone in my family, friends, even strangers had it, no matter what their religion (even though only one religion actually has it, correct?). So, every Wednesday till that fateful day, if I did get in line to share, it was with a prayer. I’m not sure if I’ve properly explained up to this point just how shit I think I am at, well, everything, verbal communication of any nature at any time being no exception (even when it’s just to myself. Yes, that is just as insane as it sounds. I fuck up talking even talking to myself).

            I don’t know what caused me to snap that morning. While it could’ve been I had seen and been part of enough testimonies where I didn’t see it the same way as the one telling or perhaps a desire to fit in with my family and peers, I believe I just got tired of sounding… feeling fake. I have never felt good at speaking, and prayers were no exception even then in my young mind. I would finally get to a microphone, and I would fumble about words forgetting my next thoughts as my brain raced with distractions. No matter how much I practiced before getting to the front, or how sure of the ideas I wanted to speak to god about, I couldn’t get it out of me without screwing up pronunciations, repeating myself, or just standing there – silent, lost. I, in a very silly manner, finally decided enough was enough, and I told a simple testimony of praying in a hairy situation then it all works out. Your standard ABC “act of God” that you’ll hear from multitudes of individuals, not exclusive to Christianity either. Almost instantly upon being thanked for sharing (perhaps even a little before), I felt like a train had driven into my stomach. I couldn’t help but think what kind of trash and an evil person I was for having lied (what I was taught to call and the commandment I feel religious zealots love to forget “bearing false witness”) and for what. Recognition? A Sign? Acceptance? Inclusion? And it wasn’t lying about the prayer or the near miss that ate me up inside, it was the fact that I had lied for such a silly reason as inclusion over an event I knew was just cause and effect. In the end, I was still left in doubt over whether I had “proper” faith… duh.  Just because you didn’t get fucked about in a moment you could have doesn’t automatically make it the hand of an immortal supreme being. That road goes all ways too, good things in life, bad things, doesn’t matter. Chucking god at a scenario in hindsight serves more as an excuse than explanation. How does that saying about excuses go again? My Christian rule-of-law parents were so found of the cliche, and it just escapes me now for some reason.

            Not like being devastated as a young child helped anything either. I was ashamed and felt admitting such a sacrilege to my parents (in hopes for guidance or maybe consolation) would only bring punishment. So, I pushed my feelings down, stopped looking for the lightning bolt, and did not learn my lesson even slightly.  I would make more swings at lying for a testimony to feel a connection at least on two other occasions and neither would accomplish anything more than the first.  Religion was such a huge part of my life in those years; I just couldn’t come to terms with the lack of faith I felt. How could I be so distraught, so unsure, when I was taught – well religiously to understand, please, praise, and plead with god on his word, will, desire, and/or commands. Luckily, as I was very young still, day to day trials would provide new “reality shattering” events to overshadow this one. The realization of being a monster in human flesh has the tendency to dominate one’s mind from its genesis to conclusion (which I see as the end of conscious communicable thought – death).

            I first recognized this characteristic in myself in my first-grade year (so about seven, an important and stressful time). My parents had moved us to a little dead-end street on the edge of town where life would proceed to undermine their desires to shelter their offspring. The neighborhood was older in relation to the city itself, but also in terms of its occupants. Very few kids were even within blocks of our new house (let alone on our street), but a couple of kids, Loterian and Besar, would visit their grandfather (one of our neighbors) during summer and soon became part of the few friends I had for the years we lived at that house. This was a drastic shift from the previous neighborhood, but another drastic shift was the age of the aforementioned friends. While Besar had only a year or two on me, Loterian was 14, if my memory can be trusted, and he had a wealth of knowledge that blew the hinges off a very closed mind. He would reveal things like swear words, even more Christian religious variants, and, perhaps unwittingly, some dynamics of power and control.

            You see, as “open” to speak about anything as parents seem to love saying they are, I came to see this as double speak for they were open to grill me about any topic I would so much as hint at. In other words, from my perspective it was all about how my questions impacted their fragile, astute, righteous lives. Let’s not get it twisted, I don’t speak about the stupid cliché “tell the truth or it’ll be way worse.” Fucking stupidity that we’ll discuss later as the point of being truthful in such a situation isn’t to escape justice; it’s to understand why it’s necessary and seeking it for one’s self as an example for others to not fear doing the same. Yeah, I know that sounds pretty fucking sanctimonious after crudely judging my parent’s attempts at raising me.  What I referred to earlier are the little (sometimes large whether at the time their comprehendible or not) questions that you have when exposed to other human beings.  Some of whom may have vastly different lifestyles and mannerisms, no matter race, religion, gender, or economic status (which are substantial questions on their own). While I didn’t understand the cause for my parent’s reactions at times, I understood (and would continue to learn) that certain topics quickly spiraled out of control down avenues my young self couldn’t have anticipated; usually stirring up indignation, dejection, confusion, internal contention, hell just straight up hurt my feelings. Most importantly, it would have normally led to confrontation, but my family was the iron fist type especially in the beginning, a dictatorship as they “hilariously” called it. IF I were to make a stand, and I would dare only a few times, it would only be with the certainty the figurative hill was worth physically dying over. That ate up mentality may have given birth to my very firmly believed statement about their shitty handling of what honesty I would give them. As whiny/childish/bitchy/ungrateful/spiteful as I sound, no one can or will ever convince me that when someone close to you comes to you with knowledge or habits you don’t approve of, the appropriate response to them is to interrogate about those subjects, get emotional over those subjects, push your talking points on those subjects with no concern of how your own actions/delivery could be contradictory to the beliefs/desires/ethics you’re preaching. I ain’t a parent though so what the fuck do I know about how to raise a kid (you’ll get a real chuckle here soon).

            I’m off topic. So, the point is that when my parents trashed my ass for finding a Britney Spears’ poster under my bed, there was no way I was going to say a word about the game of truth or dare Loterian, Besar, and I would play when secluded. While that twisted game drew in a few others briefly over the years of its occurrence, it would frequently be us three. Loterian and Besar had their own home issues I have no doubt. Of course, it wasn’t really mentioned outside of who had the stricter parents. Kid shit and exactly why, ignorant as I was, I was an easy mark; far too eager to close any gaps in my knowledge so I wouldn’t be naïve or sheltered. At the same time though, with that in mind, who was really taken advantage of? You see I never, not once to this day, saw myself as the victim or felt duped, manipulated. I saw myself as the manipulator when these games kicked off as not only did I eagerly participate but sought to include others, frequently proposed it as an activity, and truthfully understood that I had to garner as much information both physically and mentally as I could. It was not a matter of if but when my link to knowledge, outside what my parents deemed acceptable, disappeared. I was a little over 8 though when those events began to occur and already deemed myself a monster at the worst of times and at best of times knew that I had been sold a lie as I dealt with the mental fallout of my baptism.

            Turning eight years old was a big deal in our house as it signified the “age of accountability” and so at some point at 7 years of age my parents actually sat down to seriously discuss how they were of different religions. None of it really made any sense then or now but I took it extremely seriously. It felt like I was being asked which parent I loved more. It was in these times I would scare the shit out of myself possibly for the rest of my life. First grade felt intense compared to kindergarten (oh those were the days eh) but little did I know the steady ramp up in difficulty was pattycakes compared to humanity, just in general. My 1st grade teacher set everyone a buzz when she announced to everyone that everybody in the school would get to bring in a collection of theirs to showcase.  We’d get to make a little exhibit on our desks and each grade would go to the other classrooms to see each other’s displays. My problem, I quickly discovered, was that my family seemed (only a slight bit) poorer than the average in the school and couldn’t afford to get me much of any kind of “collection.” Now I had a few Legos but someone (I honestly don’t recall who) convinced/told me Legos didn’t count. This of course didn’t not seem to hold true as not only did I see multiple Legos sets but other ridiculous sets I couldn’t believe cut it; first time as a child experiencing the dumbass principle “it doesn’t matter what, so long as you turn something in.” I already had been taught about what comes to those who try and make excuses (lying is what my parents called it back then), so I told my teacher I didn’t think I had a collection and didn’t bring anything in. It was fine though we could just leave my desk out of the circle of desks with presentations.

            Not fucking good enough. She was the sixth-grade teacher, an elderly woman who, if you didn’t see her outside the classroom, you would believe was born with a perma-scowl and something about my empty desk in the corner screamed at her. As she came around the bend, she pushed through the desks to stand at my empty one, and bending down to my eye level, asked me with a no fucking nonsense attitude, where my collection was. Now I would imagine, if you’re an adult with a kid, an older sibling, an employer/manager, teacher, if the kid/sibling/employee/ student asked you, with an “attitude,” a question about where something was that obviously wasn’t there, bet you’d have some choice words to reply with even if just something sarcastic. Now how do you think they feel when you, the motherfucker supposedly leading by example, do some same ass retarded shit. But I can’t just respond off the cusp to her. If what I respond with can be interpreted as sarcastic, silly, or antagonistic in anyway, well that’s disrespectful backtalk. If I say anything that could be seen as an excuse, well we already discussed that. So I just tried to become even smaller and weakly mumbled, “I don’t have one.”

            EXCUSE! Next fucking jacked up question, was how? Obviously all the other kids had at least brought something in, “they had tried.” I just wanted to scream that just grabbing random items from the house wasn’t trying but how can I argue with 1) obviously teacher 2) the fact that I knew I hadn’t really tried and 3) I hadn’t because I was raised at that point and beyond about the letter of the law. Rules were there for a reason and had to be obeyed. I owned nothing that met the criteria as I understood it, so I thought I made no excuses by coming in honestly even if it was empty handed. Oh contraire, I could see in her eyes, and I thought of all the spankings I would be getting for, at that time, my conceivable life if I made a scene of any kind. So like the good little dog I was, I barely managed to squeak out two no’s when, in front of the entirety of two classes, she ended her grandiose speech about dedication, intelligence, slothfulness and entitlement, and asked me again if I really had no collection to share with the school followed up with a she “couldn’t hear” my first reply.

            When it was finally over, I told one of my closer school friends at the time what a bitch she had been (new words courtesy of Loterian). Remember this was a religious private school, so I’m sure it isn’t nearly as surprising to any of you as it was to me in that moment when my friend responded with malice (she was his grandmother). BAM, Power Dynamics 101, or as seems to be the popular reference these days, politics. You see that friend and I, while we had started out close, were quickly drifting apart starting after I unwittingly sold him out (not what you think believe me). Not only was his grandmother a teacher but so to his mother and father, the later also being minister, missionary, and member of the school board. They had far different issues than my family did as well. My friend’s parents had a house on the outskirts of town, and it was a jaw dropping first of extremely few sleepovers I attended there. They owned a decent sized house, and it had more land than I had ever seen any family own yet. Also, since it was kind of a farmhouse, he had dirt bikes, bows, and guns… oh yes, a little .22 rifle and a 14-gauge shotgun. With his dad’s supervision, I got to shoot my first gun and make a huge fuck up when I excitedly told my parents.

            Now like I have repeated multiple times, I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to shit outside of my personal world, which is why I probably assumed it was done and over when my parents swore I wouldn’t get to go over there again. I have no idea what the conversation between his and my parents sounded like. I can’t imagine it was good, because after I said those words about my buddy’s grandmother, the gloves came off. He accused my dad of being cool with pedophilia, smoking, a bunch of other religious specific accusations catching me totally off guard. I would have to learn from a different friend that the teacher was his grandmother. Not the point though, now my seven year old mind has way more questions and seemingly less people to talk honestly with. I don’t know if it was that night or shortly after but before my eighth birthday and baptism, I would start to have recurring nightmares. Not in the traditional sense (I don’t think at least) for my dreams were of torture, blood, and death of others by my hand. I remember the first like it was literally last night. I’m standing in some random field with a gravel road and hand fashioned wooden fence running along its side. As I stand there waiting for something, I don’t know what at the time, I see that teacher whistling and smiling though at the time I had never seen her do either. I sprint from the barn’s porch I didn’t realize I was standing on and attack her from behind, knocking her unconscious to drag back inside.

            I know when she awakes because I see the world through her eyes. I stand before her/me openly smiling, holding butcher’s knives, and “upside down” she thinks before realizing I have her strung by her feet over a vat of roiling oil. I utter no words or change my composure in any way as I move in. She pleads and cries, and I can see on my face real elation, true joy, happiness stronger than I had ever felt in real life at that point. I feel her heart accelerate in terror as she can almost feel my dreamt heart accelerate in excitement. I notice for the first time that I’m naked and fully erect, now becoming covered in blood as I try to flay her alive. Her screams and thrashings only seem to excite me further till finally, she starts to sob, and I cut where I presume her vocal box is. To finish, I then begin dipping her, repeatedly into the oil igniting fresh but now gurgled endeavors at sound. Smiles and oil is all I can see till the end of the dream. The whole ordeal felt like a multitude of hours if not days. I was seven so of course all I had were horrific images that I couldn’t even begin to describe in the previous manner and made only worse as I had seemingly enjoyed the whole thing. I really wanted to talk to someone, or just explain it away as a nightmare. Disgusted as I was when I awoke from it that first time and all since, the emotions of disgust, terror even, stemmed from knowing I still partially felt that abundance of glee upon waking, that I could feel the emotions welling up every time I would dwell on those dreams and eventually those thoughts. I’m not really sure if open acknowledgement of this would’ve helped or hurt the decisions I would make later on in life, but the mere existence of those dreams definitely affected every decision I have ever made. My only hope/wish at the time was that if I followed all the rules (choose the right religion maybe), I wouldn’t be the monster feared. Life’s kinda funny.

            When your seven though, it can be tough with little context to make informed decisions. With the best logic I could muster, I choose to be baptized as a member of mother’s church, Restoration. They had three books you see, which, in my mind at the time, meant more evidence and more knowledge. Also, I went to a restoration school, kids were assholes enough since we were poorer and my father was different, why make it worse. I also felt like my father would handle it better than my mother, not sure if I was correct about that. Needless to say, “life-altering events” were beginning to escalate quickly and while I would still idiotically open up honestly to my parents a time or two after that, my baptism would not be among them. I would lie for the second time and again for religious inclusion. All I wanted was to fit in with a family I was becoming increasingly worried about being distant from. The pompous and fanfare surrounding my baptismal ceremony felt overwhelming. Extended family members and church friends lined the grass on a freezing, cloudy October day in Lamoni, Iowa, and after going under the water and saying the prayers, I would give testimony of how I could see a light and was filled with the warmth of the spirit of god. Yeah, I imagine shock is pretty common when submerging yourself suddenly in 50 degree water especially at 8 years of age. Oh and the sun is fucking bright even if behind a little cloud cover.

            I would move forward now with a goal, a purpose, in mind. Now I felt I understood (drinking the koolaid) that devotion, dedication, study, and application were all I lacked. We’re all sinners after all, I was just a bit off, nothing that couldn’t be muzzled because Christ died and rose again and rainbows, daisies, and unicorns. Sorry, the point being I began to actually listen to what my elders were attempting to teach. You see between school, my own mentality, and home life with two younger siblings as almost my only two friends, I had allowed myself to play with very dark actions culminating to and from my eight-year-old baptism. I couldn’t begin to understand it at the time but my little game of truth or dare at this point would be very delayed during times and of course you can’t play alone.  It’s almost enough for me to thank a god I don’t believe in that I was caught quickly else who knows what more damage I could have caused my sister or maybe eventually my brother. This would inspire my parents to enlist my maternal grandmother to teach her class on sexuality. My poor cousins and eventually my school would get a taste in that misery. However, it wasn’t all that bad, since my grandmother’s class was a weird version of “abstinent only” it could have been far worse. I say weird version because it was highly detailed from a purely biological standpoint while being paired with creationist overtones. I think this method really helped to achieve at least the outward appearance of what my parents wanted.  The scientific, bare bone basics approach kept me attentive while the religious aspects mixed in made the virtues seem more real, tangible in a sense… in a sense.

            My point is that I began in earnest to try acting differently. It was slowly (reeeeaaaaaaally slowly) dawning on me that all those words of morality were descriptions of actions an individual had to actually perform not just speak on. While still eight, our school began a sort of reward system in the elementary grades, the carrot part in the carrot-stick system, and any time you would show kindness, intellect, devotion, or excellence you could get this little card stamped by a staff member who had witnessed it. When the card was full, you would get something silly like a casual dress day or extra recess, etc. I rarely filled any of these, which of course I just loved to blame on asshole’s (staff members) kids getting awarded for inconsequential bullshit but getting off topic again. It was one day in the later half of second grade that the principal awarded everyone in my class a free fully filled card for some “holy holy” reason I forget now, and I couldn’t bring myself to accept it. I was way unworthy, and to accept it would be totally unjustified for me if not just straight up unconscionable. While I doubt I wanted to, I eventually found myself in the principal’s office trying to explain without too much…detail, why I couldn’t take that card and its benefits. Like everything in my childhood though god was the answer. We prayed on it, and I faked like everything was hunky dory taking the card so I could get the fuck out of there. Then I just shoved that sick feeling right next to the pissed off one that wanted to scream bloody murder.

            So much for that route, because I would then get the joy of explaining that incident to my parents. They were “very open” to “listening” as to why I didn’t think I should get the good boy card at school.  I’m sure they were very curious as to what was going on in my head and fucking good. I only recognize it as such now, years later, but I honestly believe that little episode of bullshit was when I started to see myself as two halves of a whole. Logic and control vs emotion or, as I see it, rage. By the time I reached eleven, twelve I could see the strings of power and control woven about my life even if I couldn’t describe them. I would fuck up constantly in this period as even such a small-scale social setting had all the similar school tropes and I seemed incapable of navigating it. The nerds would suck up to the jocks (teacher’s pets and staff children) hoping to not get shit on as bad as the small group of complete dejects (classified for whatever silly ass reason) and then me.  One second cool as a cucumber, next I’m physically trying to attack somebody for some comment, not sticking up for a bullied classmate, snitching a classmate out for being a bully, making weird animal noises in the back of the class, mumbling and repeating myself in hushed tones, or just popping off with some really hateful shit. I would never be popular due to my stand-offish nature, even the few friends I did have I would never feel truly close to even as I would fight the emotions of desperation to deepen these bonds as they were my only link to some form of friendship.

            I would try to block all of it with devotion, study, and knowledge. I started reading the bible more frequently, trying to comprehend the concepts my parents, teachers, and priesthood expounded on; till the next blow would land squarely on the foundations of what I believed in and shake the hold I maintained over my unquenched rage. I was thirteen or very close to turning said age when that eldest maternal first cousin got the call. Restorationism is unique from Catholicism in that any male can be called to the priesthood as well as they don’t have to forsake family or future plans. They also would serve a function of the church depending on which office of priesthood they were called to (sorta like Catholicism’s priest, bishop, cardinal, etc.). I was now irate. There was no fucking way my younger cousin (whose dad, my maternal uncle, was a fairly high-ranked priesthood member in our congregation) was worthy of being a priesthood member at that time. I actually tried to be worthy, paid attention in religion class, didn’t bully my weaker, smaller cousins (if you didn’t catch that, I was the weaker, smaller cousin), I didn’t play video games (not the way he got to), hell I damn near had the bible (2 of the 3 books my mother’s faith had) memorized and not just the verses damn near any atheist off the street could quote you. I know, it sounds like I really deserved that call huh, like I really had the whole mindset of being a leader of faith on lock. No, my cousin did earn the position, worked to meet his position’s standards or at the very least I instantly recognized the hypocrisy and envy that poisoned the previous thoughts trying to elevate my own worth. My cousin didn’t have to be below me for my actions to be recognized. Those acts just weren’t, is how I felt, and I shoved all the malice right back where it belonged, telling myself that this whole event didn’t change a thing.

            It did though, the proof to me is I can hardly remember real details from this point to about fifteen. It’s hard to get my head around too as these years had several impactful events. We would change private schools (mostly a result of the issues of division in my mother’s faith) and I would get a couple new friends there. I would get new friends at the neighborhood we would move to as a result of my dad landing a job with the power company. Finally, my family owned a house! We’d get a dog, satellite tv, reliable internet, hell eventually even a GameCube. I discovered my passion for writing in this time with one of my most fondly remembered teachers, I avidly sought reading material for knowledge, and I became addicted to one of humanity’s oldest hobbies through one of the few and earliest video games I got to play, Medieval Total War (MTW). It’s amazing to me how I never joined the military though every time I think it out it gets pretty clear why.

            Regardless, while I view these times as almost robotic in the nature I lived those days out, it was still eventful; life and its day-to-day shit kept going. Almost like how I felt in second grade when the towers fell and every human with a voice was showing signs of panic in whatever way befitted them. I had no context, no understanding, nothing to relate and as such it was “keep quiet and it’ll pass, Chris”; life goes on for those who live, what occurs after belong only to those of the living, the ones who make the action, those who know of it, and the rest living with its fallout. If I know not, then learn. I’m distracted again; so this funk would cloud my mind for awhile during which my parents would loosen up the 50’s era grip, social media would begin to rear its ugly head with platforms like Xanga, Myspace, and eventually Facebook, and I would get to explore more video games with the job money I could start earning (only during summer [school/learning was the ONLY important thing in our house {excluding the big G upstairs of course}]). Xanga was my first social media experience, and it went as well as you can imagine. Xanga was almost like a diary for me. You could post little blogs for people to read, and they could message you, as well as explore each other’s pages where random internet bull shit could be attached (usually just music/sound clips). I had gotten maybe two weeks with the platform before I mysteriously had to explain my very private Xanga entries to my parents who I had told nothing of the platform. If you have made it this far then you know that those entries had a multitude of statements my parents were very curious about. Also, for all the hoity-toity putting knowledge on a pedestal they spouted constantly, it seemed they didn’t really believe it for as long as I lived in their house. How else would they have been able to monitor me if I could just figure out a way to circumvent their gaze (I still haven’t figured out how my mother did that shit though that’s more on me now days).

            Fuck if I can’t keep on topic. Now I knew I couldn’t do a damn thing online either (wouldn’t stop me from trying to get away with watching porn though). Same bullshit different day in the life of Chris, but my life outlook would expand as I engaged in my “first real relationship.” Believe it or not, I met Elarraine on Hot or Not (old school tinder kids) and over the time we talked, I began to feel pretty confident “this was a real human being and she was kind of into me.” She lived over on the Kansas side though and I was still a few months away from my license. So we set up a double date and I convinced a buddy who could drive to take us to the theater out there for a movie. I still have no idea to this day how my buddy’s and my parents discovered our treachery (we told them we were seeing a movie just not the right location) but that spilled the beans about my new girlfriend. Surprising to me at the time, my parents had shifted enough to let me continue seeing her. I was elated for this was someone outside the circle of those I knew or who they knew, and even better she was incredible. She actually seemed to listen and care and support me for who I was, and also not try to alter my words to fit an agenda or push a personal belief on me. That’s when I decided I didn’t give two fucks how smart she was or what people thought of how she dressed or acted, Elarraine was right. There was no god, and I went even further than her, as I saw no evidence for any spiritual/higher being(s).

            Of course, love is a fickle thing, and I was a violently (suicidally as well if memory serves correctly) inclined rebellious teenager going into sixteen plus. Elarraine couldn’t stick around and afterward, in the depths of a teenager’s “eternal” misery, I would take another crack at opening up to my parents. This time, though, my intent was very much deceitful and malicious. I reiterate that I’m not good with words, especially when I try to speak so when conversations turn to a one-sided “only my thought counts” fest, I become frustrated with being unsure of how to progress and usually just leave. In the cases outside of family, usually for good because while I can’t articulate my inquiries without being frustrated which is on me, I don’t forget that bullshit you pulled and if you’re not sorry (by action or at very least word) what is there to forgive? This time, I thought, we’re putting a little test on the ‘rents. A little science experiment to see if all those harsh judgements of what I saw them as were really warranted. It was after a particularly rough day at school where I was especially absorbed in all of the events I’ve written and then some, that I said fuck it and when my dad came down to pretend to care about what was going on (they had figured out I was cutting though not where), I hit him with a one-two of I was sexually abused and I’ve rejected all religion up to and including the very concept of a god. They could not have realized just how easily they played into my hand and validated every nasty thought I had of them, even going beyond the extents that I had considered, l.o.l. yet again.

            First dad breaks down. Wrong play old man. Crying? In front of me? Bitch fucking please how many times did men don’t cry come out your fucking mouth. Would’ve helped the case if those crocodile tears hadn’t cleared up in seconds when it was obviously having no effect. Second, You both thought spewing more god shit at me was going to somehow solve that shit right up? As if all the fucking hypocrisy I was being subjected to on the daily wasn’t evidence enough that perhaps wrong route? Third, oh yeah that’s a smart move, undermine your child’s trust in you even further by gossiping about his issues behind his back to your precious “faith leaders.” What could possibly go wrong with that? Certainly not an entire sermon directly/indirectly aimed at him with no choice but to sit through it. Fourth, winner winner chicken dinner, send the kid off to some Christian psychiatrist. I mean, you couldn’t possibly find the time to put forth the effort to actually fix the fucked up problems you created. Just send him off to some random ass dude to pluck his brain all because he happens to have similar faith and that profession is what the world offers you for dealing with a hellion.

            Obviously, this made my sixteen year old self elated.  Angsty teenage me had all the proof he needed to stop giving even a quarter fuck and seek out trouble how I could, where I could, when I could so long as I was utterly confident it couldn’t get back to my parents. Just as some quick examples other than the vague got in some fights, dressed like Marylin Manson, actually got to go to some parties and actually drink; I would also trash an innocent girl’s heart for, to this day, can’t explain any other way than for shits and fucking giggles and I would get a peek at the real ugly self that actually scares me. There was a moment down in Texas visiting my father’s side of the family that I will never forget or forgive. Of the all the horrific things I do and don’t discuss here, this event ranks with only two others (one that’s yet to come) on events I caused that truly haunt me in the present. We were at my eldest uncle’s place when I would go to a different room not desiring to be with my overbearing religious family. Of course, my very young cousins wanted to play with the oldest cool cousin and were jumping around making a raucous while I insisted and pretended that I was trying to sleep. Then, it got real. They had started to bounce and play around on top of me instead of just about me and before I registered it, I was pitchin a mighty obvious tent. Kids under five don’t know what the hell is going on really, not because they’re incapable but generally because they haven’t lived long enough to understand the context and details that surround every one of us, and one of the youngest cousins was just curious enough to stare at the same shame that had me locked in the frozen stasis that was the flurry of multiple emotions vying to be enacted. It seemed like the seconds became hours, as in horror and desire, I saw her reach out her tiny hand towards the obstruction. I snapped to attention and literally snapped around, only then of course the call for dinner saving me. It didn’t matter that technically nothing had occurred, the fact that I let it come that close, the sick feeling of joy I know was there over what could happen – what was going to happen; the yearning coupled with terror of it actually happening. However, this behavior would continue (obviously not the running around molesting kids behavior) till my father and I would literally come to blows over nonsense with threats of kicking me out a plenty. While my mother would cool things off, it was logic that I believe kept things there. I had recently tried cigarettes and that first taste brought such peace and tranquility I had never experienced before. Dwelling on the parental incident in context with all other events leading to it, I recognized that I was moments away from being free of whatever rule of law my parents sucked at the teat of, and I just had to make it to college where their control and rule wouldn’t apply any longer.  So, the last 8 months or thereabouts had me biting my tongue and biding my time.

            At first, it would be everything I had envisioned and more. Hell, it was because of that I would very quickly understand just how fucked over I was. Regardless, I picked up smoking like a fiend. I felt calm and in control for the first time, unclouded by the torrent of wrath I had done battle with daily. I realized I had never needed to get that emotional in the first place, totally unnecessary as with critical thought and careful consideration of speech, you could subvert arguments, expose manipulation, and most importantly avoid pointless physical altercations (pah!). I started to understand why I didn’t believe in a god instead of just blindly spouting it. By having little concept of why I rejected faith, any statement I would make around family previously left me feeling just like their accusations, an angsty teen saying that shit for attention. I became engrossed in philosophy and theology, an easy step from my love of history. I would also find some of my closest friends to this day at that college. Despite all these revelations, I still knew what I was, still had all my dark fantasies and fucked up thoughts. Most relevant, I was still extremely opposed to any form of authority I could possibly perceive which would be my downfall on completing college.

            The memory burns like a hot poker even now. The nonchalant attitude my accounting teacher (Accounting was going to be my profession, writing doesn’t net you “a real job”, at least those with longevity and/or security) had while talking about how “you used to just be able to pay to take the Certified Public Accountant’s test till recently,” awakened that old friend of mine. I was stunned, dwelling on it long after the class had ended. In other words, instead of spending fuck tons of money and time to get a piece of paper so then I could sit at this test in hopes to go do this job I was considering, I could’ve just read all related information needed, paid a little money for a certification test and been about my life? Well basically I would flunk out. I tried moving in with the ‘rents (my parents) and went to community college for another partial semester, but the damage was done. It was January/February of 2009 that I would be real with my parents for the final time. Not out of desire or deception, love or hate, but simply as fact. I was done with the way they had laid out for me. I was moving in with my new friends from the first college, Eschtaros and Y’alohila, to get jobs to make ends meet while we pursued our real dreams; the desires we had for the future of our lives.

            I would communicate with my parents though for a while longer as I tried to convince myself I didn’t hate them but the actions themselves. Speaking terms certainly changed when I probably did the worst thing in their eyes. Eventually, my roommates and I had to move back over Missouri side which was closer to my job when their employment fell through in Kansas. Here, in some shitty little apartment (apt) I could barely afford off $400 every two weeks (my earnings at a restaurant), I would rekindle friendship with an old flame, Juliana, who was engaged at the time to what had been one of my best friends toward the end of high school. He had joined the military and was overseas so she would come over and we would hang out while my roommates and I did our thing: get stoned, play video games, watch tv and movies, write books and music, and in general just whatever the fuck we pleased so long as it wasn’t trying to hurt or judge another in the house (apt). One day, though, I hear from my sister of how my engaged best friend has been sending her messages of the unwanted variety. Time for a true colors appearance by yours truly as I would seduce his fiancée, my own fucking friend.

            Yes, we had probably started to get too close in this time period but when I was in full principled human being kick, I was worse than the most righteous of holy men about my actions so nothing had, and I thought would, ever come of it. Never say never kids cause it obviously didn’t take much to show I was just as hypocritical as any of those “righteous, holy men.” I do have a knack for reaping the consequences of what I sow.  So, it was not long after I had pulled my dumb ass stunt that I found out how lucky I was to be a proud DNA donor. Oh how the zealots of our families freaked. Not like I can talk shit cause I freaked. I was making four hundred dollars every two weeks; I was the only source of income in the apt at that time; I literally had been raised and/or validated in no areas that would lead to a proper income to begin with; and I had no intention of subjecting myself to the desires, whims, and speculations of those who could provide that… potential. Sure, I had been attracted to her and we were or had been friends and even further we held very similar passions and mentalities, but I didn’t love her, not the way I felt a commitment of that magnitude (talking about child rearing… and marriage though less so) required. Even worse in my mind and certainly the most important was how there was no way in fucking hell I was going to pass my shit on to a child (nurture over nature). I recognized all the worst traits of my parents in myself, I was an open and vocal atheist in the heart of the bible belt, and, of course, I was a monster, a socio- or psychopathic killer just one trigger event away from making my now waking nightmares a reality for everyone I could get my hands on.

            I wasn’t going to do it and would come close to getting that trigger event I seemed to almost seek through my life decisions. I remember my heart sinking in my chest as she called, everything having gone silent for approximately a month, so I damn near knew before having known it. I tried to reason with her stating the case for how we weren’t equipped or prepared to raise a separate and intelligent human life that would be totally dependent for at very minimum 8 years. She interrupted me about no abortions before I could spit out that abortion wasn’t the only option. Other couples in better life situations could give the child loving parents and a legit home to grow up in. She wasn’t having it though and good on her. She showed (and probably still shows) more courage, fortitude, and confidence than I certainly had or perhaps will ever have. She would follow it up with compassion and integrity as talking the talk just wasn’t enough. No sarcasm there people. Perhaps she just saw me for what I really am in our brief time together, but it doesn’t matter what her intent was, her actions were to leave me free to live how I saw fit, seeking no retribution or justice of any kind, to my knowledge.

            However, this stroke of mercy was just one avenue that the issue could apply pressure from and the others were almost just as dreadful in my mind. My parents also somehow thought I had told Juliana to get an abortion which I eventually stopped defending myself against since, whatever, think of me what you want as I really didn’t have any strong feelings on abortions anyway SINCE I’M NOT A FUCKING WOMAN. Such a fucking stupid simpleton argument to make in defense of women’s rights but I digress, my maternal and paternal grandparents both got shots in about my moral compass, ethical standing, hell, value as a human being. Nothing I didn’t expect, though the six page letter I got from my maternal grandmother stung real good. I wish I had it so I could post it here as it was one of the last real communications between us before she passed, and it destroyed all the notions of respect and love I had had for her and tried to hold on to up to that point. Immediately, I set to writing my own lengthy letter to show her that two could play lofty word games when pondering another human being’s mindset. By the time I finished the ten plus page rebuke/farewell letter (it would never see the light of day), I was broken. Probably the first real though still halfhearted attempt I would make on my life. I thought I was done, that I didn’t care any longer, and that how many lives did I need to finger-fuck before I accepted that I was a blemish on the psychological health of those around me, same as I was to my very self. I tried using the old knife in the tub trick though just like when I would cut as a teen, the blood just didn’t seem to be flowing fast enough. As I got more desperate to lay my arm open, I heard the rustling of my roommates waking and there was only one restroom in the apt. I was ashamed to own up to that to them for a long time, but they knew. You don’t just get some random long gash down the inside of one arm by tripping up the stairs (I fucking suck at lying, I’m still unsure how so few of those “testimonies” got called out).

            This is when, like the homicidal thoughts I waged war against with will and recognition, I decided to combat my suicidal inclinations with the very rage I had sought to subdue. Hatred. Stubbornness. I had told myself that others would not control me, that I would live free and not treat others in the manner I didn’t like being treated and I would do it my own way no matter the thoughts people had on my actions. Why was suicide any different? Just another asshole trying to convince me that I had to take this action for shit to get better. This way or the highway. Fuck that shit, suicide was just another way of giving up, of bowing the knee. Not this motherfucker, not until I had lost every ounce of will, given up on every principle self-shackled to my ideals. This is what I decided in that shitty, powerless (as in electric bill not paid), starving moment where hope was only there if you made it. I didn’t pretend that I was going to be some great, outstanding bastion of human behavior but maybe if I kept working, struggling, learning, just maybe, I could stop being the monster I was so sure I was.

            Well, there ya go folks, prologue over.  Sorry I drew it out so long, or, in general, drug you through the shit but hopefully I painted the proper picture of who I am. I just feel like I need you to understand the lens from which you should view me as I’m about spew bullshit. I know your probably hoping the end of this prologue would be the end of my erratic, if not insane, writing style but this is probably going to read like a madman’s ravings till the very end. If you continue reading, there are only four, though broad, chapters or subjects that will in a sense provide the subject matter for that section though they will all be tied in for the finale. We’ll start with some World and then American history; the same order I came to love these subjects growing up. Afterwards I’ll broaden the net wider as we dive into the details of our institutions in all their variety, transitioning at that point to human beings in both a physical and emotional or, I guess, metaphysical sense before the final blow of the epilogue.

            This is gonna sound mean…fuck it. For those in the societal conditions I most empathize with, please try to stick with this. I know I sound/read like a right fucker with my word choices and sentence structures, but assholes who love to surround themselves with words to beat us with need to be kept happy in some fashion. I’ve tried to put enough context into my sentences in belief it might get the basics across which is all you need. The shitty wording and longwinded blathering is for those who need it for some reason to stay engaged to the end. Undoubtedly this of course will mean more opportunities to chop my writings into whatever anyone wants, but I hope you remember my first disclaimer towards the beginning. I do not think we should try to control (vague term I know) each other; I don’t think we have the capability of controlling the future (as it would violate the first), but I think we should never stop trying to control ourselves (because we will fail… sorry). No matter what words I might throw on these pages, I am not intelligent, decent, or logical by any stretch of the imagination. So, if you start to feel that my words are abrasive/disgusting/assaulting/hateful, I hope, instead of venting action on I or perhaps others that this may remind you of, you would step away, shrugging this book and I off as the batshit crazy lies that we are. I have no other way of communicating to you, those who have strangely persevered to this point, about the issues I see and the opinions I have on them except through this method. Words that are used to hate/ lie/ manipulate/ bully/ demean/ dominate/ destroy/ demonize/ demonstrate/ uplift/ encourage/ inspire/ teach/ praise/ love.  I hope you’re ready for this because I’m still not sure I am.

History

            My fascination with world history stems from the combination of my love of reading, biblical upbringing, and the ease of access to that knowledge. For a long time, I would exclude American history from this as not only did I find it boring, but I would be under the childishly naïve and false belief that it was just us going about setting right all the incorrect or “evil” traditions our European, African, and Asian forefathers had subjugated us with for millennia. Funny how it was my love of war games that would help open my eyes to our own past and ignite my passion for learning it. I’m sure a few people would disagree at my earlier statement of war being one of man’s oldest hobbies but while no one I could easily find stated it first, I stand by that opinion. Look no further than the findings at Jebel Sahaba, Sudan or Nataruk, Kenya both dating 10,000 or more years though experts seem torn as to how much a stretch it is calling this evidence of war. I don’t need any more evidence than a mass grave, but perhaps quotes from… renowned individuals carry some weight:

The Epic of Gilgamesh, Translated by Maureen Gallery Kovacs – Electronic Edition

by Wolf Carnahan, 1998 – Tablet 1

“He who has seen everything, I will make known (?) to the lands. | I will teach (?) about

him who experienced all things, … alike | ….Supreme over other Kings, lordly in appearance | he is the hero, born of Uruk, the goring wild bull, | He walks out in front, the leader, | and walks at the rear, trusted by his companions, | Mighty net, protector of his people, | raging flood-wave who destroys even walls of stone, | Offspring of Lugalbanda, Gilgamesh is strong to perfection, | …. He walks around in the enclosure of Uruk, | Like a wild bull he makes himself mighty, head raised (over others). | There is no rival who can raise his weapon against him. | His fellows stand (at the alert), attentive to his (orders?), | and the men of Uruk become anxious in…”

The Inspired Version of the Holy Scriptures (INV), ….by Joseph Smith Jr.…, first

published 1867, Plano, Iowa – starting at Genesis 7:15

“15) and so great was the faith of Enoch, that he led the people of God, and their enemies came to battle against them, and he spake the word of the Lord, and the earth trembled, and the mountains fled, even according to his command. 16) And the rivers of water were turned out of their course, and the roar of the lions was heard out of the wilderness. 17) and all nations feared greatly, so powerful was the word of Enoch, and so great was the power of the language which God had given him. 18) There also came up a land out of the depths of the sea; and so great was the fear of the enemies of God, that they fled and stood afar off, and went upon the land which came up out of the depths of the sea. 19) And the giants of the land also stood afar off; and there went forth a curse upon all the people which fought against God. 20) And from that time forth, there were wars and bloodshed among them; but the Lord came and dwelt with his people, and they dwelt in righteousness.”

The Holy Bible, King James Version (KJV) originally published 1611, London,

England, starting with Genesis 6:1

“1) And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, 2) That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took them wives of all which they chose 3) And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. 4) There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown. 5) And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was evil continually. 6) And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. 7) and the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. 8) But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. 9) These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. 10) And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 11) The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. 12) And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. 13) And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.”  There is also the first actual instance of the word, war being used in the KJV, Genesis 14. “1) And it came to pass in the days of Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer, king of Elam, and Tidal king of nations; 2) That these made war with Bera king of Sodom, and with Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, and Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela, which is Zoar. 3) All these were joined together in the vale of Siddim, which is the salt sea. 4) Twelve years the served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled. 5) And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the kings that were with him, and smote the Rephaims in Ashteroth Karnaim, and the Zuzims in Ham, and the Emims in Shaveh Kiriathaim, 6) and the Horites in their mount Seir, unto El-paran, which is by the wilderness. 7) And they returned, and came to En-mishpat, which is Kadesh, and smote all the country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites, that dwelt in Hazezon-tamar. 8) And there went out the king of Sodom, and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (the same is Zoar;) and they joined battle with them in the vale of Siddim; 9) With Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and with Tidal king of nations, and Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar; four kings with five. 10) And the vale of Siddim was full of slimepits; and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and fell there; and they that remained fled to the mountain. 11) And they took all goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their victuals, and went their way. 12) And they took Lot, Abram’s brother’s son, who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.”

The History of Herodotus, by Herodotus, Translated by G. C. Macaulay, Provided by The Project Gutenberg, Released December 1, 2008, Updated January 25, 2013, Produced by John Bickers, Dagny, and David Widger. Volume 1, Book 1, page 1

“This is the Showing forth of Inquiry of Herodotus of Halicarnassos, to the end that neither deeds of men may be forgotten by lapse of time, nor the works, great and marvelous, which have been produced some by Hellenes and some by Barbarians, may lose their renown; and especially that the causes may be remembered for which these waged war with one another 1) Those of the Persians who have knowledge of history declare that the Phenicians first began the quarrel. These, they say, came from that which is called the Erythraian Sea to this of ours; and having settled in the land where they continue even now to dwell, set themselves forthwith to make long voyages by sea. And conveying merchandise to Egypt and of Assyria they arrived at other places and also at Argos; now Argos was at that time the first of the States within the land which is  now called Hellas;….and on the fifth or sixth day after they had arrived, when their goods had been almost all sold, there came down to the sea a great company of women, and among them the daughter of the king; and her name, as the Hellenes also agree, was Io the daughter of Inachos….buying of the wares that pleased them most, when of a sudden the Phenicians, passing the word from one to another, made a rush upon them; and the greater part of the women escaped by flight, but Io and certain others were carried off…. [into part 2)] and this they say was the first beginning of wrongs. Then after this, they say, certain Hellenes (but the name of the people they are not able to report) put in to the city of Tyre in Phenicia and carried off the king’s daughter Europa; – these would doubtless be Cretans; – and so they were quits for the former injury. After this however the Hellenes, they say, were the authors of the second wrong; for they sailed in to the Aia of Colchis and to the river Phasis with a ship of war, and from thence, after they had done the other business for which they came, they carried off the kings daughter Medea: and the king of Colchis sent a herald to the land of Hellas and demanded satisfaction for the rape and to have his daughter back; but they answered that, as the Barbarians had given them no satisfaction for the rape of Io the Argive, so neither would they give satisfaction to the Barbarians for this. 3) In the next generation after this, they say, Alexander the son of Priam, having heard of these things, desired to get a wife for himself by violence from Hellas, being fully assured that he would not be compelled to give any satisfaction for this wrong, inasmuch as the Hellenes gave none for theirs. So he carried off Helen, and the Hellenes resolved to send messengers first and to demand her back with satisfaction for the rape; and when they put forth this demand, the others alleged to them the rape of Medea, saying that the Hellenes were now desiring satisfaction to be given to them by others, though they had given none themselves nor had surrendered the person when demand was made. 4) Up to this point, they say, nothing more happened than the carrying away of women on both sides; but after this the Hellenes were very greatly to blame; for they set the first example of war, making an expedition into Asia before the Barbarians made any into Europe. Now they say that in their judgement, though it is an act of wrong to carry away women by force, it is a folly to set one’s heart on taking vengeance for their rape, and the wise course is to pay no regard when they have been carried away; for it is evident that they would never be carried away if they were not themselves willing to go. And the Persians say that they, namely the people of Asia, when their women were carried away by force, had made it a matter of no account, but the Hellenes on account of a woman of Lacedemon gathered together a great armament….”

The Iliad of Homer, by Homer, Translated by Alexander Pope, with notes by Rev.

Theodore Buckley, M.A., F.S.A. and Flaxman’s Designs, 1899 Provided by Project Gutenberg, Released September 2006, Book XIII (13), pages 246, 247?

“….(An olive’s cloudy grain the handle made, Distinct with studs, and brazen was the blade;) This on the helm discharged a noble blow, the plume dropp’d nodding to the plain below, Shorn from the crest. Atrides waved his steel: Deep through his front the weighty falchion fell; The crashing bones before its force gave way; In dust and blood the groaning hero lay: Forced from their ghastly orbs, and spouting gore, The clotted eye-balls tumble on the shore. And fierce Atrides spurn’d him as he bled, Tore off his arms, and, loud-exulting, said: ‘Thus, Trojans, thus, at length be taught to fear; O race perfidious, who delight in war! Already noble deeds ye have perform’d; A princess raped transcends a navy storm’d: In such bold feats your impious might approve, Without th’ assistance, or the fear of Jove. The violated rites, the ravish’d dame; Our heroes slaughter’d and our ships on flame, Crimes heap’d on crimes, shall bend your glory down, And whelm in ruins yon flagitious town. O thou, great father! Lord of earth and skies, Above the thought of man, supremely wise! If from thy hand the fates of mortals flow, From whence this favour to an impious foe? A godless crew, Abandon’d and unjust, Still breathing rapine, violence, and lust? The best of things, beyond their measure, cloy; Sleep’s balmy blessing, love’s endearing joy; The feast, the dance; whate’er mankind desire, Even the sweet charms of sacred numbers tire. But Troy for ever reaps a dire delight In thirst of slaughter, and in lust of fight.”

That last part is what I have seen commonly misquoted as, “Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing sooner than war.” – Homer

That’s a fuckload of quotation, I know and my bad. There’s a whole lot to unpack there which I’m not getting to immediately. These quotes were to just provide a little bit of reference to call back to in later topics, as well as serving as a decent prop to pretend supports the completely opinionated statement of war or violence (however you wanna look at it) being with humanity since historical evidence separates us from the other animals...maybe I think further than that, anyway. I promise most of the quotes from hence forth won’t be quite as long, except those pertaining to text considered scripture by religions, any and all religions. I’m an atheist (which I’ll get to details on exactly what I mean by that later) but that doesn’t mean I have to be an ass. My apologies in advance as mistakes will be made and I hope you believe it’s done out of ignorance, not that that means I am owed mercy… fucking shit getting off topic.

 For those listening instead of reading, I debated hard over how to handle footnotes and bibliography. My ultimate decision was to just cite the source as I went both written and aloud. I will throw definitions of words, perhaps not common or easily discerned from context, in parenthesis after the word in question, which will be written on the video, and all definitions are provided by my edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary Fifth Edition, published by Oxford University Press, in Oxford, New York, in the year 2002 (I’ll try to remember to remove quotation marks if it happens inside a quote, not perfect people [later edit: wouldn’t be human if I wasn’t a liar]). While it may make the audio sound even more monotonous, most secondary phrases already in parenthesis will be written on the video to go with the audio, because in many instances, I feel the interjections of those thoughts can be extremely distracting to making the sentence sound sensible. Kinda like what a whole bunch of commas do, which I’ve totally not been doing up to this point. I’ve posted a list of words from the start of this chapter I feel could fall under what I just mentioned: “Vale – (definition 1) a valley especially one which is comparatively wide and flat. Victuals – (definition 1) whatever is required or may be used for consumption to maintain life; food, sustenance; produce of the land able to be used as food. Brazen – (definition 3) of a brassy colour or sound; burnished; strident; harsh. Falchion – (definition 1) a broad curved sword with the edge on the convex side. Spurned – (definition 4) reject with contempt or disdain; treat contemptuously, scorn, despise. Flagitious – extremely wicked, criminal, villainous. Pertaining – (definition 2) having reference or relation to; relate to. Convex – (definition 1) having an outline or surface curved like the exterior of a circle or sphere…”

            Without further ado, let us just proceed under the recognition of man’s fascination of war or violence at least dating back as far as the evidence of language. Not far from my own start. While the video game MTW let me recognize the characteristic, I was introduced far younger through games like chess, risk, Chinese checkers, etc and through books like obviously the bible which I quoted earlier but also more fictional historical accounts like God King: A Story in the Days of King Hezekiah and Hittite Warrior both by Joan Williamson, The Ides of April by Mary Rae, The Story of Rolf and the Viking Bow by Allen French, and Son of Charlemagne by Barbara Willard just to name a few that also fit the narrative. MTW would also teach the basics of what even made the grand style of war I fantasized about even possible. Agriculture, infrastructure, over all the economic stability to provide the needs of a large group who, instead of participating in the aforementioned subjects, are focused on the fucking off; training of skills and ability to enact those skills out on the enemy I mean. Of course, I’m leaving out the populist/dictator/king/president/leader that’s needed to blind/unite said large group to the desired purpose without certain questions about the details of accomplishing it; the fundamental travel between points A to B broken down literally step by step. Now I’m getting ahead of myself.

            While I strongly believe violence/war isn’t unique to humans and has been a part of life since conception, we’re focusing on human beings and also on some shared history, not war and how as soon as we invented anything it was seemingly the next thought “how can I use this to beat them so I can have their stuff/person(s) around them/labor or just them.” We can sugar coat it with whatever fancy phrases, noble justifications, or moral/ethical principles we like. Neither does it change what occurs in the moment nor the actions that result from such confrontations. FUCK! Now obviously if early humans had to focus on feeding themselves at any given point they were not defending, seeking shelter or clean water; I can imagine time for frivolities/hobbies would be slim. However, get you a long pointy stick and small, slow-moving animals aren’t the only supplement to safe berries and flora. Hell, a sharp rock does wonders to separate fur from meat making better clothes, tools, or shelter; and, no matter how strong, intelligent, or experienced you are, how much easier is any task if done with dedicated() others of comparable() attributes? Then again, what happens when you’ve hunted the last of the game, foraged ([definition 4] seek out food or provisions; go out in search of food) the final herbs of the season. Human beings had to find other means of being self-sustaining ([definition found in alphabetical order under the prefix self-] sustaining oneself by one’s own power or efforts, able to continue without support or external assistance). I’ll just give you the entry collegiate level text version.

            For this next quote, I change up the traditional format of citing and break the earlier promise about quotation that probably won’t be upheld at all. The book uses a lot of pictures in places to give visual examples that I will not be providing. After I state the book, nothing will be in quotations even though much of what is written comes directly from the source material. The text, while still a summary, is quite long-winded as writers tend to be (no exceptions here). I mentioned the issue of visual aids but how the chapters are divided as well made me pause on how to quickly cover this early intro. Instead, where you see quotations (sorry listeners) is my phrasing in an attempt to smooth out one of the aforementioned problems, and I feel it too drastic of a change to be left misquoted but to jarring to read without the alteration. Also, this is going to be the only reference material for catching us up on prehistoric man. I don’t think my summary will include any statements too radical or still hotly debated but…whatever.

Encounters in World History: Sources and Themes from the Global Past, Volume

One: to 1500, First Edition, by Thomas Sanders, Samuel H. Nelson, Stephen Morillo, Nancy Ellenberger, Published by McGraw-Hill, an imprint of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc, New York, New York, Copyright 2006

Chapter 1, Page 5 – This first chapter provides an introduction to the problems of

evidence and interpretation through an examination of early human history. Because there are no written sources for most of this period, “(Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic)” it is sometimes referred to as “prehistory,” on the assumption that history emerges with writing. “(Page 6) This age of early human history is roughly dated to begin about 6 million years ago in Africa.” According to genetic evidence, that was when humans and chimpanzees, our closest living relatives, diverged evolutionarily. The family tree of early hominids (human ancestors who are not counted in the genus homo, meaning “man” in Latin) is complicated and subject to continual debate and revision by paleoanthropologists “()”, but the broad outlines are agreed upon, so its details need not concern us here. “Enclosed in the pages are photos of humanoid skulls associated with the upcoming human species mentioned.” Already marked by the binocular vision and opposable thumbs common to apes, ancestral hominids developed bipedalism (walking on two feet, leaving the hands free) before 4 million years ago. By perhaps 2.5 million years ago the early human species homo habilis (literally handy man), probably ancestral to modern humans, had learned to fashion and use simple stone tools “‘(Captioned with the corresponding picture,’ 1.8 million years ago. Homo habilis made and used a variety of simple stone tools and had a brain perhaps half the size of a modern human brain)”.  By roughly 1.9 million years ago early humans of the species homo ergaster, whose brains were about three-quarters the size of those of modern humans, were not only making stone tools but had mastered the use of fire “‘(Captioned with the picture)’ 1.75 million years ago. The variant of Homo erectus, slightly more similar to modern humans, stayed in Africa and invented a significant advance in the production of chipped stone tools known as Acheulean Technology”. Homo erectus (erect man), a branch of these early humans, became the first of hominids to move out of Africa, occupying the temperate and tropical zones of Asia starting around 1 million years ago “‘(Captioned with the picture)’ 1.75 million years ago. Homo erectus is the branch of homo ergaster that left Africa. With a brain about two-thirds the size of modern human’s, Homo erectus used a somewhat more complex set of stone tools than earlier species and mastered the use of fire”. Then, about 200,000 years ago, a separate group descended from homo ergaster emerged in east Africa as the modern human species homo sapiens (wise man). The evidence for this date comes from both genetic and comparative linguistics; the first homo sapiens fossils date only to 130,000 years ago. The oldest homo sapiens fossils outside of Africa were found in southwest Asia and date to 90,000 years ago. Almost as early is the first evidence of not only new sorts of tools but also the first new products that could have artistic or ritual significance. Certainly by the period starting 40,000 years ago, with some hints dating well before that, there was an explosion of technology and art, as well as a tremendous expansion of the geographic range of homo sapiens (and their close relatives homo neanderthalis, Neanderthal Man) into areas never colonized by homo erectus, including subartic and artic climes and land masses such as Australia…. By 14,000 years ago humans occupied all the major continents except Antarctica.  “We see a few photos of examples of simple tools that are dated to correspond with the humanoid skulls previously mentioned. This is used to support the book’s correlation with the increase in skull dimensions, what the book refers to as the human toolkit, to the advancement of tools, even if these simple improvements seem almost negligible(). (Page 11) So,” starting at least 70,000 years ago (probably earlier, but the evidence is scarce “[]” and sometimes contested), and certainly only in association with fossils of anatomically modern humans “{}” – homo sapiens – the human toolkit changes. The changes are particularly dramatic after 40,000 years ago in Europe, the beginning of what paleontologists call the Upper Paleolithic (or latest Old Stone Age) period, which coincides with the arrival of homo sapiens in Europe at the ultimate expense of Neanderthals. (Page 6) Up to this point, all humans had lived by hunting and gathering. By 10,000 years ago agriculture had appeared in a few areas; domestication of plants and animals would be repeated independently several times and spread from those various points of origin. Agriculture made possible permanent settlements, more complex societies, and the whole range of activities, inventions, and cultures…. “More photographic examples of increasingly complex arrowheads, fishing spears, cave art, ornate carvings, the semi-famous Venus statuette (), and a Russian hut made of mammoth bones roughly dated 20,000 years ago. These are used to lead into the progression of humans from nomadic tribes to settled cities/nations. (Page 25) This leads to the first site mentioned,” Catal Hoyuk on the Anatolian Plateau in modern Turkey. The people of this settlement apparently made the transition to agriculture as long ago as 6500 BCE, taking advantage of the wild, large-seeded cereals, ancestors of domesticated wheat, that grew abundantly in the area. Catal Hoyuk also contains artwork, shrines dedicated to a religion that apparently focused on hunting (a good reminder of the mixed economies of early agricultural settlements and of the long transition from food gathering to food production), and evidence of such typically urban concerns as garbage disposal (buried under ash in the courtyards of the enclosed houses)…. “(Page 26)” One of the pieces of speculation presented in the preceding description of Catal Hoyuk is the potential usefulness of its unified exterior walls for defense.  They may have served this purpose, but there is no clear evidence of warfare or its associated technologies at this site. In fact, there is no undisputed evidence for warfare, defined as large-scale and organized killing of humans by other humans, in any of the evidence uncovered by archaeologists for human societies before about 8,000 years ago – that is, well after the beginnings of agriculture…

And that’s that for the sorta modern outlook. Yup, got my fixation for war in there too and abruptly stopped quotation. But I mean what kind of nonsense is that definition. Even adhering strictly to that, I guess the neanderthals just decided to wipe themselves out with no particular intention here and there…. Yeah, I can see humans not helping themselves in that regard. Fuck it. I need to get away from this topic because, as you can see, I’m totally over the obsession from earlier days. Of course, it took the more naive form of medieval history and fantasy. While I couldn’t quote you the names of leaders, artisans, philosphers of the time period, I did know a few generals and quite a few more battle locations, strategies, and other details. I loved researching the different weapons and armor and the various uses they served in defeating the other opponent in a combination of wit and strength. Fantasy then provided the outlet for putting all these grand imaginings to coherent enjoyment in the oldest thrill, the conquering of evil by good. Such stupid silly tropes that still pull the heartstrings when just enough suspension of disbelief can be acquired. It’s definitely become harder recently to find that; this damn thing I’m writing now consumes every thought it seems….

Regardless, my only real point here was to show agriculture wasn’t necessarily the only achievement of note because of what had to come alongside it, infrastructure. Got a have a place to stay when farming the fields, and the settlement example shown in the book’s pictures is a long way from 20,000 year old mammoth hut. Cities would not be the only great innovation however, just look at how far we had to take building shit over just less then 10,000 years of evidence that still remains. There is the pyramids of Djoser (I also found Zoser or Netjerykhet) or at Giza, the White Temple of Uruk, Etemenanki ziggurat (Tower of Babel [I’ll say whatever the fuck I please in my ramblings]), the Temple of Artemis, the lighthouse at Alexandria, so on and so forth. You know, I fully expected not a single mention of the architects of these structures but not only was I pleasantly surprised but also completely justified in my expectations. Oh, four of the six mentioned have credits (easily found) to somebody other than a deity/leader; we gotta couple Egyptian nobles, and very modestly accredited Greeks as just architects, which I’m sure we’d find to be the case if we could all see for ourselves. Totally not just early evidence of an asshole wanting everyone to believe – I’m getting antagonistic now assuming a bunch of shit.

It’s hard not to though. Do you think automatically of the names of the people who built, with their physically attached hands, structures like the Colosseum, Taj Mahal, Eifel Tower, Big Ben, the Winter Palace, hell the church you might attend or store(s) you shop at? I know I don’t, I’m shit awful with names, and I don’t even know half the names (from memory) of the leaders of the times involving the feats I just mentioned so flippantly (who gave all the credit where credit was due I’m certain). On top of that, what about the steps it takes to actually put thought in action in the form of construction multiplied by all the hands that have to bring it to a successful conclusion. We didn’t just build a steppe temple in Egypt one day than say “yup on to the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus.” Though, I mean in a grand sense of things, it can certainly come off that way at times, playing pretend at intelligence doing this scatterbrained research. Oy, we’ll just go back to basics with some brief highlights of some maybe important, maybe overlooked… details of agriculture and infrastructure.

The Code of Hammurabi Translated by L. W. King © 2008 Lillian Goldman Law Library 127 Wall Street, New Haven, CT 06511. https://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/hamframe.asp

“When Anu the Sublime, King of the Anunaki, and Bel, the lord of Heaven and earth, who decreed the fate of the land, assigned to Marduk, the over-ruling son of Ea, God of righteousness, dominion over earthly man, and made him great among the Igigi, they called Babylon by his illustrious name, made it great on earth, and founded an everlasting kingdom in it, whose foundations are laid so solidly as those of heaven and earth; then Anu and Bel called by name me, Hammurabi, the exalted () prince, who feared God, to bring about the rule of righteousness in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil-doers; so that the strong should not harm the weak; so that I should rule over the black-headed people like Shamash, and enlighten the land, to further the well-being of mankind…. 1. If any one ensnare another, putting a ban upon him, but he can not prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death. 2. If any one bring an accusation against a man, and the accused go to the river and leap into the river, if he sink in the river his accuser shall take possession of his house. But if the river prove that the accused is not guilty, and he escape unhurt, then he who had brought the accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser…. 5. If a judge try a case, reach a decision, and present his judgment in writing; if later error shall appear in his decision, and it be through his own fault, then he shall pay twelve times the fine set by him in the case, and he shall be publicly removed from the judge's bench, and never again shall he sit there to render judgement. 6. If any one steal the property of a temple or of the court, he shall be put to death, and also the one who receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death. 7. If any one buy from the son or the slave of another man, without witnesses or a contract, silver or gold, a male or female slave, an ox or a sheep, an ass or anything, or if he take it in charge, he is considered a thief and shall be put to death. 8. If any one steal cattle or sheep, or an ass, or a pig or a goat, if it belong to a god or to the court, the thief shall pay thirtyfold therefor; if they belonged to a freed man of the king he shall pay tenfold; if the thief has nothing with which to pay he shall be put to death…. 14. If any one steal the minor son of another, he shall be put to death. 15. If any one take a male or female slave of the court, or a male or female slave of a freed man, outside the city gates, he shall be put to death. 16. If any one receive into his house a runaway male or female slave of the court, or of a freedman, and does not bring it out at the public proclamation of the major domus, the master of the house shall be put to death. 17. If any one find runaway male or female slaves in the open country and bring them to their masters, the master of the slaves shall pay him two shekels of silver…. 21. If any one break a hole into a house (break in to steal), he shall be put to death before that hole and be buried. 22. If any one is committing a robbery and is caught, then he shall be put to death…. 30. If a chieftain or a man leave his house, garden, and field and hires it out, and some one else takes possession of his house, garden, and field and uses it for three years: if the first owner return and claims his house, garden, and field, it shall not be given to him, but he who has taken possession of it and used it shall continue to use it. 31. If he hire it out for one year and then return, the house, garden, and field shall be given back to him, and he shall take it over again. 32. If a chieftain or a man is captured on the "Way of the King" (in war), and a merchant buy him free, and bring him back to his place; if he have the means in his house to buy his freedom, he shall buy himself free: if he have nothing in his house with which to buy himself free, he shall be bought free by the temple of his community; if there be nothing in the temple with which to buy him free, the court shall buy his freedom. His field, garden, and house shall not be given for the purchase of his freedom. 33. If a . . . or a . . . enter himself as withdrawn from the "Way of the King," and send a mercenary as substitute, but withdraw him, then the . . . or . . . shall be put to death…. 42. If any one take over a field to till it, and obtain no harvest therefrom, it must be proved that he did no work on the field, and he must deliver grain, just as his neighbor raised, to the owner of the field. 43. If he do not till the field, but let it lie fallow, he shall give grain like his neighbor's to the owner of the field, and the field which he let lie fallow he must plow and sow and return to its owner. 44. If any one take over a waste-lying field to make it arable, but is lazy, and does not make it arable, he shall plow the fallow field in the fourth year, harrow it and till it, and give it back to its owner, and for each ten gan (a measure of area) ten gur of grain shall be paid. 45. If a man rent his field for tillage for a fixed rental, and receive the rent of his field, but bad weather come and destroy the harvest, the injury falls upon the tiller of the soil. 46. If he do not receive a fixed rental for his field, but lets it on half or third shares of the harvest, the grain on the field shall be divided proportionately between the tiller and the owner. 47. If the tiller, because he did not succeed in the first year, has had the soil tilled by others, the owner may raise no objection; the field has been cultivated and he receives the harvest according to agreement. 48. If any one owe a debt for a loan, and a storm prostrates the grain, or the harvest fail, or the grain does not grow for lack of water; in that year he need not give his creditor any grain, he washes his debt-tablet in water and pays no rent for this year…. 104. If a merchant give an agent corn, wool, oil, or any other goods to transport, the agent shall give a receipt for the amount, and compensate the merchant therefor. Then he shall obtain a receipt form the merchant for the money that he gives the merchant. 105. If the agent is careless, and does not take a receipt for the money which he gave the merchant, he can not consider the unreceipted money as his own. 106. If the agent accept money from the merchant, but have a quarrel with the merchant (denying the receipt), then shall the merchant swear before God and witnesses that he has given this money to the agent, and the agent shall pay him three times the sum. 107. If the merchant cheat the agent, in that as the latter has returned to him all that had been given him, but the merchant denies the receipt of what had been returned to him, then shall this agent convict the merchant before God and the judges, and if he still deny receiving what the agent had given him shall pay six times the sum to the agent. 108. If a tavern-keeper (feminine) does not accept corn according to gross weight in payment of drink, but takes money, and the price of the drink is less than that of the corn, she shall be convicted and thrown into the water. 109. If conspirators meet in the house of a tavern-keeper, and these conspirators are not captured and delivered to the court, the tavern-keeper shall be put to death. 110. If a "sister of a god" open a tavern, or enter a tavern to drink, then shall this woman be burned to death. 111. If an inn-keeper furnish sixty ka of usakani-drink to . . . she shall receive fifty ka of corn at the harvest…. 115. If any one have a claim for corn or money upon another and imprison him; if the prisoner die in prison a natural death, the case shall go no further. 116. If the prisoner die in prison from blows or maltreatment, the master of the prisoner shall convict the merchant before the judge. If he was a free-born man, the son of the merchant shall be put to death; if it was a slave, he shall pay one-third of a mina of gold, and all that the master of the prisoner gave he shall forfeit. 117. If any one fail to meet a claim for debt, and sell himself, his wife, his son, and daughter for money or give them away to forced labor: they shall work for three years in the house of the man who bought them, or the proprietor, and in the fourth year they shall be set free. 118. If he give a male or female slave away for forced labor, and the merchant sublease them, or sell them for money, no objection can be raised….  127. If any one "point the finger" (slander) at a sister of a god or the wife of any one, and can not prove it, this man shall be taken before the judges and his brow shall be marked. (by cutting the skin, or perhaps hair.) 128. If a man take a woman to wife, but have no intercourse with her, this woman is no wife to him. 129. If a man's wife be surprised (in flagrante delicto) with another man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon his wife and the king his slaves. 130. If a man violate the wife (betrothed or child-wife) of another man, who has never known a man, and still lives in her father's house, and sleep with her and be surprised, this man shall be put to death, but the wife is blameless. 131. If a man bring a charge against one's wife, but she is not surprised with another man, she must take an oath and then may return to her house. 132. If the "finger is pointed" at a man's wife about another man, but she is not caught sleeping with the other man, she shall jump into the river for her husband. 133. If a man is taken prisoner in war, and there is a sustenance in his house, but his wife leave house and court, and go to another house: because this wife did not keep her court, and went to another house, she shall be judicially condemned and thrown into the water. 134. If any one be captured in war and there is not sustenance in his house, if then his wife go to another house this woman shall be held blameless…. 141. If a man's wife, who lives in his house, wishes to leave it, plunges into debt, tries to ruin her house, neglects her husband, and is judicially convicted: if her husband offer her release, she may go on her way, and he gives her nothing as a gift of release. If her husband does not wish to release her, and if he take another wife, she shall remain as servant in her husband's house. 142. If a woman quarrel with her husband, and say: "You are not congenial to me," the reasons for her prejudice must be presented. If she is guiltless, and there is no fault on her part, but he leaves and neglects her, then no guilt attaches to this woman, she shall take her dowry and go back to her father's house. 143. If she is not innocent, but leaves her husband, and ruins her house, neglecting her husband, this woman shall be cast into the water. 144. If a man take a wife and this woman give her husband a maid-servant, and she bear him children, but this man wishes to take another wife, this shall not be permitted to him; he shall not take a second wife. 145. If a man take a wife, and she bear him no children, and he intend to take another wife: if he take this second wife, and bring her into the house, this second wife shall not be allowed equality with his wife. 146. If a man take a wife and she give this man a maid-servant as wife and she bear him children, and then this maid assume equality with the wife: because she has borne him children her master shall not sell her for money, but he may keep her as a slave, reckoning her among the maid-servants. 147. If she have not borne him children, then her mistress may sell her for money. 148. If a man take a wife, and she be seized by disease, if he then desire to take a second wife he shall not put away his wife, who has been attacked by disease, but he shall keep her in the house which he has built and support her so long as she lives…. 153. If the wife of one man on account of another man has their mates (her husband and the other man's wife) murdered, both of them shall be impaled. 154. If a man be guilty of incest with his daughter, he shall be driven from the place (exiled). 155. If a man betroth a girl to his son, and his son have intercourse with her, but he (the father) afterward defile her, and be surprised, then he shall be bound and cast into the water (drowned). 156. If a man betroth a girl to his son, but his son has not known her, and if then he defile her, he shall pay her half a gold mina, and compensate her for all that she brought out of her father's house. She may marry the man of her heart. 157. If any one be guilty of incest with his mother after his father, both shall be burned. 158. If any one be surprised after his father with his chief wife, who has borne children, he shall be driven out of his father's house…. 175. If a State slave or the slave of a freed man marry the daughter of a free man, and children are born, the master of the slave shall have no right to enslave the children of the free…. 192. If a son of a paramour or a prostitute say to his adoptive father or mother: "You are not my father, or my mother," his tongue shall be cut off. 193. If the son of a paramour or a prostitute desire his father's house, and desert his adoptive father and adoptive mother, and goes to his father's house, then shall his eye be put out. 194. If a man give his child to a nurse and the child die in her hands, but the nurse unbeknown to the father and mother nurse another child, then they shall convict her of having nursed another child without the knowledge of the father and mother and her breasts shall be cut off. 195. If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off. 196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out. [An eye for an eye] 197. If he break another man's bone, his bone shall be broken. 198. If he put out the eye of a freed man, or break the bone of a freed man, he shall pay one gold mina. 199. If he put out the eye of a man's slave, or break the bone of a man's slave, he shall pay one-half of its value. 200. If a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out. [ A tooth for a tooth ] 201. If he knock out the teeth of a freed man, he shall pay one-third of a gold mina. 202. If any one strike the body of a man higher in rank than he, he shall receive sixty blows with an ox-whip in public. 203. If a free-born man strike the body of another free-born man or equal rank, he shall pay one gold mina. 204. If a freed man strike the body of another freed man, he shall pay ten shekels in money. 205. If the slave of a freed man strike the body of a freed man, his ear shall be cut off. 206. If during a quarrel one man strike another and wound him, then he shall swear, "I did not injure him wittingly," and pay the physicians. 207. If the man die of his wound, he shall swear similarly, and if he (the deceased) was a free-born man, he shall pay half a mina in money. 208. If he was a freed man, he shall pay one-third of a mina. 209. If a man strike a free-born woman so that she lose her unborn child, he shall pay ten shekels for her loss. 210. If the woman die, his daughter shall be put to death. 211. If a woman of the free class lose her child by a blow, he shall pay five shekels in money. 212. If this woman die, he shall pay half a mina. 213. If he strike the maid-servant of a man, and she lose her child, he shall pay two shekels in money. 214. If this maid-servant die, he shall pay one-third of a mina. 215. If a physician make a large incision with an operating knife and cure it, or if he open a tumor (over the eye) with an operating knife, and saves the eye, he shall receive ten shekels in money. 216. If the patient be a freed man, he receives five shekels. 217. If he be the slave of some one, his owner shall give the physician two shekels. 218. If a physician make a large incision with the operating knife, and kill him, or open a tumor with the operating knife, and cut out the eye, his hands shall be cut off. 219. If a physician make a large incision in the slave of a freed man, and kill him, he shall replace the slave with another slave…. 282. If a slave say to his master: "You are not my master," if they convict him his master shall cut off his ear.”

Traditions & Encounters A Brief Global History Volume 1: From the Beginning to 1500, by Jerry H. Bentley, Herbert F. Ziegler, Heather E. Streets, Published by McGraw-Hill, an imprint of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc, New York, New York, Copyright 2006

Page 84, “ The Origins of classical Persian society trace back to the stages of Mesopotamian society…. When the Assyrian and Babylonian empires weakened in the sixth century b.c.e., the Medes and the Persians launched their first bid for empire in the person of Cyrus the Achaemenid (reigned 558-530 b.c.e.). Cyrus proved to be a tough, wily leader and an outstanding military strategist, whose conquests laid the foundation for the first Persian empire….” Page 85 “Cyrus’s empire survived and expanded during the reigns of his successors. His son Cambyses (reigned 530-522 b.c.e.) conquered Egypt in 525 b.c.e. His younger kinsman Darius (reigned 521-486 b.c.e.) then extended the empire both east and west…. Yet Darius was more important as an administrator than as a conqueror…. Soon after his rise to power, Darius began to centralize his administration. About 520 b.c.e. he started to build a new capital of astonishing magnificence at Persepolis.” () “Darius intended Persepolis to serve not only as an administrative center but also as a monument to the Achaemenid dynasty. From the time of Darius to the end of the Achaemenid dynasty in 330 b.c.e.,” (Page 86) “Persepolis served as the nerve center of the Persian empire – a resplendent capital bustling with advisors, ministers, diplomats, scribes, accountants, translators, and bureaucratic officers of all descriptions. Even today, massive columns and other ruins bespeak the grandeur of Darius’s capital. The government of the Achaemenid empire depended on a finely tuned balance between central initiative and local administration. Like their Mesopotamian predecessors, the Achaemenids appointed governors to serve as agents of the central administration and oversee affairs in the various regions. Darius divided his realm into twenty-three administrative and taxation districts he called satrapies, with each governed by an official satrap. Yet the Achaemenids did not try to push direct rule on their subjects: although most satraps were Persian, the Achaemenids recruited local officials to fill almost all other administrative posts. The Achaemenid rulers employed two strategies to discourage distant satraps from allying with local groups or trying to become independent of Achaemenid authority. First, each satrapy had a contingent of military officers and tax collectors who served as checks on the satraps’ power and independence. Second, the rulers created a new category of officials – essentially imperial spies – known as the “eyes and ears of the king.” These agents traveled throughout the empire with their own military forces, conducting surprise audits of accounts and procedures in the provinces and collecting intelligence reports. Taken together, these two strategies helped prevent the vast Achaemenid empire from splitting into a series of independent kingdoms. Darius also sought to improve administrative efficiency by regularizing tax levies and standardizing laws. Instead of exacting irregular tribute payments from subject lands as his predecessors had done, Darius instituted regular, formal tax levies. Each satrapy was now required to pay a set quantity of silver to the imperial court every year. To simplify the process, Darius issued standardized coins – a move that also fostered trade throughout his empire. Equally important, beginning in 520 b.c.e., Darius also sought to bring the many legal systems of his empire closer to a single standard. The point was not to abolish the existing laws of individual lands, or peoples to impose a uniform law code on his entire empire.” (Page 87) “Rather, Darius wished to codify the laws of his subject peoples, modifying them when necessary to harmonize them with the legal principles observed in the empire as a whole. Alongside administrative and legal policies, the Achaemenid rulers took other measures to knit their far-flung realm into a coherent whole. They built good roads across their realm, notably the so-called Persian Royal Road, which stretched some 2,575 kilometers (1,600 miles)…. The imperial government also organized a courier service and built 111 postal stations at intervals of 40 to 50 kilometers (25 to 35 miles) along the Royal Road. Each station kept a supply of fresh horses, enabling couriers to speed from one end of the Royal Road to the other in a week’s time.”

The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5), by Theodor Mommsen, March 16, 2005  [eBook #10706] ISO-646-US (US-ASCII), E-text prepared by David Ceponis The Project Gutenberg eBook, Translated by William Purdie Dickson, D.D., LL.D. Professor of Divinity in the University of Glasgow, A New Edition Revised Throughout and Embodying Recent Additions. This e-book is a compilation of the five volumes of this work  Each volume is also available individually in the Project Gutenberg library. (Book I: The Period Anterior to the Abolition of the Monarchy See https://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10701 Book II:  From the Abolition of the Monarchy in Rome to the Union of Italy See https://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10702 Book III: From the Union of Italy to the Subjugation of Carthage and the Greek States See https://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10703 Book IV:  The Revolution See https://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10704 Book V:   The Establishment of the Military Monarchy See https://www.gutenberg.org/etext/10705)

“BOOK I:  The Period Anterior to the Abolition of the Monarchy CHAPTER II The

Earliest Migrations into Italy …While it is probable that the Indo-Germans led a pastoral life and were acquainted with the cereals, if at all, only in their wild state, all indications point to the conclusion that the Graeco-Italians were a grain-cultivating, perhaps even a vine-cultivating, people. The evidence of this is not simply the knowledge of agriculture itself common to both, for this does not upon the whole warrant the inference of community of origin in the peoples who may exhibit it.  An historical connection between the Indo-Germanic agriculture and that of the Chinese, Aramaean, and Egyptian stocks can hardly be disputed; and yet these stocks are either alien to the Indo-Germans, or at any rate became separated from them at a time when agriculture was certainly still unknown.  The truth is, that the more advanced races in ancient times were, as at the present day, constantly exchanging the implements and the plants employed in cultivation; and when the annals of China refer the origin of Chinese agriculture to the introduction of five species of grain that took place under a particular king in a particular year, the story undoubtedly depicts correctly, at least in a general way, the relations subsisting in the earliest epochs of civilization. A common knowledge of agriculture, like a common knowledge of the alphabet, of war chariots, of purple, and other implements and ornaments, far more frequently warrants the inference of an ancient intercourse between nations than of their original unity.  But as regards the Greeks and Italians, whose mutual relations are comparatively well known, the hypothesis that agriculture as well as writing and coinage first came to Italy by means of the Hellenes may be characterized as wholly inadmissible (). On the other hand, the existence of a most intimate connection between the agriculture of the one country and that of the other is attested () by their possessing in common all the oldest expressions relating to it…. It would thus appear that the transition from pastoral life to agriculture, or, to speak more correctly, the combination of agriculture with the earlier pastoral economy, must have taken place after the Indians had departed from the common cradle of the nations, but before the Hellenes and Italians dissolved their ancient communion.  Moreover, at the time when agriculture originated, the Hellenes and Italians appear to have been united as one national whole not merely with each other, but with other members of the great family; at least, it is a fact, that the most important of those terms of cultivation, while they are foreign to the Asiatic members of the Indo-Germanic family, are used by the Romans and Greeks in common with the Celtic as well as the Germanic, Slavonic, and Lithuanian stocks. The distinction between the common inheritance of the nations and their own subsequent acquisitions in manners and in language is still far from having been wrought out in all the variety of its details and gradations….  But there can be no doubt that, with the Graeco-Italians as with all other nations, agriculture became and in the mind of the people remained the germ and core of their national and of their private life.  The house and the fixed hearth, which the husbandman constructs instead of the light hut and shifting fireplace of the shepherd, are represented in the spiritual domain and idealized in the goddess Vesta almost the only divinity not Indo-Germanic yet from the first common to both nations.  One of the oldest legends of the Italian stock ascribes to king Italus, or, as the Italians must have pronounced the word, Vitalus or Vitulus, the introduction of the change from a pastoral to an agricultural life, and shrewdly connects with it the original Italian legislation.  We have simply another version of the same belief in the legend of the Samnite stock which makes the ox the leader of their primitive colonies, and in the oldest Latin national names which designate the people as reapers, or as field-labourer. It is one of the characteristic incongruities which attach to the so-called legend of the origin of Rome, that it represents a pastoral and hunting people as founding a city.  Legend and faith, laws and manners, among the Italians as among the Hellenes are throughout associated with agriculture. Cultivation of the soil cannot be conceived without some measurement of it, however rude.  Accordingly, the measures of surface and the mode of setting off boundaries rest, like agriculture itself, on a like basis among both peoples.  The Oscan and Umbrian of one hundred square feet corresponds exactly with the Greek.  The principle of marking off boundaries was also the same.  The land-measurer adjusted his position with reference to one of the cardinal points, and proceeded to draw in the first place two lines, one from north to south, and another from east to west, his station being at their point of intersection; then he drew at certain fixed distances lines parallel to these, and by this process produced a series of rectangular pieces of ground, the corners of which were marked by boundary posts.  This mode of defining boundaries, which is probably also Etruscan but is hardly of Etruscan origin, we find among the Romans, Umbrians, Samnites, and also in very ancient records of the Tarentine Heracleots, who are as little likely to have borrowed it from the Italians as the Italians from the Tarentines: it is an ancient possession common to all.  A peculiar characteristic of the Romans, on the other hand, was their rigid carrying out of the principle of the square; even where the sea or a river formed a natural boundary, they did not accept it, but wound up their allocation of the land with the last complete square…. CHAPTER XIII Agriculture, Trade, and Commerce Agriculture It has been already observed (1) that the transition from a pastoral to an agricultural economy preceded the immigration of the Italians into the peninsula.  Agriculture continued to be the main support of all the communities in Italy, of the Sabellians and Etruscans no less than of the Latins….  In the case of Rome in particular--and it is only in its case that we can speak of agrarian relations with any sort of certainty--the Servian reform shows very clearly not only that the agricultural class originally preponderated () in the state, but also that an effort was made permanently to maintain the collective body of freeholders as the pith and marrow of the community.  When in the course of time a large portion of the landed property in Rome had passed into the hands of non-burgesses and thus the rights and duties of burgesses were no longer bound up with freehold property, the reformed constitution obviated this incongruous state of things, and the perils which it threatened, not merely temporarily but permanently, by treating the members of the community without reference to their political position once for all according to their freeholding, and imposing the common burden of war-service on the freeholders—a step which in the natural course of things could not but be followed by the concession of public rights.  The whole policy of Roman war and conquest rested, like the constitution itself, on the basis of the freehold system; as the freeholder alone was of value in the state, the aim of war was to increase the number of its freehold members.  The vanquished community was either compelled to merge entirely into the yeomanry of Rome, or, if not reduced to this extremity, it was required, not to pay a war-contribution or a fixed tribute, but to cede a portion, usually a third part, of its domain, which was thereupon regularly occupied by Roman farms. Many nations have gained victories and made conquests as the Romans did; but none has equalled the Roman in thus making the ground he had won his own by the sweat of his brow, and in securing by the ploughshare what had been gained by the lance.  That which is gained by war may be wrested from the grasp by war again, but it is not so with the conquests made by the plough; while the Romans lost many battles, they scarcely ever on making peace ceded Roman soil, and for this result they were indebted to the tenacity with which the farmers clung to their fields and homesteads.  The strength of man and of the state lies in their dominion over the soil; the greatness of Rome was built on the most extensive and immediate mastery of her citizens over her soil, and on the compact unity of the body which thus acquired so firm a hold. System of Joint Cultivation We have already indicated that in the earliest times the arable land was cultivated in common, probably by the several clans; each clan tilled its own land, and thereafter distributed the produce among the several households belonging to it.  There exists indeed an intimate connection between the system of joint tillage and the clan form of society, and even subsequently in Rome joint residence and joint management were of very frequent occurrence in the case of co-proprietors.  Even the traditions of Roman law furnish the information that wealth consisted at first in cattle and the usufruct of the soil, and that it was not till later that land came to be distributed among the burgesses as their own special property. Better evidence that such was the case is afforded by the earliest designation of wealth as "cattle-stock" or "slave-and-cattle-stock", and of the separate possessions of the children of the household and of slaves as "small cattle" also by the earliest form of acquiring property through laying hold of it with the hand, which was only appropriate to the case of moveable articles; and above all by the earliest measure of "land of one's own", consisting of two -jugera- (about an acre and a quarter), which can only have applied to garden-ground, and not to the hide. When and how the distribution of the arable land took place, can no longer be ascertained. This much only is certain, that the oldest form of the constitution was based not on freehold settlement, but on clanship as a substitute for it, whereas the Servian constitution presupposes the distribution of the land.  It is evident from the same constitution that the great bulk of the landed property consisted of middle-sized farms, which provided work and subsistence for a family and admitted of the keeping of cattle for tillage as well as of the application of the plough.  The ordinary extent of such a Roman full hide has not been ascertained with precision, but can scarcely, as has already been shown, be estimated at less than twenty -jugera-(12 ½ acres nearly)…. BOOK II:  From the Abolition of the Monarchy in Rome to the Union of Italy CHAPTER VIII Law, Religion, Military System, Economic Condition, Nationality Farming of Estates In the national economy agriculture was, and continued to be, the social and political basis both of the Roman community and of the new Italian state.  The common assembly and the army consisted of Roman farmers; what as soldiers they had acquired by the sword, they secured as colonists by the plough.  The insolvency of the middle class of landholders gave rise to the formidable internal crises of the third and fourth centuries, amidst which it seemed as if the young republic could not but be destroyed.  The revival of the Latin farmer-class, which was produced during the fifth century partly by the large assignations of land and incorporations, partly by the fall in the rate of interest and the increase of the Roman population, was at once the effect and the cause of the mighty development of Roman power. The acute soldier's eye of Pyrrhus justly discerned the cause of the political and military ascendency of the Romans in the flourishing condition of the Roman farms.  But the rise also of husbandry on a large scale among the Romans appears to fall within this period. In earlier times indeed there existed landed estates of--at least comparatively--large size; but their management was not farming on a large scale, it was simply a husbandry of numerous small parcels. On the other hand the enactment in the law of 387, not incompatible indeed with the earlier mode of management but yet far more appropriate to the later, viz.  that the landholder should be bound to employ along with his slaves a proportional number of free persons, may well be regarded as the oldest trace of the later centralized farming of estates; and it deserves notice that even here at its first emergence it essentially rests on slave-holding.  How it arose, must remain an undecided point; possibly the Carthaginian plantations in Sicily served as models to the oldest Roman landholders, and perhaps even the appearance of wheat in husbandry by the side of spelt, which Varro places about the period of the decemvirs, was connected with that altered style of management….  It admits of no doubt that the restriction of this agricultural clientship very materially contributed towards the distress of the class of small cultivators…. Building-- Impulse Given to It In respect to buildings the regal period, particularly the epoch of the great conquests, probably accomplished more than the first two centuries of the republic.  Structures like the temples on the Capitol and on the Aventine and the great Circus were probably as obnoxious to the frugal fathers of the city as to the burgesses who gave their task-work; and it is remarkable that perhaps the most considerable building of the republican period before the Samnite wars, the temple of Ceres in the Circus, was a work of Spurius Cassius (261) who in more than one respect, sought to lead the commonwealth back to the traditions of the kings.  The governing aristocracy moreover repressed private luxury with a rigour such as the rule of the kings, if prolonged, would certainly not have displayed.  But at length even the senate was no longer able to resist the superior force of circumstances.  It was Appius Claudius who in his epoch-making censorship threw aside the antiquated rustic system of parsimonious hoarding, and taught his fellow-citizens to make a worthy use of the public resources.  He began that noble system of public works of general utility, which justifies, if anything can justify, the military successes of Rome even from the point of view of the welfare of the nations, and which even now in its ruins furnishes some idea of the greatness of Rome to thousands on thousands who have never read a page of her history.  To him the Roman state was indebted for its great military road, and the city of Rome for its first aqueduct. Following in the steps of Claudius, the Roman senate wove around Italy that network of roads and fortresses, the formation of which has already been described, and without which, as the history of all military states from the Achaemenidae down to the creator of the road over the Simplon shows, no military hegemony can subsist.  Following in the steps of Claudius, Manius Curius built from the proceeds of the Pyrrhic spoil a second aqueduct for the capital; and some years previously with the gains of the Sabine war he opened up for the Velino, at the point above Terni where it falls into the Nera, that broader channel in which the stream still flows, with a view to drain the beautiful valley of Rieti and thereby to gain space for a large burgess settlement along with a modest farm for himself.  Such works, in the eyes of persons of intelligence, threw into the shade the aimless magnificence of the Hellenic temples…. Embellishment of the City The style of living also among the citizens now was altered.  About the time of Pyrrhus silver plate began to make its appearance on Roman tables, and the chroniclers date the disappearance of shingle roofs in Rome from 470.  The new capital of Italy gradually laid aside its village-like aspect, and now began to embellish itself.  It was not yet indeed customary to strip the temples in conquered towns of their ornaments for the decoration of Rome; but the beaks of the galleys of Antium were displayed at the orator's platform in the Forum and on public festival days the gold-mounted shields brought home from the battle-fields of Samnium were exhibited along the stalls of the market.  The proceeds of fines were specially applied to the paving of the highways in and near the city, or to the erection and embellishment of public buildings.  The wooden booths of the butchers, which stretched along the Forum on both sides, gave way, first on the Palatine side, then on that also which faced the Carinae, to the stone stalls of the money-changers; so that this place became the Exchange of Rome.  Statues of the famous men of the past, of the kings, priests, and heroes of the legendary period, and of the Grecian -hospes- who was said to have interpreted to the decemvirs the laws of Solon; honorary columns and monuments dedicated to the great burgomasters who had conquered the Veientes, the Latins, the Samnites, to state envoys who had perished while executing their instructions, to rich women who had bequeathed their property to public objects, nay even to celebrated Greek philosophers and heroes such as Pythagoras and Alcibiades, were erected on the Capitol or in the Forum…. BOOK III:  From the Union of Italy to the Subjugation of Carthage and the Greek States CHAPTER XI The Government and the Governed Title-Hunting But perhaps nothing so clearly evinces the decay of genuine pride and genuine honour in high and low alike as the hunting after insignia and titles, which appeared under different forms of expression, but with substantial identity of character, among all ranks and classes.  So urgent was the demand for the honour of a triumph that there was difficulty in upholding the old rule, which accorded a triumph only to the ordinary supreme magistrate who augmented the power of the commonwealth in open battle, and thereby, it is true, not unfrequently excluded from that honour the very authors of the most important successes….  While formerly the commander-in-chief of the one year had reckoned it an honour to serve next year on the staff of his successor, the fact that the consular Cato took service as a military tribune under Tiberius Sempronius Longus and Manius Glabrio, was now regarded as a demonstration against the new-fashioned arrogance. Formerly the thanks of the community once for all had sufficed for service rendered to the state: now every meritorious act seemed to demand a permanent distinction.  Already Gaius Duilius, the victor of Mylae, had gained an exceptional permission that, when he walked in the evening through the streets of the capital, he should be preceded by a torch-bearer and a piper.  Statues and monuments, very often erected at the expense of the person whom they purported to honour, became so common, that it was ironically pronounced a distinction to have none.  But such merely personal honours did not long suffice.  A custom came into vogue, by which the victor and his descendants derived a permanent surname from the victories they had won--a custom mainly established by the victor of Zama who got himself designated as the hero of Africa, his brother as the hero of Asia, and his cousin as the hero of Spain. The example set by the higher was followed by the humbler classes.  When the ruling order did not disdain to settle the funeral arrangements for different ranks and to decree to the man who had been censor a purple winding-sheet, it could not complain of the freedmen for desiring that their sons at any rate might be decorated with the much-envied purple border.  The robe, the ring, and the amulet-case distinguished not only the burgess and the burgess's wife from the foreigner and the slave, but also the person who was free-born from one who had been a slave, the son of free-born, from the son of manumitted, parents, the son of the knight and the senator from the common burgess, the descendant of a curule house from the common senator--and this in a community where all that was good and great was the work of civil equality! The dissension in the community was reflected in the ranks of the opposition.  Resting on the support of the farmers, the patriots raised a loud cry for reform; resting on the support of the mob in the capital, demagogism began its work.  Although the two tendencies do not admit of being wholly separated but in various respects go hand in hand, it will be necessary to consider them apart…. The Party of Reform Cato The party of reform emerges, as it were, personified in Marcus Porcius Cato.  Cato, the last statesman of note belonging to that earlier system which restricted its ideas to Italy and was averse to universal empire, was for that reason accounted in after times the model of a genuine Roman of the antique stamp; he may with greater justice be regarded as the representative of the opposition of the Roman middle class to the new Hellenico-cosmopolite nobility.  Brought up at the plough, he was induced to enter on a political career by the owner of a neighbouring estate, one of the few nobles who kept aloof from the tendencies of the age, Lucius Valerius Flaccus.  That upright patrician deemed the rough Sabine farmer the proper man to stem the current of the times; and he was not deceived in his estimate. Beneath the aegis of Flaccus, and after the good old fashion serving his fellow-citizens and the commonwealth in counsel and action, Cato fought his way up to the consulate and a triumph, and even to the censorship….  He took up the key-note first struck by Manius Curius, his ideal among Roman statesmen; throughout his long life he made it his task honestly, to the best of his judgment, to assail on all hands the prevailing declension; and even in his eighty-fifth year he battled in the Forum with the new spirit of the times.  He was anything but comely--he had green eyes, his enemies alleged, and red hair--and he was not a great man, still less a far-seeing statesman. Thoroughly narrow in his political and moral views, and having the ideal of the good old times always before his eyes and on his lips, he cherished an obstinate contempt for everything new.  Deeming himself by virtue of his own austere life entitled to manifest an unrelenting severity and harshness towards everything and everybody; upright and honourable, but without a glimpse of any duty lying beyond the sphere of police order and of mercantile integrity; an enemy to all villany and vulgarity as well as to all refinement and geniality, and above all things the foe of his foes; he never made an attempt to stop evils at their source, but waged war throughout life against symptoms, and especially against persons.  The ruling lords, no doubt, looked down with a lofty disdain on the ignoble growler, and believed, not without reason, that they were far superior; but fashionable corruption in and out of the senate secretly trembled in the presence of the old censor of morals with his proud republican bearing, of the scar-covered veteran from the Hannibalic war, and of the highly influential senator and the idol of the Roman farmers….  Demagogism But, as this period witnessed the rise of a rabble by the side of the burgesses, so it witnessed also the emergence of a demagogism that flattered the populace alongside of the respectable and useful party of opposition.  Cato was already acquainted with men who made a trade of demagogism; who had a morbid propensity for speechifying, as others had for drinking or for sleeping; who hired listeners, if they could find no willing audience otherwise; and whom people heard as they heard the market-crier, without listening to their words or, in the event of needing help, entrusting themselves to their hands.  In his caustic fashion the old man describes these fops formed after the model of the Greek talkers of the agora, dealing in jests and witticisms, singing and dancing, ready for anything; such an one was, in his opinion, good for nothing but to exhibit himself as harlequin in a procession and to bandy talk with the public--he would sell his talk or his silence for a bit of bread.  In reality these demagogues were the worst enemies of reform.  While the reformers insisted above all things and in every direction on moral amendment, demagogism preferred to insist on the limitation of the powers of the government and the extension of those of the burgesses. CHAPTER XII The Management of Land and of Capital Slaves The human labour on the farm was regularly performed by slaves.  At the head of the body of slaves on the estate stood the steward, who received and expended, bought and sold, went to obtain the instructions of the landlord, and in his absence issued orders and administered punishment.  Under him were placed the stewardess who took charge of the house, kitchen and larder, poultry-yard and dovecot: a number of ploughmen and common serfs, an ass-driver, a swineherd, and, where a flock of sheep was kept, a shepherd.  The number, of course, varied according to the method of husbandry pursued….  The steward of course occupied a freer position than the other slaves: the treatise of Mago advised that he should be allowed to marry, to rear children, and to have funds of his own, and Cato advises that he should be married to the stewardess; he alone had some prospect, in the event of good behaviour, of obtaining liberty from his master.  In other respects all formed a common household. The slaves were, like the larger cattle, not bred on the estate, but purchased at an age capable of labour in the slave-market; and, when through age or infirmity they had become incapable of working, they were again sent with other refuse to the market….  It was not the ordinary practice to place chains on the slaves; but when any one had incurred punishment or was thought likely to attempt an escape, he was set to work in chains and was shut up during the night in the slaves' prison…. Competition of Transmarine Corn In order to form some estimate of the economic results of this system of husbandry, we must consider the state of prices, and particularly the prices of grain at this period.  On an average these were alarmingly low; and that in great measure through the fault of the Roman government, which in this important question was led into the most fearful blunders not so much by its short-sightedness, as by an unpardonable disposition to favour the proletariate of the capital at the expense of the farmers of Italy.  The main question here was that of the competition between transmarine and Italian corn.  The grain which was delivered by the provincials to the Roman government, sometimes gratuitously, sometimes for a moderate compensation, was in part applied by the government to the maintenance of the Roman official staff and of the Roman armies on the spot, partly given up to the lessees of the -decumae- on condition of their either paying a sum of money for it or of their undertaking to deliver certain quantities of grain at Rome or wherever else it should be required.  From the time of the second Macedonian war the Roman armies were uniformly supported by transmarine corn, and, though this tended to the benefit of the Roman exchequer, it cut off the Italian farmer from an important field of consumption for his produce.  This however was the least part of the mischief.  The government had long, as was reasonable, kept a watchful eye on the price of grain, and, when there was a threatening of dearth, had interfered by well-timed purchases abroad; and now, when the corn-deliveries of its subjects brought into its hands every year large quantities of grain--larger probably than were needed in times of peace--and when, moreover, opportunities were presented to it of acquiring foreign grain in almost unlimited quantity at moderate prices, there was a natural temptation to glut the markets of the capital with such grain, and to dispose of it at rates which either in themselves or as compared with the Italian rates were ruinously low.  Already in the years 551-554, and in the first instance apparently at the suggestion of Scipio, 6 -modii- (1 ½ bush.) of Spanish and African wheat were sold on public account to the citizens of Rome at 24 and even at 12 -asses- (1 shilling 8 pence or ten pence).  Some years afterwards, more than 240,000 bushels of Sicilian grain were distributed at the latter illusory price in the capital.  In vain Cato inveighed against this shortsighted policy: the rise of demagogism had a part in it, and these extraordinary, but presumably very frequent, distributions of grain under the market price by the government or individual magistrates became the germs of the subsequent corn-laws.  But, even where the transmarine corn did not reach the consumers in this extraordinary mode, it injuriously affected Italian agriculture.  Not only were the masses of grain which the state sold off to the lessees of the tenths beyond doubt acquired under ordinary circumstances by these so cheaply that, when re-sold, they could be disposed of under the price of production; but it is probable that in the provinces, particularly in Sicily--in consequence partly of the favourable nature of the soil, partly of the extent to which wholesale farming and slave-holding were pursued on the Carthaginian system--the price of production was in general considerably lower than in Italy, while the transport of Sicilian and Sardinian corn to Latium was at least as cheap as, if not cheaper than, its transport thither from Etruria, Campania, or even northern Italy.  In the natural course of things therefore transmarine corn could not but flow to the peninsula, and lower the price of the grain produced there.  Under the unnatural disturbance of relations occasioned by the lamentable system of slave-labour, it would perhaps have been justifiable to impose a duty on transmarine corn for the protection of the Italian farmer; but the very opposite course seems to have been pursued, and with a view to favour the import of transmarine corn to Italy, a prohibitive system seems to have been applied in the provinces--for though the Rhodians were allowed to export a quantity of corn from Sicily by way of special favour, the export of grain from the provinces must probably, as a rule, have been free only as regarded Italy, and the transmarine corn must thus have been monopolized for the benefit of the mother-country…. Revolution in Roman Agriculture In a great industrial state, whose agriculture cannot feed its population, such a result might perhaps be regarded as useful or at any rate as not absolutely injurious; but a country like Italy, where manufactures were inconsiderable and agriculture was altogether the mainstay of the state, was in this way systematically ruined, and the welfare of the nation as a whole was sacrificed in the most shameful fashion to the interests of the essentially unproductive population of the capital, to which in fact bread could never become too cheap. Nothing perhaps evinces so clearly as this, how wretched was the constitution and how incapable was the administration of this so-called golden age of the republic.  Any representative system, however meagre, would have led at least to serious complaints and to a perception of the seat of the evil; but in those primary assemblies of the burgesses anything was listened to sooner than the warning voice of a foreboding patriot.  Any government that deserved the name would of itself have interfered; but the mass of the Roman senate probably with well-meaning credulity regarded the low prices of grain as a real blessing for the people, and the Scipios and Flamininuses had, forsooth, more important things to do--to emancipate the Greeks, and to exercise the functions of republican kings….  CHAPTER XIV Literature and Art Medicine…  Physics and mathematics were not much studied in Rome; but the applied sciences connected with them received a certain measure of attention.  This was most of all true of medicine.  In 535 the first Greek physician, the Peloponnesian Archagathus, settled in Rome and there acquired such repute by his surgical operations, that a residence was assigned to him on the part of the state and he received the freedom of the city; and thereafter his colleagues flocked in crowds to Italy.  Cato no doubt not only reviled the foreign medical practitioners with a zeal worthy of a better cause, but attempted, by means of his medical manual compiled from his own experience and probably in part also from the medical literature of the Greeks, to revive the good old fashion under which the father of the family was at the same time the family physician.  The physicians and the public gave themselves, as was reasonable, but little concern about his obstinate invectives: at any rate the profession, one of the most lucrative which existed in Rome, continued a monopoly in the hands of the foreigners, and for centuries there were none but Greek physicians in Rome. Architecture Let us glance, in conclusion, at the state of the arts of architecture, sculpture, and painting.  So far as concerns the former, the traces of incipient luxury were less observable in public than in private buildings.  It was not till towards the close of this period, and especially from the time of the censorship of Cato, that the Romans began in the case of the former to have respect to the convenience as well as to the bare wants of the public; to line with stone the basins supplied from the aqueducts; to erect colonnades; and above all to transfer to Rome the Attic halls for courts and business...  The first of these buildings, somewhat corresponding to our modern bazaars--the Porcian or silversmiths' hall--was erected by Cato in 570 alongside of the senate-house; others were soon associated with it, till gradually along the sides of the Forum the private shops were replaced by these splendid columnar halls.  Everyday life, however, was more deeply influenced by the revolution in domestic architecture which must, at latest, be placed in this period.  The hall of the house, court, garden and garden colonnade, the record-chamber, chapel, kitchen, and bedrooms were by degrees severally provided for; and, as to the internal fittings, the column began to be applied both in the court and in the hall for the support of the open roof and also for the garden colonnades: throughout these arrangements it is probable that Greek models were copied or at any rate made use of.  Yet the materials used in building remained simple; "our ancestors," says Varro, "dwelt in houses of brick, and laid merely a moderate foundation of stone to keep away damp." Plastic Art and Painting Of Roman plastic art we scarcely encounter any other trace than, perhaps, the embossing in wax of the images of ancestors.  Painters and painting are mentioned somewhat more frequently.  Manius Valerius caused the victory which he obtained over the Carthaginians and Hiero in 491 off Messana to be depicted on the side wall of the senate- house--the first historical frescoes in Rome, which were followed by many of similar character, and which were in the domain of the arts of design what the national epos and the national drama became not much later in the domain of poetry.  We find named as painters, one Theodotus who, as Naevius scoffingly said,-Sedens in cella circumtectus tegetibus Lares ludentis peni pinxit bubulo;- Marcus Pacuvius of Brundisium, who painted in the temple of Hercules in the Forum Boarium--the same who, when more advanced in life, made himself a name as an editor of Greek tragedies; and Marcus Plautius Lyco, a native of Asia Minor, whose beautiful paintings in the temple of Juno at Ardea procured for him the freedom of that city.  But these very facts clearly indicate, not only that the exercise of art in Rome was altogether of subordinate importance and more of a manual occupation than an art, but also that it fell, probably still more exclusively than poetry, into the hands of Greeks and half Greeks. On the other hand there appeared in genteel circles the first traces of the tastes subsequently displayed by the dilettante and the collector….  BOOK IV The Revolution CHAPTER XIII Literature and Art Stilo The Roman, who established the investigation of the Latin language and antiquities in the spirit of the Alexandrian masters on a scientific basis, was Lucius Aelius Stilo about 650.  He first went back to the oldest monuments of the language, and commented on the Salian litanies and the Twelve Tables.  He devoted his special attention to the comedy of the sixth century, and first formed a list of the pieces of Plautus which in his opinion were genuine. He sought, after the Greek fashion, to determine historically the origin of every single phenomenon in the Roman life and dealings and to ascertain in each case the "inventor," and at the same time brought the whole annalistic tradition within the range of his research.  The success, which he had among his contemporaries, is attested by the dedication to him of the most important poetical, and the most important historical, work of his time, the Satires of Lucilius and the Annals of Antipater; and this first Roman philologist influenced the studies of his nation for the future by transmitting his spirit of investigation both into words and into things to his disciple Varro…. BOOK V The Establishment of the Military Monarchy CHAPTER XII Religion, Culture, Literature, and Art Alexandrinism In comparison with the previous epoch the Greek as well as the Latin training improved in extent and in scholastic strictness quite as much as it declined in purity and in refinement. The increasing eagerness after Greek lore gave to instruction of itself an erudite character.  To explain Homer or Euripides was after all no art; teachers and scholars found their account better in handling the Alexandrian poems, which, besides, were in their spirit far more congenial to the Roman world of that day than the genuine Greek national poetry, and which, if they were not quite so venerable as the Iliad, possessed at any rate an age sufficiently respectable to pass as classics with schoolmasters.  The love-poems of Euphorion, the "Causes" of Callimachus and his "Ibis," the comically obscure "Alexandra" of Lycophron contained in rich abundance rare vocables suitable for being extracted and interpreted, sentences laboriously involved and difficult of analysis, prolix digressions full of mystic combinations of antiquated myths, and generally a store of cumbersome erudition of all sorts. Instruction needed exercises more and more difficult; these productions, in great part model efforts of schoolmasters, were excellently adapted to be lessons for model scholars.  Thus the Alexandrian poems took a permanent place in Italian scholastic instruction, especially as trial-themes, and certainly promoted knowledge, although at the expense of taste and of discretion. The same unhealthy appetite for culture moreover impelled the Roman youths to derive their Hellenism as much as possible from the fountain-head.  The courses of the Greek masters in Rome sufficed only for a first start; every one who wished to be able to converse heard lectures on Greek philosophy at Athens, and on Greek rhetoric at Rhodes, and made a literary and artistic tour through Asia Minor, where most of the old art-treasures of the Hellenes were still to be found on the spot, and the cultivation of the fine arts had been continued, although after a mechanical fashion; whereas Alexandria, more distant and more celebrated as the seat of the exact sciences, was far more rarely the point whither young men desirous of culture directed their travels….  Architecture If, in fine, we cast a glance at art, we discover here the same unpleasing phenomena which pervade the whole mental life of this period.  Building on the part of the state was virtually brought to a total stand amidst the scarcity of money that marked the last age of the republic.  We have already spoken of the luxury in building of the Roman grandees; the architects learned in consequence of this to be lavish of marble--the coloured sorts such as the yellow Numidian and others came into vogue at this time, and the marble-quarries of Luna were now employed for the first time--and began to inlay the floors of the rooms with mosaic work, to panel the walls with slabs of marble, or to paint the compartments in imitation of marble--the first steps towards the subsequent fresco-painting.  But art was not a gainer by this lavish magnificence. Arts of Design In the arts of design connoisseurship and collecting were always on the increase….  Ancient works of art were formally hunted after--statues and pictures less, it is true, than, in accordance with the rude character of Roman luxury, artistically wrought furniture and ornaments of all sorts for the room and the table.  As early as that age the old Greek tombs of Capua and Corinth were ransacked for the sake of the bronze and earthenware vessels which had been placed in the tomb along with the dead. for a small statuette of bronze 40,000 sesterces (400 pounds) were paid, and 200,000 (2000 pounds) for a pair of costly carpets; a well-wrought bronze cooking machine came to cost more than an estate.  In this barbaric hunting after art the rich amateur was, as might be expected, frequently cheated by those who supplied him; but the economic ruin of Asia Minor in particular so exceedingly rich in artistic products brought many really ancient and rare ornaments and works of art into the market, and from Athens, Syracuse, Cyzicus, Pergamus, Chios, Samos, and other ancient seats of art, everything that was for sale and very much that was not migrated to the palaces and villas of the Roman grandees.  We have already mentioned what treasures of art were to be found within the house of Lucullus, who indeed was accused, perhaps not unjustly, of having gratified his interest in the fine arts at the expense of his duties as a general.  The amateurs of art crowded thither as they crowd at present to the Villa Borghese, and complained even then of such treasures being confined to the palaces and country-houses of the men of quality, where they could be seen only with difficulty and after special permission from the possessor. The public buildings on the other hand were far from filled in like proportion with famous works of Greek masters, and in many cases there still stood in the temples of the capital nothing but the old images of the gods carved in wood. As to the exercise of art there is virtually nothing to report; there is hardly mentioned by name from this period any Roman sculptor or painter except a certain Arellius, whose pictures rapidly went off not on account of their artistic value, but because the cunning reprobate furnished, in his pictures of the goddesses faithful portraits of his mistresses for the time being.”

The History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, Complete

6 volumes, by Edward Gibbon, Project Gutenberg eBook Release Date: June 7, 2008 [eBook #25717] Produced by: David Widger (noted is also a producer David Reed) 1782 (Written), 1845 (Revised)

“Chapter X: Emperors Decius, Gallus, Æmilianus, Valerian And Gallienus.—Part II. The Goths were now in possession of the Ukraine, a country of considerable extent and uncommon fertility, intersected with navigable rivers, which, from either side, discharge themselves into the Borysthenes; and interspersed with large and lofty forests of oaks. The plenty of game and fish, the innumerable bee-hives deposited in the hollow of old trees, and in the cavities of rocks, and forming, even in that rude age, a valuable branch of commerce, the size of the cattle, the temperature of the air, the aptness of the soil for every species of grain, and the luxuriancy of the vegetation, all displayed the liberality of Nature, and tempted the industry of man. 28 But the Goths withstood all these temptations, and still adhered to a life of idleness, of poverty, and of rapine. The Scythian hordes, which, towards the east, bordered on the new settlements of the Goths, presented nothing to their arms, except the doubtful chance of an unprofitable victory. But the prospect of the Roman territories was far more alluring; and the fields of Dacia were covered with rich harvests, sown by the hands of an industrious, and exposed to be gathered by those of a warlike, people. It is probable that the conquests of Trajan, maintained by his successors, less for any real advantage than for ideal dignity, had contributed to weaken the empire on that side. The new and unsettled province of Dacia was neither strong enough to resist, nor rich enough to satiate, the rapaciousness of the barbarians. As long as the remote banks of the Niester were considered as the boundary of the Roman power, the fortifications of the Lower Danube were more carelessly guarded, and the inhabitants of Mæsia lived in supine security, fondly conceiving themselves at an inaccessible distance from any barbarian invaders. The irruptions of the Goths, under the reign of Philip, fatally convinced them of their mistake. The king, or leader, of that fierce nation, traversed with contempt the province of Dacia, and passed both the Niester and the Danube without encountering any opposition capable of retarding his progress. The relaxed discipline of the Roman troops betrayed the most important posts, where they were stationed, and the fear of deserved punishment induced great numbers of them to enlist under the Gothic standard. The various multitude of barbarians appeared, at length, under the walls of Marcianopolis, a city built by Trajan in honor of his sister, and at that time the capital of the second Mæsia. 29 The inhabitants consented to ransom their lives and property by the payment of a large sum of money, and the invaders retreated back into their deserts, animated, rather than satisfied, with the first success of their arms against an opulent but feeble country. Intelligence was soon transmitted to the emperor Decius, that Cniva, king of the Goths, had passed the Danube a second time, with more considerable forces; that his numerous detachments scattered devastation over the province of Mæsia, whilst the main body of the army, consisting of seventy thousand Germans and Sarmatians, a force equal to the most daring achievements, required the presence of the Roman monarch, and the exertion of his military power…. At the same time when Decius was struggling with the violence of the tempest, his mind, calm and deliberate amidst the tumult of war, investigated the more general causes that, since the age of the Antonines, had so impetuously urged the decline of the Roman greatness. He soon discovered that it was impossible to replace that greatness on a permanent basis without restoring public virtue, ancient principles and manners, and the oppressed majesty of the laws. To execute this noble but arduous design, he first resolved to revive the obsolete office of censor; an office which, as long as it had subsisted in its pristine integrity, had so much contributed to the perpetuity of the state, 37 till it was usurped and gradually neglected by the Cæsars. 38 Conscious that the favor of the sovereign may confer power, but that the esteem of the people can alone bestow authority, he submitted the choice of the censor to the unbiased voice of the senate. By their unanimous votes, or rather acclamations, Valerian, who was afterwards emperor, and who then served with distinction in the army of Decius, was declared the most worthy of that exalted honor. As soon as the decree of the senate was transmitted to the emperor, he assembled a great council in his camp, and before the investiture of the censor elect, he apprised him of the difficulty and importance of his great office. “Happy Valerian,” said the prince to his distinguished subject, “happy in the general approbation () of the senate and of the Roman republic! Accept the censorship of mankind; and judge of our manners. You will select those who deserve to continue members of the senate; you will restore the equestrian order to its ancient splendor; you will improve the revenue, yet moderate the public burdens. You will distinguish into regular classes the various and infinite multitude of citizens, and accurately view the military strength, the wealth, the virtue, and the resources of Rome. Your decisions shall obtain the force of laws. The army, the palace, the ministers of justice, and the great officers of the empire, are all subject to your tribunal. None are exempted, excepting only the ordinary consuls, 39 the præfect of the city, the king of the sacrifices, and (as long as she preserves her chastity inviolate) the eldest of the vestal virgins. Even these few, who may not dread the severity, will anxiously solicit the esteem, of the Roman censor.”… A magistrate, invested with such extensive powers, would have appeared not so much the minister, as the colleague of his sovereign. 41 Valerian justly dreaded an elevation so full of envy and of suspicion. He modestly argued the alarming greatness of the trust, his own insufficiency, and the incurable corruption of the times. He artfully insinuated, that the office of censor was inseparable from the Imperial dignity, and that the feeble hands of a subject were unequal to the support of such an immense weight of cares and of power. 42 The approaching event of war soon put an end to the prosecution of a project so specious, but so impracticable; and whilst it preserved Valerian from the danger, saved the emperor Decius from the disappointment, which would most probably have attended it. A censor may maintain, he can never restore, the morals of a state. It is impossible for such a magistrate to exert his authority with benefit, or even with effect, unless he is supported by a quick sense of honor and virtue in the minds of the people, by a decent reverence for the public opinion, and by a train of useful prejudices combating on the side of national manners. In a period when these principles are annihilated, the censorial jurisdiction must either sink into empty pageantry, or be converted into a partial instrument of vexatious oppression. 43 It was easier to vanquish the Goths than to eradicate the public vices; yet even in the first of these enterprises, Decius lost his army and his life…. But the Romans were irritated to a still higher degree, when they discovered that they had not even secured their repose, though at the expense of their honor. The dangerous secret of the wealth and weakness of the empire had been revealed to the world. New swarms of barbarians, encouraged by the success, and not conceiving themselves bound by the obligation of their brethren, spread devastation though the Illyrian provinces, and terror as far as the gates of Rome…. The murder of Gallus, and of his son Volusianus, put an end to the civil war; and the senate gave a legal sanction to the rights of conquest. The letters of Æmilianus to that assembly displayed a mixture of moderation and vanity. He assured them, that he should resign to their wisdom the civil administration; and, contenting himself with the quality of their general, would in a short time assert the glory of Rome, and deliver the empire from all the barbarians both of the North and of the East. 59 His pride was flattered by the applause of the senate; and medals are still extant, representing him with the name and attributes of Hercules the Victor, and Mars the Avenger. If the new monarch possessed the abilities, he wanted the time, necessary to fulfil these splendid promises. Less than four months intervened between his victory and his fall. 61 He had vanquished Gallus: he sunk under the weight of a competitor more formidable than Gallus. That unfortunate prince had sent Valerian, already distinguished by the honorable title of censor, to bring the legions of Gaul and Germany 62 to his aid. Valerian executed that commission with zeal and fidelity; and as he arrived too late to save his sovereign, he resolved to revenge him. The troops of Æmilianus, who still lay encamped in the plains of Spoleto, were awed by the sanctity of his character, but much more by the superior strength of his army; and as they were now become as incapable of personal attachment as they had always been of constitutional principle, they readily imbrued their hands in the blood of a prince who so lately had been the object of their partial choice. The guilt was theirs, 621 but the advantage of it was Valerian’s; who obtained the possession of the throne by the means indeed of a civil war, but with a degree of innocence singular in that age of revolutions; since he owed neither gratitude nor allegiance to his predecessor, whom he dethroned. Valerian was about sixty years of age 63 when he was invested with the purple, not by the caprice of the populace, or the clamors of the army, but by the unanimous voice of the Roman world. In his gradual ascent through the honors of the state, he had deserved the favor of virtuous princes, and had declared himself the enemy of tyrants. 64 His noble birth, his mild but unblemished manners, his learning, prudence, and experience, were revered by the senate and people; and if mankind (according to the observation of an ancient writer) had been left at liberty to choose a master, their choice would most assuredly have fallen on Valerian. 65 Perhaps the merit of this emperor was inadequate to his reputation; perhaps his abilities, or at least his spirit, were affected by the languor and coldness of old age. The consciousness of his decline engaged him to share the throne with a younger and more active associate; 66 the emergency of the times demanded a general no less than a prince; and the experience of the Roman censor might have directed him where to bestow the Imperial purple, as the reward of military merit. But instead of making a judicious choice, which would have confirmed his reign and endeared his memory, Valerian, consulting only the dictates of affection or vanity, immediately invested with the supreme honors his son Gallienus, a youth whose effeminate vices had been hitherto concealed by the obscurity of a private station. The joint government of the father and the son subsisted about seven, and the sole administration of Gallienus continued about eight, years. But the whole period was one uninterrupted series of confusion and calamity. As the Roman empire was at the same time, and on every side, attacked by the blind fury of foreign invaders, and the wild ambition of domestic usurpers… Chapter X: Emperors Decius, Gallus, Æmilianus, Valerian And Gallienus.—Part IV…. The new sovereign of Persia, Artaxerxes and his son Sapor, had triumphed (as we have already seen) over the house of Arsaces. Of the many princes of that ancient race. Chosroes, king of Armenia, had alone preserved both his life and his independence. He defended himself by the natural strength of his country; by the perpetual resort of fugitives and malecontents; by the alliance of the Romans, and above all, by his own courage. Invincible in arms, during a thirty years’ war, he was at length assassinated by the emissaries of Sapor, king of Persia. The patriotic satraps of Armenia, who asserted the freedom and dignity of the crown, implored the protection of Rome in favor of Tiridates, the lawful heir. But the son of Chosroes was an infant, the allies were at a distance, and the Persian monarch advanced towards the frontier at the head of an irresistible force. Young Tiridates, the future hope of his country, was saved by the fidelity of a servant, and Armenia continued above twenty-seven years a reluctant province of the great monarchy of Persia. 134 Elated with this easy conquest, and presuming on the distresses or the degeneracy of the Romans, Sapor obliged the strong garrisons of Carrhæ and Nisibis 1341 to surrender, and spread devastation and terror on either side of the Euphrates. The loss of an important frontier, the ruin of a faithful and natural ally, and the rapid success of Sapor’s ambition, affected Rome with a deep sense of the insult as well as of the danger. Valerian flattered himself, that the vigilance of his lieutenants would sufficiently provide for the safety of the Rhine and of the Danube; but he resolved, notwithstanding his advanced age, to march in person to the defence of the Euphrates. During his progress through Asia Minor, the naval enterprises of the Goths were suspended, and the afflicted province enjoyed a transient and fallacious calm. He passed the Euphrates, encountered the Persian monarch near the walls of Edessa, was vanquished, and taken prisoner by Sapor. The particulars of this great event are darkly and imperfectly represented; yet, by the glimmering light which is afforded us, we may discover a long series of imprudence, of error, and of deserved misfortunes on the side of the Roman emperor. He reposed an implicit confidence in Macrianus, his Prætorian præfect. 135 That worthless minister rendered his master formidable only to the oppressed subjects, and contemptible to the enemies of Rome. 136 By his weak or wicked counsels, the Imperial army was betrayed into a situation where valor and military skill were equally unavailing. 137 The vigorous attempt of the Romans to cut their way through the Persian host was repulsed with great slaughter; 138 and Sapor, who encompassed the camp with superior numbers, patiently waited till the increasing rage of famine and pestilence had insured his victory. The licentious murmurs of the legions soon accused Valerian as the cause of their calamities; their seditious clamors demanded an instant capitulation. An immense sum of gold was offered to purchase the permission of a disgraceful retreat. But the Persian, conscious of his superiority, refused the money with disdain; and detaining the deputies, advanced in order of battle to the foot of the Roman rampart, and insisted on a personal conference with the emperor. Valerian was reduced to the necessity of intrusting his life and dignity to the faith of an enemy. The interview ended as it was natural to expect. The emperor was made a prisoner, and his astonished troops laid down their arms. 139 In such a moment of triumph, the pride and policy of Sapor prompted him to fill the vacant throne with a successor entirely dependent on his pleasure. Cyriades, an obscure fugitive of Antioch, stained with every vice, was chosen to dishonor the Roman purple; and the will of the Persian victor could not fail of being ratified by the acclamations, however reluctant, of the captive army…. He despaired of making any permanent establishment in the empire, and sought only to leave behind him a wasted desert, whilst he transported into Persia the people and the treasures of the provinces. At the time when the East trembled at the name of Sapor, he received a present not unworthy of the greatest kings; a long train of camels, laden with the most rare and valuable merchandises. The rich offering was accompanied with an epistle, respectful, but not servile, from Odenathus, one of the noblest and most opulent senators of Palmyra. “Who is this Odenathus,” (said the haughty victor, and he commanded that the present should be cast into the Euphrates,) “that he thus insolently presumes to write to his lord? If he entertains a hope of mitigating his punishment, let him fall prostrate before the foot of our throne, with his hands bound behind his back. Should he hesitate, swift destruction shall be poured on his head, on his whole race, and on his country.” 146 The desperate extremity to which the Palmyrenian was reduced, called into action all the latent powers of his soul. He met Sapor; but he met him in arms. Infusing his own spirit into a little army collected from the villages of Syria 147 and the tents of the desert, 148 he hovered round the Persian host, harassed their retreat, carried off part of the treasure, and, what was dearer than any treasure, several of the women of the great king; who was at last obliged to repass the Euphrates with some marks of haste and confusion. 149 By this exploit, Odenathus laid the foundations of his future fame and fortunes. The majesty of Rome, oppressed by a Persian, was protected by a Syrian or Arab of Palmyra…. The emperor Gallienus, who had long supported with impatience the censorial severity of his father and colleague, received the intelligence of his misfortunes with secret pleasure and avowed indifference. “I knew that my father was a mortal,” said he; “and since he has acted as it becomes a brave man, I am satisfied.” Whilst Rome lamented the fate of her sovereign, the savage coldness of his son was extolled by the servile courtiers as the perfect firmness of a hero and a stoic…. The reign of Gallienus, distracted as it was, produced only nineteen pretenders to the throne: Cyriades, Macrianus, Balista, Odenathus, and Zenobia, in the East; in Gaul, and the western provinces, Posthumus, Lollianus, Victorinus, and his mother Victoria, Marius, and Tetricus; in Illyricum and the confines of the Danube, Ingenuus, Regillianus, and Aureolus; in Pontus, 158 Saturninus; in Isauria, Trebellianus; Piso in Thessaly; Valens in Achaia; Æmilianus in Egypt; and Celsus in Africa. 1581 To illustrate the obscure monuments of the life and death of each individual, would prove a laborious task, alike barren of instruction and of amusement. We may content ourselves with investigating some general characters, that most strongly mark the condition of the times, and the manners of the men, their pretensions, their motives, their fate, and the destructive consequences of their usurpation. It is sufficiently known, that the odious appellation of Tyrant was often employed by the ancients to express the illegal seizure of supreme power, without any reference to the abuse of it. Several of the pretenders, who raised the standard of rebellion against the emperor Gallienus, were shining models of virtue, and almost all possessed a considerable share of vigor and ability. Their merit had recommended them to the favor of Valerian, and gradually promoted them to the most important commands of the empire. The generals, who assumed the title of Augustus, were either respected by their troops for their able conduct and severe discipline, or admired for valor and success in war, or beloved for frankness and generosity. The field of victory was often the scene of their election; and even the armorer Marius, the most contemptible of all the candidates for the purple, was distinguished, however, by intrepid courage, matchless strength, and blunt honesty. 160 His mean and recent trade cast, indeed, an air of ridicule on his elevation; 1601 but his birth could not be more obscure than was that of the greater part of his rivals, who were born of peasants, and enlisted in the army as private soldiers…. Chapter XI: Reign Of Claudius, Defeat Of The Goths.—Part I. Under the deplorable reigns of Valerian and Gallienus, the empire was oppressed and almost destroyed by the soldiers, the tyrants, and the barbarians. It was saved by a series of great princes, who derived their obscure origin from the martial provinces of Illyricum. Within a period of about thirty years, Claudius, Aurelian, Probus, Diocletian and his colleagues, triumphed over the foreign and domestic enemies of the state, reëstablished, with the military discipline, the strength of the frontiers, and deserved the glorious title of Restorers of the Roman world…. Chapter XI: Reign Of Claudius, Defeat Of The Goths.—Part II.... Aurelian had no sooner secured the person and provinces of Tetricus, than he turned his arms against Zenobia, the celebrated queen of Palmyra and the East. Modern Europe has produced several illustrious women who have sustained with glory the weight of empire; nor is our own age destitute of such distinguished characters. But if we except the doubtful achievements of Semiramis, Zenobia is perhaps the only female whose superior genius broke through the servile indolence imposed on her sex by the climate and manners of Asia. 54 She claimed her descent from the Macedonian kings of Egypt, 541 equalled in beauty her ancestor Cleopatra, and far surpassed that princess in chastity 55 and valor. Zenobia was esteemed the most lovely as well as the most heroic of her sex. She was of a dark complexion (for in speaking of a lady these trifles become important). Her teeth were of a pearly whiteness, and her large black eyes sparkled with uncommon fire, tempered by the most attractive sweetness. Her voice was strong and harmonious. Her manly understanding was strengthened and adorned by study. She was not ignorant of the Latin tongue, but possessed in equal perfection the Greek, the Syriac, and the Egyptian languages. She had drawn up for her own use an epitome of oriental history, and familiarly compared the beauties of Homer and Plato under the tuition of the sublime Longinus. This accomplished woman gave her hand to Odenathus, 551 who, from a private station, raised himself to the dominion of the East. She soon became the friend and companion of a hero. In the intervals of war, Odenathus passionately delighted in the exercise of hunting; he pursued with ardor the wild beasts of the desert, lions, panthers, and bears; and the ardor of Zenobia in that dangerous amusement was not inferior to his own. She had inured her constitution to fatigue, disdained the use of a covered carriage, generally appeared on horseback in a military habit, and sometimes marched several miles on foot at the head of the troops. The success of Odenathus was in a great measure ascribed to her incomparable prudence and fortitude. Their splendid victories over the Great King, whom they twice pursued as far as the gates of Ctesiphon, laid the foundations of their united fame and power. The armies which they commanded, and the provinces which they had saved, acknowledged not any other sovereigns than their invincible chiefs. The senate and people of Rome revered a stranger who had avenged their captive emperor, and even the insensible son of Valerian accepted Odenathus for his legitimate colleague. Chapter XI: Reign Of Claudius, Defeat Of The Goths.—Part III. …By the death of Odenathus, that authority was at an end which the senate had granted him only as a personal distinction; but his martial widow, disdaining both the senate and Gallienus, obliged one of the Roman generals, who was sent against her, to retreat into Europe, with the loss of his army and his reputation. 59 Instead of the little passions which so frequently perplex a female reign, the steady administration of Zenobia was guided by the most judicious maxims of policy. If it was expedient to pardon, she could calm her resentment; if it was necessary to punish, she could impose silence on the voice of pity. Her strict economy was accused of avarice; yet on every proper occasion she appeared magnificent and liberal…. Zenobia would have ill deserved her reputation, had she indolently permitted the emperor of the West to approach within a hundred miles of her capital. The fate of the East was decided in two great battles; so similar in almost every circumstance, that we can scarcely distinguish them from each other, except by observing that the first was fought near Antioch, 65 and the second near Emesa. 66 In both the queen of Palmyra animated the armies by her presence, and devolved the execution of her orders on Zabdas, who had already signalized his military talents by the conquest of Egypt. The numerous forces of Zenobia consisted for the most part of light archers, and of heavy cavalry clothed in complete steel. The Moorish and Illyrian horse of Aurelian were unable to sustain the ponderous charge of their antagonists. They fled in real or affected disorder, engaged the Palmyrenians in a laborious pursuit, harassed them by a desultory combat, and at length discomfited this impenetrable but unwieldy body of cavalry. The light infantry, in the mean time, when they had exhausted their quivers, remaining without protection against a closer onset, exposed their naked sides to the swords of the legions. Aurelian had chosen these veteran troops, who were usually stationed on the Upper Danube, and whose valor had been severely tried in the Alemannic war. 67 After the defeat of Emesa, Zenobia found it impossible to collect a third army. As far as the frontier of Egypt, the nations subject to her empire had joined the standard of the conqueror, who detached Probus, the bravest of his generals, to possess himself of the Egyptian provinces. Palmyra was the last resource of the widow of Odenathus. She retired within the walls of her capital, made every preparation for a vigorous resistance, and declared, with the intrepidity of a heroine, that the last moment of her reign and of her life should be the same…. The firmness of Zenobia was supported by the hope, that in a very short time famine would compel the Roman army to repass the desert; and by the reasonable expectation that the kings of the East, and particularly the Persian monarch, would arm in the defence of their most natural ally. But fortune, and the perseverance of Aurelian, overcame every obstacle. The death of Sapor, which happened about this time, 71 distracted the councils of Persia, and the inconsiderable succors that attempted to relieve Palmyra were easily intercepted either by the arms or the liberality of the emperor. From every part of Syria, a regular succession of convoys safely arrived in the camp, which was increased by the return of Probus with his victorious troops from the conquest of Egypt…. When the Syrian queen was brought into the presence of Aurelian, he sternly asked her, How she had presumed to rise in arms against the emperors of Rome! The answer of Zenobia was a prudent mixture of respect and firmness. “Because I disdained to consider as Roman emperors an Aureolus or a Gallienus. You alone I acknowledge as my conqueror and my sovereign.” 73 But as female fortitude is commonly artificial, so it is seldom steady or consistent. The courage of Zenobia deserted her in the hour of trial; she trembled at the angry clamors of the soldiers, who called aloud for her immediate execution, forgot the generous despair of Cleopatra, which she had proposed as her model, and ignominiously purchased life by the sacrifice of her fame and her friends. It was to their counsels, which governed the weakness of her sex, that she imputed the guilt of her obstinate resistance; it was on their heads that she directed the vengeance of the cruel Aurelian. The fame of Longinus, who was included among the numerous and perhaps innocent victims of her fear, will survive that of the queen who betrayed, or the tyrant who condemned him. Genius and learning were incapable of moving a fierce unlettered soldier, but they had served to elevate and harmonize the soul of Longinus. Without uttering a complaint, he calmly followed the executioner, pitying his unhappy mistress, and bestowing comfort on his afflicted friends. Returning from the conquest of the East, Aurelian had already crossed the Straits which divided Europe from Asia, when he was provoked by the intelligence that the Palmyrenians had massacred the governor and garrison which he had left among them, and again erected the standard of revolt. Without a moment’s deliberation, he once more turned his face towards Syria. Antioch was alarmed by his rapid approach, and the helpless city of Palmyra felt the irresistible weight of his resentment. We have a letter of Aurelian himself, in which he acknowledges, 75 that old men, women, children, and peasants, had been involved in that dreadful execution, which should have been confined to armed rebellion; and although his principal concern seems directed to the reëstablishment of a temple of the Sun, he discovers some pity for the remnant of the Palmyrenians, to whom he grants the permission of rebuilding and inhabiting their city. But it is easier to destroy than to restore. The seat of commerce, of arts, and of Zenobia, gradually sunk into an obscure town, a trifling fortress, and at length a miserable village…. Aurelian might now congratulate the senate, the people, and himself, that in little more than three years, he had restored universal peace and order to the Roman world…. Chapter XXVIII: Destruction Of Paganism.—Part III…. A nation of slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their master, who, in the abuse of absolute power, does not proceed to the last extremes of injustice and oppression. Theodosius might undoubtedly have proposed to his Pagan subjects the alternative of baptism or of death; and the eloquent Libanius has praised the moderation of a prince, who never enacted, by any positive law, that all his subjects should immediately embrace and practise the religion of their sovereign. 61 The profession of Christianity was not made an essential qualification for the enjoyment of the civil rights of society, nor were any peculiar hardships imposed on the sectaries, who credulously received the fables of Ovid, and obstinately rejected the miracles of the Gospel. The palace, the schools, the army, and the senate, were filled with declared and devout Pagans; they obtained, without distinction, the civil and military honors of the empire. 6111 Theodosius distinguished his liberal regard for virtue and genius by the consular dignity, which he bestowed on Symmachus; 62 and by the personal friendship which he expressed to Libanius; 63 and the two eloquent apologists of Paganism were never required either to change or to dissemble their religious opinions. The Pagans were indulged in the most licentious freedom of speech and writing; the historical and philosophic remains of Eunapius, Zosimus, 64 and the fanatic teachers of the school of Plato, betray the most furious animosity, and contain the sharpest invectives, against the sentiments and conduct of their victorious adversaries. If these audacious libels were publicly known, we must applaud the good sense of the Christian princes, who viewed, with a smile of contempt, the last struggles of superstition and despair. 65 But the Imperial laws, which prohibited the sacrifices and ceremonies of Paganism, were rigidly executed; and every hour contributed to destroy the influence of a religion, which was supported by custom, rather than by argument. The devotion or the poet, or the philosopher, may be secretly nourished by prayer, meditation, and study; but the exercise of public worship appears to be the only solid foundation of the religious sentiments of the people, which derive their force from imitation and habit. The interruption of that public exercise may consummate, in the period of a few years, the important work of a national revolution. The memory of theological opinions cannot long be preserved, without the artificial helps of priests, of temples, and of books. 66 The ignorant vulgar, whose minds are still agitated by the blind hopes and terrors of superstition, will be soon persuaded by their superiors to direct their vows to the reigning deities of the age; and will insensibly imbibe an ardent zeal for the support and propagation of the new doctrine, which spiritual hunger at first compelled them to accept. The generation that arose in the world after the promulgation of the Imperial laws, was attracted within the pale of the Catholic church: and so rapid, yet so gentle, was the fall of Paganism, that only twenty-eight years after the death of Theodosius, the faint and minute vestiges were no longer visible to the eye of the legislator. The ruin of the Pagan religion is described by the sophists as a dreadful and amazing prodigy, which covered the earth with darkness, and restored the ancient dominion of chaos and of night. They relate, in solemn and pathetic strains, that the temples were converted into sepulchres, and that the holy places, which had been adorned by the statues of the gods, were basely polluted by the relics of Christian martyrs. “The monks” (a race of filthy animals, to whom Eunapius is tempted to refuse the name of men) “are the authors of the new worship, which, in the place of those deities who are conceived by the understanding, has substituted the meanest and most contemptible slaves. The heads, salted and pickled, of those infamous malefactors, who for the multitude of their crimes have suffered a just and ignominious death; their bodies still marked by the impression of the lash, and the scars of those tortures which were inflicted by the sentence of the magistrate; such” (continues Eunapius) “are the gods which the earth produces in our days; such are the martyrs, the supreme arbitrators of our prayers and petitions to the Deity, whose tombs are now consecrated as the objects of the veneration of the people.” 68 Without approving the malice, it is natural enough to share the surprise of the sophist, the spectator of a revolution, which raised those obscure victims of the laws of Rome to the rank of celestial and invisible protectors of the Roman empire. The grateful respect of the Christians for the martyrs of the faith, was exalted, by time and victory, into religious adoration; and the most illustrious of the saints and prophets were deservedly associated to the honors of the martyrs…. In the long period of twelve hundred years, which elapsed between the reign of Constantine and the reformation of Luther, the worship of saints and relics corrupted the pure and perfect simplicity of the Christian model: and some symptoms of degeneracy may be observed even in the first generations which adopted and cherished this pernicious innovation. I. The satisfactory experience, that the relics of saints were more valuable than gold or precious stones, 75 stimulated the clergy to multiply the treasures of the church. Without much regard for truth or probability, they invented names for skeletons, and actions for names. The fame of the apostles, and of the holy men who had imitated their virtues, was darkened by religious fiction. To the invincible band of genuine and primitive martyrs, they added myriads of imaginary heroes, who had never existed, except in the fancy of crafty or credulous legendaries; and there is reason to suspect, that Tours might not be the only diocese in which the bones of a malefactor were adored, instead of those of a saint. 76 A superstitious practice, which tended to increase the temptations of fraud, and credulity, insensibly extinguished the light of history, and of reason, in the Christian world. II. But the progress of superstition would have been much less rapid and victorious, if the faith of the people had not been assisted by the seasonable aid of visions and miracles, to ascertain the authenticity and virtue of the most suspicious relics. In the reign of the younger Theodosius, Lucian, 77 a presbyter of Jerusalem, and the ecclesiastical minister of the village of Caphargamala, about twenty miles from the city, related a very singular dream, which, to remove his doubts, had been repeated on three successive Saturdays…. The coffins of Gamaliel, of his son, and of his friend, were found in regular order; but when the fourth coffin, which contained the remains of Stephen, was shown to the light, the earth trembled, and an odor, such as that of paradise, was smelt, which instantly cured the various diseases of seventy-three of the assistants. The companions of Stephen were left in their peaceful residence of Caphargamala: but the relics of the first martyr were transported, in solemn procession, to a church constructed in their honor on Mount Sion; and the minute particles of those relics, a drop of blood, 78 or the scrapings of a bone, were acknowledged, in almost every province of the Roman world, to possess a divine and miraculous virtue. The grave and learned Augustin, 79 whose understanding scarcely admits the excuse of credulity, has attested the innumerable prodigies which were performed in Africa by the relics of St. Stephen; and this marvellous narrative is inserted in the elaborate work of the City of God, which the bishop of Hippo designed as a solid and immortal proof of the truth of Christianity. Augustin solemnly declares, that he has selected those miracles only which were publicly certified by the persons who were either the objects, or the spectators, of the power of the martyr. Many prodigies were omitted, or forgotten; and Hippo had been less favorably treated than the other cities of the province. And yet the bishop enumerates above seventy miracles, of which three were resurrections from the dead, in the space of two years, and within the limits of his own diocese. 80 If we enlarge our view to all the dioceses, and all the saints, of the Christian world, it will not be easy to calculate the fables, and the errors, which issued from this inexhaustible source. But we may surely be allowed to observe, that a miracle, in that age of superstition and credulity, lost its name and its merit, since it could scarcely be considered as a deviation from the ordinary and established laws of nature. III. The innumerable miracles, of which the tombs of the martyrs were the perpetual theatre, revealed to the pious believer the actual state and constitution of the invisible world; and his religious speculations appeared to be founded on the firm basis of fact and experience. Whatever might be the condition of vulgar souls, in the long interval between the dissolution and the resurrection of their bodies, it was evident that the superior spirits of the saints and martyrs did not consume that portion of their existence in silent and inglorious sleep…. The confidence of their petitioners was founded on the persuasion, that the saints, who reigned with Christ, cast an eye of pity upon earth; that they were warmly interested in the prosperity of the Catholic Church; and that the individuals, who imitated the example of their faith and piety, were the peculiar and favorite objects of their most tender regard. Sometimes, indeed, their friendship might be influenced by considerations of a less exalted kind: they viewed with partial affection the places which had been consecrated by their birth, their residence, their death, their burial, or the possession of their relics. The meaner passions of pride, avarice, and revenge, may be deemed unworthy of a celestial breast; yet the saints themselves condescended to testify their grateful approbation of the liberality of their votaries; and the sharpest bolts of punishment were hurled against those impious wretches, who violated their magnificent shrines, or disbelieved their supernatural power…. The imagination, which had been raised by a painful effort to the contemplation and worship of the Universal Cause, eagerly embraced such inferior objects of adoration as were more proportioned to its gross conceptions and imperfect faculties. The sublime and simple theology of the primitive Christians was gradually corrupted; and the Monarchy of heaven, already clouded by metaphysical subtleties, was degraded by the introduction of a popular mythology, which tended to restore the reign of polytheism…. Chapter XXIX: Division Of Roman Empire Between Sons Of Theodosius.—Part I. The genius of Rome expired with Theodosius; the last of the successors of Augustus and Constantine, who appeared in the field at the head of their armies, and whose authority was universally acknowledged throughout the whole extent of the empire….. Theodosius had tarnished the glory of his reign by the elevation of Rufinus; an odious favorite, who, in an age of civil and religious faction, has deserved, from every party, the imputation of every crime. The strong impulse of ambition and avarice 1 had urged Rufinus to abandon his native country, an obscure corner of Gaul, 2 to advance his fortune in the capital of the East: the talent of bold and ready elocution, 3 qualified him to succeed in the lucrative profession of the law; and his success in that profession was a regular step to the most honorable and important employments of the state. He was raised, by just degrees, to the station of master of the offices. In the exercise of his various functions, so essentially connected with the whole system of civil government, he acquired the confidence of a monarch, who soon discovered his diligence and capacity in business, and who long remained ignorant of the pride, the malice, and the covetousness of his disposition. These vices were concealed beneath the mask of profound dissimulation; 4 his passions were subservient only to the passions of his master; yet in the horrid massacre of Thessalonica, the cruel Rufinus inflamed the fury, without imitating the repentance, of Theodosius. The minister, who viewed with proud indifference the rest of mankind, never forgave the appearance of an injury; and his personal enemies had forfeited, in his opinion, the merit of all public services. Promotus, the master-general of the infantry, had saved the empire from the invasion of the Ostrogoths; but he indignantly supported the preeminence of a rival, whose character and profession he despised; and in the midst of a public council, the impatient soldier was provoked to chastise with a blow the indecent pride of the favorite. This act of violence was represented to the emperor as an insult, which it was incumbent on his dignity to resent. The disgrace and exile of Promotus were signified by a peremptory order, to repair, without delay, to a military station on the banks of the Danube; and the death of that general (though he was slain in a skirmish with the Barbarians) was imputed to the perfidious arts of Rufinus. 5 The sacrifice of a hero gratified his revenge; the honors of the consulship elated his vanity; but his power was still imperfect and precarious, as long as the important posts of praefect of the East, and of praefect of Constantinople, were filled by Tatian, 6 and his son Proculus; whose united authority balanced, for some time, the ambition and favor of the master of the offices. The two praefects were accused of rapine and corruption in the administration of the laws and finances. For the trial of these illustrious offenders, the emperor constituted a special commission: several judges were named to share the guilt and reproach of injustice; but the right of pronouncing sentence was reserved to the president alone, and that president was Rufinus himself. The father, stripped of the praefecture of the East, was thrown into a dungeon; but the son, conscious that few ministers can be found innocent, where an enemy is their judge, had secretly escaped; and Rufinus must have been satisfied with the least obnoxious victim, if despotism had not condescended to employ the basest and most ungenerous artifice. The prosecution was conducted with an appearance of equity and moderation, which flattered Tatian with the hope of a favorable event: his confidence was fortified by the solemn assurances, and perfidious oaths, of the president, who presumed to interpose the sacred name of Theodosius himself; and the unhappy father was at last persuaded to recall, by a private letter, the fugitive Proculus. He was instantly seized, examined, condemned, and beheaded, in one of the suburbs of Constantinople, with a precipitation which disappointed the clemency of the emperor. Without respecting the misfortunes of a consular senator, the cruel judges of Tatian compelled him to behold the execution of his son: the fatal cord was fastened round his own neck; but in the moment when he expected. and perhaps desired, the relief of a speedy death, he was permitted to consume the miserable remnant of his old age in poverty and exile. 7 The punishment of the two praefects might, perhaps, be excused by the exceptionable parts of their own conduct; the enmity of Rufinus might be palliated by the jealous and unsociable nature of ambition. But he indulged a spirit of revenge equally repugnant to prudence and to justice, when he degraded their native country of Lycia from the rank of Roman provinces; stigmatized a guiltless people with a mark of ignominy; and declared, that the countrymen of Tatian and Proculus should forever remain incapable of holding any employment of honor or advantage under the Imperial government. 8 The new praefect of the East (for Rufinus instantly succeeded to the vacant honors of his adversary) was not diverted, however, by the most criminal pursuits, from the performance of the religious duties, which in that age were considered as the most essential to salvation. In the suburb of Chalcedon, surnamed the Oak, he had built a magnificent villa; to which he devoutly added a stately church, consecrated to the apostles St. Peter and St. Paul, and continually sanctified by the prayers and penance of a regular society of monks. A numerous, and almost general, synod of the bishops of the Eastern empire, was summoned to celebrate, at the same time, the dedication of the church, and the baptism of the founder. This double ceremony was performed with extraordinary pomp; and when Rufinus was purified, in the holy font, from all the sins that he had hitherto committed, a venerable hermit of Egypt rashly proposed himself as the sponsor of a proud and ambitious statesman. The character of Theodosius imposed on his minister the task of hypocrisy, which disguised, and sometimes restrained, the abuse of power; and Rufinus was apprehensive of disturbing the indolent slumber of a prince still capable of exerting the abilities and the virtue, which had raised him to the throne. 10 But the absence, and, soon afterwards, the death, of the emperor, confirmed the absolute authority of Rufinus over the person and dominions of Arcadius; a feeble youth, whom the imperious praefect considered as his pupil, rather than his sovereign. Regardless of the public opinion, he indulged his passions without remorse, and without resistance; and his malignant and rapacious spirit rejected every passion that might have contributed to his own glory, or the happiness of the people. His avarice, 11 which seems to have prevailed, in his corrupt mind, over every other sentiment, attracted the wealth of the East, by the various arts of partial and general extortion; oppressive taxes, scandalous bribery, immoderate fines, unjust confiscations, forced or fictitious testaments, by which the tyrant despoiled of their lawful inheritance the children of strangers, or enemies; and the public sale of justice, as well as of favor, which he instituted in the palace of Constantinople…. He aspired to place his fortune on a secure and independent basis, which should no longer depend on the caprice of the young emperor; yet he neglected to conciliate the hearts of the soldiers and people, by the liberal distribution of those riches, which he had acquired with so much toil, and with so much guilt. The extreme parsimony of Rufinus left him only the reproach and envy of ill-gotten wealth; his dependants served him without attachment; the universal hatred of mankind was repressed only by the influence of servile fear. The fate of Lucian proclaimed to the East, that the praefect, whose industry was much abated in the despatch of ordinary business, was active and indefatigable in the pursuit of revenge. Lucian, the son of the praefect Florentius, the oppressor of Gaul, and the enemy of Julian, had employed a considerable part of his inheritance, the fruit of rapine and corruption, to purchase the friendship of Rufinus, and the high office of Count of the East. But the new magistrate imprudently departed from the maxims of the court, and of the times; disgraced his benefactor by the contrast of a virtuous and temperate administration; and presumed to refuse an act of injustice, which might have tended to the profit of the emperor’s uncle. Arcadius was easily persuaded to resent the supposed insult; and the praefect of the East resolved to execute in person the cruel vengeance, which he meditated against this ungrateful delegate of his power. He performed with incessant speed the journey of seven or eight hundred miles, from Constantinople to Antioch, entered the capital of Syria at the dead of night, and spread universal consternation among a people ignorant of his design, but not ignorant of his character. The Count of the fifteen provinces of the East was dragged, like the vilest malefactor, before the arbitrary tribunal of Rufinus. Notwithstanding the clearest evidence of his integrity, which was not impeached even by the voice of an accuser, Lucian was condemned, almost with out a trial, to suffer a cruel and ignominious punishment. The ministers of the tyrant, by the orders, and in the presence, of their master, beat him on the neck with leather thongs armed at the extremities with lead; and when he fainted under the violence of the pain, he was removed in a close litter, to conceal his dying agonies from the eyes of the indignant city. No sooner had Rufinus perpetrated this inhuman act, the sole object of his expedition, than he returned, amidst the deep and silent curses of a trembling people, from Antioch to Constantinople; and his diligence was accelerated by the hope of accomplishing, without delay, the nuptials of his daughter with the emperor of the East. But Rufinus soon experienced, that a prudent minister should constantly secure his royal captive by the strong, though invisible chain of habit; and that the merit, and much more easily the favor, of the absent, are obliterated in a short time from the mind of a weak and capricious sovereign. While the praefect satiated his revenge at Antioch, a secret conspiracy of the favorite eunuchs, directed by the great chamberlain Eutropius, undermined his power in the palace of Constantinople. They discovered that Arcadius was not inclined to love the daughter of Rufinus, who had been chosen, without his consent, for his bride; and they contrived to substitute in her place the fair Eudoxia, the daughter of Bauto, 13 a general of the Franks in the service of Rome; and who was educated, since the death of her father, in the family of the sons of Promotus…. Soon after the return of Rufinus, the approaching ceremony of the royal nuptials was announced to the people of Constantinople, who prepared to celebrate, with false and hollow acclamations, the fortune of his daughter…. At the moment when he flattered himself that he should become the father of a line of kings, a foreign maid, who had been educated in the house of his implacable enemies, was introduced into the Imperial bed; and Eudoxia soon displayed a superiority of sense and spirit, to improve the ascendant which her beauty must acquire over the mind of a fond and youthful husband…. The praefect still exercised an uncontrolled authority over the civil and military government of the East; and his treasures, if he could resolve to use them, might be employed to procure proper instruments for the execution of the blackest designs, that pride, ambition, and revenge could suggest to a desperate statesman. The character of Rufinus seemed to justify the accusations that he conspired against the person of his sovereign, to seat himself on the vacant throne; and that he had secretly invited the Huns and the Goths to invade the provinces of the empire, and to increase the public confusion. The subtle praefect, whose life had been spent in the intrigues of the palace, opposed, with equal arms, the artful measures of the eunuch Eutropius; but the timid soul of Rufinus was astonished by the hostile approach of a more formidable rival, of the great Stilicho, the general, or rather the master, of the empire of the West. The celestial gift, which Achilles obtained, and Alexander envied, of a poet worthy to celebrate the actions of heroes has been enjoyed by Stilicho, in a much higher degree than might have been expected from the declining state of genius, and of art. The muse of Claudian, 17 devoted to his service, was always prepared to stigmatize his adversaries, Rufinus, or Eutropius, with eternal infamy; or to paint, in the most splendid colors, the victories and virtues of a powerful benefactor. In the review of a period indifferently supplied with authentic materials, we cannot refuse to illustrate the annals of Honorius, from the invectives, or the panegyrics, of a contemporary writer; but as Claudian appears to have indulged the most ample privilege of a poet and a courtier, some criticism will be requisite to translate the language of fiction or exaggeration, into the truth and simplicity of historic prose. His silence concerning the family of Stilicho may be admitted as a proof, that his patron was neither able, nor desirous, to boast of a long series of illustrious progenitors; and the slight mention of his father, an officer of Barbarian cavalry in the service of Valens, seems to countenance the assertion, that the general, who so long commanded the armies of Rome, was descended from the savage and perfidious race of the Vandals. 18 If Stilicho had not possessed the external advantages of strength and stature, the most flattering bard, in the presence of so many thousand spectators, would have hesitated to affirm, that he surpassed the measure of the demi-gods of antiquity; and that whenever he moved, with lofty steps, through the streets of the capital, the astonished crowd made room for the stranger, who displayed, in a private condition, the awful majesty of a hero…. Theodosius had been prompted, by a pious motive of fraternal affection, to adopt, for his own, the daughter of his brother Honorius; the beauty and accomplishments of Serena 19 were universally admired by the obsequious court; and Stilicho obtained the preference over a crowd of rivals, who ambitiously disputed the hand of the princess, and the favor of her adopted father. 20 The assurance that the husband of Serena would be faithful to the throne, which he was permitted to approach, engaged the emperor to exalt the fortunes, and to employ the abilities, of the sagacious and intrepid Stilicho…. Chapter XXIX: Division Of Roman Empire Between Sons Of Theodosius.—Part II.…The guilty soul of Rufinus was alarmed by the approach of a warrior and a rival, whose enmity he deserved; he computed, with increasing terror, the narrow space of his life and greatness; and, as the last hope of safety, he interposed the authority of the emperor Arcadius. Stilicho, who appears to have directed his march along the sea-coast of the Adriatic, was not far distant from the city of Thessalonica, when he received a peremptory message, to recall the troops of the East, and to declare, that his nearer approach would be considered, by the Byzantine court, as an act of hostility. The prompt and unexpected obedience of the general of the West, convinced the vulgar of his loyalty and moderation; and, as he had already engaged the affection of the Eastern troops, he recommended to their zeal the execution of his bloody design, which might be accomplished in his absence, with less danger, perhaps, and with less reproach. Stilicho left the command of the troops of the East to Gainas, the Goth, on whose fidelity he firmly relied, with an assurance, at least, that the hardy Barbarians would never be diverted from his purpose by any consideration of fear or remorse. The soldiers were easily persuaded to punish the enemy of Stilicho and of Rome; and such was the general hatred which Rufinus had excited, that the fatal secret, communicated to thousands, was faithfully preserved during the long march from Thessalonica to the gates of Constantinople. As soon as they had resolved his death, they condescended to flatter his pride; the ambitious praefect was seduced to believe, that those powerful auxiliaries might be tempted to place the diadem on his head; and the treasures which he distributed, with a tardy and reluctant hand, were accepted by the indignant multitude as an insult, rather than as a gift. At the distance of a mile from the capital, in the field of Mars, before the palace of Hebdomon, the troops halted: and the emperor, as well as his minister, advanced, according to ancient custom, respectfully to salute the power which supported their throne. As Rufinus passed along the ranks, and disguised, with studied courtesy, his innate haughtiness, the wings insensibly wheeled from the right and left, and enclosed the devoted victim within the circle of their arms. Before he could reflect on the danger of his situation, Gainas gave the signal of death; a daring and forward soldier plunged his sword into the breast of the guilty praefect, and Rufinus fell, groaned, and expired, at the feet of the affrighted emperor. If the agonies of a moment could expiate the crimes of a whole life, or if the outrages inflicted on a breathless corpse could be the object of pity, our humanity might perhaps be affected by the horrid circumstances which accompanied the murder of Rufinus. His mangled body was abandoned to the brutal fury of the populace of either sex, who hastened in crowds, from every quarter of the city, to trample on the remains of the haughty minister, at whose frown they had so lately trembled. His right hand was cut off, and carried through the streets of Constantinople, in cruel mockery, to extort contributions for the avaricious tyrant, whose head was publicly exposed, borne aloft on the point of a long lance. 31 According to the savage maxims of the Greek republics, his innocent family would have shared the punishment of his crimes. The wife and daughter of Rufinus were indebted for their safety to the influence of religion. Her sanctuary protected them from the raging madness of the people; and they were permitted to spend the remainder of their lives in the exercise of Christian devotions, in the peaceful retirement of Jerusalem. The servile poet of Stilicho applauds, with ferocious joy, this horrid deed, which, in the execution, perhaps, of justice, violated every law of nature and society, profaned the majesty of the prince, and renewed the dangerous examples of military license. The contemplation of the universal order and harmony had satisfied Claudian of the existence of the Deity; but the prosperous impunity of vice appeared to contradict his moral attributes; and the fate of Rufinus was the only event which could dispel the religious doubts of the poet. 33 Such an act might vindicate the honor of Providence, but it did not much contribute to the happiness of the people…. Even Stilicho did not derive from the murder of his rival the fruit which he had proposed; and though he gratified his revenge, his ambition was disappointed. Under the name of a favorite, the weakness of Arcadius required a master, but he naturally preferred the obsequious arts of the eunuch Eutropius, who had obtained his domestic confidence: and the emperor contemplated, with terror and aversion, the stern genius of a foreign warrior…. Chapter LI: Conquests By The Arabs.—Part I. The revolution of Arabia had not changed the character of the Arabs: the death of Mahomet was the signal of independence; and the hasty structure of his power and religion tottered to its foundations. A small and faithful band of his primitive disciples had listened to his eloquence, and shared his distress; had fled with the apostle from the persecution of Mecca, or had received the fugitive in the walls of Medina. The increasing myriads, who acknowledged Mahomet as their king and prophet, had been compelled by his arms, or allured by his prosperity. The polytheists were confounded by the simple idea of a solitary and invisible God; the pride of the Christians and Jews disdained the yoke of a mortal and contemporary legislator. The habits of faith and obedience were not sufficiently confirmed; and many of the new converts regretted the venerable antiquity of the law of Moses, or the rites and mysteries of the Catholic church; or the idols, the sacrifices, the joyous festivals, of their Pagan ancestors. The jarring interests and hereditary feuds of the Arabian tribes had not yet coalesced in a system of union and subordination; and the Barbarians were impatient of the mildest and most salutary laws that curbed their passions, or violated their customs…. From the rapid conquests of the Saracens a presumption will naturally arise, that the caliphs 311 commanded in person the armies of the faithful, and sought the crown of martyrdom in the foremost ranks of the battle. The courage of Abubeker, 4 Omar, 5 and Othman, 6 had indeed been tried in the persecution and wars of the prophet; and the personal assurance of paradise must have taught them to despise the pleasures and dangers of the present world. But they ascended the throne in a venerable or mature age; and esteemed the domestic cares of religion and justice the most important duties of a sovereign. Except the presence of Omar at the siege of Jerusalem, their longest expeditions were the frequent pilgrimage from Medina to Mecca; and they calmly received the tidings of victory as they prayed or preached before the sepulchre of the prophet. The austere and frugal measure of their lives was the effect of virtue or habit, and the pride of their simplicity insulted the vain magnificence of the kings of the earth. When Abubeker assumed the office of caliph, he enjoined his daughter Ayesha to take a strict account of his private patrimony, that it might be evident whether he were enriched or impoverished by the service of the state. He thought himself entitled to a stipend of three pieces of gold, with the sufficient maintenance of a single camel and a black slave; but on the Friday of each week he distributed the residue of his own and the public money, first to the most worthy, and then to the most indigent, of the Moslems. The remains of his wealth, a coarse garment, and five pieces of gold, were delivered to his successor, who lamented with a modest sigh his own inability to equal such an admirable model. Yet the abstinence and humility of Omar were not inferior to the virtues of Abubeker: his food consisted of barley bread or dates; his drink was water; he preached in a gown that was torn or tattered in twelve places; and the Persian satrap, who paid his homage to the conqueror, found him asleep among the beggars on the steps of the mosch of Medina…. Under his reign, and that of his predecessor, the conquerors of the East were the trusty servants of God and the people; the mass of the public treasure was consecrated to the expenses of peace and war; a prudent mixture of justice and bounty maintained the discipline of the Saracens, and they united, by a rare felicity, the despatch and execution of despotism with the equal and frugal maxims of a republican government. The heroic courage of Ali, 7 the consummate prudence of Moawiyah, 8 excited the emulation of their subjects; and the talents which had been exercised in the school of civil discord were more usefully applied to propagate the faith and dominion of the prophet. In the sloth and vanity of the palace of Damascus, the succeeding princes of the house of Ommiyah were alike destitute of the qualifications of statesmen and of saints. 9 Yet the spoils of unknown nations were continually laid at the foot of their throne, and the uniform ascent of the Arabian greatness must be ascribed to the spirit of the nation rather than the abilities of their chiefs. A large deduction must be allowed for the weakness of their enemies. The birth of Mahomet was fortunately placed in the most degenerate and disorderly period of the Persians, the Romans, and the Barbarians of Europe: the empires of Trajan, or even of Constantine or Charlemagne, would have repelled the assault of the naked Saracens, and the torrent of fanaticism might have been obscurely lost in the sands of Arabia…. In the ten years of the administration of Omar, the Saracens reduced to his obedience thirty-six thousand cities or castles, destroyed four thousand churches or temples of the unbelievers, and edified fourteen hundred moschs for the exercise of the religion of Mahomet. One hundred years after his flight from Mecca, the arms and the reign of his successors extended from India to the Atlantic Ocean, over the various and distant provinces, which may be comprised under the names of, I. Persia; II. Syria; III. Egypt; IV. Africa; and, V. Spain. Under this general division, I shall proceed to unfold these memorable transactions; despatching with brevity the remote and less interesting conquests of the East, and reserving a fuller narrative for those domestic countries which had been included within the pale of the Roman empire…. In the first year of the first caliph, his lieutenant Caled, the Sword of God, and the scourge of the infidels, advanced to the banks of the Euphrates, and reduced the cities of Anbar and Hira. Westward of the ruins of Babylon, a tribe of sedentary Arabs had fixed themselves on the verge of the desert; and Hira was the seat of a race of kings who had embraced the Christian religion, and reigned above six hundred years under the shadow of the throne of Persia. 16 The last of the Mondars 1611 was defeated and slain by Caled; his son was sent a captive to Medina; his nobles bowed before the successor of the prophet; the people was tempted by the example and success of their countrymen; and the caliph accepted as the first-fruits of foreign conquest an annual tribute of seventy thousand pieces of gold. The conquerors, and even their historians, were astonished by the dawn of their future greatness: “In the same year,” says Elmacin, “Caled fought many signal battles: an immense multitude of the infidels was slaughtered; and spoils infinite and innumerable were acquired by the victorious Moslems.” 17 But the invincible Caled was soon transferred to the Syrian war: the invasion of the Persian frontier was conducted by less active or less prudent commanders: the Saracens were repulsed with loss in the passage of the Euphrates; and, though they chastised the insolent pursuit of the Magians, their remaining forces still hovered in the desert of Babylon…. The morning of the succeeding day 2011 determined the fate of Persia; and a seasonable whirlwind drove a cloud of dust against the faces of the unbelievers. The clangor of arms was reechoed to the tent of Rustam, who, far unlike the ancient hero of his name, was gently reclining in a cool and tranquil shade, amidst the baggage of his camp, and the train of mules that were laden with gold and silver. On the sound of danger he started from his couch; but his flight was overtaken by a valiant Arab, who caught him by the foot, struck off his head, hoisted it on a lance, and instantly returning to the field of battle, carried slaughter and dismay among the thickest ranks of the Persians. The Saracens confess a loss of seven thousand five hundred men; 2012 and the battle of Cadesia is justly described by the epithets of obstinate and atrocious. 21 The standard of the monarchy was overthrown and captured in the field—a leathern apron of a blacksmith, who in ancient times had arisen the deliverer of Persia; but this badge of heroic poverty was disguised, and almost concealed, by a profusion of precious gems. 22 After this victory, the wealthy province of Irak, or Assyria, submitted to the caliph, and his conquests were firmly established by the speedy foundation of Bassora, 23 a place which ever commands the trade and navigation of the Persians…. Chapter LI: Conquests By The Arabs.—Part III. One of the fifteen provinces of Syria, the cultivated lands to the eastward of the Jordan, had been decorated by Roman vanity with the name of Arabia; and the first arms of the Saracens were justified by the semblance of a national right. The country was enriched by the various benefits of trade; by the vigilance of the emperors it was covered with a line of forts; and the populous cities of Gerasa, Philadelphia, and Bosra, were secure, at least from a surprise, by the solid structure of their walls…. The conquest of Bosra, four days’ journey from Damascus, encouraged the Arabs to besiege the ancient capital of Syria. At some distance from the walls, they encamped among the groves and fountains of that delicious territory, and the usual option of the Mahometan faith, of tribute or of war, was proposed to the resolute citizens, who had been lately strengthened by a reenforcement of five thousand Greeks. In the decline, as in the infancy, of the military art, a hostile defiance was frequently offered and accepted by the generals themselves: many a lance was shivered in the plain of Damascus, and the personal prowess of Caled was signalized in the first sally of the besieged. After an obstinate combat, he had overthrown and made prisoner one of the Christian leaders, a stout and worthy antagonist. He instantly mounted a fresh horse, the gift of the governor of Palmyra, and pushed forwards to the front of the battle. “Repose yourself for a moment,” said his friend Derar, “and permit me to supply your place: you are fatigued with fighting with this dog.” “O Dear!” replied the indefatigable Saracen, “we shall rest in the world to come. He that labors to-day shall rest to-morrow.” With the same unabated ardor, Caled answered, encountered, and vanquished a second champion; and the heads of his two captives who refused to abandon their religion were indignantly hurled into the midst of the city. The event of some general and partial actions reduced the Damascenes to a closer defence: but a messenger, whom they dropped from the walls, returned with the promise of speedy and powerful succor, and their tumultuous joy conveyed the intelligence to the camp of the Arabs. After some debate, it was resolved by the generals to raise, or rather to suspend, the siege of Damascus, till they had given battle to the forces of the emperor… Heraclius…. An army of seventy thousand veterans, or new levies, was assembled at Hems or Emesa, under the command of his general Werdan…. On the plain of Aiznadin, as Werdan rode on a white mule decorated with gold chains, and surrounded with ensigns and standards, he was surprised by the near approach of a fierce and naked warrior, who had undertaken to view the state of the enemy. The adventurous valor of Derar was inspired, and has perhaps been adorned, by the enthusiasm of his age and country. The hatred of the Christians, the love of spoil, and the contempt of danger, were the ruling passions of the audacious Saracen; and the prospect of instant death could never shake his religious confidence, or ruffle the calmness of his resolution, or even suspend the frank and martial pleasantry of his humor. In the most hopeless enterprises, he was bold, and prudent, and fortunate: after innumerable hazards, after being thrice a prisoner in the hands of the infidels, he still survived to relate the achievements, and to enjoy the rewards, of the Syrian conquest. On this occasion, his single lance maintained a flying fight against thirty Romans, who were detached by Werdan; and, after killing or unhorsing seventeen of their number, Derar returned in safety to his applauding brethren. When his rashness was mildly censured by the general, he excused himself with the simplicity of a soldier. “Nay,” said Derar, “I did not begin first: but they came out to take me, and I was afraid that God should see me turn my back: and indeed I fought in good earnest, and without doubt God assisted me against them; and had I not been apprehensive of disobeying your orders, I should not have come away as I did; and I perceive already that they will fall into our hands.” In the presence of both armies, a venerable Greek advanced from the ranks with a liberal offer of peace; and the departure of the Saracens would have been purchased by a gift to each soldier, of a turban, a robe, and a piece of gold; ten robes and a hundred pieces to their leader; one hundred robes and a thousand pieces to the caliph. A smile of indignation expressed the refusal of Caled. “Ye Christian dogs, you know your option; the Koran, the tribute, or the sword. We are a people whose delight is in war, rather than in peace: and we despise your pitiful alms, since we shall be speedily masters of your wealth, your families, and your persons.” Notwithstanding this apparent disdain, he was deeply conscious of the public danger: those who had been in Persia, and had seen the armies of Chosroes confessed that they never beheld a more formidable array. From the superiority of the enemy, the artful Saracen derived a fresh incentive of courage: “You see before you,” said he, “the united force of the Romans; you cannot hope to escape, but you may conquer Syria in a single day. The event depends on your discipline and patience. Reserve yourselves till the evening. It was in the evening that the Prophet was accustomed to vanquish.” During two successive engagements, his temperate firmness sustained the darts of the enemy, and the murmurs of his troops. At length, when the spirits and quivers of the adverse line were almost exhausted, Caled gave the signal of onset and victory. The remains of the Imperial army fled to Antioch, or Cæsarea, or Damascus; and the death of four hundred and seventy Moslems was compensated by the opinion that they had sent to hell above fifty thousand of the infidels…. The rest of the Arabian chiefs were fixed in their respective stations before the seven gates of Damascus; and the siege was renewed with fresh vigor and confidence. The art, the labor, the military engines, of the Greeks and Romans are seldom to be found in the simple, though successful, operations of the Saracens: it was sufficient for them to invest a city with arms, rather than with trenches; to repel the allies of the besieged; to attempt a stratagem or an assault; or to expect the progress of famine and discontent. Damascus would have acquiesced in the trial of Aiznadin, as a final and peremptory sentence between the emperor and the caliph; her courage was rekindled by the example and authority of Thomas, a noble Greek, illustrious in a private condition by the alliance of Heraclius. The tumult and illumination of the night proclaimed the design of the morning sally; and the Christian hero, who affected to despise the enthusiasm of the Arabs, employed the resource of a similar superstition. At the principal gate, in the sight of both armies, a lofty crucifix was erected; the bishop, with his clergy, accompanied the march, and laid the volume of the New Testament before the image of Jesus; and the contending parties were scandalized or edified by a prayer that the Son of God would defend his servants and vindicate his truth. The battle raged with incessant fury; and the dexterity of Thomas, an incomparable archer, was fatal to the boldest Saracens, till their death was revenged by a female heroine. The wife of Aban, who had followed him to the holy war, embraced her expiring husband. “Happy,” said she, “happy art thou, my dear: thou art gone to thy Lord, who first joined us together, and then parted us asunder. I will revenge thy death, and endeavor to the utmost of my power to come to the place where thou art, because I love thee. Henceforth shall no man ever touch me more, for I have dedicated myself to the service of God.” Without a groan, without a tear, she washed the corpse of her husband, and buried him with the usual rites. Then grasping the manly weapons, which in her native land she was accustomed to wield, the intrepid widow of Aban sought the place where his murderer fought in the thickest of the battle. Her first arrow pierced the hand of his standard-bearer; her second wounded Thomas in the eye; and the fainting Christians no longer beheld their ensign or their leader. Yet the generous champion of Damascus refused to withdraw to his palace: his wound was dressed on the rampart; the fight was continued till the evening; and the Syrians rested on their arms. In the silence of the night, the signal was given by a stroke on the great bell; the gates were thrown open, and each gate discharged an impetuous column on the sleeping camp of the Saracens. Caled was the first in arms: at the head of four hundred horse he flew to the post of danger, and the tears trickled down his iron cheeks, as he uttered a fervent ejaculation; “O God, who never sleepest, look upon they servants, and do not deliver them into the hands of their enemies.” The valor and victory of Thomas were arrested by the presence of the Sword of God; with the knowledge of the peril, the Moslems recovered their ranks, and charged the assailants in the flank and rear. After the loss of thousands, the Christian general retreated with a sigh of despair, and the pursuit of the Saracens was checked by the military engines of the rampart. After a siege of seventy days, the patience, and perhaps the provisions, of the Damascenes were exhausted; and the bravest of their chiefs submitted to the hard dictates of necessity. In the occurrences of peace and war, they had been taught to dread the fierceness of Caled, and to revere the mild virtues of Abu Obeidah. At the hour of midnight, one hundred chosen deputies of the clergy and people were introduced to the tent of that venerable commander. He received and dismissed them with courtesy. They returned with a written agreement, on the faith of a companion of Mahomet, that all hostilities should cease; that the voluntary emigrants might depart in safety, with as much as they could carry away of their effects; and that the tributary subjects of the caliph should enjoy their lands and houses, with the use and possession of seven churches. On these terms, the most respectable hostages, and the gate nearest to his camp, were delivered into his hands: his soldiers imitated the moderation of their chief; and he enjoyed the submissive gratitude of a people whom he had rescued from destruction. But the success of the treaty had relaxed their vigilance, and in the same moment the opposite quarter of the city was betrayed and taken by assault. A party of a hundred Arabs had opened the eastern gate to a more inexorable foe. “No quarter,” cried the rapacious and sanguinary Caled, “no quarter to the enemies of the Lord:” his trumpets sounded, and a torrent of Christian blood was poured down the streets of Damascus. When he reached the church of St. Mary, he was astonished and provoked by the peaceful aspect of his companions; their swords were in the scabbard, and they were surrounded by a multitude of priests and monks. Abu Obeidah saluted the general: “God,” said he, “has delivered the city into my hands by way of surrender, and has saved the believers the trouble of fighting.” “And am I not,” replied the indignant Caled, “am I not the lieutenant of the commander of the faithful? Have I not taken the city by storm? The unbelievers shall perish by the sword. Fall on.” The hungry and cruel Arabs would have obeyed the welcome command; and Damascus was lost, if the benevolence of Abu Obeidah had not been supported by a decent and dignified firmness. Throwing himself between the trembling citizens and the most eager of the Barbarians, he adjured them, by the holy name of God, to respect his promise, to suspend their fury, and to wait the determination of their chiefs. The chiefs retired into the church of St. Mary; and after a vehement debate, Caled submitted in some measure to the reason and authority of his colleague; who urged the sanctity of a covenant, the advantage as well as the honor which the Moslems would derive from the punctual performance of their word, and the obstinate resistance which they must encounter from the distrust and despair of the rest of the Syrian cities. It was agreed that the sword should be sheathed, that the part of Damascus which had surrendered to Abu Obeidah, should be immediately entitled to the benefit of his capitulation, and that the final decision should be referred to the justice and wisdom of the caliph. A large majority of the people accepted the terms of toleration and tribute; and Damascus is still peopled by twenty thousand Christians. But the valiant Thomas, and the free-born patriots who had fought under his banner, embraced the alternative of poverty and exile. In the adjacent meadow, a numerous encampment was formed of priests and laymen, of soldiers and citizens, of women and children: they collected, with haste and terror, their most precious movables; and abandoned, with loud lamentations, or silent anguish, their native homes, and the pleasant banks of the Pharpar. The inflexible soul of Caled was not touched by the spectacle of their distress: he disputed with the Damascenes the property of a magazine of corn; endeavored to exclude the garrison from the benefit of the treaty; consented, with reluctance, that each of the fugitives should arm himself with a sword, or a lance, or a bow; and sternly declared, that, after a respite of three days, they might be pursued and treated as the enemies of the Moslems….. At the head of four thousand horse, in the disguise of Christian Arabs, Caled undertook the pursuit. They halted only for the moments of prayer; and their guide had a perfect knowledge of the country. For a long way the footsteps of the Damascenes were plain and conspicuous: they vanished on a sudden; but the Saracens were comforted by the assurance that the caravan had turned aside into the mountains, and must speedily fall into their hands. In traversing the ridges of the Libanus, they endured intolerable hardships, and the sinking spirits of the veteran fanatics were supported and cheered by the unconquerable ardor of a lover. From a peasant of the country, they were informed that the emperor had sent orders to the colony of exiles to pursue without delay the road of the sea-coast, and of Constantinople, apprehensive, perhaps, that the soldiers and people of Antioch might be discouraged by the sight and the story of their sufferings. The Saracens were conducted through the territories of Gabala and Laodicea, at a cautious distance from the walls of the cities; the rain was incessant, the night was dark, a single mountain separated them from the Roman army; and Caled, ever anxious for the safety of his brethren, whispered an ominous dream in the ear of his companion. With the dawn of day, the prospect again cleared, and they saw before them, in a pleasant valley, the tents of Damascus. After a short interval of repose and prayer, Caled divided his cavalry into four squadrons, committing the first to his faithful Derar, and reserving the last for himself. They successively rushed on the promiscuous multitude, insufficiently provided with arms, and already vanquished by sorrow and fatigue. Except a captive, who was pardoned and dismissed, the Arabs enjoyed the satisfaction of believing that not a Christian of either sex escaped the edge of their cimeters. The gold and silver of Damascus was scattered over the camp, and a royal wardrobe of three hundred load of silk might clothe an army of naked Barbarians. In the tumult of the battle, Jonas sought and found the object of his pursuit: but her resentment was inflamed by the last act of his perfidy; and as Eudocia struggled in his hateful embraces, she struck a dagger to her heart. Another female, the widow of Thomas, and the real or supposed daughter of Heraclius, was spared and released without a ransom; but the generosity of Caled was the effect of his contempt; and the haughty Saracen insulted, by a message of defiance, the throne of the Cæsars. Caled had penetrated above a hundred and fifty miles into the heart of the Roman province: he returned to Damascus with the same secrecy and speed On the accession of Omar, the Sword of God was removed from the command; but the caliph, who blamed the rashness, was compelled to applaud the vigor and conduct, of the enterprise.”

Domesday Book and Beyond, by Frederic William Maitland, The Project Gutenberg

eBook, Release Date: July 19, 2013 [eBook #43255], CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, C. F. CLAY, Manager. London: FETTER LANE, E.C. Glasgow: 50, WELLINGTON STREET, First Edition 1897. Reprinted 1907

“ESSAY I. DOMESDAY BOOK. Domesday Book and its satellites. At midwinter in

the year 1085 William the Conqueror wore his crown at Gloucester and there he had deep speech with his wise men. The outcome of that speech was the mission throughout all England of ‘barons,’ ‘legates’ or ‘justices’ charged with the duty of collecting from the verdicts of the shires, the hundreds and the vills a descriptio of his new realm. The outcome of that mission was the descriptio preserved for us in two manuscript volumes, which within a century after their making had already acquired the name of Domesday Book…. Domesday a geld book. To say that Domesday Book is no collection of laws or treatise on law would be needless. Very seldom does it state any rule in general terms, and when it does so we shall usually find cause for believing that this rule is itself an exception, a local custom, a provincial privilege. Thus, if we are to come by general rules, we must obtain them inductively by a comparison of many thousand particular instances. But further, Domesday Book is no register of title, no register of all those rights and facts which constitute the system of land-holdership. One great purpose seems to mould both its form and its substance; it is a geld-book. Danegeld. When Duke William became king of the English, he found (so he might well think) among the most valuable of his newly acquired regalia, a right to levy a land-tax under the name of geld or danegeld. A detailed history of that tax cannot be written. It is under the year 991 that our English chronicle first mentions a tribute paid to the Danes[8]; £10,000 was then paid to them. In 994 the yet larger sum of £16,000[9] was levied…. With a Dane upon the throne, this tribute seems to have become an occasional war-tax. How often it was levied we cannot tell; but that it was levied more than once by the Confessor is not doubtful[16]. We are told that he abolished it in or about the year 1051, some eight or nine years after his accession, some fifteen before his death. No sooner was William crowned than ‘he laid on men a geld exceeding stiff.’ In the next year ‘he set a mickle geld’ on the people. In the winter of 1083–4 he raised a geld of 72 pence (6 Norman shillings) upon the hide…. But grievous as was the tax which immediately preceded the making of the survey, we are not entitled to infer that it was of unprecedented severity…. If the huge sums mentioned by the chronicler had really been exacted, and that too within the memory of men who were yet living, William might well regard the right to levy a geld as the most precious jewel in his English crown. To secure a due and punctual payment of it was worth a gigantic effort, a survey such as had never been made and a record such as had never been penned since the grandest days of the old Roman Empire. But further, the assessment of the geld sadly needed reform. Owing to one cause and another, owing to privileges and immunities that had been capriciously granted, owing also, so we think, to a radically vicious method of computing the geldable areas of counties and hundreds, the old assessment was full of anomalies and iniquities. Some estates were over-rated, others were scandalously under-rated. That William intended to correct the old assessment, or rather to sweep it away and put a new assessment in its stead, seems highly probable, though it has not been proved that either he or his sons accomplished this feat[18]…. All the lands, all the land-holders of England may be brought before us, but we are told only of such facts, such rights, such legal relationships as bear on the actual or potential payment of geld…. Here and there the peculiar customs of a shire or a borough will be stated, and incidentally the services that certain tenants owe to their lords may be noticed. But all this is done sporadically and unsystematically. Our record is no register of title, it is no feodary, it is no custumal, it is no rent roll; it is a tax book, a geld book. The survey and the geld system. We say this, not by way of vain complaint against its meagreness, but because in our belief a care for geld and for all that concerns the assessment and payment of geld colours far more deeply than commentators have usually supposed the information that is given to us about other matters. We should not be surprised if definitions and distinctions which at first sight have little enough to do with fiscal arrangements, for example the definition of a manor and the distinction between a villein and a ‘free man,’ involved references to the apportionment and the levy of the land-tax. Often enough it happens that legal ideas of a very general kind are defined by fiscal rules; for example, our modern English idea of ‘occupation’ has become so much part and parcel of a system of assessment that lawyers are always ready to argue that a certain man must be an ‘occupier’ because such men as he are rated to the relief of the poor…. 2. THE SERFS. The serfs in Domesday Book. The existence of some 25,000 serfs is recorded. In the thirteenth century servus and villanus are, at least among lawyers, equivalent words. The only unfree man is the ‘serf-villein’ and the lawyers are trying to subject him to the curious principle that he is the lord’s chattel but a free man in relation to all but his lord[61]. It is far otherwise in Domesday Book. In entry after entry and county after county the servi are kept well apart from the villani, bordarii, cotarii. Often they are mentioned in quite another context to that in which the villani are enumerated. As an instance we may take a manor in Surrey[62]:—‘In demesne there are 5 teams and there are 25 villani and 6 bordarii with 14 teams. There is one mill of 2 shillings and one fishery and one church and 4 acres of meadow, and wood for 150 pannage pigs, and 2 stone-quarries of 2 shillings and 2 nests of hawks in the wood and 10 servi.’ Often enough the servi are placed between two other sources of wealth, the church and the mill…. Legal position of the serf. Of the legal position of the servus Domesday Book tells us little or nothing; but earlier and later documents oblige us to think of him as a slave, one who in the main has no legal rights. He is the theów of the Anglo-Saxon dooms, the servus of the ecclesiastical canons. But though we do right in calling him a slave, still we might well be mistaken were we to think of the line which divides him from other men as being as sharp as the line which a mature jurisprudence will draw between thing and person. We may well doubt whether this principle—‘The slave is a thing, not a person’—can be fully understood by a grossly barbarous age. It implies the idea of a person, and in the world of sense we find not persons but men…. Prædial element in serfage. In the second place, we may guess that from a remote time there has been in the condition of the theów a certain element of praediality. The slaves have not been worked in gangs nor housed in barracks[67]. The servus has often been a servus casatus, he has had a cottage or even a manse and yardland which de facto he might call his own. There is here no legal limitation of his master’s power. Some slave trade there has been; but on the whole it seems probable that the theów has been usually treated as annexed to a tenement. The duties exacted of him from year to year have remained constant. The consequence is that a free man in return for a plot of land may well agree to do all that a theów usually does and see in this no descent into slavery. Thus the slave gets a chance of acquiring what will be as a matter of fact a peculium. In the seventh century the church tried to turn this matter of fact into matter of law. ‘Non licet homini,’ says Theodore’s Penitential, ‘a servo tollere pecuniam, quam ipse labore suo adquesierit[68].’ We have no reason for thinking that this effort was very strenuous or very successful, or that the law of the eleventh century allowed the servus any proprietary rights; and yet he might often be the occupier of land and of chattels with which, so long as he did his customary services, his lord would seldom meddle. The serf in criminal law. In the third place, we may believe that for some time past police law and punitive law have been doing something to conceal, if not to obliterate, the line which separates the slave from other men. A mature jurisprudence may be able to hold fast the fundamental principle that a slave is not a person but a thing, while at the same time it both limits the master’s power of abusing his human chattel and guards against those dangers which may arise from the existence of things which have wills, and sometimes bad wills, of their own. But an immature jurisprudence is incapable of this exploit. It begins to play fast and loose with its elementary notions. It begins to punish the criminous slave without being quite certain as to how far it is punishing him and how far it is punishing his master. Confusion is easy, for if the slave be punished by death or mutilation, his master will suffer, and a pecuniary mulct exacted from the slave is exacted from his master…. . For a long time past the law has had before it the difficult problem of dealing with crimes and delicts committed by poor and economically dependent free men, men who have no land of their own, who are here to-day and gone to-morrow, ‘men from whom no right can be had.’ It has been endeavouring to make the lords answerable to a certain extent for the misdeeds of their free retainers. If a slave is charged with a crime his master is bound to produce him in court. But the law requires that the lord shall in very similar fashion produce his free ‘loaf eater,’ his mainpast, nay, it has been endeavouring to enforce the rule that every free man who has no land of his own shall have a lord bound to produce him when he is accused. Also it has been fostering the growth of private justice. The lord’s duty of producing his men, bond and free, has been becoming the duty of holding a court in which his men, free and bond, will answer for themselves…. 8. The Feudal Superstructure…. Dependent tenure. The general theory that all land tenure, except indeed the tenure by which the king holds land in demesne, is dependent tenure, seems to be implied, not only by many particular entries, but also by the whole scheme of the book. Every holder of land, except the king, holds it of (de) some lord, and therefore every acre of land that is not royal demesne can be arranged under the name of some tenant in chief. Even a church will hold its land, if not of the king, then of some other lord[618]. The terms of the tenure are but very rarely described, for Domesday Book is no feodary…. We shall remark, however, the absence of those abstract terms which are to become the names of the various tenures. We read of servientes, sochemanni, villani, burgenses, but not of seriantia[623], socagium, villenagium, burgagium. As we pursue our retrogressive course through the middle ages, we do not find that the law of personal condition becomes more and more distinct from the law of land tenure; on the contrary, the two become less and less separable…. The king as landlord. King William is much richer than King Edward was. The Conqueror has been chary in appointing earls and consequently he has in his hand, not only the royal manors, but also a great many comital manors, to say nothing of some other estates which, for one reason or another, he has kept to himself. Edward had been rich, but when compared with his earls he had not been extravagantly rich…. The royal demesne had been a scattered territory; the king had something in most shires, but was far richer in some than in others. It was not so much in the number of his manors as in their size and value that he excelled the richest of his subjects. Somehow or another he had acquired many of those vills which were to be the smaller boroughs and the market towns of later days. We may well suppose that from of old the vills that a king would wish to get and to keep would be the flourishing vills, but again we can not doubt that many a vill has prospered because it was the king’s…. The comital manors. As with the estates of the king, so with the estates of the earls, we find it impossible to distinguish between private property and official property. Certain manors are regarded as the ‘manors of the shire’ (mansiones de comitatu[682]); certain vills are ‘comital vills[683],’ they belong to ‘the consulate[684].’ Hereditary right tempered by outlawry was fast becoming the title by which the earldoms were holden. The position of the house of Leofric in Mercia was far from being as strong as the position of the house of Rolf in Normandy, and yet we may be sure that King Harold would not have been able to treat the sons of Ælfgar as removable officers…. Private rights and governmental revenues. The wealth of the earls is a matter of great importance. If we subtract the estates of the king, the estates of the earls, and the estates of the churches—and, as we shall see hereafter, the churches had obtained the bulk of their wealth directly from the kings,—if we subtract again the lands which the king, the earls, the churches have granted to their thegns, the England of 1065 will not appear to us a land of very great landowners, and we may obtain a valuable hint as to one of the origins of feudalism. A vast amount of land is or has recently been held by office-holders, by the holders of the kingship, the earlships, or the ealdormanships. We seem to see their proprietary rights arising in the sphere of public law, growing out of governmental rights, which however themselves are conceived as being in some sort proprietary. Many a passage in Domesday Book will suggest to us that a right to take tribute and a right to take the profits of justice have helped to give the king and the earls their manors and their seignories…. The English state. If now we look at that English state which is the outcome of a purely English history, we see that it has already taken a pyramidal or conical shape. It is a society of lords and men. At its base are the cultivators of the soil, at its apex is the king. This cone is as yet but low. Even at the end of William’s reign the peasant seldom had more than two lords between him and the king, but already in the Confessor’s reign he might well have three[696]. Also the cone is obtuse: the angle at its apex will grow acuter under Norman rulers. We can indeed obtain no accurate statistics, but the number of landholders who were King Edward’s men must have been much larger than the tale of the Norman tenants in chief. In the geographical distribution of the large estates under William there is but little more regularity than there was under his predecessor…. Still a great change took place in the substance of the cone, or if that substance is made up of lords and men and acres, then in the nature of, or rather the relation between, the forces which held the atoms together. Every change makes for symmetry, simplicity, consolidation. Some of these changes will seem to us predestined…. But if England was not to be for ever a prey to rebellions and civil wars, the power of the lords over their men must have been—not indeed increased, but—territorialized; the liberty of ‘going with one’s land to whatever lord one chose’ must have been curtailed. As yet the central force embodied in the kingship was too feeble to deal directly with every one of its subjects, to govern them and protect them. The intermediation of the lords was necessary; the state could not but be pyramidal; and, while this was so, the freedom that men had of forsaking one lord for another, of forsaking even the king for the ambitious earl, was a freedom that was akin to anarchy. Such a liberty must have its wings clipt; free contract must be taught to know its place; the lord’s hold over the man’s land must become permanent…. Again, we may guess, if we please, that but for the Norman Conquest the mass of the English peasantry would never have fallen so low as fall it did. The ‘sokemen’ would hardly have been turned into ‘villeins,’ the ‘villeins’ would hardly have become ‘serfs.’ And yet the villeins of the Confessor’s time were in a perilous position. Already they were occupying lands which for two most important purposes were reckoned the lands of their lords, lands for which their lords gelded, lands for which their lords fought…”

            How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization by Thomas E. Woods, Jr., Ph.D., Copyright 2005, Published by Regnery Publishing, Inc., Distributed by National Book Network

            “CHAPTER 1: The Indispensable Church  Philip Jenkins, distinguished professor of history and religious studies at Pennsylvania State University, has called anti-Catholicism the one remaining acceptable prejudice in America. His assessment is difficult to dispute. In our media and popular culture, little is off-limits when it comes to ridiculing or parodying the Church. My own students, to the extent that they know anything at all about the Church, are typically familiar only with alleged Church ‘corruption,’” (HAH!) “of which they heard ceaseless tales of varying credibility from their high school teachers. The story of Catholicism, as far as they know, is one of ignorance, repression, and stagnation. That Western Civilization stands indebted to the Church for the university system, charitable work, international law, the sciences, important legal principles, and much else besides has not been impressed upon them with terrific zeal….Western civilization does not derive entirely from Catholicism of course; one can scarcely deny the importance of ancient Greece and Rome or of the various Germanic tribes that succeeded the Roman Empire in the West as formative influences on our civilization. The Church repudiated none of these traditions, and in fact absorbed and learned from the best of them….With the exception of scholars of medieval Europe, most people believe that the thousand years prior to the Renaissance were a time of ignorance and intellectual repression in which vigorous debate and lively intellectual exchange did not occur, and that strict conformity was ruthlessly imposed on whatever scholarly community might be said to have existed…. Even some professional authors can still be found giving credence to this view. In the course of some research I came across a 2001 book called Second Messiah by Christopher Knight and Robert Lomas. These authors paint a picture of the Catholic Church and its influence on Western civilization that could not be more wrong…. For example, we read:… ‘Everything that was good and proper was despised and all branches of human achievement were ignored in the name of Jesus Christ.’…Not Mentioned by Knight and Lomas is that it was in ‘Dark Age’ Europe that the university system, a gift of Western civilization to the world, was developed by the Catholic Church. Historians have marveled at the extent to which intellectual debate in those universities was free and unfettered. The exaltation of human reason and its capabilities, a commitment to rigorous and rational debate, a promotion of intellectual inquiry and scholarly exchange – all sponsored by the Church – provided the framework for the Scientific Revolution, which was unique to Western Civilization…. One can scarcely find a significant endeavor in the advancement of civilization during the early Middle Ages in which the monks did not play a major role. As one study described it, the monks gave ‘the whole of Europe…a network of model factories, centers for breeding livestock, centers of scholarship, spiritual fervor, the art of living…readiness for social action – in a word…advanced civilization that emerged from the chaotic waves of surrounding barbarity. Without any doubt, Saint Benedict [the most important architect of Western monasticism] was the Father of Europe. The Benedictines, his children, were the Fathers of European civilization.’… CHAPTER 2: A Light in the Darkness  The term ‘Dark Ages’ was once applied to the entire millennium separating the period of late antiquity from the Renaissance. Nowadays, there is widespread acknowledgement of the accomplishments of the High Middle Ages. As David Knowles points out, scholars have begun more and more to push the “Dark Age” designation back still further, excluding the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries from that dubious distinction. Still, there can be little doubt that the sixth and seventh centuries were marked by cultural and intellectual retrogression, in terms of education, literary output, and similar indicators. Was that the Church’s fault? Historian Will Durant – an agnostic – defended the Church against this charge decades ago, placing blame for the decline not on the Church, which did everything it could to reverse it, but on the barbarian invasions of late antiquity…. In the eighth century, the Church blessed the official transfer of power from the Merovingian dynasty to the Carolingian family – the family of Charles Martel, who had famously defeated the Muslims at Tours in 732, and ultimately of Charles the Great or Charlemagne, who would become known as the Father of Europe…. Under the influence of the Church, this barbarian people would be transformed into civilization builders…. Perhaps the central intellectual figure of the Carolingian Renaissance was Alcuin, an Anglo-Saxon who had been educated at York by a pupil of the Venerable Bede, the great saint and ecclesiastical historian who was one of the greatest intellects of his day…. Knowledge of Latin made possible both the study of the Latin Church fathers and the classical world of ancient Rome. In fact, the oldest surviving copies of most ancient Roman literature date back to the ninth century, when Carolingian scholars rescued them from oblivion…. Another achievement of the Carolingian Renaissance was an important innovation in writing known as “Carolingian miniscule.” Previously, geographical isolation had contributed to the growth of a variety of scripts throughout Western Europe, such that it eventually became difficult for people to decipher what their counterparts elsewhere were saying. The various scripts in use before the advent of Carolingian miniscule were difficult to read and time consuming to write; there were no lowercase letters, punctuation, or blank spaces between words…. Although most educated people think of the medieval monasteries’ scholarly and cultural pursuits as their contribution to Western Civilization, we should not overlook the monks’ important cultivation of what might be called the practical arts…. Manual labor, expressly called for in the Rule of Saint Benedict, played a central role in the monastic life. Although the Rule was known for its moderation and its aversion to exaggerated penances, we often find the monks freely embracing work that was difficult and unattractive, since for them such tasks were channels of grace and opportunities for mortification of the flesh. This was certainly true in the clearing and reclaiming of land…. Wherever they went, the monks introduced crops, industries, or production methods with which the people had not been previously familiar…. According to the Rule, ‘All guests who come shall be received as though they were Christ.’...  CHAPTER 5: The Church and Science…. Oddly enough, it was a Marxist historian, Joseph Needham, who really got to the bottom of this failure. In his view, the culprit was the religious and philosophical framework in which Chinese thinkers operated. Such a conclusion is all the more stunning given Needham’s Marxist ideology, which should have preferred some kind of economic or materialist explanation for the stillbirth of science in China….”

            THE GREAT HUNGER: IRELAND 1845-1849, by CECIL WOODHAM-SMITH, HARPER & ROW, PUBLISHERS, New York and Evanston, 1962

            “CHAPTER 1 (pg. 15)At the beginning of the year 1845 the state of Ireland was, as it had been for nearly seven hundred years, a source of grave anxiety to England. Ireland had first been invaded in 1169; it was now 1845, yet she had been neither assimilated nor subdued…. On January I, 180I, an event of enormous importance had taken place—the Act of Union between Ireland and England became operative. The two countries were made one, the economy of Ireland was assimilated into the economy of England, the Irish Parliament at Dublin disappeared and the Parliament at Westminster henceforward legislated for both countries…. At first sight it seemed that Ireland had everything to gain. Free Trade between Ireland and England meant that the discrimination hitherto practised by England against Irish industry would come to an end; united with English riches Ireland would gain the capital she desperately needed for development, while the hundred Irish Members who were to sit at Westminster would give Ireland, for the first time, a voice in Imperial affairs. Further, an impression had been created that when the Union became law Catholic emancipation would immediately follow…. The reality, however, was very different. The primary object of (pg. 16) the Union was not to assist and improve Ireland but to bring her more completely into subjection. Two years earlier, in 1798, the Irish had rebelled. England at that moment was in extreme danger, passing through the darkest days of her struggle with revolutionary France, and the rebels of ‘98 were assisted by French troops and with French money. The rebellion was put down with savagery, the strength of the army in Ireland was increased to a hundred thousand men, and the Union followed…. The hope of English investment proved a delusion. Free Trade between the two countries enabled England to use Ireland as a market for surplus English goods; Irish industry collapsed, unemployment was wide- spread, and Dublin, now that an Irish Parliament sat no longer in College Green, became a half-dead city. Above all, Catholic emancipation, expected to follow immediately on the Union, was only achieved, after a desperate struggle, in 1829. Ireland besought a repeal of the Union, and by 1843 the strength of the demand was seriously disquieting to the British Government. The Catholic peasantry was becoming organized, the commercial classes were being drawn in, substantial sums of money were being raised. All this was the work of one man, Daniel O'Connell, who gave up a brilliant career at the bar to devote his life to Ireland…. Self-government, not separation from England, was O’Connell’s aim; and he cherished a romantic admiration for Queen Victoria, 'the darling little Queen’. He had a lawyer's respect for the law, with a horror of armed rebellion which derived from his personal recollection of the hangings, torturings and floggings that had (pg. 17) followed the ‘98; his followers were pledged to obtain repeal only by legal and constitutional means. Nevertheless, the Repeal movement was felt by the Government to be menacing…. An Irish people united and controlled was an ominous spectacle, and the British Government, seized with something near panic, began to prepare ‘as if in hourly expectation of civil war’. Troops were hastily brought from England, barracks were fortified and provisioned to withstand a siege, Justices of the Peace who were repealers were dismissed, and in the courtyard of Dublin Castle a regiment of infantry was kept drawn up and under arms, in readiness to suppress a revolt…. Instead of ‘proclaiming’ the meeting at once, nothing was done until the eleventh hour, on the Saturday afternoon before the Sunday. Then the guns of the Pigeon House, the fort commanding Dublin Bay, were trained on Clontarf, warships entered Dublin Bay, and troops occupied the approaches to the meeting place when tens of thousands of people were massing. Had it not been for O’Connell’s creed that ‘human blood is no cement for the temple of liberty’ a massacre might have taken place; but O'Connell ordered the people to go home and, directed by his lieutenants, the vast multitude (pg. 18) quietly dispersed. No monster meeting took place, no disturbance occurred. Nevertheless, O'Connell was arrested a week later on a charge of trying to alter the constitution by force. Convicted by a ‘packed jury’, a partisan jury on which no Catholic or repealed was allowed to sit, he was sent to prison. The verdict was reversed by the House of Lords on September 24. 1844, and he was released. But for the movement the psychological moment had passed: the iron of Repeal had cooled and O'Connell himself was a changed man, while in prison he had ‘lost his nerve’. He was nearly seventy, and the strain of the monster meetings, followed by arrest, trial and imprisonment, even though he had been treated with consideration in prison, had broken his health.… In the political division of Europe which followed the Reformation, England and Ireland were on opposing sides. Henceforward, Irish (pg. 19) aspirations could only be fulfilled, Irish faith could only flourish, through the defeat of England and the triumph of her enemies. Freedom for Ireland meant Philip of Spain and the Inquisition in place of Elizabeth I, it meant James II instead of William III, it even meant, since misery and oppression make strange bedfellows, the victory of Napoleon…. Freedom for the one meant slavery for the other; victory for the one meant defeat for the other; the good of the one was the evil of the other. Ireland, resentful and hostile, lying only a day's sail, in fine weather, from Britain's coasts, for centuries provided a refuge for enemy agents, a hatching-ground for enemy plots; her motto was ‘England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity’, and in every crisis of England's history she seized the moment of weakness to stab her enemy in the back. It is the explanation, if not the excuse, for the ferocity with which the English have treated Ireland…. (pg. 20) All this wretchedness and misery could, almost without exception, be traced to a single source—the system under which land had come to be occupied and owned in Ireland, a system produced by centuries of successive conquests, rebellions, confiscations and punitive legislation. In I843, in the midst of the Repeal agitation, the British Government, recognizing that the land question was at the root of Irish (pg. 21) discontent, set up a Royal Commission ‘to inquire into the law and practice with regard to the occupation of land in Ireland’. This Commission, called the Devon Commission, after its chairman, the Earl of Devon, visited every part of Ireland, examined 1,100 witnesses, printed three huge volumes of evidence, and reported in February, 1845, a few months before the outbreak of the famine. Its secretary was an able and ‘improving’ landlord, John Pitt Kennedy, who had gained some celebrity as the author of a pamphlet on the Irish question entitled ‘Instruct: Employ: Don't Hang Them’. It adds to the weight of its conclusions that the Commission was a landlords’ Commission; every member who sat on it was a landowner, and O'Connell declared, ‘It is perfectly one-sided, all landlords and no tenants.’… (pg. 22) Under a practice known as ‘tenant right’, found mainly in Ulster, compensation for improvements was paid, and where the practice existed it was jealously guarded…. The Devon Commission stated that the superior prosperity and tranquillity of Ulster, compared with the rest of Ireland, were due to tenant right…. (pg. 23) A tenant of Lord Mountcashel's told the Devon Commission: ‘From the unbending integrity and honesty of Mr. Joy [the agent] we are considered as safe at will as under a lease. I have expended £500 without the scratch of a pen.’ He added, however: ‘But Lord Mountcashel may be gathered to his fathers and Mr. Joy may die, and another Pharaoh may arise who knew not Joseph.’… (pg. 24) Wretched though their condition might be, the pre-famine Irish peasants were not gloomy. ‘Their natural condition,’ wrote Sir Walter Scott during his visit to Ireland in 1825, ‘is turned towards gaiety and happiness,’ and the Census Commissioners noted ‘the proverbial gaiety and lightheartedness of the peasant people’. Dancing was the universal diversion, and Lord George Hill, who owned property in Donegal, has left an account of removing a cabin with dancing and fiddling. ‘The custom on such occasions is for the person who has the work to be done to hire a fiddler, upon which engagement all the neighbours joyously assemble and carry in an incredibly short time the stones and timber upon their backs to the new site; men, women and children alternately dancing and working while daylight lasts, at the termination of which they adjourn to some dwelling where they finish the night, often prolonging the dance to dawn of day.’… (pg. 26) There was, however, a darker and more sinister side to the Irish character. They are, said a land agent on the eve of the famine, ‘a very desperate people, with all this degree of courtesy, hospitality and cleverness amongst them.’

To understand the Irish of the nineteenth century and their blend of courage and evasiveness, tenacity and inertia, loyalty and double-dealing, it is necessary to go back to the Penal Laws…. (pg. 27) In broad outline, they barred Catholics from the army and navy, the law, commerce, and from every civic activity. No Catholic could vote, hold any office under the Crown, or purchase land, and Catholic estates were dismembered by an enactment directing that at the death of a Catholic owner his land was to be divided among all his sons, unless the eldest became a Protestant, when he would inherit the whole. Education was made almost impossible, since Catholics might not attend schools, nor keep schools, nor send their children to be educated abroad. The practice of the Catholic faith was proscribed; informing was encouraged as ‘an honourable service’ and priest-hunting treated as a sport…. (pg. 28) In these conditions suspicion of the law', of the ministers of the law and of all established authority ‘worked into the very nerves and blood of the Irish peasant’, and, since the law did not give him justice, he set up his own law. The secret societies which have been the curse of Ireland became widespread during the Penal period, and a succession of underground associations, Oak Boys, White Boys and Ribbon ten, gathering in bogs and lonely glens, flouted the law and dispensed a people's justice in the terrible form of revenge…. Nor were lawlessness, cruelty and revenge the only consequences. During the long Penal period, dissimulation became a moral necessity and evasion of the law the duty of every god-fearing Catholic. To worship according to his faith, the Catholic must attend illegal meetings; to protect his priest, he must be secret, cunning, and a concealer of the truth….”

            The Constitution of the United States of America: and Selected Writings of the Founding Fathers, Compilation… Copyright 2012, Barnes and Noble, Inc.  122 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10011

            “The Declaration of Independence, in Congress, July 4, 1776, The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America,  When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind, requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation… deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed: that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it…. The history of the present king of Great Britain, is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations ()… to prove this, let the facts be submitted to a candid world…. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the repository of their public records…. He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing, with manly firmness, his invasions on the rights of the people…. He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands…. He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers, to harass our people, and eat out their substance…. He has affected to render the military independent, of, and superior to, the civil power… for protecting them by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states, for cutting off our trade with all parts of the world…for suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever…. He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy (), scarcely parallelled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation…. Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren…. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity ()…. We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in general congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world… declare, that these United Colonies are, and of right to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES… and that, as free and independent states, they have the full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do….

On the Resolution to Put the Commonwealth into a State of Defence, by Patrick Henry (Delivered before the Virginia Convention, March 23, 1775),   Mr. President, no man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism as well as abilities of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the house. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen, if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the house is on of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate…. Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and having ears, hear not the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth, to know the worst, and to provide for it…. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports () with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation?... These are the implements of war and subjugation, the last arguments to which kings resort…. Our petitions have been slighted, our remonstrances () have produced additional violence and insult, our supplications have been disregarded, and we have been spurned with contempt from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation…. Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?... Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace, but there is no peace. The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle?... Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

The Story of the Church, by Inez Smith Davis, Fifth Edition Copyright 1955 – First Edition Copyright 1934, Harold Publishing House, Independence, Missouri

“Chapter 1 Background (pg. 11) Little more than a century ago our church had its beginnings in the pioneer village of Palmyra in western New York. The history we have made in the succeeding years has been vivid, colorful, and distinctive; so much so that thousands of writers have piled up books, pamphlets, magazine articles, sermons, novels, stories, and plays in such number that it would take a library to hold them all…. Zealous ministers of almost every other faith under the sun have added their rabid contributions and kindled many a fire, the acrid smoke of whose burning still obscures the clear facts of history. Peeved and disgruntled dissenters from our own ranks have occasionally added gossipy exposes, some of which have run into many undeserved editions. And eager but undiscriminating students have enriched the world with their "scientific" and psychological studies of "Mormonism."… (pg. 12) No malicious people ever enthroned in their philosophy as their highest ideal the belief that God is love and that all men are brothers. Such a philosophy comes from the hearts of poets, enthusiasts, prophets, "saints." To have missed the central faith and purpose of our belief is to have failed to know it at all; and the history of our church movement comprises, at its core, the more or less sporadic attempts of a people--incapacitated by human stupidities, human fears and prejudices, but actuated by lofty aspirations and glorious dreams--to frame their convictions into a system that will eventually regenerate the souls of men…. (pg. 13) The people had passed through a war of seven years' duration, and moral and religious decadence almost invariably follows war. A toppling over of the Episcopal Church in America was the natural result…. The year 1783 marked the closing of the Revolution, and left the people drunk with the idea of "liberty"--a liberty which needed to be interpreted to be made usable in the formation of a new government…. Throughout all our troubles, France had been our friend, or was so considered. The French Revolution found many partisans in the new republic. Everyone began to talk and write the new "liberty" jargon that was fashionable at the time. License, anarchy, infidelity were part of that jargon, even as the French fashions, the white cockade, and the address of "Citizen." France was frankly atheistic…. (pg. 15) It is not at all strange that the most intelligent and tolerant men in a community made no profession of faith, for so many religious people were so narrow and fanatical that they would be intolerable to the people who profess to belong to the same denominations today. "The most pious people in the beginning of the present century in the United States entertained a faith so unlike the belief of evangelical Christians as to almost create the impression that their religion was not the same religion we now have, and in which we now believe."… There was no power in the written word, or for that matter in the spoken word, to (pg. 16) produce a saving faith in anyone. Such faith, or "regeneration" as it was then called, was a gift from God, a miracle with which he transformed the hearts of his elect…. Chapter 2 The Great Revival (pg. 18) A "revival" movement among a people who had previously shown such little interest in religion and had indeed fostered assiduously an attitude of antipathy to it is one of the strangest chapters in American religious history. Perhaps stranger still was the fact that those most affected by the movement were in many cases the most unimaginative, phlegmatic, and common-sense backwoodsmen…. (pg. 19) In August, 1801, Barton Stone introduced the movement into Cane Ridge, Kentucky, and held one of the most famous camp meetings of all time…. Other Presbyterian ministers, McNamar, Thompson, Dunlavy, Marshall, David Purviance, began to hold similar services… says Stone ‘…that God required us to believe in his Son, and had given us sufficient evidence in his Word to produce faith in us, if attended to by us – that sinners were capable of understanding and believing this testimony, and of acting upon it by coming to the Savior and obeying him, and from him obtaining salvation and the Holy Spirit…. When we began first to preach these things, the people appeared as just awakened from the sleep of ages – they seemed to see for the first time that they were responsible beings, and that a refusal to use the means appointed, was a damning sin. (I gave more context than the book did from the Autobiography of Barton Stone)… Chapter 12 The Church Moves West (pg. 112) … At the Conference in Fayette, January 2, 1831, the last General Conference in New York, direction was given concerning the move to Ohio, and promise of a great endowment there was given…. (pg. 115) Kirtland had never been intended for more than a temporary stopping place for the Saints in their pilgrimage west to the Zion that was to be built on "the borders by the Lamanites."… (pg. 117) As the five men walked along, they talked over the gospel and made it a practice to read a chapter from the Bible and have a prayer every day. Arriving in what is now Kansas City, the party camped near the site of the historic old spring which is now directly at the foot of the extension of Charlotte Street…. Chapter 13 Pioneering in the West (pg. 126) …Charles Joseph Latrobe… was an Englishman traveling in America, and found much to amuse and entertain him in the manners of his partly civilized American cousins. He published his observations in The Rambler in North America… (pg. 127) ‘A young Negro took our horses with that affection of extreme politeness and good breeding, which is so highly amusing in many of his color, and which inclines me to think that they appreciate the character of a "fine gentlemen" more than any other part of the community . . . . We were met by the settler with the frank unceremonious bearing of his race…. (pg. 128) The meal which followed was plentiful and homely, and was dispatched first by the female and then by the male visitors, with the marvelous rapacity which is generally observable in the West; and, as I sat apart waiting till our turn should come, I was much amused with the bustle of the scene. I watched the plates run the gauntlet from the table to the washing-tub, among a set of little Negroes of all shapes and sizes, who all strove to act as preliminary scourers, much to the disappointment of the dogs, who whined, whimpered, scratched, and pushed their sable competitors, and not less to the annoyance of the fat Negress who acted as cook… (pg. 129) These were the scenes which seemed to eastern-bred Joseph Smith nearly a century behind the times. They depict the original settler as he appeared to his contemporaries. It is a common failing of the American people to place the pioneer upon a pedestal and worship there. The virtues of the father always exceed the virtues of the son; we always sigh for the good old days and the good old ways, which would prove intolerable to us if we could bring them back. Our grandsires are great and noble. It is sacrilege to assign to them the commonplace sins and failings. Our grandmothers are universally virtuous, self-sacrificing, and industrious, possessing virtues we may never attain…. (pg. 131) The typical pioneer was of the rough and ready type. Physical courage was inordinately () admired…. (pg. 132) This attitude of the fighting Missourian was as inexplicable to the staid New England Latter Day Saints, as their tendency to reason things out without the aid of fists was to the Missourian. To the majority of pioneers, there could be but one reason for not fighting out a quarrel, and that was cowardice. To the early Saints, Lyman Wight's tendency to refuse to turn the other cheek was a grievous fault…. (pg. 137) But perhaps all might have gone well in spite of so many differences in temperament had it not been for slavery. The gentry of New York had slaves, a few even in Fayette had a bond servant or two, but the keeping of slaves in large numbers was new to the Saints. They would have indignantly denied they were that hated thing known as an "abolitionist," but at the same time these eastern people were Yankees; they owned no slaves, and in spite of denials, they were suspected of being abolitionists, whether they were or not. There was an attitude of almost fraternizing with the blacks, of treating them much as they treated white people, which was to say the least, enough to make any slave-owner distinctly uneasy…. Chapter 14 Slavery in Missouri… (pg. 144) To our so-called enlightened age, the economic system under which these people lived savored of barbarism, but conscientious and religious people held these opinions and made these laws. It is not at all improbable that one hundred years from now, our economic system will seem as antiquated and our political treatises as quaint as that of Governor Reynolds of Illinois as late as 1860. This man, who was possessed of enough culture, education, and popularity to become governor of the State of Illinois, wrote "a rather remarkable pamphlet entitled Balm of Gilead, which he termed 'An Inquiry Into the Right of Human Slavery.' . . . He compares the cohesion of the abolitionists to the religious organization of the Mormons, and the followers of John Brown are declared to be the same class as those in the French Revolution who 'fraternized on pikes, and feasted on blood.' His conclusion was that 'we, of the United States at this day, with slavery, enjoy the most perfect and the most free government on earth, and I pray that it may be continued forever!'"... Chapter 18 The Storm Breaks... (pg. 174) Perhaps more than all else contributing to the mob of July 20, 1833, in Independence, was the publication of an editorial "Free People of Color," in The Evening and the Morning Star of that month. A careful reading of this editorial at the present time shows nothing to give offense; but read with the bias of those days, in the spirit of "those who are not of us are against us," one may see why the people were so incensed by it. Actually it was intended to pour oil on troubled waters, by declaring the intention of the Saints to observe strict neutrality on the slave issue, but to the Missourian of that day there was no neutrality. In many quarters the very basis of his civilization was being threatened; he (pg. 175) intended to take no chances. And in spite of the efforts of the Saints to move with caution, they were judged not by the words of their mouths, but by the thoughts of their minds and the feelings of their hearts. The Missourians instinctively felt an antagonism to the industrial system upon which their civilization was built, and seized upon this first public utterance, to make it mean an invitation for free blacks to come and settle among them, to be companions to their wives and children!... (pg. 176) But not all authorities are inclined to blame the riffraff of the town for the trouble. One writer (Warren Watson) who calls himself an agnostic, writes in a sarcastic vein: "The lieutenant-governor of the State, Lilburn W. Boggs, who witnessed this rare exhibition, exclaimed in a paroxysm of religious fervor and patriotic satisfaction, 'Mormons are the common enemies of mankind and ought to be destroyed,' and 'you now know what our Jackson boys can do, and you must leave the country.' " He definitely names George Simpson as the leader of the mob. This same writer gives Boggs, whether rightfully or not, the credit for a plan frequently followed in the next few years, that is to gain possession of the arms of the Saints and then attack them….”

https://explorepahistory.com/hmarker.php?markerId=1-A-334, Copyright © 2019 WITF, Inc. Historical Marker ® 2019 PHMC, WITF, Inc.  4801 Lindle Road, Harrisburg, PA 17111

            “Pennsylvania, or "Penn's Woods," has been known since its founding for its large stretches of unbroken forests and pine-covered mountains. The lands William Penn and Quaker settlers explored in the 1680s must have been an intimidating sight. In an era when most buildings were made from and heated with wood, trees were an extremely valuable resource, but an enormous amount of labor was required to cut, saw, and transport wood. In the colonial era, wood was usually a by-product of efforts to clear land for farming…. This changed when Major James H. Perkins's Susquehanna Boom Company established a boom at markerWilliamsport by 1851. A boom was a string of chained logs that spanned a river and caught logs that came from upstream. Companies branded their logs before floating to make sorting easier at the other end. Other technological innovations, the railroad and steam-powered saw mills, encouraged lumber entrepreneurs to descend on north-central Pennsylvania…. Born in Fort Plains, New York, in 1824, he experienced the hard work of farm life as a young man. After working briefly at a New York sawmill in 1844, Herdic decided to try his luck in Pennsylvania. By 1846, he and partner William Andress owned shares in a shingle mill nine miles north of Williamsport in Cogan House Township, Lycoming County. Three years later he bought a woodlot and sawmill of his own. In 1853, Herdic and his wife moved to Williamsport where his career blossomed. His coming coincided with the arrival of a rail line in Williamsport, then home to less than 2,000 people. Herdic correctly sensed that a boom was around the corner and began buying up as much property as he could, including building lots, woodlots, and sites for sawmills. He also bought enormous tracts of timberland. At one point, he was the sole owner of 54,000 acres of timberland in Cameron, Clinton, Potter, Tioga, and Lycoming counties…. In 1869, Herdic was elected mayor of the new city of Williamsport. At the same time he owned the gas works and sold land to the railroads to bring them into the city (routing them through other Herdic property to increase its value). He built office buildings, a waterworks, an urban railway, and a bridge over the Susquehanna River. Herdic also owned the newspaper…. The man who built the Millionaires' Row mansions was hurt badly in the 1873 financial panic. He never recovered and filed for bankruptcy in 1878. Over the next ten years, Herdic developed waterworks in Pennsylvania and Illinois. On March 2, 1888, he died after falling on ice and fracturing his skull. Herdic's death came a year before a catastrophic flood that hastened the decline of the lumber industry in the area…. After the devastating flood, many mill owners did not rebuild because of the decreasing wood supply in the region. The center of the industry moved westward as did future lumber giants Frederick Weyerhaeuser, William E. Dodge, and Harry McCormick.”

            BRIA 23 1 b Progressives and the Era of Trustbusting CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS FOUNDATION Bill of Rights in Action Spring 2007 (Volume 23, No. 1)

https://www.crf-usa.org/bill-of-rights-in-action/bria-23-1-b-progressives-and-the-era-of-trustbusting.html, Constitutional Rights Foundation, 601 S. Kingsley Drive., Los Angeles, CA 90005 © 2022 Constitutional Rights Foundation®

            “…In 1776, Adam Smith argued in The Wealth of Nations that free-market capitalism would bring prosperity for all by finding new ways for workers to divide their labor. The Industrial Revolution utilized machines and methods of mass production that magnified this division of labor. By the end of the 19th century, this resulted in an explosion of competitive businesses in the United States. Adam Smith viewed wide-open competition as the driving force of the free-market system. Competition, however, sometimes resulted in price wars, wasteful duplication of production, and bankruptcies. Profit-minded business leaders discovered that the way around the instability of competition was to dominate the market by creating cartels and bigger industrial organizations…. Between 1897 and 1901, more than 2,000 mergers took place in the United States. This horizontal integration reduced the number of competitive companies in an industry. Defenders of "corporate bigness" claimed that the new super-corporations created jobs and efficiently produced and distributed goods and services at a lower cost. They further argued that property and contract rights permitted businesses to pursue their economic interests as they saw fit without government interference. This reflected the laissez faire (let business alone) idea of capitalism…. By 1880, John D. Rockefeller had merged about 100 independent oil refineries with his Standard Oil Company. He controlled about 90 percent of the U.S. oil business. (Oil was used to light kerosene lamps, utilized throughout the country.) In 1882, Rockefeller formed the Standard Oil Trust. He set up a board of trustees to take control of all the stock from his many vertically and horizontally connected companies. By forming the Standard Oil Trust, Rockefeller was trying to hide that Standard Oil was a monopoly. Soon corporate leaders in other industries such as railroads, cigarette making, and sugar refining organized their own trusts. The trusts speeded up mergers and eliminated competition among their members…. As public criticism mounted during the 1880s, the American public called for government control over the powerful trusts. Reformers, called Progressives, demanded that states pass antitrust laws to make cartels and monopolistic practices illegal and to regulate railroad rates. These laws, however, were ineffective because most trusts operated across state lines. Only the federal government could regulate interstate commerce…. In 1890, Congress passed the first federal antitrust law, the Sherman Act. It outlawed "every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy in restraint of trade." The Sherman Act also made it a crime "to combine or conspire . . . to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the several states."… In 1895, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Sherman Act could regulate interstate sales and transportation. But the court said the act could not ban the merger of manufacturing assets that established monopolies, even by companies operating in interstate commerce. The court reasoned that manufacturing was not part of interstate commerce. In another case that year, the Supreme Court decided that the Sherman Act could bar union strikes that interfered with interstate commerce. Ironically, while Congress intended the Sherman Act to combat the big trusts, it was becoming a major weapon against organized labor…. Vice President Theodore Roosevelt became president in September 1901… Roosevelt told Congress he opposed banning monopolies. Instead, he preferred that the federal government "assume power of supervision and regulation over all corporations doing an interstate business." Despite his generally pro-business outlook, Roosevelt disliked the corruption and arrogance of the new class of super rich. In 1902, public demands for "trustbusting" (breaking up the monopolies) prompted him to file suit under the Sherman Act against the biggest railroad trust in the country…. Northern Securities lost in the lower courts and appealed to the Supreme Court, claiming that the Sherman Act violated the freedom to make contracts. In 1904 in a stunning opinion for the court, Justice John Marshall Harlan declared that "every combination" that eliminates interstate competition was illegal…. The Supreme Court majority found that all monopolies tended to restrain trade and "to deprive the public of the advantages that flow from free competition." The court ordered the breakup of the Northern Securities Company into independent competitive railroads…. Even so, by the end of his second term, Roosevelt remained convinced that federal regulation of big business was the best way to tame the trusts. Filing lawsuits against individual monopolies to break them up was a costly and slow slog through the courts, he believed. Besides, he held the view that "good" monopolies benefited the public with efficient distribution of new products…. Roosevelt accepted monopolies as an inevitable part of a modern economy. He proposed, however, a federal commission to regulate them by inspecting their accounting books and setting maximum prices on their products. He also wanted to impose rules for hours, wages, and working conditions. Roosevelt declared that "the enslavement of the people by the great corporations . . . can only be held in check through the expansion of governmental power."…”

            Wellington's millions: History kinder to Saginaw lumber baron than family's legacy, preservationist says https://www.mlive.com/news/saginaw/2011/05/wellingtons_millions_history_k.html, Published: May. 10, 2011, 1:01 p.m. By Justin Engel | jengel1@mlive.com © 2022 Advance Local Media LLC

            “Born Aug. 26, 1831, in Pike Township, New York, Burt began his life as a farm boy.  At 7, he stepped upon Michigan soil when his parents moved to Jackson County. By 22, his sense of adventure and curiosity sent him sailing aboard freighters and visiting Australia, South America and the islands today known as Tasmania. He decided to settle down at age 26, when he returned to Michigan with plans to learn about the state’s budding lumber industry. He found his way to mid-Michigan, where, in 1857, he earned his first $13 monthly paycheck working as a woodsman at St. Louis’ Pine River lumber camp. The boss there liked the young man’s drive, and after a month, Burt became camp foreman and doubled his wage. The next year, with money saved, he set out to build his own establishment in nearby Saginaw County. Burt eventually owned several mills, but the largest was known as Melbourne, named after his favorite Australian city…. The camp featured a stave and heading mill, barrel factory, shingle mill and companion salt block, carpenter and blacksmith shops and a gas works station that provided lighting for the community’s 45 houses, where woodsmen and their families lived…. When traveling abroad, he employed his own press to report on his journeys for the daily newspapers… Much of his time was spent around camp, where Burt built places like Melbourne around family men — an effort that required adding a store, library and school for the woodsmen’s children. “He mainly hired married men because married men won’t go on strike,” Mudd said. Burt also tried his hand at politics. In 1867, East Saginaw elected him its eighth mayor, and later, he became a state senator…. He invested in the former CS&M railroad that stretched from Durand to Bay City, and, at one time, owned most of an Ann Arbor railroad system. He invested abroad, buying up railways in Russia and China. Burt owned more than $300,000 in foreign bonds in Russia, China, Brazil, Nicaragua, Argentina and Bolivia when he died, records show. His wealth was so well-known abroad that officials with Canada’s Bank of Montreal turned to him for help when the institution teetered on the edge of failure. He obliged, loaning the bank $6 million. Burt for a time also was charitable to Saginaw, where he funded a municipal auditorium, a women’s hospital, a Salvation Army and a YWCA that later became downtown’s Jacobson’s….”

            VINCENT KOSUGA AND HIS ONIONS, April 23, 2014 Karl Smallwood http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/04/vincent-kosuga-onions/

            “…Vincent Kosuga was an unimposing, 5 ft 4 inch tall onion farmer who had turned an unwanted 5000 acre patch of dirt into a veritable onion-filled garden of Eden…. Kosuga had tried to trade wheat futures on the commodities market and screwed up so badly that he brought his family to the brink of bankruptcy. Kosuga’s wife made him promise never to trade again after his failed trades resulted in them having to borrow money from a family friend just to stay afloat. Ignoring the pleas of his wife, Kosuga soon went back to trading, only this time instead of trading wheat, he stuck to what he knew and began trading onions. If you’re curious about why onions were such a lucrative market, that has a lot to do with the “limited storability of onions” which are typically planted and harvested at very specific times during the year, which meant that for traders the price of onions had the potential to fluctuate wildly on a near day to day basis. For example, when the onions were harvested, they typically commanded a high price due to the fact the market had been virtually devoid of them for many months and remaining stores of the previous crop were rapidly spoiling; however, this inevitably led to many farmers flooding the market with their harvest at the same time in a desperate attempt to get the best price, in turn dramatically lowering the price. The market for onions was so potentially lucrative that at one point in time, about 20% of all the trading that occurred in the MERC () involved onions…. Kosuga was buying onion futures in the hopes that the price would go up when that date arrived so that he could sell them for a profit. The thing is, as an onion farmer, Vincent held considerable sway over the market… one year Kosuga desperately needed the price to go up to turn a profit…. Kosuga bribed an official at the Chicago weather office to issue a severe frost warning (which would lead to many onion crops failing).  There was no such frost coming, but when this news leaked, people began panic-buying onions, driving up the price and thus making Kosuga his money…. In the Autumn of 1955, after almost a year of frantic buying, Siegel and Kosuga owned 98% of the onions in Chicago (about 30 million pounds worth). With literally the entire supply of onions under their control, the men were then able to artificially inflate the price of onions to about $2.75 a sack by severely restricting the supply…. Because the men owned just about every onion in the city, they could guarantee that the price of onions would fall simply by flooding the market with the millions of onions they were holding in reserve as soon as the sales were final. By March of 1956, the price of onions fell so much that they effectively became worthless (from $2.75 cents per 50 lb bag to 10 cents in the span of just 6 months)- the onions were now worth less than the sacks they were being sold in. Dozens of onion farmers… went bankrupt and millions of rotting and worthless onions ended up being dumped across the city. As for Kosuga and Siegel, they got away completely scot-free because they’d technically not committed a crime. As a direct result of Kosuga’s actions though, the U.S. government enacted the Onion Futures Act in 1958, making it illegal to trade onion futures…. He (Kosuga) was a hugely respected and loved philanthropist almost his entire life, and the lion’s share of the money he earned trading actually went straight to some charity or other. He was also well known for showering friends and family in lavish gifts. Kosuga was also a very devout Catholic and he donated so much money to help fund the church’s charitable activities that he was given a private audience with three different Popes. To top it all off, Kosuga was so loved by his community that Pine Island (the place he called his home) voted him their citizen of the year in 1987….”

            https://www.cftc.gov/sites/default/files/idc/groups/public/@lrceacases/documents/ceacases/kosuga-jul1957-629.pdf, Commodity Futures Trading Commission CEA CASES NAME: VINCENT W. KOSUGA, SAM S. SIEGEL, AND NATIONAL PRODUCE DISTRIBUTORS, INC. CITATION: 16 Agric. Dec. 665 DOCKET NUMBER: 73 DATE: JULY 18, 1957,

            “ORDER REMANDING PROCEEDING TO REFEREE This is a disciplinary proceeding under the Commodity Exchange Act (7 U.S.C. Chapter 1). The respondents are charged with attempting to manipulate, and with manipulating, the prices of onions in interstate commerce and for future delivery on or subject to the rules of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Following presentation of the complainant's evidence at a hearing upon the complaint and answers the referee issued a report on May 3, 1957, recommending that the complaint be dismissed and the proceeding terminated. The basis for the recommendation was the complainant's refusal to furnish to the respondents transcripts of sworn testimony given before investigators of the Commodity Exchange Authority…. In response to a subpoena duces tecum issued by the referee to the Administrator, Commodity Exchange Authority, the complainant had offered to make the transcripts available to the referee for his examination and for disclosure by him of any materials in the investigatory transcripts which he considered of impeachment value to the respondents. The respondents rejected such proffer and the refusal of the complainant to make the transcripts freely available to the respondents resulted in the referee's report recommending that the complaint be dismissed….”

            The Constitution of the United States of America: and Selected Writings of the Founding Fathers, Compilation… Copyright 2012, Barnes and Noble, Inc.  122 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10011

            “Constitutional Liberty and Arbitrary Power by Joseph Warren (Delivered in Boston, March 5, 1772)… That man is formed for social life is an observation which, upon our first inquiry, presents itself immediately to our view, and our reason approves that wise and generous principle which actuated the first founders of civil government, an institution which hath its origin in the weakness of individuals, and hath for its end the strength and security of all; and so long as the means of effecting this important end are thoroughly known and religiously attended to government is one of the richest blessings to mankind, and ought to be held in the highest veneration. In young and new-formed communities the grand design of this institution is most generally understood and the most strictly guarded… so long as this noble attachment to a constitution, founded on free and benevolent principles, exists in full vigor, in any state, that state must be flourishing and happy. It was this noble attachment to a free Constitution which raised ancient Rome from the smallest beginnings to that bright summit of happiness and glory… and when this decayed, her magistrates lost their reverence for justice and the laws… forgetful of their dignity, and seduced by base corruption, betrayed their country; her soldiers, regardless of their relation to the community, and urged only by the hopes of plunder and rapine, unfeelingly committed the most flagrant enormities… whereby the streets of Rome were drenched with her noblest blood…. So hard was it to resolve to imbrue their [the first settlers of this country] hands in blood of their brethren, that they chose rather to quit their fair possessions and seek another habitation in a distant clime. When they came to this new world, which they fairly purchased of the Indian natives, the only rightful proprietors, they cultivated the then barren soil by their incessant labor, and defended their dear-bought possession with the fortitude of the Christian and the bravery of the hero…. The British Constitution, of which ours is a copy, is a happy compound of three forms… monarchy, aristocracy, democracy… and without the consent of each branch, nothing can carry with it the force of a law; but when a law is to be passed for raising a tax, that law can originate only in the democratic branch…. The reason is obvious; they and their constituents are to pay much the largest part of it… and as the monarchic branch… is supposed to have a just sense of his own interest, which is that of all the subjects in general, his consent is also necessary…. First, I would ask whether the members of the British House of Commons are the democracy of this province? If they are, they are either the people of this province or are elected by the people of this province to represent them... it is most certain they are neither, and therefore nothing done by them can be said to be done by the democratic branch of our Constitution…. The power of the monarchic branch we, with pleasure, acknowledge resides in the King… for it is plain that if there is any validity in those acts, it must arise altogether from the monarchial branch… for I do not conceive it to be of the least importance to us by whom our property is taken away, so long as it is taken without our consent; and I am very much at a loss to know by what figure of rhetoric the inhabitants of this province can be called free subjects… how they can be said to have property, when a body of men whom they have not the least control, and who are not in any way accountable to them, shall oblige them to deliver up part, or the whole of their substance, without even asking their consent; and yet, whoever pretends that the late acts of the British Parliament for taxing America out to be deemed binding upon us, must admit at once that we are absolute slaves, and have no property of our own... it can be no matter of wonder that the people quickly perceived and seriously complained of the inroads which these acts must unavoidably make upon their liberty… as it was soon found this taxation could not be supported by reason and argument, it seemed necessary that one act of oppression should be enforced by another, and therefore contrary to our just rights as possessing, or at least having a just title to possess, all the liberties and immunities of British subjects, a standing army was established among us in time of peace.... Their baneful influence is most suddenly felt, when they are placed in populous cities; for, by a corruption of morals, the public happiness is immediately affected; and that this is one of the effects of quartering troops in a populous city is a truth to which many a mourning parent, many a lost, despairing child in this metropolis, must bear a very melancholy testimony. Soldiers are also taught to consider arms as the only arbiters by which every dispute is to be decided between contending states; they are instructed implicitly to obey their commanders, without inquiring into the justice of the cause they are engaged to support…. Language is too feeble to paint the emotions of our souls, when our streets were stained with the blood of our brethren, when our ears were wounded by the groans of the dying, and our eyes were tormented with the sight of the mangled bodies of the dead…. The immediate actors in the tragedy of that night were surrendered to justice. It is not mine to say how far they were guilty. They have been tried by the country, and acquitted of murder…. What can be proposed by the repeated attacks made upon our freedom, I really cannot surmise, even leaving justice and humanity out of the question. I do not know one single advantage which can arise to the British nation from our being enslaved: ̶ I know not of any gains which can be wrung from us by oppression, which they may not obtain from us by our own consent… but this, it seems, is too great a favor – we are to be governed by the absolute command of others; our property is to be taken away without our consent; if we complain, our complaints are treated with contempt; if we assert our rights, that assertion is deemed insolence; if we humbly offer to submit the matter to the impartial decision of reason, the sword is judged the most proper argument to silence our murmurs!... You have, my friends and countrymen, frustrated the designs of your enemies by your unanimity and fortitude; it was your union and determined spirit which expelled those troops who polluted your streets with innocent blood…. None but they who set a just value upon the blessings of liberty are worthy to enjoy her – your illustrious fathers were her zealous votaries… they brought her safe over the rough ocean, and fixed her seat in this then dreary wilderness… you surely cannot, with such examples before your eyes, as every page of the history of this country affords, suffer your liberties to be ravished from you by lawless force, or cajoled away by flattery and fraud. The voice of your fathers’ blood cries to you from the ground, My sons, scorn to be slaves!... Follow not the dictates of passion, but enlist yourselves under the sacred banner of reason; use every method in your power to secure your rights; at least prevent the curses of posterity from being heaped upon your memories…. If you, from yours souls, despise the most gaudy dress that slavery can wear; if you really prefer the lonely cottage (whilst blest with liberty) to gilded palaces, surrounded by the ensigns of slavery, you may have the fullest assurances that tyranny, with her whole accursed train, will hide their hideous heads in confusion, shame, and despair…. May we every be a people favored of God! May our land be a land of liberty, the seat of virtue, the asylum of the oppressed… until the last shock of time shall bury the empires of the world…”

            FUCKING CHRIST! Mother Mary, and all the goddamn shitting saints, why… just fucking why… I fucking hate all the quotation, my deepest apologies or at least I would offer it if I wasn’t just lying to myself at the onset of this project that I wouldn’t do this very thing. Hell, there ain’t none of you left to apologize to or, more likely, you’ve perhaps tried to skip all that boring ass history written by long winded, cocky shit sucking pigs and may drop in latter on.... I’m getting antagonistic… need to back off and write coherently… fuck. So, obviously I tossed the initial layout off the London Tower. I had probably thirty other sources I had just skimmed and thought of throwing in to help reiterate points I would then layout in the upcoming chapters I had mentioned at the start of this madness of a second chapter. Hmm.

            If it wasn’t clear, I had intended to lay out examples, that I don’t hear about quite as often, that related to our “progression” in the overarching topics of agriculture, infrastructure, and the civil institutions developed to refine such progression, even to allowing the creation of perhaps more frivolous () pursuits/organizations. Also, it wasn’t technically going to be a chronological summary but one that led… keep calm… through the insane, terrible, yet amazing acts of all these countries that take the historic pretense to fuck each other over – or their own people…. Having trouble as if there is anything I am pissed or actually sorry over its not doing all of humanity its justice in recalling such a summary.  I tried to sprinkle what I could, how you take it is your own thought process; as for mine, well, I threw that China quote by the author of the illuminating piece on the Catholic church just being the greatest and most oppressed thing on the planet… breathe…. What kind of retarded ass take is that though? He didn’t even fucking quote the mother fucking source with proper context. Chopping, screwing shit to… to move on, I’ll just say that’s why I gave such large quotations (no promises but I hope those were the last). I grew up in a Christian household, and so much of the disagreements I saw tearing these communities apart seemed due to the desire of humans to do this very thing. Hyper focus. Get back to the subject Chris.

I’m sure you guessed by all the attention paid to European history, I’m that (at least at the time of writing this sentence and years before it) arrogant ass cis gender single white American male with probably damn near all northern European blood. You know recent events could almost make an atheist like myself question their resolve against spiritual influences. I look at the pain and anguish, I see my generation fall into logical fallacies in the pursuit of hope, and I think to myself, how easy it could have been to fall down those same roads, to desire these same outcomes. It’s why, after I had laid my groundwork for all the other countries, I would turn to what I had tried to make my forte, U.S. history. Instead, you got that fucking nonsense. Phoowh. I was the typical angsty teen, but my love of reading helped fuel my hate during this time. This was when I started to discover more of my country’s claims to infamy like the lobbying of lumber barons to crush hemp in the 1930’s (what we call a drug war [and that date should be earlier]), the Tulsa massacre, the Japanese internment camps, the bodies of Chinese immigrants that lay underneath the railways, how we bombed our own city, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania no less, or sacrificing our “mentally impaired” to pseudo scientists like ol’ Walter Freeman. Hell, even the stupid ass Civil War states’ rights spiel; a fucking state’s right to tell other human beings they have no freedoms being the actual reality. Oh yeah, we’re fucking going down that darks and dustys roads eventually. I played out all the hate cycle, conspiracy theorist, violence is the only answer bull hockey, still have trouble shaking the tinfoil hat off to this day.

Needless to say, I was screaming about the Chinese government’s potential power growth in 2009 and got over it by 2015. Too much other equally horrific history being made to play arbiter of who’s the most villainous. For instance, it seems impossible to have a civilized conversation about the questions of 9/11 without damn near starting a brawl. I don’t buy daddy government’s bull shit on World Trade Center Tower 7; you know the one that never got hit but lay in literally just as much fucking rubble as the two (Towers 1 & 2) that got creamed with Boeing 767s. I mean for fuck sake literally fuck…. No… we’re only a little half way through this journey I can’t jump the shark just yet.  I will say this, no it’s not the fucking jews, and I’ve got a wonderful surprise at the end of this book, especially for those that like to just skip to the end and read the last page.  For those (absolutely bat shit crazy) readers/listeners that endure this – probably to be judged some sick manifesto – I hope you can sift through the salaciousness to some degree as to minimize any… perturbed feelings. With that being said, time to try and salvage what’s left of this loving headache.

Summary of the subjects as stated in the beginning up to and including the Epilogue with other bullshit

            You know, back when I first conceived this work, it was during the brief stint of college I did at Benedictine in Atchison, Kansas. It was a wildly different concept back then as well. I previously stated that I had begun to seek out texts of philosophy and theology as I hoped to understand what I believe instead of being told my thoughts. While I imagine two of those sentences may have you scoffing, it was here I was able to engage in honest discussion with a devout Catholic theology teacher who, being the human being he was, treated me (at least openly) as more an equal than a superior despite his superior length of study. My conversations with him began to give rise to the idea of agency, or humanity’s ability to choose as I saw it, negating the very concept of an eternal, omnipotent, omniscient being, or the Intelligent Designer. Despite how this concept would alter or, more accurately, be rebuilt, the subject has stuck with me even though a multiverse consisting of such an individual quickly disrupts the main argument. Distractions. I went forward trying to understand what made this topic so essential to me.

            I came to the decision that it was due to my peers, or those who claimed some fashion or form of atheism as well. I despise most of you almost as much as religious zealots. After leaving a religious private school (technically graduated) where I was almost the only open atheist in attendance (not that special with K-12 having barely 300 plus students), all I saw was human beings doing the exact same shit I hated so much about what I felt was my distaste with Christianity. What was the point of acting like assholes if you’re so goddamn sure you’re correct? Richard Dawkins was one of the worst offenders. This fucking douchebag was all the rage of those supposedly of similar thought to me and all he contributed was telling atheists to act like bible thumping Christians instead of opening the god damn thing and using knowledge from it to show the error in their behaviors. I seemingly lived in an era long detached from some of the great “atheist” thinkers. Hell, men like Fredrick Nietzsche, Immanuel Kantz weren’t even true atheists (some scott’s man fallacy for all you highbrow numbnuts), at least as I think of it, but they did more for the belief I hold as one than anyone I’ve read in the years concurrent to my life span.

            The whole purpose almost seemed to be the eradication of faith through humiliation; what I see as incredibly akin to being some form of wounded individual and lead to believing in a purpose. There was no comprehension, no study or pursuit to exchange controversial opinions to achieve knowledge. Every niche group had a line in the sand, a message from the wilderness, an ideal so wholly leaned upon that its belief was tantamount to reality and the questioning of it was an affront to “common sense.” Just fucking writing that word fills me with the desire to amputate the offending fingers or maybe go desecrate the grave of Thomas Paine. I’m not ready for that rabbit hole yet; obviously, getting worked up because of what I really wanna get to. Which is, why I think our whole environment and its workings devolved the way it did, that is of course, if it really devolved in any meaningful way to begin with (as I seemingly made a previous time seem so grand in comparison to the one I reside in).

            Good old, competition. Gotta love it, right? Drives human innovation. Provides excitement to our extracurricular activities. Energizes the heart and body when pitted in proving one’s skill against another of almost equal, or greater, merit. Shows strengths and weaknesses through trial and tribulation of individual methods to accomplish a similar task. Cares only for the most effective, efficient actions leading to the accomplishment of a specific criteria – right? I’m sure there are just oh so many examples to prove me wrong but take your argument up with your bank account. Money is what I desire to target despite the whole competition shtick being older still. Money has contributed so much to all those grand designs that seemed to enable humanity to break through barrier after barrier of culture, art, and foundationally intellect. To expound, when I speak of money here, I use my basic understanding of it as a medium to equate products and services for facilitating fair trade (and I wish the reality of money were only this). No need to get triggered, as much as my teenage self – identified Marxist part would love such a critique as heartless and/or prone to injustice, I would just be lying to myself now. I’m well aware that the ideology of capitalism far predates my country, and my critiques of it could easily be dismissed by the same reasoning used in my apologetics for Marxism/Communism/ Socialism. The mistakes/issues/atrocities attributed to supposed Communist governments are not the faults of the principles that comprise the promised system, but the human beings bearing its’ icons failure to embody the hope at the heart of the symbol. Again, I don’t mean something so basic as the errors we inevitably make as humans, but the desire to shy away from these incidents which can become more tantalizing the more responsibility the individual has usually translating into a larger fallout from mistakes. Chris…. Chris, Chris, Chris. Oy, once again being vague and rambling. Let’s get back on target.

            So money, makes the world go round, I believe is the cliché. Kind of a funny one at that if you ask me; based on the view I laid out from my perspective, how could something so basic be so potent? Unfortunately, it doesn’t take much imagination or critical thought (I arrived at the conclusion for fuck sake) before the spider’s web of realized potential comes into focus. Before governments, armies, cities, or probably significant communities, humans assuredly had to think of ways to gather what items they thought necessary or desirable. Rather than be limited to an individual’s capabilities; having excess food, crafted materials, or unique objects could assist with retrieving the wants/needs held by the other. For the sake of some silly shit, let’s say you got 100 pounds of corn and you meet a shepherd willing to trade you two sheep for your corn. Pleased to have an animal for wool and meat, you take one of your newly acquired sheep to the metalsmith who every year repairs your hoe for 50 pounds of corn in preparation for the next season. Problem is, he says it will be 4 sheep to pay for the service. You can’t spare any more of your corn reserves and you only have two sheep. Let’s add money (which obviously implies a basic system shared/agreed upon by a collective) to the mix. The farmer gives a merchant his corn for its equal 100 coins. Farmer buys one sheep for fifty and the services of the blacksmith for the remainder. The two can now use their coin to buy corn from the merchant. This is a super basic ass example, but hey, every innovation seems to start somewhere before we “improve” it.

            I’m sure every wannabe socialist just went “HA! There it is, the problem with capitalism.” A merchant under my example would have to be a government agent of some compacity as there is no compensation for his part in transaction. Without access to alternative resources, the merchant is now at square one with no goods and 100 coins. And even if he has such capability, what service puts coin back into the merchant’s pocket to trade with the farmer again or even sustain the merchant’s livelihood? Hence why even roman senators were romanticizing capitalist progression fucking two millennia ago. I mean, all that those high minded, learned fellows needed was the assets to create for us their wonderful utopia, you know alongside our obedience, I mean cooperation of course. I fucking suck. Yeah, I fucking know that verb lacks a predicate. You know, I fucking hate Saul, bigoted ass son of bitch roman soldier, but he nailed it when he wrote the love of money was the root of all evil (just pump your brakes “bible scholars”). Fuck even that though cause it was just rephrasing what he presumed Christ’s words meant. And now I’m assuming shit.

The basic (ass) example gives us at least two quick options for our merchant. They can operate as a government agent having their needs met and act as the institution’s price/goods exchange. They could also be a free agent having to exchange goods at a profit to themselves to cover their expenses. While both theoretically work, one obviously gives the merchant more freedom in the conduct of his business. Does it really matter who does the squeezing when pressure is put on the consumer to except their goods being traded at a value they know will not sustain them?  Swinging wild. Yes, I believe any group being handed so much power as to dictate the price of commodities can be just as unbalanced as individuals, through some method, holding the same claim.  Some seem to have understood that no matter how good the intentions, a monopoly is as devastating as a natural disaster. “The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise.” – Tacitus (supposedly) “…Neither Russia, nor Germany, nor any other Great Power has the right to claim that it is waging a “war of defense”; all the Great Powers are waging an imperialist, capitalist war, a predatory war, a war for the oppression of small and foreign nations, a war for the sake of the profits of the capitalists, who are coining golden profits amounting to billions out of the appalling sufferings of the masses…” Vladimir Lenin, Speech at Berne, February 8, 1916. “…The East India Company helped kill off India’s once-robust textile industries, pushing more and more people into agriculture. This, in turn, made the Indian economy much more dependent on the whims of seasonal monsoons…. In the mid-19th century, it was common economic wisdom that government intervention in famines was unnecessary and even harmful…” Viewpoint: How British let one million Indians die in famine by Dinyar Patel, June 11, 2016, BBC website (couldn’t get the link to pull up so just google the title). Honestly, they never even come close to the word monopoly, but in my mind, the simplest characteristics of what makes a monopoly fits very nicely into all these quotes.

            Is it not good “business” to direct the ventures of such toward a profitable future? Even when risks are taken in hopes of progression, is caution thrown completely to the wind with no care to understanding all that is available before acting? Boy howdy there definitely seem to be good examples of the answer being no, take charities. These are businesses; they have employees, management, accountants, advertisements, and a myriad of codes/practices to assist their operation. So many have proven themselves aligned to some of the worst offenders of questionable economics while simultaneously promoting health, safety, and/or prosperity. While I began to set my agency paper on the backburner of my brain, Eschtaros and Y’alohila (my roommates) showed me a wealth of information I may never have found myself.  I tend to be stuck in the past across so much of my thinking (would have never guessed right?), and I believe they got a serious kick out of knowing a conservative that didn’t see themselves as such. I rarely change (probably not even drastically when it does occur) but I do seek knowledge and comprehension which facilitates change even if it’s only a change of speech to better represent what I ascribed to/what actions I want to take. The Young Turks were one such source of information with a far different format than from what I found detestable in the major networks.

            Y’alohila was probably one of their original viewers; being millennials we had differing degrees/avenues of political interest, but Eschtaros was most certainly the most liberal of us three I would say. The Young Turks (TYT) were trying to jump start the progressive movement in some fashion when I started to listen on YouTube, somewhere between 2009 – 2012. I was firmly a Marxist in my mind during this time. Both parties were completely unsalvageable as both suffered from the problem with the entire system as a whole and TYT seemed to be one of the few news outlets (suck your own dick mainstream media) kinda touching on it. The pursuit of economic stability neigh success filled me with disgust and coupled with an overbearing conservative upbringing, lead me to foolishly get caught up under the powerful lies then president elect Barack Obama spouted to set himself apart from Hillary Clinton in the primary and John McCain in the general. Still, I should be thankful, Obama bailing out the automotive industry marked the last time I would consciously be so enamored () with another human being to trust the words of them without any thought to examine their prior actions. If I were a better person at the time, I would have just written your name on the general ballot Bernie (Sanders).

            Anna Kasparian and Cenk Uygur (founders of TYT) caught my ear and held it through their critique of the then president who shared their party. While still Democrats, they laid into him over the same issues I was harping on about. Like a breath of fresh air in a cramped, loaded porta potty, I quickly tried inhaling a majority of their content and while we disagreed on many issues, I trusted them (and still do mostly) to give context, the holy grail of news in my mind, its’ absence a large contributor to my rejection of most traditional journalism. I did not want both sides bull shit or questions as a response, nor did I appreciate the focus that was paid to choices/characteristics of a personal-freedom nature. What I wanted was for those delivering the quotes of others to relay those quotes in fullness, not dissected to prop up the opinion – sorry, truth (about to fucking lose it again) they hold of the events/intentions on whom they reported. Cenk and Anna seemed to hit these points in spades during this time, easily eviscerating the ridiculous attacks hurled at Obama by other organizations while shouting into the ether about his policies detrimental impacts on average Americans both present and future.

            Alas, as to whether they changed or I did is totally up for debate. I could feel myself, whatever emotion I allowed of course, breaking as more and more I shouted at the screen not in agreement but anger. Many of my early disagreements with their reporting boiled down to semantics basically. While I seemed to think we both saw the problem, we had to totally opposing beliefs as to how it should be solved, but I enjoyed the controversy. Know thine enemy I believe is the idiom, which is a day-to-day struggle if you know you know nothing. I would ramble on, usually to myself but occasionally to Y’alohila and Eschtaros, about where the consequences of the TYT’s propositions would lead, obviously from a historical precedent. Trouble is, whatever my counter retort was (whether pointed out by myself or roommates) ended up going down similar or the same fucking routes I had goddamn put on their options usually leading to me throwing up my hands and saying “I don’t fucking know but I know it ain’t that way.” That was until, like so many of my favorite musicians, I realized my opinion was just my own. We shared nothing but our humanity.

            So much good and anguish came from the wild goose chases you guys would send me on, researching so much more of our nation’s history than I would have ever cared for with my base knowledge despite my then complete reversal on what I thought of America. You worried me with your defenses of capitalism and authentic “free markets” which maybe makes me the fool; maybe the signs, the speech was always there and I just agreed too heavily to listen. I said a reversal of my thoughts on my country due to what I said in the beginning on believing as a child this country had set the world’s wrongs, right. My adoption of the moniker Marxist was me acting upon the realization of how this country was a façade. Like a masse of angry humans raising the hue and cry, the true movements of the country as a whole would only blaze under passionate ideals guided by men of wisdom and wealth (gonna hurl) who swore to us better futures, sang laud to the heavens with verses of peace, justice… posterity. Of course, a look longer than the blink of an eye tells me that even before this country was even fully formed, these lofty hopes, aspirations of liberty were actively being undermined by the same men who dared utter its temptations. Yay for me but nay for thee. Looking at you John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, and so fucking many others… but that’s what humans do isn’t it? Without an example to promote action alongside their flowery litanies, it feels almost predestined (only at times) that this country would certainly follow in the same footsteps all “great” nations prior had tread.

            Capitalists, merchants, titans of economy/industry: the names I mentioned previously where this and more – desperate to spread their influence, manage a fledgling government into righteousness, preserve this “new nation’s wealth” that the Spaniards, French, and English were so vehemently fixated upon. The constitution forged from such men could only fall short of living up to the standards brandied about so casually (not a mere few breaths later in the grand scheme of even human history) stoking the hearts of the masses into merely swapping their yokes.  Men so enlightened giving us renowned vocabulary on the details of what invited the evils of tyranny to rot the core tenants of a nation’s “good and just” principles would not dare refuse themselves the potential for the same right when the time came to put down the law with pen to paper. “…. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable right that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness….” Everyone living in same country as I should recognize that line and I think some clarity shit got lost along the way. “…. I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors out of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people… there is a physical difference between the white and black races… while they do remain together there must be a position of superior and inferior…” Abraham Lincoln (your precious white slavery savior you fucking history twisters), Lincoln versus Douglas – 4th debate, September 18, 1858. Go ahead and get more of the context on that one, just like all his fucking ilk, he had some serious blind spots relative to the quotation.

            Unnecessary assumptions from me out of spite. I do give ol’ honest Abe the benefit of the doubt, while I find it hard to say he was not a complete bigot, I imagine he knew, like a lawyer would, that an outright demand for the equality of all human beings could literally be political (if not physical) suicide. Certainly not going to do yourself any economic favors in the eyes of individuals/families, who are being told their very way of life is at stake with such an upheaval. I don’t just empathize with the “southern strategy” (or whatever the fuck labels people wanna throw at it), I believe it whole-heartedly. In my opinion, the way things have trended over the last 150 plus years, the north’s goal was to make all men slaves to the government and more importantly – as with all governments – give a helping hand to the institutions/humans that are favored by these same individuals that are charged with managing the lives of whom should truly be at the forefront of their legislative thoughts, their bosses, the people, all people a.k.a. what a government is in my opinion. I do think Lincoln wanted something different then what he began, those who are convinced of their own lies make better populists; they’re just dangerous once they have the authority to institute real change especially when their forced to grow a backbone in order to successfully crush an enemy.

            Here, let me help you see that Lincoln was just another brick in the road back towards totalitarianism while causing you to cry inside some more (did me at least).  Early Industrialization in the Northeast https://courses.lumenlearning.com/ushistory1os2xmaster/chapter/early-industrialization-in-the-northeast/ “…. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, artisans—skilled, experienced craft workers—produced goods by hand…. An apprenticeship would be followed by work as a journeyman (a skilled worker without his own shop). After sufficient time as a journeyman, a shoemaker could at last set up his own shop as a master artisan… merchants in the Northeast and elsewhere turned their attention as never before to the benefits of using unskilled wage labor to make a greater profit by reducing labor costs…. This process proved attractive because it whittled production costs. The families who participated in the putting-out system were not skilled artisans. They had not spent years learning and perfecting their craft and did not have ambitious journeymen to pay. Therefore, they could not demand—and did not receive—high wages. Most of the year they tended fields and orchards, ate the food that they produced, and sold the surplus. Putting-out work proved a welcome source of extra income for New England farm families who saw their profits dwindle from new competition from midwestern farms with higher-yield lands…. Some skilled British mechanics, including Samuel Slater, managed to travel to the United States in the hopes of profiting from their knowledge and experience… Slater convinced several American merchants, including the wealthy Providence industrialist Moses Brown, to finance and build a water-powered cotton mill based on the British models…. The Embargo of 1807 and the War of 1812 played a pivotal role in spurring industrial development in the United States. Jefferson’s embargo prevented American merchants from engaging in the Atlantic trade, severely cutting into their profits. The War of 1812 further compounded the financial woes of American merchants. The acute economic problems led some New England merchants, including Francis Cabot Lowell, to cast their gaze on manufacturing…. In 1813, Lowell and these wealthy investors, known as the Boston Associates, created the Boston Manufacturing Company. Together they raised $400,000 ($400,000 in 1814 is equivalent in purchasing power to about $6,733,545.45 today, an increase of $6,333,545.45 over 208 years. The dollar had an average inflation rate of 1.37% per year between 1814 and today, producing a cumulative price increase of 1,583.39%. This means that today's prices are 16.83 times higher than average prices since 1814, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index. A dollar today only buys 5.940% of what it could buy back then. – https://www.officialdata.org/us/inflation/1814?amount=400000 ) and, in 1814, established a textile mill in Waltham and a second one in the same town shortly thereafter…. The Boston Associates’ mills, which each employed hundreds of workers, were located in company towns, where the factories and worker housing were owned by a single company. This gave the owners and their agents control over their workers…. The competition New England farmers faced from farmers now settling in the West, and the growing scarcity of land in population-dense New England, had important implications for farmers’ children. Realizing their chances of inheriting a large farm or receiving a substantial dowry were remote, these teenagers sought other employment opportunities, often at the urging of their parents…. In the 1830s, the French government sent engineer and economist Michel Chevalier to study industrial and financial affairs in Mexico and the United States. In 1839, he published Society, Manners, and Politics in the United States… Chevalier describes the rules and wages of the Lawrence Company in 1833. ‘(pg. 142)    All persons employed by the Company must devote themselves assiduously to their duty during working-hours. They must be capable of doing the work which they undertake, or use all their efforts to this effect. They must on all occasions, both in their words and in their actions, show that they are penetrated by a laudable love of temperance and virtue, and animated by a sense of their moral and social obligations. The Agent of the Company shall endeavour to set to all a good example in this respect. Every individual who shall be notoriously dissolute, idle, dishonest, or intemperate, who shall be in the practice of absenting himself from divine service, or shall violate the Sabbath, or shall be addicted to gaming, shall be dismissed from the service of the Company. . . . All ardent spirits are banished from the Company’s grounds, except when prescribed by a physician. All games of hazard and cards are prohibited within their limits and in the boarding-houses.’…”  THE TIMBER AND STONE CULTURE ACT

http://njdigitalhistory.org/TR-national-parks/index.php/why-is-conservation-important/timber-cutting-act/

“Congress established the Timber and Stone Culture Act of 1878 on June 3rd. The law was part of a large-scale effort to help populate the West. The TSCA promoted the sale of land in the four states or territories of California, Oregon, Nevada, and in Washington. Goals of the TSCA were to help the Western population growth and to meet the demands of independent lumbermen…. The land covered under the TSCA was “unfit for farming,” but deemed fit for foresting and mining. The quality of the land allowed the government to sell said land for $2.50 per acre. Though the price of the land was very low, the government put a purchasing limit of 160-acre blocks of land to any one person, family, or small company. Furthermore, only one person in said groups could have ownership of TSCA land…. The oath of settlement or own benefit stipulation in the TSCA was purposely added to prevent any larger company from hiring people to buy land and then transferring the deed to said company…. In the same year of the signing of the TSCA, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the government could not enforce restrictions on citizens rights to sell purchased land. With the ruling by the Supreme Court, large lumber companies began to acquire lands rights from settlers. In some cases, sailors were paid to buy land and transfer ownership right after purchasing it. An estimate places the total amount of sold TSCA forest land at over 13 million acres.”

            Maine Peonage Law Sent Men to Jail for Quitting Their Jobs

https://www.newenglandhistoricalsociety.com/maine-peonage-law-sent-men-jail-quitting-jobs/

“In 1907, lumber barons persuaded politicians to pass the Maine peonage law to keep lumberjacks on the job…. Maine lawmakers copied from an Alabama law designed to tie workers to their employers . They employers put them. into debt and the government put them in jail if they didn’t work it off…. Historian Charles Scontras concluded 342 men went to jail after employers tricked them into accepting lumber work they couldn’t do. Or employment brokers loaned train fare and dumped miles from the camps. Or the company store gave them credit to buy overpriced boots and clothes and other necessities…. “Under its provisions hundreds of men have been convicted and forced to serve a sentence in jail for no offense other than being in debt,” the report said. The labor commissioner also criticized judges who are ‘anxious to make the sentence satisfactory to the influential lumbermen operating in the vicinity.’… The lumbermen’s reaction to the labor commissioner’s report was swift, sure and anonymous. The newspaper quoted them calling the report a ‘false alarm.’ The lumber barons claimed only a half dozen men had been prosecuted. They complained the crews were made up of ‘foreigners and the scum of Boston,’ most of whom were unfit for hard work. They complained the men were taken into the woods ‘at much expense and after working two or three weeks have left.’…”

The Enforcement Acts of 1870 and 1871 Morton, Hon. Oliver Hazard Perry T. of Ind. Senator. Gov. of Ind. https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/EnforcementActs.htm

“The adoption of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution extended civil and legal protections to former slaves and prohibited states from disenfranchising voters ‘on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.’… In its first effort to counteract such use of violence and intimidation, Congress passed the Enforcement Act of May 1870, which prohibited groups of people from banding together "or to go in disguise upon the public highways, or upon the premises of another" with the intention of violating citizens’ constitutional rights…. The Second Force Act, which became law in February 1871, placed administration of national elections under the control of the federal government and empowered federal judges and United States marshals to supervise local polling places. The Third Force Act, dated April 1871, empowered the president to use the armed forces to combat those who conspired to deny equal protection of the laws and to suspend habeas corpus, if necessary, to enforce the act…” I mean are we really pretending these fucking northern puritan fanatical misers really believed in “freedom/liberty/unalienable rights?”

            Berate my poor interpretations at your will, but I am right there with you “small government” southerners except… I’m here alone what the fuck is this shit, “…. The master mind of the so-called Republican party, Senator Seward (New York), has in a recent speech at Rochester, announced the purpose of his party to dislodge the Democracy from the possession of the federal Government, and assigns as a reason the friendship of that party for what he denominates the slave system. He declares the Union between the States having slave labor and free labor to be incompatible, and announces that one or the other must disappear….” Speech of Jefferson Davis before the Mississippi Legislature, Nov. 16, 1858, http://www.confederateneoconfederatereader.com/detail/the-gathering-storm/speech-of-jefferson-davis-before-the-mississippi-legislature-nov-16/ And that motherfucker Seward was goddamn right. How, in the same speech, are you gonna argue that slavery is a just system while pleading for the recognition of individual freedom and liberty? Of course, that’s exactly why an argument can’t be made in the same fashion I pose it. Rather than conversing with the north to truly supplement the vast economic changes that such upheaval of traditional management would require, it was far more profitable for the wealthy of both sides to force one to submit to the other’s word structure. Davis and his peers couldn’t truly desire to see a free America when they profited from what was foundationally the same evil as his “enemies” in the north. The only difference is the south wanted to keep an entire people as non-human to preserve their constituents’ faithfulness and the north just said everybody gets rights – so long as you meet A-Z criteria… that we get to set at whim with the power of a federal government. It’s why there’s just a plethora of flowery rhetoric; they all screech about our duty to goodness, morality, justice, godliness, independence, etc. only to skip the details about how obedience in our actions for them translates to such aspirational realities. Get a bunch of fucking nonsensical faith-based, unrelated, ad hoc word games. I am not one to call out contradictions lightly as I firmly (perhaps too much so) ascribe to a “duality of man” view, but freedom and power are direct opposites, humans as a whole aren’t free so long as any form of power actually exists. Though like how does that even work when shit like freedom and power don’t fucking exist to begin with… and I’m getting ahead of myself again.

            My aunt called me a contrarian recently and it gave me serious pause. While I do have a nigh muscle memory reaction to disagree with any ultimatum/judgement on the state of things, I always considered it to be from a place of general disagreement on the processes used to layout said “fact-based” statement. I had to stop and reevaluate my own motives; shut the fuck up and dive down the rabbit hole of what I actually believe once again.  It’s hard to completely disagree with such an assessment when you’ve seemingly sought to defend anything other than the assessments of popular society. Music, movies, art, books, politics, religion, hell even our criminal justice system I love to play devil’s advocate; no matter the stance being held by the other I’m engaged with. It’s unfortunate I find such a stance incredibly easy to take, all I need to do is think about the relation the subject has to wealth. Once I have figured out which parties are trying to play power top in my mind, I’m done with the process; there is no convincing me that the method being discussed should be implemented even if the overall conclusion is a statement I too hold to be true.

            Our country has helped apply a dollar symbol to everything across our globe. I’ve held a deep empathy for felons/convicts/prisoners/whatever term you like for those prosecuted by judicial system. I think I took too much to heart the teachings of my youth and, when working at V’s Italiano Ristorante, I got a first-hand look at the “riff-raff” that in reality are just less fortunate due to how the world spins. Some of my (what I desperately called) friends were former murderers, thieves, arsonists, mostly addicts/drug dealers though I wouldn’t be surprised if chomos and rapists were amongst them too; despite all this, I say there was no difference between them and individuals never caught/prosecuted – my former coworkers formed bonds with those they toiled beside, told their jokes and shared their rude, simplistic stereotypes, had goals, desires, tribulations, dread, pet peeves, etc. and etc. because they were just human beings like everybody else. My irritation at the narratives told around those found guilty of whatever continued to reach new heights as the options I heard were they suffer too much and our legal system is rigged or they get exactly what they deserve no matter the penalty so long as torture isn’t involved (in most cases and what we’ve been told to consider torture of course). I didn’t even bother going into semantics with peers on this subject at the time due to trying to show both statements were false and true simultaneously was like trying to look left and right at the same time. TYT finally helped bring some clarity to my thoughts.

            It was the money. Once again, the issue I had not anticipated was the subject that was seemingly just the way of things. One of the worst/best ideologies TYT helped me weaponize was the belief of true equal justice. The human beings with the least to lose were the easiest to oppress through every means possible as they deserve it right? Totally sounds like blind justice to me, regardless, it seemed the stigma of conviction carried a heavy burden. TYT and their affiliates confirmed the actions being taken against the demographic with information regarding prison labor, guard shortages/exploitation, the continual privatization of prisons and the effects of turning an institution charged with rehabilitation/guardianship towards one of cutting “unnecessary costs” if not net gain. Hilarious as even an affront to freedom warranting rebellion was supposedly imprisonment over debts and yet it’s been with us since the birth of this country. I had a heavily enforced teaching about laws and their purpose growing up but lies are what it boiled down to, there was no “natural moral law” there was only instinct. A natural law, like gravity for instance, is something that forces your actions to comply, you will not continuously fly upwards just by jumping, the action of the force cannot be avoided with what we as humans are at basis equipped with, “being good or bad” cannot fit that description. Woo, slow your crazy train of thoughts. When I began to pit the actions of our society against its words, more contradictions than the bible showed up.

            The pursuit of this knowledge originated from what was the economic crash of 2008 where I started finally realizing what was at stake versus how the show was run. After my roommates and I decided to set out on our own means, events began to change my perception of financial status partly because we were starting to lose control of what little bills we had. I had a lead foot problem and, while I certainly never considered it excessive, it was excessive how often I started getting caught speeding. Thousands of dollars over a few years before I would fully learn my lesson but when I got yet another ticket for expired tags in Blue Springs I had little idea that my refusal to pay a fine for what I saw as paperwork would mark an intriguing future set of legal shenanigans. We could barely keep the lights on in our shitty little one-bedroom apartment so for damn sure we weren’t spending almost half a two-week paycheck for nitpicky regulations to those flush already. I mean if I had that kind of money there wouldn’t have been a problem to begin with.

             I finally landed a job without the help of anyone else at Little Caesar’s (L.C.) who were at least going to offer me a steady 30 hours with the ability to pick more up. The fast-food store was a couple blocks from the apartments so a lot less driving, no extra money spent on bull shit rules that just fucked people who were poor to begin with. You look at vehicles alone and the amount of wealth required was exorbitant even in the early 2010’s. I had to insure out of a six hundred dollar (being way generous and that’s gross not fucking net) biweekly paycheck that the one hundred forty dollar insurance got covered, roughly 60-80 (because gas was expensive during a republican’s time too) dollars for gas, any spare money clung to desperately in case of mechanical failures (used replacement tire – $30, oil change – $30, calipers/rotors – $50-$200, so on so forth), and generally once a year spend two hours at minimum in the Department of Motor Vehicles to spend another sixty bucks after dropping seventy at courthouse for taxes. We’ve not even touched other expenses of living.

            After moving up forcefully through management of L.C., I started driving again and for a while got lucky mostly by not speeding as often. I was smoking a lot of weed now and there was no need to bring more shit down on my head but success breeds laziness and while driving between Kansas City and Leavenworth I got pulled over for speeding and expired tags with a small pipe for smoking. Now I imagine there’s a lot of different ways the whole situation could have gone from there but to keep the story short, I was given tickets for the tags and paraphernalia and when I went to court (for shits and giggles) I gave our sixth amendment a shot going before the judge without a lawyer. When you’re white and play dumb but polite you can learn some shit, I was immediately informed that unless I got representation, I would face a one thousand dollar fine and a year in jail. Missouri 2012 folks. Now how Platte County wasn’t aware of Blue Springs I have not a clue; I pretty much wiped out what I had saved to get a lawyer magically reducing the Platte pipe possession charge to like a five hundred dollar fine and year of probation all the while Blue Springs had my license as suspended.  I would discover this after getting pulled over once again for tags by Blue Springs’ officers and they would basically take my whole check to bail myself out and retrieve my vehicle. However, this potentially serious issue went a whole different route; my father was with me in the courthouse on the day of the hearing and saw a friend of his who, as judge and lawyer himself (trusting my memory), knew the judge presiding over my case. I never saw the judge again and I was immediately able to reinstate my license. Cenk and Anna now had every ounce of my attention on this subject and more.

            A punitive system designed to bleed dry those who’ve committed small offenses can easily lead to desperation. If not for my roommates, I might not have even allowed myself to be degraded over asking my parents for assistance, certainly wouldn’t have remained a free citizen. Anyway, my initial shock was followed by self-repudiation for naivety over what I technically already knew. I’m not gonna chalk everything up to “systemic racism” for I see another problem as the more fundamental schism amongst us; networking was never my strong suit and my unfortunate habit of spending money like it grows on trees when in “good company” doesn’t encourage me to repeat said ventures as often as I feel I should. I can only sit here and let my mind run wild with speculations of how that “friend” and judge were acquainted. Maybe they would treat each other to lunch occasionally, maybe they attended the same school for some unbeknownst amount of time, maybe they were friends themselves or hell perhaps they just owned similar stock or attended some church function together. Does it matter? Certainly my roommates wouldn’t have received such leniency even as white as I am (I speak with certitude for I was slated for a far worse result till the intervention) which leaves me to ponder about those who don’t have family in the know, who might not have a suit or clean work uniform (our apartment’s cleaning machines were just under four dollars to wash and a buck fifty to dry… in theory) to present themselves before the court, perhaps visible tattoos or just a different skin tone, fuck what about, just maybe, a limited vocabulary aiding in an impression of defiance, intended or not?

            This is why, as tempting as it is, I can’t just throw injustice at the feet of economics, but every day seems to bring contradictory news to batter against my belief. Steven Donziger should be nominated for god damn sainthood; around 2011 he (and those not mentioned where the fuck they at) went toe-to-toe with Chevron – a major oil and natural gas company – in a nine billion dollar attempt to achieve some form of reparations for the fuckery pulled on Ecuadorians. Let me be specific instead of spiteful; Donziger, a Harvard law graduate and former public defender, helped lead the case against Chevron for pollution caused in part by leaks from a majority of the oil wells in Lago Agrio resulting in the death of local fauna and foliage, farmland becoming barren, cancer rates spiking, and quality of life plummeting. Chevron contends that the entire judicial process carried out in Ecuadorian courts, even though they sought these courts, was corrupt and the malpractice was accomplished in hopes of digging into Chevron’s three hundred plus billion-dollar pockets. The records of ill management and consequential methods from both sides paints the age old “no innocent parties” picture but I only see a few individuals worth hundreds of billions of dollars, I only read of Chevron’s lawyers trying to run the circuits internationally. It wasn’t Americans working for Chevron that suffered house arrest in a last-ditch effort to preserve the cost margins for the company, not over a measly nine billion settlement but the bankrupting precedent it would set.

            I’ve totally overshot a glaringly poorly thought statement. What about Americans working for this benevolent, time-tested, vital corporate provider? I do not speak of upper management, affiliated lobby groups, closely tied law firms, collegiate associates in schools, scientists hired for the labs, representatives in other countries, I’m sure the list goes on; the individuals: who work your gas stations, stock your offices and cargo bays, carry your goods, extract your produce, held responsible for cleaning your messes, are amongst those I would call average Americans. I wonder if they feel like your trickle-down charity isn’t just house arrest under a nom de plume. Nobody else wonder in fear over the covid regulations implemented by businesses, nah that was gov’ment. Nobody else for the last two decades feel like making incrementally more gets you dramatically less, nah inflation and gov’ment spending. Nobody else watches businesses/institutions “tighten the ship” on all the nostalgic accomplishments from our favorite stories, nah newest generation’s name here and gov’ment. Am I the only motherfucker living recognizing these HUMAN BEINGS act in such ways and we all just cheer for our favorite dogmatic explanation?

            You’re not special, Chevron, you’re just fucking unique. I could siphon through any number of companies across any category of economics and single out behavior I find indefensible as I already have in the case of your predecessor, Rockefeller’s Standard Oil Company.  The practices you partake in are replicated ad nauseum across all fields, ImClone’s stock profiteering off a shoddy medical product, the Bureau of Chemistry a.k.a. F.D.A.’s compliance in almost every step taken during the Prohibition; the disregard for citizen’s lives constructing/relocating infrastructure where beneficial to the creator not the inhabitant i.e., Dakota Access Pipeline, Flint Michigan Water Supply, Central and South Florida Flood Control Project’s levees and canals, convenience and fast food chains’ national reclamation from simple, uncoordinated, independent local shops, the military’s testing around the Marshall Islands, the Department of Transportation’s continuous fidgeting with regulations at the behest of those with the capital to meet them, Trump’s god forsaken fucking border wall to stop my asinine tirade before spiraling further. Are these the examples of a free market? I’ll gladly slave under communism you fucking hypocrites. Jesus fucking Christ… You are not exempt either TYT. Everyone seemed to lose their minds (not excluding myself here) when the 45th presidential election came to its unclimactic resolution, and once again all I see are dollar signs at the heart of it all.

            When Trump took the republican nomination, I was far too confident that here at least the people who I knew as republican (and therefore my association with the party as a general bias) would finally see what the symbol of their beliefs on how our country should continue to operate translated to those elected by them.  Instead, I was met with “the country needs/could use a good business leader” or something to that affect. Really, let’s set aside his “methods” to achieve the status of “successful businessman”, that’s what we wanted/needed, more monetary management? Your bosses seemingly proselytize () your interests at a priority nigh equal to their own, pursue avenues for you to have the economic freedom in the development of hobbies on your own land right down the road to call you neighbor, exude patience in the face of your mistakes/outbursts while under stressors, refrain from ridicule when perceived insufficient understanding from you is made known. And if you nodded along to those statements, you’re the motherfucker I’m shitting on right now. I was not just speechless, I was reactionless. I had no idea how to continue forward when those who had been screaming for change, hollering fraud as Hillary cemented her position as the Democratic nominee, went immediately to apologetics as if there truly was a difference between her and the family buddy Trump. The Clintons and Trumps are known to fraternize with one another, how was everybody convinced that “their guy” was “for us” not what’s been the motivation for all this country’s prior actions, personal wealth. Here I am making an ass out of you and me again… eh mostly me.

            Alright, hit the bowl, reorganize. It broke what heart I have when the aftermath of all the doubling down lead to so many sociological fractures amongst those I live around, those I listen to, and the communities I found out about. At the same time, how could I fault it when I too felt as though the climax to the movie was about to peak. Thankfully, my parents never got caught up in the Christian apocalyptic hype wave of Obama being the antichrist, I found it truly amusing though to see so many quick to bandy the term about now fawning over Trump, even to compare him to the “deity” their faith takes its name from. Let me help you understand my sick pleasure (INV) “Luke 21:8 … The time draweth near, and therefore take heed that ye be not deceived; for many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; go ye not therefore after them… Revelations 13:2 And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion; and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. (3) And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast. (4) And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast; and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? Who is able to make war with him?... (11) And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth… (12) and he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.” Interpret that how you please, I know what dumbass connections I had made. Just cause the authority figures in my life didn’t scream about the antichrist doesn’t mean I didn’t spend a significant portion of my child hearing about “the end times.”

            These men of faith spouting off about the same shit, whether you jumped on the Trump wagon or not, continue to harp on about god’s judgement and repentance. I see the growth of the prosperity gospel simultaneously leading down what I had always thought was the opposite of one of the messages that cross both testaments. The bible I just quoted has over a thousand pages so it’s probably pretty easy to find verses supporting whatever it is you wanna say; of the barely hundred pages of my own words (future edit: HA!) written here, I cannot imagine the variety of ways it can be diced up.  Jargon not far off from what the judiciary seems to enjoy or even the business entities themselves. Little Caesar’s was a hellacious awakening to the “meritocracy” system. V’s had a lackadaisical ma and pa atmosphere, despite the poverty (and questionable backgrounds) of most the staff, Mama V seemed to inspire loyalty and pride in the simplest work tasks. When the financial pinch started to be felt personally and I had to leave for L.C., I felt bad because I didn’t feel sad enough. The pay was shit as were the hours and I began to harbor resentment over actions I interpreted as disrespectful, saw myself as ultimately a number so why not go somewhere that doesn’t try and play coy about it.

            Jobs that our society loves to shit on can still provide a sense of pride, joy, success, learning, even camaraderie. Tasks even in the “teenage non-jobs” should be accomplished with accuracy, speed, and to maintain a physically clean environment – dedication meaning those (superficial word garbage) characteristics and more all should be developed systematically by some nature in every set of hands with any potential to become involved with the work. So, what about when these goals are met, even exceeded? After being passed up for the spawn of goat and whale, as I so fondly referred to her as, I would leave for L.C. instead of having it as a second job as originally planned. Pathetic that we as a nation have allowed ourselves to be led to believe that certain tasks deserve to be shat on by the “innovators” who established these “too big to fail” industries. Absolutely no reason in a country screaming about liberty for its citizens to abandon the physical objects/economic stability that gives the words any meaning. Freedom should not be the consumption of time for the sake of bare essentials leaving all pursuits of life to the wayside e.g., our art, passions, hobbies, improved health which includes the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom. That is unless your value is deemed worthy.

            I was pleased with the situation for I didn’t want to consume my life in the pursuit of wealth which in my mind taking two jobs said in action. I did not know what the overhead for owning the apartment complex I stayed in could be even now but I understand that treating others like an inferior might just backfire. Bills were piling up and I cared little for “voluntary” legal documents; the light bill got paid later and later, rent getting divided up in smaller portions paid with constantly mounting late fees, insurance only to tag the vehicle after receiving a couple tickets, miniscule medical care, and certainly food barely worth consumption unless grabbed from the kitchen I worked in. The sustainability walls were starting to close in on us with I being the only employed individual amongst us, and I could feel that something was going to have to change if we truly desired to continue the small amount of freedom we had carved for ourselves. Sometime after the fall out of Juliana, the retrogression of rent payments became too much for the apartment manager’s sensibilities. He cop-knocked on the door one morning to let me know a shit storm was coming down on my head cause I couldn’t be late any more. Small balding white man must of seen “meekness” in my initial replies as a reason to work himself up into yelling the same nonsense about the rent until I finally got in that he would get his two hundred-ish dollars before the office closed and shut the door in his face. I chain smoked a couple packs of cheap cigs to regain control and began my second job hunt.

            Now only reliant on a fast-food check, I was eager to get a cushion as fast as possible for the plasma donations were timely and provided little relief. As a white male in the early 20’s with no kiddo’s (technically) there was no food stamps, god the disgraces I stooped to stay free (boohoo). Distracted. Despite the general manager’s (GM) assurances that his L.C. was like a family, I could read. The pamphlets/guidelines/handbooks were cold, logical, full of insight about the details printed for anyone to see. They were speaking to just anonymous persons that needed every step, every movement painstakingly explained to assist the goal of the business – profit. Alas, being shit at so much, my first couple months were not fruitful. I was slow to take up the movements necessary in production, I struggled to keep pace at any station due to weakness, and my original 30-hour week instantly went to 20 the next schedule, and 15 the next as I was tasked with my strength, standing with a sign at the side of the road 4 days a week for 3 hours, 6 if lucky (11 am to 1 pm then 4 pm to 7 pm). While I blame a lot of the idiosyncrasies of my parental units for much of the outlook I continue to hold, I can only thank them for the trait that brought me through that moment. Resentment.

            I despised the smug assuredness dickfaces would presume over my continued failures. The mockery was fuel to my desire to ram the accusations down their boisterous throat. Not with words which held no true rebuttal mostly due to garbled incoherent noises being my brain’s only defense, but out of nowhere undeniable evidence to discredit their perception in a blatant manner. Thankfully, other’s cared as little to be there as I did and/or had other methods of income apparently as I began to seek the shifts of others wanting time off as my scheduled hours fell. Months passed and the GM couldn’t ignore the pace I set and began building a faux sense of fellowship over our “shared atheism.” A couple years would pass and his reliance on me finally drew the notice of our Area Supervisor (AS) who I imagine was partly responsible for my sought-after promotion. On $7.45 an hour, the petite 10 cent/15 cent raises at a whim were nothing but a farce for paperwork’s sake in my eyes and, to truly reach a level of comfort once held by us, the assistant manager position was where my will was set, though it could hardly stop there of course. The pleasure at the shock on that fucking douche’s face when I finally started getting rent in early… quickly lost when I thought how he was probably patting himself on the back, “just a little tough love needed hya-uck” … focus.

            This journey to find balance in the joys of living to the necessities of sustaining it would lead to my continued promotions, both roommates finding employment, the loss of our pursuit in a heavy metal band, and the loss of sight in what I had set out with them to begin with. My fantasy novel took a back seat to the new video games, TV series and movies we could now afford, no more Boondock Saints on repeat interrupted only by Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Hell, we even got internet, no more jacking it from others in the building. My conservative nature took like a glove to the system of management businesses promote but I thought I could do it more honestly, with more integrity, by my example – I just needed more power, more control over the operations of my… whoops a store. My AS quickly stood out as a model of leadership instead of the overbearing micromanager with little comprehension of the scope of the tasks he assigned. I like to think this was due to my insane efforts to show exactly what his orders entailed, though instead of recognizing the ridiculousness of the requests overall he awarded me greater economic power. I thought this was the way of things back then no other choices, which formed the foundation of my practices in the Leavenworth, KS location that I eagerly took up as my latest longitudinal movement.

            It was easy to justify/lie about my motivations and deeds when the example of one of the franchise owners was consistently available to study. I swear to this day he garnered elation from his appearance at his poverty centers in costly clothing, popular vehicles worth tens of thousands on rotation, fatherfucker even showed up with the original Google glasses that failed miserably. I pushed for excellence in my crew and in return they got more responsibilities, I mean hours as raises were above my head. Obama/Romney Care hit and I swung for the fences, cutting labor like a good house nigga to promote my bootlickers to management positions for “real” raises and a circumvention of the insurance policy now forcing those too poor for such a monthly expense to seek multiple jobs for hours cause for damn sure the corporate/franchise accounts weren’t going to shell out a fine for any full-time uninsured peasants, apologies workers. The grip on control needed tightening to bring the numbers to the proper level, food cost was rising and labor was one of the few percentages I physically affected at this point. I fucking killed a damn old man with 15+ years at that son of a bitch…. Breathe.

            Oligarchs… ahem franchise owners barely even offered those in my position insurance and I skated by off the inclusion to my parent’s insurance till twenty-six years of age, not that I received income sufficient to warrant using it. After rent, electricity, water/sewage, trash, phone, insurance, gas, food, cigarettes, weed, and miscellaneous mundane supplies excess funds that weren’t saved for a future joy splurge here and there went into what little quality of life improvements I was capable of at the store. I briefly tasted of the dream that perhaps I could rise above the self-inflicted stumbling blocks to obtain that house, afford more than just my basic animal existence, maybe be worthy of meeting a life I had forsaken due to “false hopelessness”. A loss of my current love interest and a change in the circumstances around my employment at LC ultimately pushed me once again to do something drastic. That’s when I took the ultimate disgrace in my mind and began working for Asplundh Tree Trimming Experts CO [now LLC (Asplundh)] contracted at the power company my father worked at. Nepotism. What a lovely feather to add to the cap of what insanely small pride I kept losing. Imagine what shock I had when to my expectations, the blue collar honest American work of this tree trimming company was rife with the same flaws and habits plaguing the fast-food industry.

            I had hit reset on any progress to seek greener pastures but found myself sharing rentals with Esctharos and Y’alohila and beginning the budgeting process once again in hopes I could purchase a place of my own. The new spending power at my fingers helped me hold the blinders tight. I started looking for houses in preparation while seeking out doctors, dentists, and less processed food choices hoping to change habits that I knew where problematic. I had gotten back into utilizing the internet as well as purchasing my desktop, began procuring tools allowing the capability for fixing random problems in our rental home that seemed trivial to bother the landlord. Not much was making it into the savings account, especially when I finally had the excess funds (supposedly) to go out with friends to bars, clubs, concerts, events, so on so forth. Hell, even if it was just going out on public land to drink and chill at least I could afford alcohol and weed to chip in, but as the funding increased as well as my expenditure, I found it harder and harder to separate my thoughts from the insanely similar problematic practices that brought me to abandon LC with no respect or courtesy. It finally dawned on me that the disgusting directives driving managements’ maneuvering were not unique to the food industry but cornerstones of business fundamentals.

            The push for power, control, obedience was alive and well with regulations coming out daily at times. Someone doesn’t pay attention when using a gas-powered pole saw and cuts a line – all gas-powered pole saws gone; somebody one hands a chainsaw in a tree with poor posture/ positioning resulting in error – all trim-saws gone and I could go on. Asplundh was up to the same tactics the only variables being the relation to the task of tree trimming. As our wages rose year after year by a miniscule percentage while leaving the future of our contract in the air, other small changes started popping up like the loss of safety incentive checks for “gear”, crackdowns on dress code requirements, and ever-increasing stacks of paperwork being handed down while they mouthed production. Our union had and continues to take actions/make air vibrations to placate and assure us that our best interest is truly their goal but I look around seeing the opposite. On one side brotherhood, unity, worker’s rights, respectful discourse, jobsite safety but on this side, percentage cuts on wages for union health insurance, stock market retirements, compromises with Asplundh on gear and training, random preference on the individual level, and possibly worst the sea of gossip around the aforementioned and more. You’re all just humans, like anyone else, your history playing your actions like Beethoven believing…. I can only speculate what my employers’ part to play in our representation may be and its potential effect on the outcomes of our negotiations – I do know that it’s no different than anywhere else no matter the details.

            It’s why I keep trying to not throw accusations around because what do you do differently? No example exists to have stood the test of time in our records or in this day to set the path. The purpose of bringing up those quotes by Saul and Jesus on money was to remind myself of this very reasoning. (INV) “1 Timothy 6:5 Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness; from such withdraw thyself. (6) But godliness with contentment is great gain. (7) For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we carry nothing out. (8) And having food and raiment, let us be therewith content. (9) But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition (). (10) For the love of money is the root of all evil; which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.” Of course that whole chapter opens up with “(1)Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. (2) And they that have believing masters, let them not despise them, because they are brethren; but rather do them service, because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of the benefit. These things teach and extort.” This is a bit off the mark from what I read here (INV) “Matthew 6:35 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (36) Why is it that ye murmur among yourselves, saying, We cannot obey thy words because ye have not all these things… (38) Wherefore seek not the things of this world; but seek ye first to build up the kingdom of God, and to establish his righteousness… Matthew 10:8 Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purse. (9) Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves; for the workman is worthy of his meat. (10) And into whatsoever town or city ye shall enter, enquire who in it is worthy, and there abide till ye go thence…. (12) And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house, or city, shake off the dust of your feet for a testimony against them. (13) And, verily, I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgement, than for that city. Matthew 12:41 … Behold, thy (Jesus) mother and thy brethren stand without desiring to speak with thee. (42) But he answered and said unto the man that told him, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? (43) And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! Matthew 15:2 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they wash not their hands when the eat bread. (3) But he answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your traditions? (4) For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother; and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death which Moses shall appoint. (5) But ye say, Whosoever shall say to father and mother, By whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me, it is a gift from one, and honour not his father and mother, it is well. Matthew 16:27 Break not my commandments for to save your lives; for whosoever will save his life in this world, shall lose it in the world to come… (29) Therefore, forsake the world, and save your souls; for what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?... Matthew 19:24 And again I say unto you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. (25) When his disciples heard this, they were exceedingly amazed, saying, Who then can be saved? (26) But Jesus beheld their thoughts, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but if they will forsake all things for my sake, with God whatsoever things I speak are possible.” I try to remind myself that no matter the size or category of wealth, they aren’t any different than any other human being. The way I read it, the wealth itself was never the problem but the lifestyle it gives, the desperation to hold onto it, or the pretenses of generosity believed to inspire accumulation. Jesus didn’t want us to be slaves to anybody other than God and in his mind, money stood firmly in that path but only because of what we as human beings were willing to justify under the wide net we allow money to encompass. He recognized that money was nothing but a human construct and as such had whatever potential we desired for it. That desire, in a utilitarian sense, was the easiest denominator to eliminate supposedly allowing men to be free from one another and understanding as to why this freedom was in fact a call to humility from us to each other which would provide a different wealth. However, where’s the example, the proof that we as a species can study, ponder, and test to improve these symptoms of living? How can I call out for vengeance nigh unto the reckoning of the French nobility when any I might point the finger at treads the same path as all those before, monkey see monkey do.

            Man is it fucking difficult, especially in the day and age of one of the most prevalent and disgusting scams backed by human reasoning in the annals of history, insurance. Hundreds of years showing us time and again how such a system can be exploited and yet its growth to infest the lives of individuals in numerous degrees continues to be pushed even by the average civilian. Their relationship with business I’ve been so happy to spew venom at is only a product of their conjunction to the end goal of all the human beings involved, monetary stability. No matter nation, creed, or era these companies have been bound to their resource, the source of the money and those tied to its origin. The scandals recorded against them only make clear the ties of the humans in charge of our livelihoods to those of wealth and popularity despite the pandering jargon to steer the reader to a “bad apple” conclusion. The names are more difficult to remember than the actual suffering felt due to their actions but is this not the purpose of a corporate entity? The lead gets buried quickly though for even that statement is a distraction to the core of what leads to civilian suffrage; pay not attention to the methods of obfuscated tediousness that lead to your stressors, but demand justice for the frivolous frolicking plastered in our friendly news outlets for record of such indignities. Can’t afford to leave your family a means of support upon passing, don’t blame your employer pay this guy a little dough each month. Can’t afford to fix/replace your transportation in case of misadventure, don’t rail at the motor companies just give this dude some cash each month. Can’t afford the amenities to your residence showing your support for American excellence, don’t look to your government just give your retailer a portion of funds each month. Your hardships are not an implication of the practices inherent within the entirety of the enterprise but a product of an individual’s lavishness openly on display, a view easier to sell if a popular moral highpoint can be applied.

            American Heritage: American Characters  James Hazen Hyde, Richard F. Snow, August/September 1981, Volume 32, Issue 5 https://www.americanheritage.com/james-hazen-hyde “... The elder Hyde had come down to Manhattan from his Catskill birthplace in the mid-1850’s at the age of 16. After putting in seven years at the Mutual Life Insurance Company, he decided he could do better… He paid claims promptly, and the business grew around him, but he continued to live frugally, drawing a salary of $1,500 a year. He imposed this same rigorous thrift () on his son James, who was born in 1876… Hyde graduated from 1898, taking honors in German and French. The next year his father died of overwork, leaving the twenty-three-year-old Hyde in charge of a billion dollars of life insurance… Joseph Pulitzer saw a story here, and the World, which a few days earlier had described Hyde as ‘a serious and an excellent man of business,’ now changed its tune and decided he was ‘a little too Frenchified” for decent Americans…. The welter of charges and countercharges about Hyde’s management of Equitable brought on an investigation of the whole industry…. The next year (1906) new government regulations overhauled the entire business….”

            Really? Did it though? Justice Department Recovers 1.4 Billion in Fraud and False Claims…, Department of Justice, November, 2005, https://www.justice.gov/archive/opa/pr/2005/November/05_civ_595.html

“… This brings total recoveries since 1986, when Congress substantially strengthened the civil False Claims Act, to $15 billion. ‘This year’s outstanding recoveries in civil fraud cases…’ said Peter Keisler… ‘… attests to the fortitude of whistle-blowers who report fraud and the tireless efforts of civil servants who investigate and prosecute these cases…’ Mr. Keisler also paid tribute to Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa and Representative Howard L. Berman of California who sponsored the 1986 ammendments to the False Claims Act… ‘Without this important legislation strengthening the Act and, in particular, the qui tam () provisions which give ordinary citizens the courage and protection to blow the whistle on government fraud…’ … Such cases run the gamut of federally funded programs from Medicare and Medicaid to defense contracts, disaster assistance loans, and agricultural subsidies…. The relator’s share increases up to 30 percent if the United States declines to intervene and the whistleblower pursues the action alone…. The Department of Health and Human Services reaped the biggest recoveries, largely attributable to its Medicare and Medicaid Programs. Substantial recoveries were also made by the Office of Personnel Management which administers the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, the Department of Defense for its TRICARE insurance program, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Railroad Retirement Board… another 41.9 million recovered from PriceWaterhouseCoopers, L.L.P., for alleged false claims for travel expenses in connection with its contracts with numerous federal agencies, and 30.5 million from Harvard University and its agents in connection with a United States Agency for International Development agreement to advise Russia in its transition to a market economy….” Hey, you got off lucky, Art Williams, straight from the Dept. of Justice desk and not a single mention of your part to play in those revisions to the fraud legislation.

            I swear I haven’t even begun to break the surface of all the bullshit governments let money get away with and despite all the pages this work will have in its totality, I still wont even come close. Just fucking platitudes, metaphors, and presumptions that only serve as an extension of self-desire to understand and overcome a mentality of self-destruction. That very reasoning is what lead me by the hand to stop hyper-focusing on the love of money and search for a more tangible cause for the actions taken. I cannot eliminate money from this process despite my best efforts however I now categorize the search of economic stability under a greater, more encompassing… happenstance. Power/control is something every human can probably relate to; different words and experiences may color our perception of what forms we recognize in our own lives or more specifically in our own actions but the similarities consume my thoughts. I’m using generalities and obscure diction again.

            All the quotations I’ve used up till now have many common themes to me, one of those is the attempts at managing our environment in all its aspects. While working at LC, I fully embraced the method with which I was raised – speak when spoken to, ask only how high if you ask at all. The ‘rents softened fast though (unlike the stories I hear of the previous generations) proven in my winning freedom from the pants down paddle/switching for my younger siblings including myself. I held that grudge till the day I woke up to my stupidity and decided to act in a manner that led to my freedom instead of increasing adversity till the time came to grasp said liberty. The action I felt so appalled by was the experience of the consequences having meant nothing at all; pertinence dependent solely on the individuals involved not a statement of physical law. While growing up, trying to learn how to communicate/navigate the world with my strange mentality, the revelation that their quickness to admonish problematic behavior was not an actual standard but a product of desire from them, surmised the conclusion that judgement for personal sins was only a matter of acknowledgement. I’m sure all who have siblings (maybe even those who don’t) are well aware of being forced to take responsibility for the actions of another for whatever reason tickled the fancy of the figure in authority. Heh, I remember a moment before we truly were allowed to watch television, my father actually tried to accuse me of hiding the remote. Obviously I had never touched it but obviously I was lying for my father obviously hadn’t hidden it from himself and my siblings were too young to have done it, it certainly “didn’t just grow legs and walk away”. Some time after my switching didn’t reveal its location, I was allowed out of my room when the remote was pulled from the lazy boy cushion. Instead of an apology, I got a heartfelt discussion about remaining respectful to one’s elders even in the face adversity.

            This doesn’t even take the cake for the genesis of real hatred taking root in my mind. I was still young enough to be caught up in the rhetoric hook, line, and sinker, I bore the fault for my reaction to the accusation; then after I finally received the promise that, now thirteen, I was too old to receive a paddling it was proven that too was worth no more than the vibrations of air molecules that transmitted the information. I’m no saint, things I desire to accomplish I’m on top of like white on rice but something not so exciting interrupting whatever activity I’m engaged in can be put off a second. That was unacceptable this night, I had been called one time to brush my teeth in preparation for prayers and that was all I got. Even though there never came a second call, even though I was not even a full minute in my response, I got a good paddling. Now somewhere between the ages of 13-15, the last straw had been drawn. Liars, hypocrites, authoritarians where all I saw in the place of parents. Funny, this event still didn’t have me questioning the methods only the humans behind them.

            Spare the rod, spoil the child; “tough love.” Still can’t say I’ve shaken myself of the trope. The idea of teaching consequences for actions seems like a state of matter at times with how ingrained aspects of the thought permeates so much of our lives. How does one teach if the knowledge gained from failure is removed from the failure itself? Now the child has heard and understands not to touch the top of the stove but is it because of the comprehension of the damage heat will perform on the body; more likely it’s because you said it’s hot… because you said so. However, are you just supposed to let them burn the shit out themselves, I know I didn’t give my parents an option. I just waited till everyone was in bed then tested the varying degrees of heat at certain distances as well as how quickly I could touch the top without being burned. Like all things I was told not touch, I became obsessed with many of the forbidden objects (i.e. knives, guns, fire…sexuality) that warranted punishments to dissuade interest. Poor logic, no, no, no, personal logic based on faith held by them only kept me in check for as long as the supportive reasoning was not disrupted by alternative perceptions that contained even the smallest ring of truth. If any part of physical reality I have lived by on the word of others shows a fraction of falsehood, the whole mentality now has to be broken down, dissimulated, and reproofed with greater detail and critical thinking.  To be more concise, while growing up, why was everyone so adamant that my hair had to be cut short when figures such as Jesus and Sampson, adherents to the Nazarite code (I know I was told incorrectly about that shit, learned ones) and examples of righteousness, kept their hair long.

            Alas, my disgust at how easily I find it to defend the doling out of reprimands still has yet to change my stance in spite of every single day providing more examples of how the method is an utter failure. While growing up, I tried to stay positive about the system my parents utilized for teaching me right from wrong however as more events piled up to support the theory of their hypocrisy I had to grapple with other hypotheses as to what actions were involved in achieving the goal. A standout example was during the early years of my younger brother. I was somewhere between first and second grade when my youngest brother finally reached the age my parents started to “crack down” on potty-training. I had already witnessed my sister receive a far more caring and lenient approach (not as quick to whippings) but I had it explained very carefully and “maturely” that we didn’t treat women in such a manner. The justification for my brother damn near being bribed instead of beaten to obey was another crack in my sanity (like I was just being smacked around the place fucking jesus). It wasn’t the first instance of the seeming double standard and as I’ve already written it wouldn’t be the last. It didn’t take long into my teenage years to feel a bit butt hurt about the way the system played out, so I focused on the portion that I felt made the penance acceptable; the knowledge imparted from the discussion around the offense.

            Can you really turn your nose at my struggle around the quandary when all our organizations seem to love some form of the ridiculous cliché. My school(s) certainly wasn’t above the criticism and I doubt much has changed since I left. The demerit system was just one way they could try and curtail behaviors some of us just decide to bring into school with us some days. For me, demerits added up and at a certain point you spent time after school writing sentences, usually from the scriptures. Of course, the “good teachers” choose verses seemingly pertaining to the transgression. I can’t tell you how many times I wrote verses about respecting elders and teachers and parents. The perception of control needed to mete out consequences requires a level of recognition. What might be recognized is whatever brings you to the conclusion of listening… at least outwardly. That of course is the problem. Is there any high ground to be claimed if the call for improved etiquette only imparts the lesson of greater discretion? Can’t take responsibility for how an individual interprets your “guidance” though huh. Uniforms only purpose is to inspire conformity something kinda commie if you ask me but even public schools seem to like playing with related regulations attempting to “improve performance.”

            The uniform I dealt with was pretty limited in choices but that didn’t stop many of us finding accessories or ways to wear the obligated dress in ways not specifically noted in the handbook. It’s almost amazing how fast humans, even “children”, turn into lawyers when seeking individualism, regardless of ulterior intentions. The cyclical nature of verbal back and forth between students and instructors was almost always a matter of perseverance with many of us trying to reason our case far beyond the point of the teachers’ patience. The exception was always the one that went from zero to ten at a pen drop. Those who didn’t fuck around handing out what authority was allowed when it was possible to use, only got tested by the students who decided to not give a fuck about the chastisements they felt the teachers had as their limit. At this point I could give an example of a student getting suspended for his disregard of the dress code, but let’s be honest, the reproof was for his attitude in response of being in violation. I imagine many who ascribe to some structure of hierarchy would have seen his responses as a problem therefore needing correction.

            I know I did. His reactions to questions/demands frequently had my eyes bulging in their sockets. I would be completely blown away by the nonchalant attitude he kept as he dug his hole deeper. Ristakoeth and his family lived in significant poverty and his single mom struggled to keep a handle on him. She drove an old beater station wagon that seemed to have issues getting Ristakoeth and his siblings to school regularly and, while I’m sure I heard stories even then (gossip does fly at the speed of sound), looking back I’m almost positive she struggled with the use of drugs. I don’t just speak of the hard stuff, the shit you’ve been wired to recall when that word is used, for the only difference between those and prescriptions are the individuals pushing them. Not that I state this as rebuke to her and her child’s behavior either, that freedom to take into one’s body whatever is desired belongs to the individual, and I would take whatever the doctors recommended too when dealing with a crippling disability. Ristakoeth seemed to derive pleasure from pushing her buttons and one day I thought to myself, “no wonder” when I watched his mother lay into him one morning, screeching insults with little criticism that could be used to improve him causing their tardiness, and immediately felt shame. I thought to myself how others would interpret the outbursts of my own parents when I wore their patience thin out in public, takes two to tango and I knew Ristakoeth loved to dance. It’s funny on a day-to-day basis I would fluctuate between admiration and hatred for him, at times literally entertaining thoughts of the ways I could murder him and the next day singing his praises in my head as he stood up for the students speaking bluntly, as to equal the manner used on us and then dealing with the repercussions.

            I mention this probably common feeling for most as strange because I’ve always been a bit too black and white in my mentality. I haven’t changed; when I’ve settled on hatred there is no redemption, or I should say I have yet to witness the target even tentatively take the actions I see as recognition of their fuckery. Except Ristakoeth, his odd moments of clarity and humility that we shared briefly and sparingly would sow the seed of that “duality of man” concept. Ristakoeth seemed to comprehend (as well as a twelvish year old could) that the fault wasn’t all on his mom, or even his white absent father, or even the overbearing religious structure his peers seemed to practice. However, that didn’t give him an excuse, in my mind, for the “get what you can when you can how you can” outlook he touted about. “All I got are my words and my balls,” boy did he love to view himself as a corrupter. Thought he was a little hood rat in a prep school, there to twist all the little innocents away from the guardians’ teachings. His accusations of naivety towards me at our first acquaintance, all too familiar, instantly stuck him on the list of people I’d like to torture to their end. My desire to silence these accusations were inhibited by my lack of ability to speak coherently and be listened by those I sought to refute, though I also lacked the evidence along with the control due to the mental fission over my parents whose orders had encouraged me to inhabit my room and read books.

            I have the infuriating incapability to remember spoken words, conversations, despite my efforts to listen which of course encouraged random people, even those I despised, to just share their struggles/hopes/dreams/feelings. I imagine I got a bit of a complex from all the times I heard “you’re not listening” from… I guess not the dog we’d eventually get (easier to state who hasn’t said it). Not that of course this helped, if you cannot recall what was literally just spoken to you, “you’re still not listening.” Books provided a visual reference to the words seemingly aiding my memory, hell when I used to dream, I would swear to you that it was almost like reading a novel but somehow containing visuals making my insane nightmares all the more vivid in the mind’s eye. It’s also why I was insanely good about the “letter of the law” but it would take well into my twenties to settle on what I consider the spirit to be. I would hold fast to a belief that I didn’t practice until that time. For example, the moment I had my subconscious biases logically hurled in my face through the black crime statistic.

            The problem with researching as a knob lies with the ability to sift through the very general and basic information available for comparison. I can’t even find the videos or statistics that were supposed to jog the memory of exactly how wrong I fucking was. Some period of time before the 2016 election, I had latched on to some dumb ass statistic about either the black-on-black crime rate or the percentage of black inmates in our prisons and had another instance similar to the abortion scenario with Juliana. My rambling and excessive use of exposition for reaching a point seems to make it easy to interrupt me with rebuttals on the assumption of what conclusion I may be heading towards. I would love to say it was on the second topic and I wanted to make an argument against the idea of systemic racism in favor of economic destitution which had less basis on race than how the percentages in the reports publicized were being spoken on. However, I didn’t make it far past the quoted percentage when I was interrupted albeit again with a topic I had not thought out thoroughly which shut me down instantly. Y’alohila responded with a passion I can only assume came from the presumption that I was about to make a racist claim (maybe that they deserve it I don’t know) which wasn’t a far left field take with my frequent Animal Mother quotation. She showed that even if you took the percentage out to a macro level you still had a vast disparity that wasn’t accounted for by a breakdown of crime/incarceration by total population.

            The United States in 2010 had a population of plus three hundred eight million; the population of white and black was sixty-four and twelve-point-six percent respectively. This puts white citizens at a bit over 197 million and black Americans roughly around 38 million. 2008 statistics for incarcerated beings were in total approximately 2.4 million, the white and black ratios being 39 and 40 percent. This places the population of both around nine hundred thousand (black-967,340.8 white-943,157.28 are the numbers I came up with) meaning about 2.5% of the total black populace in the U.S.A. and .4% of the white public. Two thousand fourteen analytics from the F.B.I. show an estimated total population of slightly more than two hundred fifty million and the total arrests for whites and blacks for the year at 6,056,687 (69.4%) and 2,427,683 (27.8%) correspondingly. If I am remembering correctly, I didn’t even get a portion of those statistics out (I think partially due to mentioning that fake ass white on black, black on white, black on black crime percent floating around that time), about the ratios of incarcerated before Y’alohila shut down by stating the obvious about the numbers’ equality being the problem itself due to the disparity in the overall pool of beings (also the white on white crime statistic). Shut me the fuck up; I don’t know how I had overlooked something so simple. Despite my irritation about the interruption, regardless of my overall point still being valid in my mind, I couldn’t, with this comprehension of evidence, argue that my interpretation of the numbers was the correct method.

            I really see so much of the issues as one above race transcending to the plane of life’s instinct to control its environment (in any way possible and comfortable) to a beneficiary end for self. I still will not budge from my stance that the crime issue isn’t just for a specific race, the regulations and institutions charged with keeping them are obfuscating to navigate for the purpose of a staging a mindset desired by the humans overseeing the process. The exceptions allow for individuals to deal out life altering judgements based upon perceptions whether they be out of grievous ignorance of belief, a simple misunderstanding widely accepted, or an emotional response to personal facts that come to light. This would allow for racist assholes to make their waves but not due to the system being racist; it feels like a nonsensical point as case after case (not studies) year after year alongside historical instances discovered and rediscovered furthers the refutation that our whole society doesn’t just slide to fucking racism at the drop of a fucking hat the second any fucking perception of suffering fucking comes up even in just the fucking rhetoric. Fuck…. I hated math growing up. I felt so much of it was subjective and teachers couldn’t expound on my ill worded questions except with what amounted to “that’s the way it is.” I could never come to terms with that and my grades showed it when I moved to algebra and above. I could copy the algorithms, imitate the steps, but it always came out wrong in some manner because I didn’t understand. No different here. I see the exceptions to the majority statistic and reason all of them as part of the same issue… at the least in this instance. Those who take the responsibility of managing our affairs of state see it as their duty to take the mantle of the past and improve, which leads to standards for an ultimate goal usually told in a utopian fashion but those who don’t qualify/struggle to grasp/actively disagree have to be “taught/incentivized”.

            From my experience and understanding, at some point everyone is willing to agree with a method of control as a tool for reformation. Funny to me, as the excuse seems an awful lot like it comes from a place of laziness where those tasked by us for bringing knowledge, comprehensive explanations, and enlightened reasoning find it far easier to enact a (seemingly profitable) physical judgement as the technique for instruction most generally sprinkled with verbal “encouragement”. I don’t have any idea of what could replace/change this mentality and still accomplish the effect of showing others the errors of reasoning that led to their illogical behavior. People can’t just be running around stealing, enslaving, murdering, fucking each other and our race be expected to accomplish anything. This doesn’t just apply to the big obvious heavy hitters I mentioned but my endeavor has been to include the manner in which we interact with one another; how we cope with our financial, personal, and sociological struggles in the purview () of all of us. Does that truly require us to imprison each other for simply being poor though? “In Massachusetts, Iheanyi Daniel Okoroafor, a 73-year-old retired mental health case manager, was ordered jailed in 2014 when he appeared in small-claims court over a $508 debt for furnace repair…. Okoroafor said the repair was improperly done and had not fixed the problem with his furnace…. At the June 2014 hearing in Belchertown District Court, he also told the judge that he did not have the funds to make the payments or hire an attorney, as his main source of income is a $2,000 monthly state pension. Okoroafor explained that after paying monthly bills, including medical bills for his wife who suffers from dementia and tithing of 10 percent of his income to the church, he is ‘left almost without anything.’… Okoroafor thought he would have a chance to explain why he did not pay the bill, but the judge concluded that Okoroafor could pay the debt, ruled him in contempt of court for failing to do so, and ordered him jailed for 30 days or until he paid the full amount owed…. He was held at Hampshire County Jail for 12 hours before his daughter paid his debt to secure his release at about 2:00 a.m. ...” A Pound of Flesh, The Criminalization of Private Debt, ….researched and written by Jennifer Turner, Principle Human Rights Researcher in the ACLU’s (American Civil Liberties Union) Human Rights Program. Copyright 2018. I can only speculate though that the cases similar to the example have a core principle elegantly communicated in this quote. “… a judge in Perry County, Indiana, threatened Herman Button with jail if he did not agree to pay $25 a month toward a $1,865.93 judgement his former landlord obtained for an eight-year-old debt. Button was unemployed and living on disability benefits; he appeared in court without a lawyer…. The Court: ‘So we’re here today for you to explain what you’re going to do to pay this off.’ Mr. Button: ‘I can’t.’ The Court: ‘Okay, but you’re going to.’ Mr. Button: ‘I can’t do it.’ The Court: ‘Okay, Mr. Button.’ Mr. Button: ‘Yes, ma’am.’ The Court: ‘For some reason we’re not communicating. Alright, you’re not hearing me for some reason. I am telling you that, yes, you will. You’re going to tell me how you’re going to go about doing that. And I’m not going to accept I cannot, and if the next words out of your mouth are I cannot, Mr. Button, then you will sit with Mr. Glenn at the Sheriff’s Department until you find a way that, yes, you can….’” Ibid.

            Gotta pay what you owe right? Society would surely collapse if we encouraged the choice to be freeloaders/moochers/deadbeats and a man in debt is a slave, I think I’ve heard, and servants should obey their masters. Don’t give me excuses or tell me you can’t, you’ve already failed with a mentality like that, there is no try, only do or do not. Right?... Calm… I’m aware that someone like me has little ground to hurl stones at about anything I’ve covered including the stuff I wish I had the space/patience for. “This topic disproportionately affects minorities! Systemic Racism! White Privilege!” and all that jazz. That is my hang up though, that word disproportionately is not the word only. Whities seem to, at some capacity, suffer a similar fate but that’s deserved at some level huh or maybe there’s an underlying bigoted nature to regulations that feeds injustice at the hands of institutions that’s more than happy to cuddle up with racism. You know what fuck that shit, I don’t need to explain myself to the likes of fucking hypocrites anyway. Including you ACLU, fucking spouting similar talking points in the same publication you seem to disproportionately use white examples in. I can hardly claim I gave it the attention it was owed or the research but I didn’t find a black example till the fucking appendices in which I feel I barely butchered the summary of details worse than you. And an update would be nice like is this Iheanyi Daniel Okoroafor (god I know I’ve butchered that in oration) the same as the doctor who wrote The Black Man in the United States of America, is he an Endangered Species? I mean I find it difficult to wrap my mind around a 73-year-old retiree achieving his doctorate in the five years between trial and the publication. That tells me though the ol’ hoity toity “business” advocating for civil rights didn’t give a “person of color” their due. I don’t know, could have just slipped the information net or perhaps he’s just stretching his mental health work for all its worth; hell maybe not even the same guy or a hundred other possibilities, I’m sure. Yes, I threw a scripture reference or two back there for shits and giggles. I just can’t get over how hysterical it is, in the case of Okoroafor at least, that the Christian populace wasn’t up in arms, pitchforks and tiki torches, etc., over the whole outcome. Let me quote, “… Never did he think the June 11 hearing in the Belchertown small claims court over his unpaid $508 debt would land him behind bars…. Okoroafor told Murphy that his main source of income is a $2,000 monthly pension from the state, and that he pays 10 percent of this to his church each month… Resurrection Life Ministries in Northampton, a Pentecostal church where he has been a member for more than 10 years. After paying monthly bills – including medical bills for his wife, Evelyn, who suffers from dementia – he told the judge that he is ‘left almost without anything.’ According to the recording, Murphy responded, ‘Other than the $200 you pay to your church every month?’…” Debtor’s Jail? By Gena Mangiaratti, Daily Hampshire Gazette, Greenfield Recorder, September 25th, 2014, https://www.recorder.com/Archives/2014/7/DHGWEB-DebtorJailed-GR-072114

            Where’s your anger here, all you “true believers”? Where’s the outrage over this oppression of religious freedom by the government? This was back in 2014 and I don’t even remember hearing a peep back then, certainly had some fucking digging to do in 2022 when I’m being told we’re at the height of state condoned violence on menial grounds for free religious practice. Certainly has nothing to do with skin color. Could be dead serious there. How many of you intellectual non-religious identifying asswipes scoffed inwardly at the mention of that man’s offerings to his church? Bastards, worse how many of you “Christians/theists” scoffed at the mention of his Pentecostal affiliation? Don’t even venture to feed me no goddamn nonsense either about giving caesar what is caesar’s. Pretty positive it was your precious geebus that had some quote about serving two masters so where the fuck you at “moral majority”, where the fucking shit hell is that fucking prosperity gospel now you disgusting piles of shit out the asses of maggots. Where is your fucking Christian nation amongst fucking any of my examples – hellacious, malicious, insane prodigies of fucking monkeys that happily desire to have us act in such a fashion. Nicotine. Tetrahydrocannabinol. Immediately. Does it never occur to many of you who claim the evidence of our “God-fearing” forefathers as support for the basis of church entwined with state, that it was this very reason that gave these religious founders the personal understanding of how such a structure suspiciously appeared at the heart of so much inhumane, authoritative injustice (when we couldn’t drum up the distracting indignation for a people of a different shade as an outlet for the hate from personal hardship). So many stories of the real average men and women fleeing to this country placed the blame on religious persecution, not from Muslims or atheists or Hindus or whatever (jews…fucking pricks), but the very “Christians” that shared the commandment to call each other brother, let alone the heathens they were told to call neighbor. Restated the persecution was usually dealt out on the order of a similarly “Christian” (perhaps differently named sect) institution.

            Alas, I’ve allowed frustration to fuel my tendency to hyper focus and spout foolishness. I haven’t even gotten to toddler rant about the credit system or the accounting infrastructure (i.e., stock market) or tech industries. I would find myself most reprehensible, even revolting for failing to give the credit owed to the entertainment industry and the psychological impacts its physical embodiment coincidently parallels the topics I’ve stated or hinted at. I’m not even sure where to begin with such a behemoth of a topic though. Interestingly (to me), TYT also facilitated the realization of the acquired power by the options for escapism coinciding with problematic consequences for those lacking in wealth. Oy, you know I swear I knew of a survey result showing state by state the highest wage employee (? something like that) and long story short the conclusions seem to indicate that a majority of states valued “pro-level” athletes, coaches, owners over… no I’ll wait on this subject. The study doesn’t seem to exist or it was a hoax like that stupid crime statistic, just said something I liked making it easier to swallow…. I feel at times like the greatest, simplest and yet thought-provoking lyrics I’ve had the pleasure to hear is the chorus of Jim Croce’s Operator “…But isn’t that the way they say it goes? Well, let’s forget all that and give me the number if you can find it so, I can call just to tell ‘em I’m fine and to show I’ve over come the blow I’ve learned to take it well I only wish my words could just convince myself that it just wasn’t real but that’s not the way it feels…”

            With the love of music I’ve constantly held dear, you’d think the industry would have been the first reality check to rip the blinders off of the shady dealings of the infrastructure that exists to publicize art. I hate to be an ass about it, but hip-hop/pop didn’t write the book on exploiting their artists and influence to talk civilians out of sustenance… apologies money. Hell rock-n-roll didn’t either and I wrote a damn ten-page paper on the subject in junior year (high school though pretty sure I already mentioned I didn’t do college) that was rife with mentions of the corporate sectors pulling the strings. I look back thinking how did all of that just slap me about the face and I just go, huh fascinating. Fucking dumb ass.  A little harsh, but my focus was weighted too heavily at proving a meaningless point, that the Beatles were the true “kings of rock and roll.” A silly hill to die on that I happily defended till I finally became totally apathetic. While I was enthralled by the newfound genre of heavy metal (which remains my favorite), I held a special place for the Beatles from my early youth where the pool of media to partake of was heavily censored. The combination of their beats, notes, and lyrics, whether arbitrary () or engrossing/relatable, were not only what I saw made a “real” rock n roll band singing rock music but, combined with what popularity they commanded (even if not the highest grossing artists), made them the unrecognized greatest of all time; Elvis, of course, being the more commonly held pinnacle around me at least.

            Greatest of all time, the G.O.A.T. What an imbecilic, boisterous load of horse ninny that ever became a thing. Fans of whatever artist compiling their lists of attributes that support their fever-fantasy of how “their guy” meets “the criteria.” The statement is far too subjective even when desperately attempting to associate the conclusion on “facts.” At the time of writing that paper I was also a maggot (a stan of Slipknot for any post 2000’s babies [or others] unfamilar), meaning there was no greater band (period full stop), dead, living, or yet to come, than Slipknot and no equal talent to their front man, Corey Taylor. He could literally do everything vocal related and combined with the supreme talents on the instrumentals, I still have those first three albums Corey joined Slipknot amongst my absolute favorite pieces of all time. Every time I pick one up, I feel almost compelled to listen to them all the way through, each song excellent and unique, and the messages of hate and revenge were close to the heart. The group was just another mention alongside other idolized musicians like Judas Priest, Lamb of God, Iron Maiden, and Marilyn Manson and the Spooky Kids in the paper (gotta play it cool you know), mostly in hopes that I could kill some stereotypes about the “satanist worshiping, evil loving, violence inspiring, no talent hacks that could only smash on their instruments fast while one yelled/screamed in a microphone.”

            I believe I threw the paper in the trash (I try to an insane level to keep my writings) when enlightenment took a baseball bat to my brain listening to Volume 3: The Subliminal Verses (Slipknot) for the god knows what repetitious time. In my crazed mind’s eye, I connected my feelings about the album having single hits for the first time as the “selling out of my band”. Whether this outlook led to my disillusion or that they did just cease playing fast paced notes with “fuck everyone” lyrics from a place of authenticity, I stopped placing them on a god tier pedestal and brought it down to earth focusing on the undeniable talent that was evident even if not incomparable/unmatched. The attraction felt towards lyrics that resonate with personal experience isn’t special, and my desire to escape/placate my mind encouraged me to imagine a bond between the artists and myself (not that this is particularly outside of the normal either). Others heard hate, rage, or at best loud incoherent noises and I wanted to show others what my ears received and how I interpreted it; at least to me the message garnered gave feelings of peace, calm, joy, while simultaneously providing focus and energy. “…It never stops, you can’t be everything to everyone, contagion, I’m sitting at the side of Satan what do you want from me? They never told me the failure I was meant to be, overdo it, don’t tell me you blew it, stop your bitching and fight your way through it. I’m not like you, I just fuck up, come on motherfucker, everybody has to die. Come on motherfucker, everybody has to die…” Still gets the blood pumping but reminiscing over People = Shit couldn’t (and probably made worse) cease my being pissed off over the band I loved only raging because they were poor, like literally all the bands I had tried to cover in my paper.

            My existing excess of malicious intent needed an outlet and I had already got over the torturing small critters shit (never cats or dogs, love dogs more than people and larger animals usually had someone they cared about meaning I could be caught). The fuckers hadn’t ever done anything that gave rise to my desires of fire, blood, and pain, and I settled in my mind that they could feel, all were alive down to the smallest insect and plant even single celled organism. I detested random wanton violence (bullying), I only sought vengeance but was too stupid to conjure a satisfactory method to exact it that didn’t place me amongst serial killers meaning in a cell or the ground. The relief I found in hard rock/heavy metal would put my thoughts out in the air and hearing it, I would smile, maybe laugh aloud, scolding my silly overreaction to a mundane issue. Of course, I could easily be substituting logic to explain some simple emotion as “I like fast heavy bass” and there’s no denying that accusation when discerning the qualities of recognized “legends/one hit wonders/niche counter culturists”, many points presented as fact are subjective. Say that or any critiques (constructive or otherwise) in front of someone uplifted/motivated by the medium scrutinized () and gloves off. The devotee can hardly be blamed in my eyes when the criticism (even well thought and articulated carefully) usually seems to be aimed at the supporter of the creator/artist themselves or felt as such if commentary towards the popular figure is “unjust,” wouldn’t you agree “rap god.”

            I will attempt to keep this brief, too many shitheads seem desperate to throw stones at the man making it difficult to discern whose iterations () come from a desire to cease hero worship or capitalize off the attention his name tows with it. The issues seem awfully similar to my hang ups with the ol’ Abe, that being even the honest ones (as far as I can tell) are overly sympathetic toward another equally at fault, turnabout is fair play I think the saying goes. Marshall Mathers ain’t some Elvis clone, the accusations of culture vulture has become insanely common from where I sit and it would have me rolling if I didn’t see it as a serious roadblock for discussing the actual problem. Part of the thing I regret about that rock n roll paper was my defense of Elvis; I was too ignorant and (lacking resources as well… more excuses) insufficient time had been spent to put nuance into context. Oh sure, I was after his throne to give to another, but he wasn’t the mastermind of his success or even his own songs. The label, publication, and agency companies funding and pushing his music took a pretty faced sixteen-year-old and waved money in his face. From what I’ve read, Elvis wasn’t exactly “gifted” academically or athletically, nor described as a creative innovator before getting offered by others the chance to raise him and his family out of poverty.

            Boy, I wish I could go back and physically hear the wind going over my head as I ever so briefly touched on his puppet masters before forging ahead. I was only focused on the mediocre talent and effort compared to the pedestal I placed the Beatles on, and my refutation of how he was considered the king solely (to me) due to popularity, restated his throne was just the sheer number of individuals who verbalized the sentiment. Die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you’re an Elvis clone in all the worst ways, Marsh. The main thing I hear (regarding Elvis) is how swinging his hips to a quickened blues beat spurred his rise (and you know was the black folks thing) but I would argue it was the ability to relate with that beat to the poor majority not just the black Americans amongst them. A symbol to those who empathized with the plight of totalitarianism felt by blacks despite sharing the master’s color. Can you claim much different Em? “… It’s like my mother always told me rani-rani-rani-rani-rani-rani-rani-rani-rani and codeine and god damn it, you little motherfucker, if you ain’t got nothing nice to say, then don’t say nothing. Uh fuck that shit bitch eat a motherfuckin dick chew on a prick and lick a million motherfuckin cocks per second I’d rather put out a motherfuckin gospel record I’d rather be a pussy-whipped bitch, eat pussy and have pussy lips glued to my face with a clit ring in my nose…” (My Dad’s Gone Crazy) If I had a quarter for every time I heard if you have nothing nice to say, then say nothing at all. Clever sounding way to silence dissent but if conversations were just a string of insults, I don’t see how it would result in progress.

I doubt I’m alone either, parent’s love the song and dance used by their parents and lyrics like that inspire a sense of comradery, of shared suffering. So fucking what, if all these fucks are just rehashing shit we’ve all been through what good has it brought us? I mean, for real, you respond that way to your mother, Marshall, when staring down douchey authoritarianism disguised as wit, how ‘bout the bosses, and even if you did, that magically solve the reason for the interaction to begin with? You’ve been played like a fiddle, using what talent (undeniably prevalent) and will are at your disposal to find security for yourself and loved ones, increasing the wealth of those who play the game of our livelihoods. “… But I’m not throwin ones, fives, tens or even twenties, I’m throwin quarters, nickels, dimes, pennies up at skinnies, man, I do this for them bunnies up at Denny’s from the north, east, and west, but when it comes to them trailers in them South Parks muffle it, cause homie that hood’s tighter than Kenny’s, so ladies if your belly button’s not an innie them I’m outie, now hop in my minivan, let’s get rowdy, c’mon…” (W.T.P. [White Trash Party]) Honestly, I struggle to think you truly comprehend any longer about the fear constantly thrown at the populace as topics of controversy to encourage our sacrifice of self-governing. Your actions place you right alongside the pricks I hold the most accountable for the despair in this world.

Now I’m just being a fuck-stick for no reason. “… Look at these rappers, how I treat ‘em, so why the fuck would I join ‘em when I beat ‘em. They call me a freak ‘cause I like to spit on these pussies ‘fore I eat ‘em, man, get these whack cocksuckers off the stage, where the fuck is Kanye when you need him…” (No Love featuring [feat.] Lil Wayne) “… I inspire the Hopsins, the Logics, the Coles, the Seans, the K-dots, the 5’9”s, and oh brought the world 50 cent, you did squat piss and moan, but I’m not gonna fall, bitch…” (Fall) Fucking christ it’s hard not to accuse you of just jumping on band wagons to stay relevant, the consequences being more power to those who fashion themselves experts, savvy, or simply just responsible for your (and their) continued economic safety. Where’s the mentions for Tech N9ne or Strange Music artists in general, or Krazy Bone, Twista, Brotha Lynch Hung, Mystikal … whatever rambling, cause you have, not really talking to you anymore; point being yes obviously you have an incredible way with words and by all accounts a courteous, driven demeanor. You’re not special, you’re only unique because there is no other Marshall Mathers, you don’t bring shit to the table that a thousand others haven’t brought, been bringing, or will bring themselves. Again, exactly the same as your predecessors (my pessimism says posterities as well), soon as realization of status starts to set in, the “fuck everything” message gotta go. Double talk and moral high grounds replace trash talking and silly offensive metaphors cause all that nonsense now applies to you in some way. I wonder if that acknowledgement and the rejection of it was what inspired Elvis to seek drugs and die on a shitter.

My discontent lies in the same place it’s always been – the alternating standard, the ever-changing bar. “… Before I fold I’m a die first, won’t adapt unless you diverse, trying to catch a wave of my tears lately all I ate are my words clear straight roads never made great drivers chasing the American dream is giving me nightmares, I see the rocket’s red glare, bombs bursting in the air and they try to tell me it’s fireworks…” (Miles Davis Kontra-Band Stevie Stone and JL B. Hood feat. Joey Cool) Those lyrics come from possibly my favorite hiphop/rap (fucking hate categories and I’m shit with them… apologies?) album by two artists I find skilled and enjoyable. I can’t say Stevie Stone is the greatest lyricist, singer, or raps over the best beats hell probably not even top ten through that gauntlet of characteristics (my bad man), but him and JL put out an album that I listen to front to back, no skips almost every time a song off the album pops on my Pandora radio. Stevie also has multiple albums with a majority of songs I find enjoyable as well as featuring on songs I think are another artists’ strongest showing. I wanna say it’s his voice, but maybe I’m just a home team fanboy. Ces Cru (Ubiquitous and Godemis), Krizz, Big Scoob, King I.S.O., Kutt Calhoun I mean where all the neo civil rights, culture warrior hiphop acolytes be for these talented/gifted lyricists/musicians/artists. Every single one mentioned and more.

Oy, stay focused Chris… but first, it’s not like I only care about these mentions. Artists like Hyro the Hero, Immortal Technique, A.F.R.O., K.A.A.N., Daddyphatsnaps (youtube anime rapper doesn’t count right?) don’t get the recognition deserved. I am not just male simping () here; yes, my violent inclinations and overwhelming angst skews my tastes away from the romantic lyrically dominated state female artists seemed to be encouraged to write/sing on but I still bump those like Missy Elliot, Trina, Snow the Product, Angel Haze, and Flo Milli. Okay now that all the previous shit is off my chest, let’s return to what I just hinted at with my shot at the female music industry. You, Marshall, just like every artist in any field, is an “Elvis clone.” The only reason I specifically reject you as one lies in the labels we love throwing at each other only fills the coffers of the handlers. Controversy, in all it’s forms, aren’t new to even recent events involving the business of music. “…Butcher Pete’s got a long sharp knife, he starts choppin and don’t know when to stop all you fellows gotta watch your wives cause Pete don’t care whose meat he chops… The police put Pete in jail yes he finally met his fate but when they came to pay his bail they found him choppin up his cell mate…” (Butcher Pete part 1, Roy Brown, 1950 [yes I was exposed to this from the Fallout games, at me shit fucking bitch faced bastards]) None of you are as clever as you think, but you’re encouraged to think so by those who suck your assholes to get a piece of the pie and those who make the dish just demand your ingredients to “feed you all”. For your own good, of course, I mean doesn’t seem like many of you are certified public accountants, lawyers, professors, doctors. You gonna manage the equipment, production, storage, distribution, labor, advertising, etc. for your album solo. Oh my goodness, I said manage, I meant do. Manage still implies others accomplishing the direct tasks for you. I’m throwing shade when you’re just mimicking the accolades preset by forms of entertainment like fiction, theatre, and comedy.

Just, I’m right there with anyone who wants to say Elvis was a pawn (eventually even a willing one) to those exploiting a variety of popular themes combined in the singer to increase their influence while controlling the rights and production. The only names I should fucking hear in relation to him or Eminem alongside the words, “culture vultures”, are those like Jimmy Iovine, Lyor Cohen, Paul Rosenburg, Andre Young, Sam Phillips, Thomas Parker, Jean and Julian Aberbach. “This here was all in a dream, everything’s getting complicated as it would have seemed, nigga’s was stressed out, the rent’s due a couple checks bounced, I was looking for something to test out, criminal, I don’t usually want the style but now circumstances have got me on the prowl, I mean how up in the late night, you can check the shit out and when I see the bait bite, voices were saying to me…”(Dollar General by Stevie Stone) I love our ideas of freedom of speech but so do these rat spawned fuck faces glibly signing off on emotional outbursts just so long as it doesn’t hurt their pockets. Just like so many innovations, language is a tool and what it does is actually what we do with it. Those of power/prominence/popularity/prosperity have always been somewhere in the scenes for forms of escapism, even back when all that existed was sports and the jesters, caves and soot.

I think it’s about time I whine about Freud cause I got far more than 99 problems and that bitch is involved in all of them. Eschtaros, Y’alohila, and I had a wide variety of music tastes but a common resentment of our insane zealous upbringings was a strong mutual bond and most of the music was the blanket genre of rock and roll which meant for every unique song there was a mutually loved tune also. Eschtaros was the more talented, if speaking of the performance aspect, excellent on the guitar, and he talked us into attempting a heavy metal band. Encouraged by the immense joy the animated comedy, Metalocalypse, brought to our poor little apt. and my ability to growl, we came up with the name Messianic Massacre and for a year or two we made serious progress (writing songs that is). Eschtaros not only played multiple instruments, but some classical training gave him a mind for song structure that was crucial when trying to work around my weirdness as vocalist/lyricist. Early 2010’s “Garage Band” on a mac book wasn’t exactly cutting-edge technology either. “Multiply, divide, conquer, thin your lines and be defeated, controlled cookie cutter cottages containing spaces needing heated, our filthy fucking politicians spinning filthy fucking lies, you eat their hypocritical bullshit and I don’t fuckin sympathize. – (refrain) Plague, infection, everywhere, fills the pews and doesn’t care, doesn’t heal the cancer festering in your mind, listen to your politician lest Satan claims your lives. (x2) – I don’t follow viral prophets, I just paint the fucking walls, think your gods from death exempt you, while sucking on our fucking balls, our will towards further knowledge cucksuckers sly to cull, shepherds of their plague, fuckers in control, corrupt the yuppies, sons and daughters, cleansed in water, fire, sell your soul. (repeat refrain) Viscus(s misspelled in the original) ore, collective gore, casted faces hollow, begging more, cantriped accusations with intangible collaborations, cast a pall upon us all, from bird to worm that crawl, sadists spurring inseurrections bent on living, building Ba’al, Fire the hatch, admire the craft, blow out your brain, right into the grain, darkness is free, why can’t you all see, just give your soul to me. Die, incinerate, unfabricate, obliterate. Die, erode to dust, corrosive husk, your life is bust. Die, receive the fade, and be unmade, your carcass has been spade. Pandemic – Apocolypse, Empty soles, paying tolls, blackened by eclipse, you gladly drink their acid, ingest, yourself made placid, inhaling illusion, addict to confusion, insisting masticating shit, they edict mass execution. So one last suggestion, a small little question, your life, do you look at with spite.” (Plague, Chris Holder, Eschtaros, Y’alohila)

Cut some slack folks, I was barely in my twenties when I created that and despite my love to write, a poet I am not. I tried to warn Eschtaros beforehand but I should have never underestimated him. I know I would bump that shitty metal song to this day if we ever got the band off the ground. Fucking funny, reading it after these last years, if I didn’t hold a firm opinion about “seers”, I might even be shocked about my own words. Obviously not a prophet (atheist, the type that believes in nothing spiritual of any kind), I don’t have any friends in “high places” or with “inside info”, and even if I believed my mother about my I.Q. test results (and I definitely do not. Hate to call her a liar, but I’m firmly convinced an error occurred somewhere), one twentyish is not, by any stretch of the imagination, astounding. I fucking wrote that shit in early 2012, during Obama’s administration, and despite whatever similes/parallels are extracted from it, there’s nothing new, nothing special contained in those stupid alliterations. Fuck I’m never going to stay on topic.

Anyway, we never actually made the band official as a true disagreement couldn’t be compromised to a satisfactory solution. Probably pretty blatant at this point, but I hold immense disapproval for profit motives. On the other hand, Eschtaros had a much more practical, realistic view being that without some form of financial backing, the music thing wasn’t gonna work. After deciding on the song with the best lyrical structure (the one just mentioned [yes, I know, sad]) he cranked out some instrumentals and then we did our first rough copy. It was better than we could have ever dreamed; both of us now excited, Eschtaros wanted to ship the sample to Sony and get the ball rolling to make us legit. Sony, being a big record company, could provide assistance on all the nuanced, droll tasks that must be accomplished outside just “making the music.” I, having a hard on for corporate fuckery even then, had a lot of reservations. Don’t get me wrong, Playstation till I die (actually, pc master race) but that’s me using their shit for escapism. This was our… actually let’s just be honest I felt that was my shit, and I would be thrice damned in a hell I don’t believe in before I trusted a giant company to do right by us with our art, especially if it did “blow up”.

Who can really say if that was the best route. Sure, we never got a try at superstardom, or even comfortable rock status, but we also started to cease the suffocating insanity of poverty brought on by our focus on subjects that did not involve pumping out dollar bills for the country’s daddies. Who knows if Eschtaros would have finished college otherwise, overcome addiction and reliance on pharmaceuticals, and moved on with Y’alohila to find enjoyment in life. Being young, repressed adults finally away from the ever-watching eye, none of us had derogatory thoughts on the use of drugs; instead, we acknowledged the individual potential for addiction and the desire it caused leading to increasingly destructive behavior. Eschtaros probably had the greatest disadvantage at such a trial possibly due to his family winning the award for most financially stable amongst us (depends on your outlook… and a lot of other shit). Y’alohila and I had always tried to play our emotions close to the chest, worried (speak for yourself, Chris) of what repercussions were possible for letting others get a glimpse of the strange (more like disturbing) thoughts we entertained. Eschtaros, whether his parent’s had money to burn or “just cared more”, got the joys of psychoanalysis from a young age for the slightest out of norm act, at least how I interpreted the recollection. He spent more time with a therapist than Y’alohila and I which led to beliefs I found… trippy for lack of a better word. He had to deal with manic-depression, ADHD, and I believe some other shit but memory’s a bit fuzzy. The therapists he had seen sounded like good people but they all had their own take on what method was needed to fix the host of stressors weighing on him.

Armed with money and prescriptions, his last few years of schooling before our accommodations was a whole different experience to what Y’alohila and I went through. She from a rural public school and I a private school, Eschtaros had commanded an air of extroverted joy that was naturally magnetic but he chalked it up to the chemicals his doctors told him to take. This didn’t phase the two of us at all and proved day in day out we could care less about the drugs; Eschtaros was a bit taken aback from this as his experiences had taught him that almost everybody was just looking to get high and have fun. Being constantly reminded of his misgivings by parents, teachers, and doctors alike (I’m so buried in my shit I can’t believe I can still speak it), he had developed a habit of abusing his ADHD medication and, from what I understand, with just ADHD alone instilling a tendency towards certain drugs, this wasn’t uncommon. I mean, for most people, Y’alohila included, who doesn’t like a bit of a pick me up. This guy right here didn’t. I still prefer downers to this day because I never felt like I had any lack of wakefulness, in fact just the opposite.

We were all a bit goth (as I’m sure was guessed) meaning all of us leaned a little into the macabre. Y’alohila and I overwhelming so over Eschtaros; both of us considered ourselves serial killers without a kill count… yet, and whether one was a psychopath and/or sociopath was just semantics for professors on the origin for a desire to destroy. I swear we found a different definition for the two terms every time we researched it during a debate. We loved our horror movies, the worse, the gorier, the better. Eschtaros probably stopped wondering if we actually were that fucked up after a couple years of dealing with our fascination on the perverse. (So proud of my ridiculously common copy of Cannibal Holocaust) We all had a bit screwy with us but only Eschtaros had the credentials, and while he always commented on how impressed he was on the methods I discussed for subduing my insanity without letting another human take the reins, I don’t think he was nearly as impressed as I was when, supposedly partly from my advice and support, he completely kicked all his prescriptions.

Nothing worth having ever comes easy. The hardship of trying to correct the bad habits of abusing his medicine seemed miniscule when I watched him take the path to clean his body entirely. Y’alohila was incredibly supportive and who I think helped, if anyone other than himself, my soundbites were just vibrations in the air. I probably wouldn’t be so harsh on myself if it wasn’t for the familiar bitter-sweet taste in the mouth as I watched him (and Y’alohila) fight, persevere, and correct the unwanted characteristics of self; I was reliving my cousin taking his place among the priesthood all over again. They would continue to progress, as I previously mentioned, even quitting cigarettes before moving to the coast for Eschtaros to finish his higher education. Meanwhile, here I am, just turned thirty-three years old, college dropout, deadbeat dad, chain-smoker, procrastinator, and still raving like a lunatic but now recognizing I have no conclusion. I hated even thinking it and I don’t believe I ever stated it aloud, even to them, as even when it would randomly occur in my mind, I felt it a sick, insane attempt at flexing over an abhorrent mindset, but I always felt a step closer to full blown murderer than the two of them. Ultimately, this is what led to our final parting, in which they eventually left the Midwest for a fresh start.

I knew most of the right things to say and do (as usual for whatever label you wanna stick to my mentality), and as much as I thought it was impossible, I felt remorse and hurt (and continue to) when I moved out our rental house. I had always talked about owning my own place (crazy shit sometimes with Alaska and fighting a bear bare handed) and it was the excuse I used in the third time I decided to move away from them. True, I wasn’t saving money like I wanted, as I stated to them, and yes, (sorry guys honesty time, please brace yourselves as you may be the only ones who read it anyway) being the one with the cash to actually care for house affairs could feel a bit one-sided. Reality is, I was losing the battle with sanity. As I continued to kid myself that I was in control with the help of my weed, I discovered that cleaning was no different than mental health. I had fooled myself, excusing my silly introspection as effort enough and eventually I began to pay the price for sweeping dust under the rug.

During the time I was working in Leavenworth, shortly after my girlfriend and I split I would get that ticket and probation leading to no weed for a year. No problem, I’ll just drink a little at night to help myself sleep, weeds not a physical addiction (or is it the other way around experts) so I’ll be fine, just have the mental shackles ready for an enraged beast. How in the fuck synthetic weed was ever legal and yet we still make the stupidest fucking arguments on a fucking plant that you technically don’t need to do shit to other than burn is beyond my comprehension. Six months into my probation, I was starting to have the nightmares return and it was intensely worse than I had given them credit for previously. I decided to give the synthetic stuff some buddies brought by a shot as I had dabbled a little bit with it during poorer times and that experience gave me a false impression that maybe it was less a drug than I talked shit on it about when stacking it against the real thing. No – drug, for me, bad drug; don’t know what was different about that stuff but the most intense body high hit me like a baseball bat. Worst, my body was trying to convince me to use that pent energy to grab the axe hidden behind my chair and hack everyone to pieces, my mind at war with itself. I might have cried a warning if I were capable. Instead, I sat locked on my lazy boy trying to clear my mind, white knuckling the armrests as the axe was far too ready and I dared not to listen to the conversations going on around me for fear of losing my concentration.

I don’t really know how, but I made it through the peak, desperately holding on to what Eschtaros had said when we dropped acid the first time; no matter what you see, no matter what you hear, no matter what you feel, and especially whatever thoughts are spawned, it’s technically in your head and you can prevent it from consuming you, just know your limits. After making it through I swore I would never take a chemical I couldn’t verify in “recreational amounts” unless around the closest of friends I could trust with my darkest traits. Albeit, the damage was already done. I can’t blame k2 or whatever it was and I really don’t want to blame weed itself, however, after my time with the justice system was up, not much time passed before compounding stressors brought a new symptom to my malady. I didn’t dream of torture, heinous rape, murder, destruction, suicide any longer instead they began to infest my waking thoughts, demented daydreams that overwhelmed me randomly if I became lost in thought. Obsessed with choice and its pathways (remember the “thesis” on agency) I would set about meditating on past events, personal and popular, up to the present and wind my way down a variety of potential outcomes to prepare myself.

Unfortunately, I found with increasing frequency, I would consistently force myself awake from addictive fantasizing about the hell on earth I could bestow on someone, and worse that individual could have yet to even take the action that led to the musings… a couple of times the human didn’t even exist. I would abandon Leavenworth (as if the people there or the city itself was the issue not yours truly, but I knew that) hoping to escape what I thought was me losing my grip, again making bull shit excuses to those around me, and once more seeking the companionship of Eschtaros and Y’alohila who I felt cared and understood my plight better than any other being. Nothing had changed, though, and I do mean nothing. It would take years to bear fruit, my stubborn ass too ignorant to accept the cloud shadowing my every action. I desperately wanted the rest of my life spent with the joy of their company except the pleasantry was lost. I imagine all of us get that feeling of exasperation with those we share significant time around, and as they began to be the objects of my daymares, I knew I had to leave, I was the problem. So, I achieved the pinnacle of worthless millennial moving back in with the parents. Thirty-year-old man living in mommy and daddy’s basement on top of all the other cockamamie horse ninny. I had finally reached my potential. Fuck, I mean if I was gonna lose it might as well be on those I felt it was “justified”. Yeah all you father fuckers talking like you my daddy, trying to son me and shit. Still want a piece of that classification? Keep going with it. I’m more than happy to rack up a couple surrogates before the real primary target.

While I did feel it necessary (I honestly think subconsciously I wanted this piece of shit written and done with), I had drastically underestimated the wave of apathy and depression that swallowed me returning to the existential genesis of my negativity – felt like I was a teenager once more. Since I had never desired or allowed a professional of mental health to have a crack at me, I was left to find my own ways to deal with any behaviors of thought I needed to correct to be “happy… normal”. Self-prescribed weed and cigs, hobbies I loved, music, and definitely video games were the crutches long relied on to support my progress on destroying hated desires. Part of the struggle to save money came from my love of video games, like stated, I could blackout the entirety of life when engaged with strategy-based entertainment. Of course, some of the most available, convenient, innovative versions appear on that “wonderful, multi-tasking smart” phone. Not ready to prove that I’m actually some fucked up version of the “greatest generation” trapped in a millennial’s body; I couldn’t do it anyway as any time depression, anxiety, nihilism would get too potent, I would blow any money I felt “extra” on those stupid mobile games proven time and time again to suffer from all the same think tank processing of business conduct.

Part of my reasoning for leaving the roommates came from the hope that by removing the object of my horrific fantasies I would find the will to refuse shooting myself in the foot economically. I imagine you guessed that it didn’t work, I fucked myself and that just made it a habit for repetition. I slowly ramped up the pathetic display of hedonism with throwing money at silly micro-transactions almost all varieties of mobile games are equipped with to progress. It was never the same game, I would spend all my extra money seemingly on health, dental, or vehicle related expenses for a while not saving shit, then get upset about that start saving money, then get fucking pissed about that and find a mobile game to distract myself. The cycle begins at this point where (with ever increasing frequency and amounts) I would get involved with the mechanics, admiring whatever effort I felt I recognized. I got involved with individuals like myself going through life looking for a little respite, finding further joy in bonding with a group and heartache as those with the big pockets… sorry guns show up to swing their big dicks around. Then I start throwing the money I’ve saved leading to the realization of if I’m going to spend this money, there’s real shit pertinent to living I should direct it towards and I quit the game – that game.

I couldn’t seem to break the cycle until my dumbass realized I hadn’t truly attempted any other actions to impede my poor habit, just like the old days. The only recourse was to find another distraction, and after some time of treating cash like excrement, I settled on sex. During the last few years, I had ceased looking for a companion; I didn’t wanna try to facilitate a relationship hoping that I could trust the partner with full honesty only to reach a crossroads where one of us (or both) no longer desired the company of the other. I would just go about my routine activities and if a chick actually thought I was attractive enough to date it would be obvious and I wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Of course, it would have to be very blatant as I’m oblivious and that’s not exactly the mannerisms, even in 2022, we encourage of the female sex. While self-analyzing my destructive tendencies, I realized that I wasn’t engaging in any platonic, romantic, or just straight sexual activity, I had stepped up cig and weed smoking, and I couldn’t keep a dollar to my name. The first course of action I settled on was a sex doll. If I could save my money to afford a decent one and never touch another micro-transaction again, I would allow myself the indignity of a fancy cum rag. Needless to say, can’t hate on the results, of course the real thing is better but that requires a real human being, and I was getting really bored with my hand. Alas, it would take a bit longer to start saving anything, bunch of bull shit i.e., thought I would walk out on my job, still hardly any teeth in my head, ridiculous list of weird medical burps no one takes seriously, my vehicle hardly going two months without throwing hands – sorry codes, you know whine whine complain complain complain.

Getting way off the beaten path here. While my silly attempt seemed uncorrelated to the capability of saving, it was indeed successful. The problems of holding back funds drew from multiple causes, but my inability to find peace so as to continue this nonsense (my writing) was quelled. I told you I was going to shit all over Sigmund Freud, have you heard how so far?  Fucking christ… almost at two hundred pages now (future edit: look at that, cut it down a hair at least) … I got a bad feeling my writing will get uglier. Just, no shame, Chris. Alright, my parents know of the cigarette and weed use but I keep them in the dark as much as possible on the nuance as laid out prior, and I certainly wouldn’t normally out Lyllitha (yes, the sex doll) not just for the repressed nature of their thoughts on sexuality, but the intense proclivity () placed on financial gain. Never stated in such words, instead taking the form of long held traditions or institutions, but the hypocrisy is just as depressing as the feeling of living with my roommates in the apt. era. How on earth I developed a desire for attention to detail, absolute perseverance regardless of environment, letting my mind speak instead of my mouth – all those and more that they supposedly held as the standard – when the physical demonstrations from said “teachers” rarely matched the bullshit issuing from their throats, I… understand all too well, can I communicate it is the question. The depressing part of all this is the self-discovery providing no relief, improvement, despite all the careful repetition. I mean, I’m not even going as far as I did for my fellows Eschtaros and Y’alohila where I would get every nook and cranny, underneath furniture, ceilings, maybe cook a meal for us all, lots of dishes, but yeah… fuck my parents you ain’t getting shit as the ones who, what’s the cliché, “lead by example.” Though, I’m probably just a disgruntled degenerate obsessed with the fetishizing of lingerie and blowjobs leaving me one of them incels or whatever. Comical, as even now 8 cigs in the four hours I’ve been awake, I would still classify that simple fetish as the only addiction I actually can’t control. Wow, I’m a lost ball in high weeds, lets continue writing with my skull not my head.

I still can’t find the acceptance/forgiveness to act the way I feel I should at all times while in their presence (overestimated the will power to back up my ethics again) even though there’s nothing special about them warranting my obstinance. They only know the shit they’ve been taught in the same manners they passed on, no different than any human being on this planet. Every day brings new levels of apathy over humanity’s bass ackwards methods (sut mig, technicians know). “… She says that she’s thinking of reproductive rights one minute from having a baby. This is about as perverse a notion as I could possibly imagine, that as you’re about to have your child, you’re thinking boy wouldn’t it be great if I could still kill this baby…what I care about is not killing babies… it’s not aborting a fetus, it’s not getting rid of a ball of tissue… it’s not a matter of woman’s rights to choose. A slave owner didn’t get to choose to hold slaves, Nazis didn’t get to decide which jews got to live… literally the most innocent among us, we treat the killing of these human beings as nothing more than just an issue of convenience and choice and all the rest… I wish to God that Mike Pence would have said that instead of citing the Bible… I think the Bible is right but I don’t think the Bible is the important textbook here, I think what’s important here is the science…” Ben Shapiro Destroys the Abortion Argument, Ben Shapiro YouTube channel, Ben Shapiro, October 6, 2016.

Oh yes, let’s get crackin. Above was some reactions from Shapiro at an infomercial put out by Olivia Wilde on reproductive rights, or as Ben loved putting it, killing “fully formed children” and “individual human beings”. I find these points a bit off the mark and I’ll explain. You support our 2nd amendment (as I) but a gun is just a tool, and all tools (like abortion) require knowledge, wisdom, and physical training to recognize how and when its utilization is, not only acceptable, but truly necessary. The whole video is riddled with the nuance and details supporting the value of the life of a human being, no matter the stage of development, but they’re not positioned as a rebuttal to the nuance and details glossed over of the ideology you seek to show as false. With such an example, one can easily demolish our right to bear arms, as these tools serve no other purpose but to take life. Sure, we love to play games with the boom sticks, some of us find pleasure in the engineering, but even if not a human one, at the end of the day, a gun’s only purpose is to reach out some length of distance and take life. The target games just play second fiddle; what should be a method of training to ensure that the dangers of recklessness/“poor luck” don’t result in “accidents” seem to have devolved to a point of showmanship and defense against perceived insults of liberty. Yet these realities don’t negate the other facts either.

I found it insanely difficult to push aside indignation as you brushed off planning, comprehension, and the capability to teach and provide for another individual human being as a matter of “choice” and “convenience”. When owning a gun, it’s imperative you know the moving parts, where the business end is, how to transport, package, and store; one needs the finances to practice in a contained area, to provide the resources for the tool’s function, as well as the time for the previously mentioned and further basic maintenance for a precision instrument. Do not all these apply in some fashion to the rearing of a civilian? What life would I have given a child if despite my shitty job, atheistic beliefs, and poor understanding of societal interactions, I hopped in with the rest of the salmon to swim with the school and said that’s my child I gotta be a “man” and raise it? Better question, do you think humans like Alois and Klara Hitler, Michael and Anne Higgins, Lionel and Joyce Dahmer, Pauline and Seymour Epstein should have had no other option but to raise the consequences of sharing their commandment of marriage? Perhaps you hold the environmental/socio-economic status or personal behaviors as the perpetrator for the events that would play out, or maybe you’d say the sins of the father and all that jazz except reverse as it’s the sins of the offspring. Did the lives their progeny would end equate to the justification of their spawns’ existence to begin with or did these evil doers’ own lives become forfeit only at the moment of taking another’s? The lives of the parents prior?

            At some level, you do understand that so many of the contentious beliefs of how we live require a level of deliberation and discussion. “… if you say that the only schools that are allowed to receive funding are non-religious schools, than you are effectively violating freedom of religion by discriminating against schools that are religious… its very silly to say that you should be allowed to use your voucher for some sort of secular school, the idea being that secular schools sorta the default, but not for a religious school of your choosing… nothing wrong with the government directly funding religious schools, if their funding not religious schools, if their funding Jewish and Catholic schools that is obviously not religious discrimination… it seems the Supreme Court is now moving in the direction of what we call the Utah rule... it has a very expansive nondiscrimination law… but it has religious exemptions, it has a broad religious carve out… whenever there is some sort of major national catastrophe and then legislators” (maybe the faith leaders, managers, officials, lobbyists, judges, lawyers, doctors, scientists etc. as well? Just saying) “jump into the fray to solve the problem, very often they do more harm than good… somebody whose actually demonstrating full scale threatening behavior, the idea of a red flag law is not bad, the problem is how to enforce… one of the problems with an extreme protection order is that its enforced without actually the ability to rebut right away… the minute you start passing gun legislation on the basis of terrible things happening, well next time a terrible thing happens they’ll push more gun legislation and you will just pass that gun legislation as well… just horrific action by this police department and no amount of additional funding to red flag laws is gonna fix that…” The Return of Religious Freedom/ ep. 1520, Ben Shapiro YouTube channel, Ben Shapiro, June 22, 2022.

            Why do you defend the principal of gun ownership when the answer is incredibly obvious, as obvious as not killing babies. Yes, if you take all the guns and weapons except from those permitted to hold a license (whether for work or wealth) the populace no longer has a means of defense against those individuals who desire to take their freedoms by force, but those who wish such “evil” actions upon their peers now stand out like a sore thumb, do they not? Is not this the reason for criminalizing abortion? Once we recognize the injustice of ending the growth of cells into a birthed human as the murder it is, legislation isolates those willing to risk the action, inhibits the free exchange of knowledge as to the proper procedures and safe practices pre and post the operation, businesses and law enforcement cooperate to track those acquiring the equipment to even attempt the now criminal act – you mean to say that these measures and others applied to the owning of a gun wouldn’t have drastically altered the events of Robb Elementary (Uvalde, Texas)? You scoffed at the idea of play in the joints for discussing religious litigation and your stance on abortion supports such but are not the arguments for “states rights” on gun control by individual citizens and “freedom of speech” for business entities a form of this very principle?

            The dream of religious freedom is held by the followers of many religions, but every organized religion at its core holds that their form of faith, their traditions and teachings, hold the fundamentally correct answers for a human’s way of life. The founders of this country didn’t have to be historians to see the pattern of the combination of outlawed weaponry with a religion at the side of the state, making it the religion, leading to, at best, a state of persecution for the disenfranchised and, at worst, state sanctioned theft, adultery (rape and refusal to recognize marriages, probably other acts I’m not thinking of at the time of writing), and murder. So how far does a “secular” nation go to prevent the suffering of it’s civilians under a delegated denomination and establish the safety of its populace to follow any religion they choose, even if that be none? Which, you do admit to the exemptions, gun rights are a privilege and fucking up in a certain way removes that privilege. If you’re dangerous to yourself or others, we’re not gonna just give you a gun… well sometimes, but that’s how the cookie crumbles. So often, history’s greatest atrocities revolve around a sanctioned (in some fashion) individual acting under their own nefarious intent against those who feel powerless to stand against them, why else try and protect an individual’s right to own an Equalizer?

            The way I see it, the contentious nature of even allocating funds towards a religious institution stems from the humans allocating the finances sending that money to other sapiens who now spend the money for the progression of their livelihoods. If there is no oversight or legal ramifications for the conglomerate (), the growth of those outside their group is inhibited. Other civilians lose their rights lest they seek another method for openly/honestly carrying on with life. This method of subjugation can disguise itself as something as innocent as the giver and the receiver being of similar mentality… morality, and those deemed “degenerate”, waste as such without the resources and rights to work for their own health and prosperity. You even state so yourself for why else would religious individuals need “protections” from anti-discrimination laws that uselessly stereotypes civilians for the purpose of making already illegal acts clarified on a more meticulous level? The beings tasked with upholding a nation of freedom and peace often share many of your beliefs and ethics yet somehow their influence sets the precedence for the same people you raise the alarm over to be legally stripped of their right to live as they see fit. Organized religions seemingly love to conflate () a differing opinion with the start of societal degradation. Being gay or trans doesn’t make one automatically a pedophile, rapist, or “groomer” nor is the choice to cease the potential for life reliant on said individual, perhaps to avoid the tribulations propagated by a flawed guardian arduously trying and failing to raise them with knowledge that they never received, require the forfeiture of same citizen’s life as recompense ().

            I agree that the science is important – incompetent as I have found my mind to be for the full comprehension of the monumental advances during my lifetime – struggle, patience, and repetition of common knowledge has led to a very basic and possibly mislead conclusions. However, what science, what logos, gives you this principle you repeatedly defend on the value of all life; where do the definitions of “good” and “evil” present themselves physically to be applied to the scientific method? Life itself is not inherently the science for the continuation of said life, else, not only do the worst offenders go free, but a call must be had for the elimination of all weapons, all medications like penicillin and ivermectin, all chemical cleaners and water treatment practices, eating anything but carrion from natural death, even vaccines that have halted the destruction of millions, possibly nations, for history is rife with the affects of disease. There is no science that defends the preservation of one life over another; this is a subject of perspective often skewed as “common sense” since virtue-based cajoling on ancient grandstanding has lost some popularity. So, Ben, yes, the Bible was the proper text, the problem is you know the Old Testament doesn’t support the view all babies must be saved. Mike Pence just foolishly convinced himself as a “Christian” that his New Testament held not the same flaws.

            “Numbers 14:3 …And wherefore hath the Lord brought us into this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be prey? were it not better for us to return into Egypt? 4 And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt… 11 And the Lord said unto Moses, How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have showed among them? 12 I will smite them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and will make of thee a greater nation mightier than they… 26 And the Lord spake unto Moses, and unto Aaron, saying… 29 Your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness, and all that were numbered of you, according to your whole number, from twenty years old and upward, which have murmured against me… 31 But your little ones, which ye said should be a prey, them will I bring in, and they shall know the land which ye have despised… Numbers 25:6 And, behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought unto his brethren a Midianitish woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel, who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation… 8 And he (Phinehas, son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest) went after the man of Israel into the tent, and thrust both of them through (with a spear), the man of Israel, and the woman through her belly. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel… Judges 20:4 And the Levite, the husband of the woman that was slain, answered, and said, I came unto Gibeah that belongeth to Benjamin, I and my concubine, to lodge. 5 And the men of Gibeah rose against me, and beset the house round about upon me by night, and thought to have slain me; and my concubine (that he just threw at them to save his hide) have they forced, that she is dead… 27 And the children of Israel inquired of the Lord… 28… saying, shall I yet again go out to battle against the children of Benjamin my brother, or shall I cease? And the Lord said, Go up; for to-morrow I will deliver them into thine hand… 37 And the liers () in wait hasted, and rushed upon Gibeah; and the liers in wait drew themselves along, and smote all the city with the edge of the sword… 40 But when the flame began to arise up out of the city with a pillar of smoke, the Benjamites looked behind them, and, behold, the flame of the city ascended up to heaven… 42 Therefore they turned their backs before the men of Israel unto the way of the wilderness; but the battle overtook them; and them which came out of the cities they destroyed in the midst of them… 48 And the men of Israel turned again upon the children of Benjamin, and smote them with the edge of the sword, as well the men of every city, as the beast, and all that came to hand; also they set on fire all the cities that they came to… Ezekiel 9:4 And the Lord said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof. 5 And to the others he said in mine (Ezekiel’s) hearing, Go ye after him through the city, and smite; let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity; 6 Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women; but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient men which were before the house. 7 And he said unto them, Defile the house, and fill the courts with the slain; go ye forth. And they went forth and slew in the city. 8 And it came to pass, while they were slaying them, and I was left, that I fell upon my face, and cried, and said, Ah Lord God! wilt thou destroy all the residue of Israel in thy pouring out of thy fury upon Jerusalem? 9 Then said he unto me, The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah is exceeding great, and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness; for they say, the Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord seeth not…”

            Sounds to me like the lord didn’t even value the lives of his chosen people, born or yet created, purely on the basis of being alive. Certain criteria had to be met, and the faith you profess seemed to be inadequate, so much so, your god disinherited you and told his prophets of your annihilation, and supposedly a few hundred years before he sent his “son” to be killed in Roman fashion. Not the point (not getting caught up in the stupidity of historicity games), for I desire to call out the “yay for me, nay for thee” human instinct that undercuts so much of the bible allowing for misinterpretation. Obviously, not just the bible, for faith and tradition play equal parts in dictating our processing of information and the reactions we have to “injustice”.  The “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” retardedness that I hear frequently but have yet to see in physical form. Hell, even when I hear it said, the words that almost always immediately follow our generally contradictory to the point itself. As entertaining as I would find it to now proceed with all the politicians, judges, and influencers that scream prolife at everyone while finding mercy and exemptions regarding their own lives, I’ll just settle with showing that ol’ jebus, and most definitely those he charged with carrying on his message, were just as shortsighted and left the door open for the same errors of humanity.

            “Matthew 11:7 And as they departed, Jesus began to say unto the multitudes concerning John, What went ye out into the wilderness to see? Was it a reed shaken with the wind? And they answered him, No… 22 Then he began to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not… 25 And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell; for if the mighty works which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 26 But I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgement, than for thee… Romans 1:28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, according to some to do those things which are not convenient; 29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whispers, 30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31 Without understanding, covenant-breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful; 32 And some knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are inexcusable, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them… Romans 2:12 For as many as have sinned without law shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law shall be judged by the law… Romans 3:9 If not so; what then are we better than they? No, in no wise; for we have proved before, that the Jews and Gentiles are all under sin. 10 As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one; 11 There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. 12 They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one… Romans 5:12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned… 14 For I say that through the offence, death reigned over all from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come… Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord… Revelations 2:20 Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. 21 And I gave her space to repent of her fornication; and she repented not. 22 Behold, I will cast her into hell, and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation, except they repent of their deeds. 23 And I will kill her children with death; and all the churches shall know that I am he (HIM as the kids say) which searcheth the reins and hearts; and I will give unto every one of you according to your works…”

            I tell myself I’m insane, tsch. It’s almost impossible to read any hopeful section of the scriptures (you mormons too) without reading just a bit further and finding out some of the consequences for non-adherence to the rules laid out. In simpler terms, life, liberty, happiness, “freedoms” are only for the obedient. Sounds a tad contradictory, though maybe the “orders” to be obeyed aren’t those the institutions prefer to focus on. So often I would try to point out a more potent, encompassing interpretation to elders/teachers in my youth and I would just get solemn nods at best if not completely shuffled off to stay on the message they wanted to preach, not what truth they should be concerned about. For instance, before decided I was an atheist, I attended a religious summer camp and my second time there I was definitely in a crisis of faith. One of the silly little classes they had, I was charged with discussing the sin of curse words; my vast knowledge of the scriptures instantly set to work on recalling all the verses I knew and I started the research. It did not take long, at 15, to quickly realize I had never brought comprehension to the verses, for in nigh every instance, the subject had nothing to do with specific words being of a sinful nature. Imagine that, an all powerful being doesn’t give a fuck about certain vibrations made by the muscles in the throat but how we direct it at one another. Not a popular take, though another instance a bit later was a little more understandable. At this point I was openly atheistic and I reveled in any who thought to engage with me on the topic of religion as I knew the basis for the faith like the back of my hand. I would not seek a scientific or philosophical approach to the debate as I had no significant exposure to these things and I thought it was a poor way to achieve the destruction of faith. Instead, I agued from the same perspective as they, that the book was written originally by those who claim to and that they felt inspired to write such moral obligations. My points showed their prophets were all just human; refusing to cherry pick, I would lay out the logical conclusions of their methods and show the contradictory nature of the ideals with the practice. It didn’t accomplish anything though I wouldn’t recognize this even after my paper on the Islamic faith, attempting to demolish the accusations of fanaticism, violence and show its brotherhood to the Abrahamic faith they professed themselves, went over like a wet towel (shouldn’t have surprised me it was 2005-06). Frustrating, but not enough to see the problems I threw on top of it. After being refuted in the manner I was at college and I read into the subjects I’ve tossed mentions at, it slowly dawned on me that I was acting in a manner no different than those that I claimed to be deceived or deceivers.

            I didn’t need to attack any religion, for at the end of the day my thoughts were my own and those who sought to sway them would fail for they did it for themselves. My reproach at their attempts only cemented their convictions of righteousness or, much, much worse wrecked their belief opening them up to whatever rhetoric could appeal to their mentality. Instead, I had to show that these qualities of goodness were not unique to a human no matter the race, creed, location, gender and that the judgement we feel justified in passing down was not supported by any faith at its core even if the creator most definitely wrote it that way. A method of freedom, a grain of truth lay at the heart of ideals that saw their genesis in the reasoning of people who felt there was a better way but lost it when faced with a less profitable route being the actions (by them) needed for an example to teach those they preached at. Control, punishment, rewards… obedience. The way I read the bible, the confusion humans get over following a commandment and being “the one” to teach everybody else the correct adherence to it is where shit hits the fan. According to the early days at least, god didn’t even want his people to have a king because the judges weren’t supposed to be in charge. God was supposed to be the only leader, because all were created equal but the humility of certain ones earned them favor. That didn’t translate to every one of the generations they would propagate and neither did the qualities behind those ideals heralded by self-appointed teachers/judges of their peers. You tell me how you interpret 1 Samuel chapter 8 (you can start about verse 7 and go to the end). Go read it yourselves if you need the proof, I don’t feel like quoting more scripture at this moment. Fuck, read the whole damn thing, you might see what I’m talking about when I say it’s not about the gayness or witchcraft or foul language or promiscuity of an individual but the words I read speaks of those using their intellect, their station, their wealth, their power to force others to partake in personal desires against the will/comprehension of the target; the entirety of the motherfucking thrice goddamn scriptures say it along with so many other religions’ texts. All the insightful/controversial words used in the bible are humans obsessing over their conception of what the problem is because to admit the issue I write on would be to speak against themselves. Hypocrites, liars for having even opened your mouths, put pen to paper. It is fan-fucking-tastic that you feel deeply about the call to your spouse and the continuation of the human race, nothing on this earth or off it gives you the right to bend others to this outcome nor support those who would seek force of any nature to ensure unanimity () on the matter. So yes, the individual slave masters and Nazis did have a fucking choice; at any moment, any one of them could have had some fucking courage and said no this doesn’t match the principles I profess to hold dear. Yeah, that probably means death or at the very least utter disgrace (which I argue is worse but more on that later), but the action and those that proceed should be a reflection of the standard preached. These dynamics aid all the “kind enemy/master stories” that are utter nonsense as the humans understood the core truth that led so many astray but lacked the courage to halt profiting off the mass manipulation by the holders of popular attention utilizing the message to twist out their own designs.  I have gone way off the fucking deep end, cease your nuttery.

            I wish I could convince myself that your points were from a place of study, attention to detail, and critical thinking but your own statements presented as fact give evidence to the opposite. One of the few specified instances you’ve used to support your opinions, Kermit Gosnell, was rife with inaccuracies I felt beneath the level of critique presented throughout your video. You claimed it hardly got covered in the mainstream media, however, not only did I find numerous articles written during and after the discovery, but Fox and even the “liberal jokes” at CNN covered the event. Your abortion loving buddy, Cenk, did a segment on the atrocities done under Kermit’s authority two years before yourself, and no, it was not agreeable for such methods. Of course, none of these points make it seem like abortionists want the wholesale slaughter of infants simultaneously exploiting the very real proclivity for industries to hide controversial information to imply complicity towards the same goals. Does any of that really change the action of ceasing the growth of parasitic cells within the body as the destruction of life? Why not just approach the subject with complete openness and recognition? Fucking damn it all, I’m being a fucking prick again. Look Ben and all those who agree with his stances, abortion is defined here: “1 The act of giving premature birth with loss of the foetus, especially (& Medicine) in the period before a live birth is possible; (the procuring of) induced termination of pregnancy to destroy a foetus. M16 b figurative. Failure (of an aim, promise, etc.) E18 2 The imperfect offspring or product of a miscarriage {}; a person or thing dwarfed or mishappen. L16 3 Biology. Arrestment of development of any organ, especially of a seed or fruit. M18.” I have no idea if you desire to have more children (though depending on your devotedness, Ben, may your wife be blessed with such again) but would it be acceptable to see your spouse jailed/killed for the natural loss of your child; for the legal system needs proof, evidence to remove all doubt you and your wife didn’t fail to provide for the growth via a beneficial habitat, the temple that is her body. Did she eat and drink appropriately acquiring only the nutrients for nourishing life, even before her pregnancy, or perhaps a sedentary lifestyle leaves her body inadequate just as likely that an attempt to be the opposite providing the same result. Maybe the environment is poor, poisoning the body with the economic waste pushed into our air, water, and soil by humanity’s greed by all we partake, breathe, and “no attempt” is made to remove ourselves from the scenario. What would you do when that life lost threatens the existence of the one you’re commanded to cherish? Would you trust a being labeled felon/murderer for simply having the knowledge to save your wife with doing so – would you continue to support figures that would see actions of kindness prosecuted and repeat their dogma? Oy, I’m fucking done with this… cause I ain’t done with you fucks at TYT yet.

            Once more, I get to talk about our second amendment, whoopee. I’m starting to feel like a broken record this far in but the subject is brought up frequently and is one (I feel) that you guys discuss in a manner I loathe in equal parts to the counter logic put forth and for exactly the same reasons. The passion you feel over the needless loss of life is commendable but I find myself entering a tizzy every time I hear what I perceive as verbiage detrimental to persuading those who believe they disagree with you at enmity; for every ten who nod in acknowledgement, how many set their feet into the ground shutting themselves off from critical thinking. The fancy fucking words you “intellectuals” love to use, at their heart, have a physical action, and the consequences that stem from them have long been recorded, that is to say those who may not know the specific jargon utilized can easily interpret such as a call for repression, sometimes (often) spurred on by those engaging in the same, intent or not, but parading as the opposer, a champion for those “trodden under foot”. Don’t get it twisted, I am not some gun loving, flag hugging dickbag (well, perhaps that last one), I fucking hate guns. There are few inventions, conceptions by humanity I find as cowardly as the desire to sit all nice and cozy and take life on a whim, but it was necessary right? Get the advantage, good tactics, good business… stay on target. It only barely beats out explosives and bows used as weapons of war for chicken shit behavior, though like bows, I understand their utility in the same breath. We aren’t as fast and/or big as many creatures we share the planet with and the capability to diversify our diet and defend ourselves from predators in arguably a far more humane fashion is only something I can praise. I’m a fucking monster, though, as when it comes to the pettiness we engage in to validate the slaughter of one another, there should only be swords, knives, axes, spears etc. Fucking sycophants posing as men speaking like your willingness to defend with lily-livered methods and justifications makes you strong – you desire not “civil war, bloodshed, or even the protection of the innocent”… not a one of you appreciates life to have the stones to hack another sapien to pieces, stare into their eyes as your actions cease their vision only to search out another, wading amongst the blood and limbs accompanied by the screeching of dying foes, comrades, family members. You’re not even warriors, who should couple the knowledge of how to end life with the training, restraint, perseverance to preserve it; barely soldiers blinding following orders. Fucking shit… “War is sweet to those who have never experienced it.” Oh boy, now you got me doing it, Cenk, how bout I just quote you a little and we’ll try and continue this.

            “… I talk about on the show all the time that these shootings happen everywhere, they’re gonna happen everywhere… there’s a mass shooting on average about once a day in America… we’re all gonna be treated like a prisoners, everywhere is gonna be like an airport… or we could do something about guns…” Shooting at YouTube HQ, The Young Turks YouTube channel, The Young Turks, April 3, 2018. “… the left wing constantly says nonviolence, preaches nonviolence, is for gun control so that there is less violence… remind me again who the hateful people are that encourage violence, none of those people are left wing…” How the Internet Reacted to TYT’s Shooting Coverage, The Young Turks YouTube channel, The Young Turks, June 29, 2018. I would say that’s dangerously close to fear mongering, perhaps profiling if I didn’t know you guys better. Time and time again you’ve spoken out about those who seemingly act in such a manner to defend old principles/unsubstantiated () tropes, presumably so you can show the country as a whole a better way to exist. However, in this attempt, your fervor can obfuscate the message, meaning those who relate (for whatever reason) to the individual being villainized for a freedom destroying action may reject your logic translating the message they hear as a call for themselves, having not acted similarly, to be held subject in the name of protection. I fail to see any consistency when you place violence solely at the feet of citizens who falsely think (including yourselves [include your fucking self, Chris]) themselves opposite of you. You love all the statistics and fancy sounding scientific studies while with the same mind yelling into the ether about the corruption of the top. Who do you believe sets the qualifications for these accolades, who funds the peons to put out the self-gratifying “statements of fact”; are there no foundational equivocates between the distraught who act against their peers regardless of the races, creeds, genders, or politics present? Numerous cases over the years, I’ve heard you implore this nation to cease the hatred and murder of minorities and individuals who live outside historic norms at the hands of the enforcers of authoritarianism; rail against policies instituted that, in reality, promote demagoguery towards citizens, underneath the laws’ fancy phrasing, as well as using the trials and tribulations of the disenfranchised lives as a plea for mercy. “… in the case of Rittenhouse, just cause he gets acquitted does not mean the state thinks it was hunky-dory, they just couldn’t prove it beyond a reasonable doubt… the second guy hit him with a skateboard, now I wouldn’t kill anyone if they hit me with a skateboard… do we want people walking around with a weapon, provoking people, and then as soon as they’re threatened in any way, start killing people… So anything before 30 seconds before he started killing people, you can’t question… but they think the motivations of the people who died should go into our evaluation of this, but not the motivations of the guy who took a gun he never should have had across state lines…” Rittenhouse Found Not Guilty on All Counts, The Young Turks YouTube channel, The Young Turks, November 19, 2001.

            Violence. How do we as a society define such, does it only qualify when it’s against us and those we empathize with, do we celebrate accomplishments in the same vain but under the pretense of justice? When an entity, or collection of human beings, are charged with upholding the continued operation of the whole, often the methods used to ensure the words set have physical meaning are glossed over in favor of terrifying/inspiring/commanding/charitable phrases that enflame our hearts and cease our minds. I cannot speak for you, but I see the messages of those asserting lawfulness to validate their means, setting a standard they care not to follow but it’s obligation by others profits them. I do not believe, that at any point or in any fashion, the abolishment of guns would solve even a minute fraction of the enmity that pressures humanity. The association you seem to correlate between violence and a single tool that can be used to carry out the events we’ve racked up in our recent history makes it hard for me to see any honesty. I’m not gonna rehash all the oversimplified exposition I went through earlier in the abortion thoughts; bearing that in mind though, I hear a whole lot of state sanctioned violence in carrying out a working method of getting the massive amounts of guns out of circulation. Yes, this may drastically reduce the ease of opportunity for mass casualties caused by our peers, our equals, depending on what words we use to classify these events. For all those who have or will commit such atrocities maybe only half, in this hypothetical gun regulated scenario, would harbor such resentment past a fleeting thought and say only half of them try to find a method to create their thoughts, and, hell, only half of them see the project through with only half of them being successful in accomplishing the goal – those are good statistics, put a cease to violence, right? Well, actually, we still gotta cover the legal violence. Surely, I know you understand that even taking the measures I listed earlier would still leave exemptions for some of our populace. I can’t wrap my mind around how you call for the rehabilitation of our police forces while leaving this important nuance out of the presentation for gun control. I doubt that even the most extreme believer of such methods would agree with all the details that originate in the ideal; I find it irksome how I let anger best me when you speak like the UK somehow solved violence with their gun control measures but even some of their officers carry guns. I can’t imagine what they would need them for in this day and age and there’s ultimately the military forces of the world, you can’t possibly want to send our troops out with nothing but supplies and their two hands. I despise the setup of our current military-industrial complex but to abolish the military in such a manner… would we go to all the countries we’ve wronged with hollow placations and trade promises when they come for their pound of flesh? It’d be fine, right, humanity’s known for its restraint in the pursuit of justice. Fuck, while we’re at it let’s just restrict ingenuity, the tools for crafting said creativity, hell we can even do it through some sly disincentives against learning anything remotely how to. Take notes, coming up with totally new, unprecedented shit here…

            With such laws, we would effectively create another class of civilian (if it wasn’t obvious yet, I feel like our records backs me up there) and those of us without the right to hold such freedoms are now at the whims of the individuals who hold this privilege. You guys have helped teach this as you rant over case after case of this very issue already prevalent in society. How would we fix that? Maybe the offenders are just “bad apples” or perhaps we cheer for the further enslavement to our institutions/government entities, ultimately foolish literature, to preempt a potential future rather than the equality of resources to strategize our lives away from whatever problems may come. Is it just guns that kill us when we raise our voices against the mismanagement by those entrusted or is it more the bombs, gasses, blunt force trauma, fucking four stone walls and forceful chemical mastication ()?! Another point you don’t actually have a foot to stand on cause you don’t truly hate the prison system, you just don’t like how it’s operated. How else do you propose to “rehabilitate” humans who refuse to cooperate with the laws as you should see them written? Your jest about the skateboard betrays you.

You wouldn’t shoot me for hitting you with a skateboard? What if I put it this way instead: if in the dark of the night, amongst the chaos of fleeting bodies fleeing in directions all around, you trip and fall as I come up with the roller board raised above my head, do you reach for the gun at your side, or even worse: you round a city block to see me poised above your son, wailing on him with “just a skateboard”, blood pouring from every facial orifice as I attempt to unlock his grey matter – when you tackled me, would you cease your own pummeling before my life was extinguished and would not such retribution be justified as (whether accomplished or not) it was your son’s life I sought? Whatever, writing bullshit, the real point is the nonchalance used to discuss the realities around our pursuit for progress achieves the opposite, but the only way to combat falling into the same habits that undermine previous accomplishments is to recognize how the desires/beliefs we praise impacts all lives in its fruition. I know I’m completely fucked – I can’t think of any other justification for the torture of incarceration, holding other humans against their will, except in the cases the being forced this on another. Fear not, for I’m consistent on that logic (to some degree); life for a life to the extent rape victims should oversee the same for the perpetrator(s), a beat down for “aggravated assault”, no hand for theft but equal theft in return, but now it’s getting complicated in the details. I mean how do we handle the Madoff’s of the world, such murky territory.  You’ve spoken yourselves about the questions around the ethics of imprisoning those merely impoverished to a point of desperation, but murders still rot in a cell. This is a waste, is the simplest statement, for their life is forfeit and the victims should have their justice not herded into the arms of vengeance. I ask is anything truly learned, even in the instances of mercy, if the culprit seeks not the repercussions for themselves? Real justice comes from the understanding by the offender that their deeds can and should be done in return to them. Of course, we can’t forget how often we badly screw up arresting the correct individual, seemingly happy as nation/race to accept someone in that “desperate poverty” class, equal to those at the opposite end of the spectrum “getting” leniency or outright, we’re told nothing happened there (sometimes carrying their fucking water… disheartening). What’s justice look like in these cases? We all help muddy the conversation, though, by trying to equate our suffering with certain “facts of life” that can’t be compared to the atrocities committed by the opposite side, right TYT? Fighting fire with fire should not be a cliché, we achieve nothing when poisoning our discussions with such a mentality even when coupled with proper humility. I can’t even begin to show any of y’alls videos (not just saying TYT here) to those I share my existence with for at best they just get pissed off shutting down after one phrase and at worst they totally miss the heart of the matter because of what amounts to the same underlying cause. I agree, in some fashion, that correlation without causation is a problem humanity has struggles with (for millennia in my mind), but this goes doubly in my mind for the manner we conduct ourselves towards one another. Human beings on this planet seem to hit blind spots in response to stressors without an instant answer, hiding behind quotations of prominent assholes or fucking comedy, whatever silly shit helps pull us from critical thought to a place of confidence.

Spiraling… I fucking loathe all comparisons/stereotypes/analyses of our behavior, our obsession with comprehending the malignancy/charity of others should lead us to a recognition over its drivers and reveal methods to overcome/emulate but the meticulous thought processing leading to this knowledge seems to be lost after the “confirmation” sought is acquired. Usually, I see this take the form of popularity; a figure appears in our screens, papers, and/or societal topics crying out against follies relevant to our lives, exciting our imaginations, encouraging us to see the individual as the guy, the one to get to the core of problems and fuck some shit up on our behalf. Even in this day and age where we’ve come up with a word for every conceivable vocal trick used to sway the “gullible” amongst us, we cheer the loudest when they’re used to call out “our” agonies/stressors. The “whataboutism” isn’t a one-sided issue to me, nor does the claim that violence is solely on the heads of a specific party, denomination, or collective of humans ring true to my personal experience. Anecdotal, though, right? My disgraceful inability to speak coherently and the conservative nature of my rearing left me as low hanging fruit for ridicule. I was too open to change for my family/elders and to set in my ways for my peers/generation and, sure, the unencountered/forgotten knowledge/facts coupled with the occasional mental and physical jeering isn’t the same as being shot at or beat down … hunted by the symbol… on a daily but that’s because it’s mine. No individual experience should ever be compared with others (or even worse set to a statistical standard) at all but at the very least in such a style as to dissuade the victim from recognizing injustice even when they indeed were in the wrong, linguistically and/or in the actions taken towards/in society. The ease in which we elevate one story and denigrate another nauseates the ass shitting fuck out of me – I care not how many relevant similarities are evident in the situation for we speculate on separate beings that we know not the mind of, as none knows our own (I don’t even believe people know their own personal intentions/reasonings most the time). God I’m fucking talking circles and yet so many of the factors mentioned are the ones I feel lead us to reject more than just the suppositions/instances put forth in our lives, feeling it necessary to refute the entity as a whole for all. We hear so much, including the plight of one another, but we’re only listening to our own thoughts as we engage.

I get it, the categorization and dissemination of our thoughts/deeds/environment into a form that can be related to by those who were not witnesses to the subject has positive qualities. So does fecal matter, the habitual use of these meaningless noises to promote others to feel a sense of compulsion, disgrace, comradery, hope even hate and love invariably lay a path for hypocrisy. “The road to hell is paved in good intentions”… what crap and yet how better to state it simply? Heh, how bout “the pen is mightier than the sword.” I don’t see a solution to violence other than a utopia scenario of every single person understanding every dumbass superficial form the word takes and consciously avoiding all of it. Till such a time, those who (pretend to) recognize these feelings of aggression that seed such actions must force every single ounce of their existence to show and teach the opposite, meaning even when there is failure, as we live, we accept it, apologize, not just a “sorry” but a full accounting of what was done. Yeah, I understand the knee jerk maneuver to avoid suffering such humiliation, even in the worst case scenarios – to verbalize against this, thineself, openly in a straightforward manner might make it sound as bad as… well, we knew it was, we just justified the offense with thoughts of an understanding of company on our intent, maybe validation of majority opinion, experience/knowledge given from others, or that it’s “just a joke”. Why then is it so hard to separate the heckling method getting a rise, from the reaction/outcome we had assumed would result? For fuck sake you asswipes get me in such a passion I find myself defending fucking Trump/Biden. Mother fucker deserves death not just public humiliation (it was a legit punishment learn something) for his encouragement of the same and probably a couple rapings alongside the theft of every item he holds I’d imagine. When does justice become served, how long do you keep taking the easy pickings, throwing insults like punches? Is it when the offender acknowledges it with words/assets, when a court system orders some form of retribution, or maybe when “karma” catches up? At the time any of these might be fulfilled, will their resolution be acceptable, considered enough to “balance the scales”, or is it just an all-lifelong issue till “in our honest/humble opinion”, the culprit had showed they had “learned their lesson”.

So quick we are to wield our “first amendment” for the defense of “good”. The fact we still argue about speech shows just how much we don’t really wanna fix the problem, cause at its heart, it works the same for us, content to just sink further inventing slogans/terminology/slang to separate ourselves from the “others who are the real issue”. Like guns, language is just a tool. How we utilize it is said to dictate subsequent actions at times. As I see/hear it, those who bring these arguments to the table seem to fall short on continuing certain lines of thought, usually those that could start to conflict with the call to others they offer. Criminals get pushed through our system, suffering while the outside applies layers, blinders, then when they come amongst us, their given criteria, oversight, and a healthy dose of skepticism/demonization from all us “perfect”… apologies law-abiding citizens. I would argue (that more often than not) even those released having served what was deemed “justice” to it's full don’t rejoin with the “freedoms” that are “enjoyed” by their peers… sorry again, citizens that would never commit such an act. They certainly aren’t owed any courtesy/respect, right; though that’s the kicker about the masses, don’t need twelve and somebody in fancy garb to exact what “miniscule” power to hold those in “high places” to account. That’s why we keep getting our shots in on Trump/Biden, am I wrong? The clever witticisms/judgmental ponderings tossed around at his expense is (in my mind) a call for the ulterior form of justice, the only choice the people have outside violence and “their” courts. Putting aside all previous instances of acquittal that are brought up on loop to keep our attention, get the fuck over the January 6th riot. The whole thing, every last aspect… fuck…. Not a thrice-damned insurrection; oh there was an attempt at one but it wasn’t that ragtag chaotic mob that couldn’t cognitively reason literally five-seconds beyond each step needing all focus on getting their mind-altering chants straight. Heralding freedom/truth/a return to morality with the same breath used to place these at the feet of one man. That’s the trick, when confronted with the flaws around the actions behind the chants (albeit by fucking dickheads) just pull it all back to the dude… a kingdom divided… your own fucking minds are divided on itself. Rrrr. You can’t claim independence and freedom while wanting to sacrifice all of it to an individual; let alone the fact that in this instance, Trump/Biden was as much ingrained with the problem as any of these – candidates – we’ve had in my lifetime at least. I would speculate that the whole “rigged election” malarkey resonates with people because we know it’s fucking true, even all you fuckers that are suddenly on the other side whistling nothing to see here. Who was it crying foul in 2000, and rightfully so, who called attention to the fuckery of 2015 and 2019 primaries, for fuck sake, how many godforsaken books have been written covering our obvious fucking over of a group of people out of their rights? Just like Trump/Biden, soon as the outcome gives you a believed win, well obviously the system works, no governmental cabals pulling strings, that’s all conspiracy or (deeper wishful denialism than the previous) the individual being propped up overcame and defeated the “institutional hierarchy”. Elections didn’t change that drastically between the time Trump called out “fraud” working for him (against Bernie) to the moment he tried to rile up his followers over whatever convoluted “evidence” any fart sucking fanatic would present with some remote semblance of charisma. He loved saying he won, that the “deep state” put their candidate in the white house; why wasn’t he specific, why didn’t he lay out piece by piece, step by step the methods with which this 2020 presidential run was weighted against him instead of pointing at anyone looking for his table scraps, yet Trump was so well versed he knew these happenings before the event even unfolded and still couldn’t let us in on how the spaghetti’s made. Any of you “lovers of the constitution” rallying behind speech like “fake news/critical race theory/trigger the dems”, or “lock her up” for some governmental nuance, or “blue/all lives matter” as a response to the cries against tyranny and wealth redistribution – all of it at its core shit you’ll rail against in a heartbeat – why continue to buy (literally in cases) into the narratives spewed about “antifa/black lives matter/radical leftists”. These “groups”, Americans, your equals, understand the same trials that plague you, weep for the same causal oppressions that run rampant through our society, our world. We cannot possibly be at enmity with each other over a mere difference of opinion on how to achieve the same goal, peace on earth. What a clown show, “The most disadvantageous peace is better than the most just war.” (supposedly Desiderius Erasmus) Two sides of the same coin, we create our little cliques, seeking/using consolidation to promote what we hope to be progression/improvement, now if everyone would just get with the program right? The results of elections effecting laws and the way their carried out is not skewed against us due to nefarious intent, or secret rules for a certain group, or smoke-filled backrooms – no, its right in our faces, plastered amongst us blatant for all to see, infecting our state and even local governments all the way down to communal assemblies. People like the Clintons, the Trumps, the Bushes and Obamas, the Kochs and Soroses, the Kindlers and Sacklers, the Waltons and Bezoses, the Sulzbergers and Murdochs, the Copelands and Sharptons, the Gateses and Jobses, and all other subcategories or enterprises not represented right there are just that; human beings, not special or different, only unique cause none of us are them. Other than that, they fraternize amongst us, dream of better times, strive for prosperity, and take a vested interest in the way we conduct ourselves from the bottom to the top, suffer, plead, and fear just like anybody else. That’s why it’s not the “Illuminati/Free Masons/corporate elites/billionaires/capitalists/socialists” pulling the strings – oh I’m sure they try, no doubt, and they’re “trying” against each other, needing a plurality of our love, oops obedience, ugh god, our “cooperation” (that’s the one right) to elevate the good and cease all the bad shit. They all rub elbows then act/speak in smug or judgmental manners towards the “opponents” when the cameras roll, a commonality to all of us just like a cause for the behavior, the encompassing, life choices, up to and after death, that we’ve tightly bound to currency. I could use any number of names, it matters not; their taking the same actions we all do regardless of scale, seeking to take the environment they’ve inherited and go further, profit, achieve success and why rarely they touch each other’s bread, cause it’s theirs too. The best you fucks “calling out Trump” (at best in hopes of persuading some to see the man for “what he was”) could accomplish was hardening the hearts of others… is my statement that wrong when all you really offered in response at the end of the day is fealty to a different puppet, fucking dumb ass, Chris, the puppet you… fuck it, never mind, clarifying idiocy is like polishing a turd. For real though, is it so much better to have someone speaking sweet futures in our ears with calm tones and intellectual prowess when the standard operating procedures continue, cause I guess throw my foil hat in with the “deplorables” as I find the double speak more disgusting and reprehensible than blatant, nigh, even willful ignorance. Trump’s buffoonish actions as president to control the ever moving standard was literally no different than any other prominent figure in the history of our race, but more specifically all are a product of our instincts manifested on a national scale which to get there, the top of the pyramid, the real bosses, those on the minute (not in number) scale have to support and approve, at the very least, with deed. Our state, city and county laws… the way we treat “the next generation”… going down from macro to micro is just the nature of how I went down the rabbit hole and I’ve allowed my insanity to run wild seeing this silliness everywhere. The drama playing for all our eyes in every grande style of media is just an extension of our reactions within our own lives. The sentiment “mo’ money mo’ problems” I assume was a recognition that as more wealth is accumulated, more responsibilities are inherit alongside it (to maintain) not just the freeloaders coming out the woodworks or a “target” manifesting on the back. Heh fuck I’m never gonna end this the way I wanted – all those put into the positions with which we deem in charge of affecting change seem to leave unfortunate common conclusions in their wake. Same with D’s and R’s or the many voices screeching “states’ rights/what’s our government even for”, our little catchphrases don’t mean what I think we want them to. Truly, let’s all cheer for being bent over a stool by state legislators instead of the federal ones, not like their funded in the same fucking way; honestly, not sure if I see running into the arms of more power put into the hands of a single human to stop the big meanies as worse. Oh my, I really wanna go fucking nuts with conspiracy, pointing fingers at all our monopolies dancing with our national institutions like the stock market, the reserve, our military budget, state/national taxes, business/societal regulations but it would just prove fruitless. The only thing I would prove at the end is that they all are trying to run their businesses, every little nuance or detail providing a distraction, no, no, no, Chris, a legitimate process of interpreting evidence that contradicts any accusations of cooperative decimation. I guess what I’m getting at is sorry, Brazil, but your silly imitation of our stupidity is indeed a representation of you just like our own, because they’re us, fellow citizens, and until we can empathize at a level to take the craziest arguments for their face value, we’ll never succeed at showing the moment where truth becomes twisted, replacing the misjudgment/fractured comprehension with knowledge, wisdom, or even a tiny bit of the peace realized in dispelling unwarranted fear. I was gonna include a quote (from The Damage Report YouTube channel) to kinda explain that little name toss but for the fucking life of me I can’t verify any damn sources, fuck if everything ain’t just fucked behind a godfucking motha ass shitting paywall, fuck… bitching shit ass hell if it don’t make a lick of damn difference anyway. Fucking breathe… I could slap any countries’ name in there, swap some pronouns/proper nouns around, maybe the tenses of verbs, and bam said the same damn thing with another set of words. The douchebags who manage impactful (debatable) environmental structures, inarguably having brought forth levels of freedom previously tested but unacknowledged by the whole, prove time and time again that no matter what credentials they point to (intellect, predestination, genetics, status, higher power) they are every bit the same as the rest of us. We allow those bought by their own agenda to speak for us, rich dickcunts seemingly playing us in opposition to one another as they sit back together watching us lose our shit while sipping wine. I’m shit… now if I can bring myself to make some sense, I swear I keep going on the attack against wealth and I fear it paints the wrong picture. I can’t help but to throw a majority of my ire in your direction as you hold all… a significant portion of the resources that may be used for all these noble ambitions. I apologize because every fucking one of you makes no difference at all, unique not different, I could replace literally every last one of you with the poorest or most deserving or well-intentioned competent humans on this planet and not one damn aspect of our world/nations/societies would change, and I find it incredibly depressing that I have so much confidence in such a statement. Hhhhhhhh… the medieval dude I quoted a bit ago was acquainted with Martin Luther (so I read); the guy who stood up to the Catholic Church of the time, started another sect, and shared Desiderius’s sentiments on war (eh), but Luther, perhaps, made one statement I can agree with, coincidently, on belief in God, “Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding,” (I’ll get to what could be the legit version of this) of course I’m straying from the point which would be his quote, “War is the greatest plague that can affect humanity; it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.” These quotes are probably false (one more time?) as I couldn’t verify… just stop Chris… doesn’t matter since the later has similar sentiments shared across time by others so pick your favourite and insert there. I… the silly little phrase used was just to show a problem with the thought as it is not war that does these things, I don’t wanna repeat myself yet so instead let’s just acknowledge I prefer the words of (you know the drill) Tacitus, “a bad peace is even worse than war” for I see war the same as language, guns, abortion, science, maths and, in general, our evolution over history – a specific set of actions done by us, the flowery rhetoric surrounding it only suitable for wishful thinking on how we might not be the problem, as a group or the whole. While Luther may not have said those specific phrases, we do have records we attribute to his pen or mouth besides his Ninety-nine Thesis, and from what I gather he was a pacifist or accused of such during a time Europe was at one height of religious zealotry. He also, supposedly, wrote an entire book proving there were exceptions to peace at the least in conjunction with his ragging hatred of Jews, giving us quotes like, “…. Therefore be on your guard against the Jews, knowing that wherever they have their synagogues, nothing is found but a den of devils in which sheer selfglory, conceit, lies, blasphemy, and defaming of God and men are practiced… they are nothing but thieves and robbers who daily eat no morsel and wear no thread of clothing which they have not stolen and pilfered from us… I brief, dear princes and lords, those of you who have Jews under your rule…set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn… done in honor of our Lord and Christendom… I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues, instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies…” (The Jews and Their Lies by Martin Luther) Whose fucking barn or roof, you’re calling on all “good” Christians to ostracize them for wanting the same freedoms you fucks enjoyed. Oy… the only point there is, regardless if the war quote was from Luther, war is not the only action capable of destroying families, homes, infrastructure, and/or morality/ethics. Unless we want to classify peace as just the civil war of its people for one sect to achieve greater wealth and means over the rest of their fellow citizens… well, than we can just pretend war is always going on despite any change in the field of battle. That doesn’t sound familiar at all. Look, I just cannot accept that any form of control exacted on an individual basis leads to the removal of the constant common issue, which to me, is the control, is US. We keep pointing the fingers wanting those we demagogue to accomplish tasks from our words but that doesn’t teach the mannerisms that succeeded in any enlightened conclusion touted. Of course, I think some are smart enough to understand that and use stupid circular logic purposefully to keep us at odds so nothing really changes… I’m ludicrous, completely off the topic. I just can’t understand why there isn’t more common consent on how to avoid being played by those with greater access to knowledge and resources. All the crying and whining over Biden’s ineffectual methods for ending “Trump era policies”, for fucking real? Talking about the same person who literally masked off before Trump ever made the shit popular for half the country, “… Well, I’m not sure you should assume I’m not corrupt, but I thank you for that. The system does produce corruption… the fortunate thing is that I didn’t have many larger contributors and the only reason (pause) See, I went to the big guys for the money. I was ready to prostitute myself in the manner in which I talk about it, but what happened was they said, ‘Come back when you’re forty, son.’... The only reason I was able to raise the money is that I was able to have a national constituency… I’m like the token black or token woman. I was the token young person.” (Should the Federal Government Subsidize Political Campaigns and Limit Individual Contributions, part of The Advocates, https://openvault.wgbh.org/catalog/V_036A8212AFA94893A7DA5907D8412F6E, February 7th, 1974) So much mud to sling and not just from the out of context quotes I pulled, fuck it,  I’m not saying all you “progressive voices/civil right champions/anti-fascists” should have been there on January 6th, 2021 screaming Trumps name marching to the capitol. We should have been there to show you could be done with the circus without having to bend over backwards to lick the anus of the ringleader emblazoned with your favorite animal. Fucking absolute morons cheering Trump’s incessant bawling of fraudulent election, just be glad your silly mob wasn’t touting significant fire power. Fucking retards playing into these assholes’ hands, what you think would have happened if that group of “secretly federal agents/underhanded antifa/peaceful protesters/innocent Americans just taking a tour” (for real make up your minds on the narrative) was truly armed in any sense? I can tell you. Even if the display of violence that would ensue was successful in swaying those still left of cosigning the actual legislative/pencil pushing (seemingly already underway) required to subvert the original decision, every fucking one of us would be done with that freedom, you know that second one. No matter which “party rose to power”, the damage would be done, “proof/evidence” that we weren’t capable of conducting ourselves with such temptations at our fingertips available for all to see and have repeated every sixtyish seconds. If my poor and brief call to history throughout this wasn’t enough to back my claim, go read/listen to some more; the recuring themes “just kinda similar” to relatable events will be fun and exciting for you. Hell in my eyes the similarity is as blatant as the identical fear and desperation the loudest voices seem to repeat, whether the name attached is Biden/Bernie/so on and so forth, or Trump/Desantis/ditto. You don’t need them to be a fucking supervillain; you just have to show the actual evidence of how they are as bought by the system as any other causing the overall oppression coming from the stock that loves to play vizier, using their “first amendment” to thumb the scale. Those hardworking talented oligarchs fall all over themselves for the silly pieces of paper nuance as they know that’s really all our government and similar institutions are at heart. What I view as the attempted insurrection, a push farther down the road of good management structure, whoops, totalitarianism (flip it and reverse it) had nothing to do with the future (I guess current) scapegoats. “Hang Mike Pence,” oh boy now that shit was fucking hilarious – anyone taking half a glance at the historical context around that “archaic” rule could instantly see, oh yes Pence did have that authority. The issue was that the point of that particular “failsafe” was to prevent motherfuckers exactly like Trump from cowing the entire system of accountability for those who like to pretend they’re above it. I guess, despite all the gaslighting (fucking hate the word, better watch your mouth) he and others did around the matter, Pence never pulled that ultimate disgrace though my pessimism likes to tell me, that in an opposite scenario, that’s the kinda bull hockey that gets eaten right up. What doesn’t fly so smoothly (though gobbled just as heartily) is bloodshed, the slaughter of respectable peers, people at equal standing to those with clearly better opinions but that doesn’t call for barbarism in our places of discourse regardless of disagreement…. Money is speech, fucking disgusting, corporations are people, shittin’ ludicrous. The emperor’s new clothes shtick I read/heard repeatedly about Trump in the start of his term wasn’t supposed to be used as a term of mockery about the dude himself, he wasn’t the fucking emperor he was the damn clothes for fuck’s sake. It’s why all the upper class and media, worried about their precious economy, flipped their lid, he was blatantly pulling all their favorite tricks by utilizing a defense that boiled down to “takes one to know one” and the truth gets fought, buried, smothered, and/or twisted; hence everybody just say the first thing that comes to your mind and create a good sized cacophony, fucking SILENCE, CHRISTOPHER! The reason Trump is awful is because he used the promise of an outside perspective to obscure the reality of the outside influence wanting a spot in the limelight. His policies amounting to nothing more than a continuation of the analogical () accomplishments of Obama, Bush, Clinton, Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy, etc. (I could keep going, I assure you) – that is, the mindset of how our society is favored in one direction never faltered with him as with the others. It’s why nothing but the optics changed under Biden, why the cocks at the microphone, even if there be abhorrence at Trump’s messaging or actions, are still playing with the idea of another go from him, and ultimately why he (like so many others) seemingly won’t face any “justice” for his “crimes”. Nothing actually changed, ever changed, nothing… For the love of all I have left to hold dear, fuck this shit, time to end this absolutely fucked rant of a 7 page paragraph or whatever… all I guess I can say is, in the whole Rittenhouse debacle (though not exclusive to it), sucks, huh TYT, to have the shoe on the other foot. All you gun barrel fucking simps I see waggling your ill-gotten freedoms and half-baked talking points for all to witness (talking to fucks like you Garand Thumb, Taofledermaus, Iraqveteran8888, Forgotten Weapons, Brandon Herrera, Donut Operator, and so many others), I would have pissed myself laughing had it not been so miserably disheartening to hear so many switch their tune of “alpha male gun toting seriously fun and a serious responsibility to uphold freedom” to crying and wailing in the defense of a child’s… nope, I will not insult children like seems to be popular, in the defense of a cognizant being’s series of actions that literally spits in the face of everything you pretended to stand for. I don’t even wanna hear a word in disagreement with all the cucking you did for the Trump party and your sycophantic “supporters” filling your pockets…. The jack asses don’t want guns for everybody, aren’t interested in responsible, individual control and ownership, that was the shit meant for them and their rich ass elite buddies. Oh sure, I’m positive any eager “loyalists” can get a pass but is that really the second amendment you clammer about? Say Trump, after all your fawning and gun touting in his name, approaches you – a red blooded freedom loving independent thinker beholden to God, family, country, in that order – telling you to prove your loyalty and “grab ‘em by the pussy”, you think if even remote hesitation flickers across your face that you won’t be one of the enemy that “doesn’t deserve the same rights”… “non-American” and am I even fucking saying these words right now, suck sweaty rhino balls, I’m done…. Just one more thing…. “We have got to talk about the fundamentals of our worldview, which is different from the left, different from the Godless atheist constructivist liberal worldview… a society where women don’t have the right to vote… like mothers raising their children and it looks like pornography being banned, and homosexuality and transsexuality, as well as heterosexual sodomy, as well as fornication and adultery being shamed by the society and may be in some places in some jurisdictions regulated by the law. It’s not enough to say we’re against *censored*, you got to be against women’s rights too. It’s not enough to be against blue-haired feminism, you got to be against women getting educated… so we’re burning your gay pride flag, we’re burning your gay pride float and then we’re gonna drag your *censored* wife out of her house kicking and screaming and then were gonna burn her at the stake too for being a witch…” (Nick Fuentes’ Vision for America: The Handmaid’s Tale, The Humanist Report YouTube channel, Mike Figueredo, July 15, 2022) I see you Nick Fuentes and all of you who entertain even the smallest aspects of such weak and cowardly fantasies (i.e. Tucker Carlson, Matt Walsh, The Quartering, Jesse Waters, Jordan… why the fuck am I even bothering, you know who the fuck you are, including you bastards that I personally know, not in the public eye); let me assure you that if I ever witness anything close to such actions where I can be physically present… you better hope you have law enforcement with you and supporting your actions because I will not be calling them and you’ll need every advantage you can get, I swear it's not even giving me pause. I just love when a nigga brings his whole crew, just a bigger piece of cake for me to chew a hole through….

So, Christ walks into a hotel and throws down a few nails on the counter, saying “Innkeeper, put me up for the night”. Y’alohila and I always got a good chuckle out of that joke not a good ice breaker in the heart of the Midwest though. Ah, jokes, humor, joy, happiness. While I’m sure this surprises no one still around, comedy was completely lost on me for the… well at this point still a majority of my life (maybe currently). I found most forms of jokes and humor either insulting or simply nonsense for the sake of such and I wanted no part of it. Probably just envious I didn’t get to be the one telling the jokes, besides the point, during those hazy earlier teen years I discovered one of the things I did find funny was macabre shit. Darker humor (for my house mind you [in other words what was classified as dry humor]) was what little I found honestly laugh inducing, though my exposure was pretty limited, my mother being the only one from early youth that I remember regularly cracking the less daisies and daffodils witticisms. I wouldn’t draw the connection till I started seeking “evil” shit for a laugh which came after finally watching my first genuine horror movie, Wrong Turn 2: Dead End. Instantly in love, dumbass mother fuckers finally getting their just desserts for retarded decisions and poorly-thought/malicious demeanors towards peers – purely delightful.

Heh, maybe I have changed a little over the years. Meh. There was just something about the over-the-top ultimate consequence paid for foolishness I saw saturating existence that put an authentic smile on my face. As I would experience more of the genre, most would fall under the same category whether this was the intent or not, but my all-time favorites would give me other subjects for introspective. Horror quickly stood out as the pentacle of artistic expression for motion pictures to me, and I would argue vehemently for it. No other genre of entertainment, remotely related, would unapologetically showcase topics of survival, manipulation, hatred, and/or hopelessness; themes that I found equally prevalent in reality if not of equal merit to all other expressions. All good things come to an end though, (as became increasingly obvious over a number of pleasures/hobbies) my whole counterculture/cult-classic/contrarian love wasn’t as niche which had prior been some fucked up source of self-confidence for… reasons? It took many years to quench the dominating disgust for all the gaiety derived from the plethora of popular poetry, songs, musicals, movies/television, books, stories/speeches, sports, games, hell advertisement/products repetitiously harping nauseating topics of charity and caring and hope and kindness and knowledge and patience and reason and fucking fantastical lovely shit, now if it was all just real.

All I experience are jokes, bunch of unrecognized comedians jacking their material from the same sources I just brought up and then some. Fucking hated “professional comedians” above so much other shit as a teenager; worthless airwasters just so fucking clever with the quips, the one-liners, table turning comebacks, and “insights”. Here’s some funny shit that ain’t a joke, the only one of you that even got half a real chuckle out of me abstemious () was Dane Cook. Worthless pieces of shit gravitate I guess, not shockingly they were the pokes at messing with religious figures or the whispering at the drive thru. I would say something about being a teenage boy but I’m laughing now just recalling it. One of the greatest teachings Eschtaros and Y’alohila imparted to me during our time together was the ability to enjoy at least some forms of comedy other than… nonconventional media mostly funny to pretty much only me till that point. Katt Williams is still one of the funniest motherfuckers alive for me despite, well you know what I do by this point to figures I find intriguing. It’s pretty tempting to blame the weed for opening up to enjoyment since it was also with my roommates that I started smoking regularly. However, I do actually believe the cliché “you can’t blame the drugs”, I just apply that equally. Yeah, it probably made it a whole lot easier though, probably why I won’t detach myself from Mary Jane to this day and got no plans to either.

            Finally out from my parents thumb, I still hadn’t mellowed, still held a philosophy that regardless of circumstances the proper method for handling any situation was head on, fuck the consequences, they’ll be dealt with in time. I’ve had accusations of more stimulating drug usage hurled my direction many a time over the years but that would wreck me. While forming coherent thought with any form of haste is nigh impossible for me baked off my ass, the peace brought to psyche allowed my amped “cognizance” to stop blindly selecting whatever choice felt accomplished the most physical change. This, in turn, was how I accomplished feeling the smallest portion of sympathy, probably ever but, eh, memory. Empathy had never been my issue (I realized finally around that time), I could comprehend, occasionally regurgitate, the emotions and/or ideologies of those I interacted with but honestly I couldn’t care less about any of them even the ones I kinda liked, under most circumstances. Passions of reading, study, videogames (mostly strategy based) all held a sense of hollow gratification till it was finally coupled with the emotion of freedom first revealed to me with my new fellow dropout roommates.

            I had always struggled with sleeping but I can’t call it insomnia cause eventually I would sleep and usually be very stubborn about staying that way. However, till that point of nigh 20 years on the earth, I had never pulled over 3 solid days, happy as a clam with Eschtaros and I chillin on the couch getting high as our girlfriends, Y’alohila and Tala’hirr respectively, would pop in and out from their work schedules. We spoke on backgrounds, politics, religions, music, watching movies, YouTube videos of all the pop culture shit I had shunned/been banned from, and for the first time I felt it, smacking me out of nowhere. A twinge of self-hatred at the thought of murdering him coupled with immense sorrow, coldness. I’ve mentioned these thoughts coupled with my monstrous urgings before, the difference was this time it wasn’t forced. The very mental place I always attributed to such random extremes seemed to balk at what it had just proposed. Here was another human who had suffered so much of the same hardships I had and in many ways far surpassing my own yet here I sat with betrayal on the mind towards perhaps the first individual who had sat with me to open up on the past and then listened, didn’t seek moments to interject or control the conversation, who knew (in portion) of the troubled desires I battled and projected no judgement, spoke to me as an equal in all facets. The rejection of self was instant, instinctual and I was elated; I can say I didn’t understand joy till then.

            For once in my life, it occurred to me that I was just another human being, not special (which I did think, just not in a positive way, probably obvious), at best unique. I don’t know how or where or when that immediate almost subconscious response to a deeply rooted, long running, problematic mentality manifested into existence but I rejoiced, for the crack in the stone wall did exist. It was time to apply my passions, combining my pathetic love of meditation/self-introspection with the petite brain, basic understanding of strategy to draw out the part I wanted in order to help kill the logic of the mindsets I felt I might be losing against. I was capable of sympathy, love (platonic)… mercy, I just had to isolate and imitate, perfect practice would make perfect actions (you’d say I’ve nailed it right heh). The pathways I would decide to go down in my attempts to test and refine the brief reaction into a constant frame of viewing the deeds and/or thoughts of everyone, including myself, I doubt my roommates would have ever predicted.

            When I was real young, one demonstration of my inability to play pattycakes with repetitious bullying, mm-mm, I mean the jokes that like to be told more than once was with my uncle (doesn’t matter which side). “Trolling” as we seem to enjoy calling it today is what basically passes as common comedy amongst the family. Disparagement, sardonicism, taunts, jeers, ridicule, mockery, razz, roast… my parents did an excellent job of imparting at a young age the importance of respect to superiors and through their example, over the years, I concluded that they would get the barest minimum due as that was what they gave. I may have been a bit too blatant with the first aforementioned family member in this paragraph.  Not a hundred percent sure how old I was, couldn’t be much later than 13, and it wasn’t the first time he turned a handshake into a match of “uncle” but it was the last. I was fed up with this game for laughs at my expense, so this time I didn’t throw on a fake laugh, or exaggeratingly buckle and dramatically cry for respite; no, with a shit-eating grin, I locked eyes with him and focused on fighting every urge of my form. He thought it was pretty fun too, sneering “better say it” at first, till the look on my face and the messed-up angle of my arms started to convince him that he, a full grown man with two hundred plus pounds and over a foot on me, would have to brake the arms of a child to get the acquiescence he leered about. I was purposefully putting every effort I could spare into portraying, with out a sound, “Please, break your sister’s child’s arms right in front of her, do it. You’ll get nothing out of me either way.”

            It was over shortly, and while you could say I won that one, I view it as an equal loss to every time I just laughed it all off and/or played along. The combative nature of our interactions started escalating till I finally got the opportunity to separate myself from my family, the whole family and everything to do with them in any nature. Ending this singular source of ire did nothing to teach me the fundamental flaws of these “natural human socializations”; instead I took it as evidence of my psychopathy, another characteristic that need to be segmented, next isolated, afterword described, and then physically manifested in the form I perceived acceptable, amicable. My belief of failing along this route originates from that petty self-accusation of killing an elderly man even though that enlightenment only highlighted parallel events. After forcing management to take note of my increasing efficacy, I had hardened my mind behind an ethic of work that demanded the same from all beings. However, I was convinced that the problem of accomplishing the result lay on the shoulders of management more so than they desired to acknowledge. I would never utter such out loud at that point, knowing the idiocy of humanity all too well, but I could not (and still will not) be convinced that those who failed (fired or quit), failed “solely” on the “merits” of their own physicality and/or mentality.

            Instead, I had a whole list of tropes I had adopted or developed, usually worded in some neo-Meditations (credited to Marcus Aurelius) facsimile () meaning from the start of working at LC, I would waste breath on thoughts like self-responsibility/accountability, the mentality applied to tasks no matter the perceived menial importance to the result, the separation of industry requirements and personal pride, of wage and work ethic. Alas, if I could only speak with eloquence, shit’s hard though when the most social interaction and therefore knowledge of such I recognize was in the back of a seedy Italian (-American [sorry momma V]) restaurant. “War manners” is what I called it, completely ripping off the work of another niche, not so unknown as I humiliatingly believed for too long, author, Mercedes Lackey (I didn’t forget you James Mallory). One of the biggest adjustments from restaurant to fast food was a back kitchen. Yeah, in the prior case, you were gonna be called and hear things like dumbass, motherfucker, dipshit, asswipe, numbnuts, retard, and more (quite often heavily garnished with other forms of profanity), but it would always be intermingled with specific instructions, the direct action needing completed in that moment, even if in caveman form. For the kitchen to operate when the rush really hit, communication was obligatory; two-foot-wide aisles meandering numerous stoves, grills, fryers, ovens, preparation stations – packed in every available space remaining were storage for ingredients needing conscientious replenishment, and all had to be operated by six or more big ass dudes (not including myself) crammed in the center of it all (dishpit was “separated”).

            It would take a couple years after leaving LC before I would realize the difference between these two occupations wasn’t fast food to restaurant but the size of the operations, “ma and pa” vs corporate entity. LC was refined, utilitarian… on paper. Oh, how my pathetically weak and uninspired mind latched on like a fucking newborn to the teat. This was how work was meant to be carried out. To hell with all the confusing lingo, irritated blasting, “jovial” niggling that passed as training; here every minute step was recorded in words on paper readily accessible for study and there was little room for misinterpretation only err in reading the instructions. Those filling the positions of management or seniority in LC still acted almost identically to those I had fashioned bonds with at V’s. The increased pace was a rough adjustment despite the simplification of product sold, perhaps due to the method of imparting knowledge remaining similar. Yell, jeer, cajole, demand, demean the conclusion you desire down your subordinates’ throats, it seemed worse because the job requirements were “easier”, you know, working a teenager’s job, something for the college students or…. Needless to say as it’s repetition (I’d get used to it. I hate repeating myself and yet I keep fucking doing it), I was lacking a combo of mental and physical capabilities which lead to my shakerboarding for what might have been till the end of my employment had I not fallen back to my age old tactic for passing classes in school. Hit the books.

            My rationalizations were most certainly misplaced and/or misguided though. I still firmly stand by the fault for my inability to achieve the standards quoted had a place on the shoulders of those paid to uphold it. My success at forcing my way back in the store and then up the promotion ladder was all the validation I needed at the time. Just like all the years of my life experience to that point, people equal shit; where humans fucked around constantly forgetting to impart necessary details, substituting explanations with the equivocate of “just do it”, mocking/lambasting over any form of failure – books didn’t give a fuck about your mentality, didn’t waste space with useless exposition (heheh) or insults about the reader, wasn’t watching or following up or rushing the shit out of you, changing the format of their instruction (if not the task itself), books laid out all the writer put forth and it was up to the individual to partake. After another week of Dekpettih proving he was far too lazy to provide the training or opportunity in store to practice… sorry after my worthiness had been evaluated and I found its conclusion wanting, I stole the reading material in store for a bit while I combed over it the multiple times I know it takes me to retain any amount of information.

            You didn’t read/hear that wrong, you see those “tools” were required on hand for training purposes during those totally non-imaginary down times when nothing’s to be done but get to studying. The display of holding up a wall… wrong, Chris… “supervising” definitely encouraged that mindset to push for those “nothing left to be done” moments to hit the books on the clock. Oy, regardless of my feelings, I set to prove my thoughts with action, so the second I was offered managing a store, I leapt on it, no hesitation. It was almost impossible to hide my glee from the obvious display of betrayal on Dekpettih’s face when he found out. Oh the joy I smothered (probably failed); fool thought after I had clawed my way into the scheduling than management that I had some loyalty to him, that he and I shared some kind of commonality. This was due to the unfortunate similarities between us beyond atheism including musicians, movies, tv shows, hell even our looks to a certain degree. I’m chuckling thinking back at his pathetic defense of TOOL as a heavy metal band, I could care less now but… just stay focused for god’s sake (thought I hated myself before this project).

            As so many others before and after him, he mistook my efforts to do my job while exuding level-headedness, patience, and courtesy as kindness… friendship. He got a less rude awakening than others. All of it was inconsequential, for the time had finally been delivered into my hands where I could put my money where my mouth was, even if the inside of my skull was the only one hearing my mouth. It was the perfect starter for my experiment. I certainly didn’t find it so in the moment; inches of dust and grime literally (no sarcasm this time) everywhere, insufficient space and shelving for product and tools, no recognizable organization, and I spent the first two weeks almost entirely in the store attempting to set everything in order. One hundred twenty plus hours each of those weeks were logged by me on a fifty hour a week fast food manager’s salary (2013ish so 160 dollars per 10 hour scheduled shift before taxes). So began my attempts to forge the path in words and action to show those “in my charge” a better way for the work to be done.

            It was toughest those first few months, I truly wondered if I had bit off more than I could chew. My curtness and inexperience added to the stress of the standards I put on myself (something I still put perhaps too much blame on driving my then girlfriend away), which would have surely lead to further failure had not my AS gave me the last piece of advice I needed to complete my transformation. While doubtless it needs no clarification, my lack of social skills made customer service/register work my poorest area. I was (hah! is) the one who overcompensated by saturating my voice and body language with sweetness, brightness, and/or caring; I mean, years of doing this in my personal life growing up meant I feel most people considered it genuine, though there was always the “before my coffee” people who basically, in one way or another, would tell me to take it down a notch. To sum it up, I had the ability, I just hadn’t put together the strategy, or even end goal, to realize the utility of such characteristics. This was where my AS stepped in. Till this time, despite my best efforts, cleaning the house of staff was occurring alongside the store itself, and every employee lost outside of finding a better job was a direct hit to me. I held the ultimate responsibility for every one of them and it was beginning to destroy me till he came in one day, after a particularly bad one where I lost two employees, with this advice.

            Don’t let work rule you. Don’t allow the store’s trouble to follow you back home, meaning even to the point of souring your attitude (what I now frame as forgive or, at the least, forget). Most importantly, you can’t control what other people do, so stop being upset about it. So long as I was confident that I was training effectively, there was no need to get angry or frustrated because they knew what was required of them and they either tried at these tasks or three strikes on to the next application. It hardly ever reached that point, naturally, most are not going to stick around and be fired purposefully. I wouldn’t ponder this information till a few years down the line, but I was a little too keen on the nice asshole role. Heh, ugly, sick, broke and stupid. I thought my version of authority was the proper form proven by outcomes but reality was I just needed a bad day to put myself side-by-side to any of the acts I categorized as foolish, unbeneficial… evil. None of the trials I had willingly thrown myself at, previously, taught me a damn thing; hence a man with 15+ years at the company finally raising the white flag and passing from this world only a short while after “retiring.”

            Eschtaros and Y’alohila I don’t think ever understood the friendship with Kardessio, a big ass dude with an abrasive character I met working at V’s. They would use descriptors more along the lines of bigoted, jerk, bully, fucktard and so on, and I couldn’t really blame them. Eschtaros certainly had deeper emotional connections to the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer Intersex and Asexual (LGBTQIA+[probably just gonna use LGBT]) community than I and so the “humor” of the wanna-be Sicilian wangster was not taken graciously. The trial of showing a douchebag that the kindness and mercy in their heart for some, juxtaposed to the pain they had suffered at the hands of social/cultural environments, need not to translate into being a dick for us to kick it, was undermined at every turn by the defensiveness of those I felt had the strength and collective knowledge to see how they were engaging in the same game just a different angle. Now I was trying to fight a pacifist war on two fronts; it was “completely useless” as my roommates would get their “justification” on their judgement when, shortly after I was finished having fun with some good cocaine moving through, Kardessio would continue using, get addicted to meth, and rob his own mother with whom he lived with. Piece of shit, huh, unfortunately we were done when he basically chose the drugs – going to LC didn’t hurt.

            “Fag. Faggot. Christina. Cock Holder.” The jokes weren’t even inventive but I don’t think they had ever been as repetitive, incessant even, till I met Kardessio. To this day, one of the toughest friendships I maintained. So many times, I had to consciously restrain myself from waiting till backs were turned than just stabbing the fucking shit out of him. Eh, my roommates were used to the weird/discordant behavior from me. You should have seen the disappointment in the faces when our shared disbelief in Christianity didn’t translate to enjoyment of “comedic gold” like George Carlin, Idiocracy, or Dogma. These were examples of the worst types of assholes, is the simplest answer. The hilarity was derived from disingenuous portrayals of believers or straight up false statements on snippets of the Bible to paint the contradiction supporting their ridicule, you know, cause science, truth, maths, history and all that superior high-minded nonsense.

            Have you started to hear it now, Gabriel Iglesias, Carlos Mencia, Rodney Dangerfield, Andrew Clay, Steve Hofstetter, Eddie Griffin, Richard Prior, Corey Holcomb, Andrew Shultz, Aziz Ansari and any of you who place yourself in the occupation including all you consumers, you hear your fucking punchlines in this bull shit yet? I should’ve just said everyone on this fucking planet – space related hoaxes, presidential assassinations, flat earthers, gamer gate pfft birds aren’t real. Ya‘all just love talking your shit, “debunking” mainstream narratives or “responding” to misinformation, none of you sound fucking genuine. Time and time again, I hear folks spew the obviously preplanned information they think is their ace in the hole and, from where I sit, use it like it’s a reject all other palaver card. Looking at you containers of ass (SciManDan, Professor Dave, CosmicSkepitic, Miniminuteman, Dave McKeegan, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Bill Nye [fucks sake YouTube where’s my BIPOC throbbing brains refuting misinformation]) writing your fucking books/papers, chiming in on podcasts, online videos, television interviews; it’s your words, your ideals that had me in the “moon landing wasn’t real” camp for way too fucking long. Yeah, I empathize with conspiracists more than is good for my health, can’t seem to help myself when all I hear coming out of the mouths with the knowledge and access to physical evidence for supporting our collective discoveries is a bunch of fucking comedy. That is, of course, if it’s not in the format of a “debate”, silly ass shit, which sounds like the desperate flinging of statements at one another with each party coming away, “look at this clip that proves I punked ‘em.” No fucking authenticity… couldn’t stand debate for that very reason, seemingly just an excuse for the most popular thought/idea/person of the room to make the opposing side a joke… pariah.

            I can’t help but chuckle thinking of DMX’s lyrics “…I think about when a nigga didn’t have and a nigga told a joke, and the bitches didn’t laugh. Well see now I do the math, I see if you got this and this and this, to same cats, that nigga’s the shit…” (What these Bitches Want) You can see that shit anywhere you look, its why some of us get away with, oh, perhaps behavior similar to interrupting, insulting, rebelling, commanding, lying, or blustering and those of us on the out wanting to call it the way we receive it, get hit with all the unrelated accomplishments that’s somehow affiliated with why they get to act in such a manner. Words fail me when I attempt to suffer through the “dialogue” of peckers… apologies “master debaters”, (Charlie Kirk, Sam Seder, Tim Pool, Hasan Piker, Steven Crowder, Xanderhaul, eh, LiberalHivemind, Suris… fucking god way too many others) especially you, Vaush. Never in my life did I think I would agree on so much with an individual yet disagree on every level cause you’re a fucking douche. Fuck you, we don’t see eye to eye on any of it even if the same fundamental ideas spring from our larynx. As I see it, you prove you don’t believe what we defend with your representation, why you inevitably fall back on pseudo-intellectual jargon and conventional logic framed as impervious to critique with the promoted conjunctive evidence. Fucking get a hold of yourself, Chris. It’s…. so many figures we trash for high minded ideals/furthering the progress of humanity because, from what I understand, they were absolute hypocrites, living garbage. Are there no comparisons to be learned… nothing to be garnered from compassionate murders, charitable thieves, brilliant molesters, good-hearted rapists, peaceful bigots, freedom-loving slave owners (a little ambiguous but hopefully blunt enough for you, “I never burn bridges” Vaush).

            Huhhhh, it’s the goddamn assumption of intent, the villainy, the usage of a truth to ignore or superimpose over facts equal in relevancy. Fucking two way street, oy, none of its any different at any scale. Just unique, curious if that’s helped the rise of such forms of escapism. Just wish the “moral of the story” was actually being discussed. Instead, it just seems to give everyone their talking points… and immediately I feel like some fucking ass news anchor vomiting donkey dung about video games. It’s tough to reject such a natural instinct, but I’ve been trying, substituting my words with demonstration as best I can. Struggling with silence when I wish to rebuke and showing what I perceive to be the opposite of another’s behavior, the better method to impart their knowledge that I know is at the heart of the “misdeed”. I’m only human… and all that other shit we’ve discussed. I fuck up cause it’s nice to receive the same understanding I attempt to offer. I think that was what drew me to the principle of debate in the beginning; a very basic (and another example of naivety) impression of an organized, courteous exchange of those wishing to discuss topics leading to a conclusion, even if that be that neither party agreed in finality of this singular occurrence. Its ok, you can laugh, I know I do when I think of that brief thought before standing in my middle school classroom to hash out a subject that was snuffed in memory to the “inconsequential” events simultaneous to our “rapport”. Constantly interrupted, moderated for similar behavior, and of course can’t really finish the debate without an acceptance of ground lost/gained, “learning” you know. Tch, winners and losers.

            Anyone on some fuckin nonsense over that being middle school and kids be fucking blahdy fucking blah blah blah get the fuck out of your own fuckhole. Nothing changed over years or locations or company. Hmm, company… guess now’s as good as time as any to turn my ire to Asplundh Tree Experts and their butt buddies, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. I briefly touched on some experiences to throw a few accusations around but let’s get specific. I began employment with Asplundh towards the end of Obama’s presidency (e.g. the economy was strengthening/recovering/elevating) and briefly thought I could see my “10 years till Alaska” plan as a possibility instead of some funny shit I spouted off at the mouth about. Certainly I could finally afford a place of my own, right? Guess I already revealed the cat in the box on that one; sucks, as I was all full of pomp, joy, and confidence when I netted my first unionized “career” with a starting pay of over fifteen dollars (after 90 days and Class B license). If memory servers me correctly, minimum wage was still hovering between the $7-$8 range and the only option for not… appreciating a work scenario being “the door”. Fucking damn skippy, I had motherfucking rights now and a starting wage higher than my GM salary (lies). Year after year, I began to see the cycle of our contract being set on an annual basis – how each term was relayed in a fashion of acquiescence. Each time “this is the best were going to get guys”, “the national headquarters/main branch would have to sign off on a strike”, “the highest increase we’ve seen in a decade”, fucking benefits, retirements, backpays, statistics, and whatever fucking nonsense that can be thrown in our face to dissuade from demanding our rights from our employers. “New charges today in a four-year long FBI corruption investigation of the United Autoworkers Union…. The first sign of trouble came four years ago, when a former Fiat Chrysler financial analyst admitted he’d created false tax returns for UAW officials to hide bribes from company officials and to hide their embezzlement. The U.S. Justice Department said the bribes were made to keep union leaders, quote, “fat, dumb, and happy” in the 2011 and 2015 contract talks…. The FBI is investigating allegations of lavish junkets for Jones and Williams paid for with union dues… as well as possible improprieties by a charity Jones created….” (“UAW Corruption Scandal Widens with Raids on Homes and Latest Arrest” by Tracy Samilton on All Things Considered – NPR, September 12, 2019).

            I get it, I assure you, I understand the reasoning behind such twisted and convoluted regulations, and no I am not going to make more accusations of greed… or I shall do my best to resist. Hell, I remember vividly, as anyone who has had any managerial duties involving people should, the constant boundary pushing, the “loopholes”, the lack of focus from employees… the fucking cellphones… “Just happened”, “I didn’t know”, “I saw so-so”, “I thought huha”, “drama, drama, gossip, woe is my life”. Heard it all, and guess what, I still think you… we still own a significant portion of the blame for that shit. When I first started without a fucking clue about tree trimming and never experienced a repetitive, “physical” job, I knew my body would be tested beyond anything before and I set myself to prove mind over matter. Heh, like so many times previous, jokes about snapping like a twig, blowing away with the wind, hiding behind a sapling, weakness in general, abounded. One of the foremen (entry level management, like an assistant manager), Jarrallelleph, I worked under began to consistently tell me I was “too smart” for this – you know, after the months of insults passed, I had stayed and snuffed the reality of these jabs… whoops jests. That was the real joke, I wasn’t any smarter than him. In his own words “The dying part is easy, it’s the living that’s hard.” He was as absolute shit at training as any “manager” I’ve worked under; fucking alternating standards, high minded “words of wisdom” that obviously applied to everybody else, and let’s not leave out the most pervasive and putrid “just get ‘er done”. Every mother fucker I’ve had the displeasure of working “under” speaks out both sides of their fucking mouth, that’s of course if they even seem to know how to speak at all, acting like the end goal is holding up a fence to shit talk on all the other lazy, dumb, try hard, brown nosing individuals all the while performing the most basic of your own managerial tasks, like informing, isn’t part of the fucking deal (I imagine one of you I work with [for now] thinks that some of the words in these last few pages were a direct call out. Oh no, none of that was specifically aimed at you. Have a little patience, I’m getting there).

            Jarrallelleph was no fool, or lazy as so many loved to paint him (at least no more so than any of them including myself), but he always threw his hat in with the union and, despite his gruff and insulting attitude, would always tie conflicts in the yard to the unity we members needed to show publicly in the face of our company and contractors (power company). Times haven’t been getting easier during my recollection at least, and Jarrallelleph began to take the union’s advice, giving only what was required, passive aggressive protesting our bosses “forcing” our union to concede on practices, benefits, pay, retirement… freedom…. He was combative with those who dictated the work and demanding of the elected officers representing us. It’s hard not to find this an elaborate scheme, fighting a billion dollar plus corporation over wages, insurance, rules, equipment, and training (politics? No not that one right) with tactics like refusing additive requests, running to mommy/sorry keeping the hall on speed dial, straight calling in absent to apply pressure. How does this aid us when it’s time to sit at the table and demand our just deserts?

 A fucking improv group is what I see. Youngins eager for the opportunity to receive recognition for their effort or any with an axe to grind all too happy to ostracize our “union brothers” till the shoes on their foot. Twas the fate of Jarrallelleph, hopefully the opportunity that arose from it was a better one. If I wasn’t so eager to kill, the hypocrisy would be gut bustingly funny.  “We gotta stay productive”, “Safety first, no one gets hurt”, “We need better attendance”, “No one wants to work these days”, “We need to be thorough doing the job briefings and everyone needs to be involved”, “Job briefings should only take fifteen to twenty minutes”, “Stop peeling out before you’re off the clock”, “It’s a new world/age/era now, guys”. Just endless douchey dick faced behavior: butt hurt threatening as the fair play of turnabout only applying to self, petty fucking emotions over assumptions on one another, snitching… hehheh “you either gon’ respect the code or you gon’ get what you give” (Snitch by Joyner Lucas, “Evolution” 2020), man I’m being way too generous to you fucks. Fucking voted blatant stupidity down three times just to overwhelming kneel and suck… don’t you dare use that as an insult, Chris.

“Who the fuck voted for Biden! I fucking swear to god Imma punch anyone who voted for that motherfucker!” Yuppers, cause Biden forced our company to put out it’s Covid guidelines, certainly not the other way around. That’s why Trump kept saying all those wonderful liberty phrases and shit didn’t shut down till well into 2021…wait, what? Part of the fun, right Asplundh, trying to figure out how to keep the bottom line in the green while dealing with a bunch of careless, narcissistic servants/workers, their endlessly entitlement seeking representation, and a government that, no matter how much money you throw at them – I mean economic growth/essential services you provide, will stick their bloody nose in if the help raises too much of a stink. Every local area you set up shop in has lawyers, judges, elected officials, their lackey regulators – fucking loud mouthed “do-gooders”, and yahoos pretending to offer comparable work/rates. From there, every county, every state, every nation, every continent, all containing the next grade of these hurdles with additional unique challenges. Then, you’ve got the business itself, gotta be creative/innovative to keep the popular optics… shit, the “expenditures” from driving your “vital commodity/marketable service” into “bankruptcy” a.k.a. the forfeiture of assets, additionally, perhaps, the access to obtain assets (well for those with my financial status or less).

Consolidating ownership, encouraging the creation of a top-down structure, offering commands not suggestions, pushing rhetoric for “clarification” of requirements, standardizing every little operation thinkable: all of that makes perfect sense to me especially when sitting in the union meetings where a bunch of ingrates caught up in their personal b.s. shout repetitive statements at the negotiators who have the knowledge/experience concerning the thrice said operations/requests. Of course, that is if there is more than ten of us (out of a few hundred) that show up. I guess if there’s only a handful of us, discussions are a hell of lot easier to manage, organize, silence… oh, not the last one. Cocking bastardized liquid shitting less than microbial arse group think. Grrr… “…it’d be like four-thirty in the morning and I’d be still trying to get laid, and then I had to be up at seven to go to my construction job…. I’d come home and fall asleep before I even got my clothes off. I’d just hit the fucking bed, sideways, out cold, wake up in the morning and do it all over again… working while you’re tired when you’re a kid is so important… to realize how to power through things cause you don’t power through shit when you’re a little kid…. All of a sudden you have to work… now you gotta get up at six. Those summer jobs, those were the big eye opener for me. That’s when I knew… I could never work construction… summer jobs when I was in high school and right out of high school is like fuck this…. I had other jobs that weren’t as hard… I was a dishwasher, then I was a cook, wasn’t that hard. I mean it sucked, it wasn’t fun… but that was like my only job that I’d had until I started construction jobs… when you’re a laborer, you’re a sixteen year old laborer on a construction site, fuck your life…” (Joe Rogan Experience #941 – Greg Fitzsimmons “Joe Rogan on Working Summer Jobs” Joe Rogan, YouTube, April 5, 2017).

            Look at all the contradictions riddled throughout that statement. Irritating vocalizations on lacking willpower, the effort required by certain forms of employment, blatant double speak about “out all night” then “work so hard, no time for silliness” and no I am not speaking of the quote alone; stupid idioms I’ve been hearing in its ten thousand forms for the entirety of my life. So yeah, Joe Rogan, Dave Chapelle, Jeff Foxworthy, Wanda Sykes, Whitney Cummings, Ari Shaffir, Joey Diaz, Ken Jeong, Ali Wong, Jordan Peele, Tom Segura, Ellen DeGeneres, Ali Siddiq, Carl Benjamin, Ethan Klein, Chris Rock, put me in Will Smith’s camp. For real, I’ve tried to learn and witness a lot of shit but seeing that go down might possibly wind up being the greatest highlight of my life. The only issue now is trying to figure out who’s side I perceive to be the most incorrect. I didn’t get to watch it go down live, but I watched it plenty of times the next day. For about a full second after first watching Smith take the stage and tea slap Rock, I was laughing hysterically just thinking, “yeah sucks when ‘words have consequences’ don’t it.” It’s insanely unfortunate (or unfortunate to the point of insanity?) that I immediately associated the look on Rock’s face with one I had felt myself wear too many times. I only know my own thoughts, but words like indignation, confusion, anger… betrayal surface in my mind, at which point, I found myself singing a different tune. “Cock sucking fucker thinking he’s superior, that his “status” allows him to walk up there and slap another mother fucker like he owns the bitch. Anything is a weapon with enough force applied. No matter their stature, skills, or power, they all bleed. So fuck that shit, stab the hell out of him, Chris.”

            Fantastic how such little things will send me into a frothing rage and similar stupid little details leave me cursing my own emotions; the act of saying the name I share causing amusement at the thought of talking to myself a-gain. I used to be so fucking pissed on the prevalence of my name and yet, the older I get, the more meaningless (and worst, utilitarian) I find it to be. Names in general, that is, but including my own. Ah, words. Language. Fucking tripe, gotta love it. Disgusting lies, absolute dog shit constantly spewing from the mouths of all across generations. Purpose, meaning, understanding driven from them although it was the only reason for their existence in the first place, and all I can manage in their defense is a pathetic two hundred plus page diss (high pitched whining tantrum) at… well everything under the fucking sun.  Heheh like there poking fun at extreme hyperbole, and don’t lie, even if not at me or my words, “the fact that you would be so blasé about it shows you don’t understand how important it is” (let me have this, obviously no one, but me, around here has used the word blasé that I’ve ever heard). You motherfuckers miss the point, not I. I’m literally imitating you in those moments and watching as the same compassion, comprehension I showed you is expectorated out your nostrils in my face. Time and time again: backstabbing, gossip, misuse of property, no fucks given about anything that isn’t directly tied to your ass and even then it’s only as many fucks as you wanna give and god help the mother fucker you’ve called out previously if they return the favor.

            Can there really be any question as to how “we’ve come to this point” when it’s all caused by us; of course, “companies/governments/assemblies” push for “control/advantage”, no soul would have any other goal due to those words seemingly describes the basic steps for understanding culminating, hopefully, in the ability to avoid hazards/damages so whatever outcome desired becomes reality. Fucking bitching, moaning, gnashing of teeth over the walk you’d take in a heartbeat when it becomes your path, no matter whose backs pave the road. Ugh, yes, I’m sure you have your little buddies that might be lucky enough to walk at your side instead of under your heel, sound familiar? They would have earned it though, right? Proven beyond any shadow of a doubt what diligent, honest, and “good people” they are, deserving of such “responsibility/grace.” Not like those previously in command, or maybe hollering alongside you for the same change… heh or screaming the same meanings just on the otherside of the fence. “How long, how looonnng will I try…” (yes a Red Hot Chili Peppers reference) pfft get a hold of yourself… no different with you, nothing new to see here.

            The male youth crisis. I swear to whatever god you prefer I am not snickering – over the thoughts you might assume at least.  There’s nothing there that hasn’t always been prevalent at all other moments. It’s factors/components/agents almost identical to all the “social issues/policies” that we have cycled before our eyes to be haggled over because words solve problems, tantamount to action you know. I’m sure the poor chick I got a bit too handsy on the dance floor with surely took my immediate repeal and apologies as equal to the first act. I do mean immediate repeal. The instant she showed displeasure, aggression, I backed way the fuck off and never looked her way again after putting my hands up and apologizing. Was the damage already done, the internet still rages on. Hell, to make sure I wasn’t even at the same club any longer, I gave up on dismissing the advances of some swinger couple and wound up fucking some cuck’s wife at their house (and I continue to expound on the depths of my depravity. Goddamnit, why am I still bothering with these parenthesis, all these fucking pages in and do you even understand that fucking statement?). Long before this moment, I ceased being the loudly self-declared chivalrous cringe peacock I proved not in my character, but that didn’t mean I had to quit standards.

            Yes, I was the overzealous, unbearable “women’s rights activist”, the “equal rights starts with equal pay” and all that jazz. Definitely the kind of repulsive (disturbing? May have disturbed a few) douche that said nonsense like “all men are trash”, “a man never has good reason/excuse to hit or assault a woman.” Heh, even after I grew up enough to understand what absolutist/fatalistic garbage that was, I would still pompously declare that I, personally, would -never, under any circumstance (and if you weren’t man-trash, you’d show it). There is always a better way. Still believe it, can’t say it honestly anymore. It puts a serious hole in the grandstanding when one of the “reformed” addicts you let in your apartment while getting hammered decides to check your vitals with buckets of water and hair pulling. Outside of fucking around, I’ve ceased putting definitive judgements on a human’s intent; ambiguous shit talking on general fuck ups. I can’t shake the hindsight of these statements becoming challenges to my future. It doesn’t matter what circumstances surrounded the event, the second I gained semiconsciousness and went to swinging blindly, I made my decision. Now I’m a liar so never say never.

            I made that whole situation myself, started the second I listened to my second in command at Leavenworth LC and started hiring chicks. Yeah, yeah I know how that sounds, had to walk my Comanager through this as well. I had every confidence that the women I would hire could just as easily be trained to: complete the work tasks, assist in counting and managing product/staff, cleaning and maintaining the store and equipment, etc. etc. The mystery (to everyone but me) was whether the now majority of dudes in my store (speculate how you will) would remember their training; would continue to uphold a solid work ethic; would recognize that the time they were wasting spitting their best game was the time necessary for prepping so there wouldn’t be frustrations later. Spoiler alert, I wound up one of the only dudes in the store. Oh boy, one of… Fucking stupidity, the gender/sex discussions, pshh, arguments all sound like endless cheese graters on chalkboards. How much goddamn copium you “men” need to inject in the morning to believe that science proves men are “physically stronger, predisposed to lust/anger/intellect” or “calmer, more reasonable, more trustworthy, logical instead of emotional.” Psuedo-science… We love our terms. Societal construct.

            Those ladies busted ass. Those who pushed for it, easily put times up that rivaled any of the best records by the other guys and I. The dudes, no matter the generation, were just as likely to call in, act shitty from a “bad day”, or fuck around on the goddamn phone! Fuck you cocks, you ever consider for half a fucking second that any, and I mean ANY, difference in skill or physicality spawns from literal millennia of encouraging these fucking roles from literal (I mean that both times) fucking conception, a stupid ass zygote and that’s being kind to all you thrice fucked creationists only putting “millennia” in there. I mean for fucks sake, you all act like a bunch of high school girls well past “adulthood”, creating your little fucking cliques, gossiping – sorry – talking shit behind each others’ backs the second an opportunity presents itself. I need to stop repeating myself… don’t think any of you douchebags I currently work along side are any different or better. Fucking hell I would have loved to have any of you in my store to see how long you held that nose of yours in the air. We’d see how big your britches were when your wiping actual shit off around the toilet on hands and knees for seven dollars and twenty-five cents an hour and then I laughing in your face at the slop you’d tried to pass off as good enough (totally not speaking from experience on both ends of the spectrum). Oh, sure, maybe your first two weeks would be great, but what about after the 3rd paycheck or maybe the 5th when your still behind on the rent from last month and you’re staring down its barrel once more? Who am I kidding, not a one of you would have lasted the four weeks to your first four-to-five-hundred-dollar paycheck.

            Heh, “no I in team”, percents, instructions, boundaries, stereotypes… statistics. After beating down the drunk, crack addled, older women who made such fervent efforts to ensure I hadn’t overdosed on alcohol, I got pissed at her in a brief reaction, as if she had chosen for me to wake up swinging, and I didn’t even get to have the excuse of black out drunk. Pretty hard not to put that last one in quotation marks. For a long time I considered that condition to be a lie, another excuse for humans to fabricate a perpetrator for their actions other than themselves. Yes, I got to find out that one the hard way too. Poor Orlessiah didn’t deserve that shit, she had enough on her plate but “everybody’s got choices.” Yup (E40 but you should check out his other music instead of the one hit most know). Guess what, I still think that shit’s just a deflection whether the condition is a real one or not. Shocker, maybe there are things that can be both true and false while simultaneously neither. Food for thought for fucking “intelligentsia”. I really want to stop punching sideways but I don’t see myself getting over it till I can order a fucking fast-food hamburger without getting cheese on the fucking thing! Fuck … no.

             I swear so many fuckin retards – let’s add a little clairvoyance to that statement. I am well aware of the stigmatism placed upon the usage of the word like so many others, but that’s due to a fundamental misunderstanding of the way such a word should be used. When I say it, contrary to the way it “medically” inferred someone of “less mental capacity”, I call all those who love to claim themselves “normal/sane” or just acts/talks like there somehow above those first defined, retard, for it applies to y’all, not the afflicted. I said earlier it was almost impossible to hide my glee at the hurt feelings of Dekpettih upon my promotion and for good reason. In truth, he should have (and may have) seen it coming from the moment he decided to wage his little war with me. My promotion to entry level management was very similar to obtaining my own store (there it is again) and it didn’t take long for the pattern to emerge. Every new hire I took an interest in for training to progress in efficiency would become a target for Dekpettih’s worst antagonism. So many (eventually) good employees lost over fucking drama. I recognize my own choices here – just as I’ll give the benefit of subconscious behavior to him, I believe it started that way for myself. I innately strove to prove the value of all beings, a quirk/characteristic/flaw inconsequential to the help they could provide. Perhaps seeing those he deemed unfit, rise above expectations, caused him to double down without knowing it, but I saw it and I began to think it my next vendetta. So many times I encouraged and reminded the workers who strove for diligence/patience/acknowledgement, “Let the words/acts be water off the back. Your reaction is what is wanted, don’t satisfy or justify their jackassery.” I attempted every way I could to give insight towards my will to ignore disparagement and then crush the implications with deed.

            While there were many failures, one success proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that we’re the fucking retards. Wish I could remember his name, but I remember that sickening demeanor Dekpettih showed upon hiring him. The “inclusivity” hire that everyone loves to snicker about, the moment I saw that poor handicapped young adult get only shakerboard hours I knew what had to be done. The best heartbreaking detail of it all was my own misconceptions. Here I was no better than those slinging dirt, falsely assuming my wish to help somehow negated my preconceived thoughts of the difficulty in imparting knowledge to someone with his mental impairment, like was he was different somehow. Mother fucker just need someone that actually gave a flying fuck about teaching, about treating them as the fucking equal they are, so the fuck what it took ‘em a bit of time, I fucking empathize with that. Maybe if fuckers “in charge” gave half an ass about wisdom, we’d all see my words ring with truth. He picked up the training just as quickly as any other, maybe even faster. I didn’t even bother to hide my sinister glee, pestering Dekpettih over his begrudging acceptance of the “store dunce” as an actual component of operations. When the rush hits and customers start… well only an ultra-maroon would choose to have an able body stand at the side of the road with the corporate logo instead of “serving every customer with a smile and a perfect pizza in less than thirty seconds, every time.” I’ve just grown so much beyond those aforementioned misconceptions.

            I don’t know if that ignoramus hot-n-ready promise will still get you a free a hot-n-ready pizza but there it is, almost an entire decade latter and that quote still burns as the day I first branded it in my mind. Kfff, mental health. What kind of fucking nonsense was that when this whole fucking anti-vaccination craze made its latest damn cyclical run through our media? With the examples throughout all recorded history, we’re seriously confused as to the fucking distrust over institutions like the medical/pharmaceutical (what the fuck kinda spelling…) industries by those mocked, used, discarded, ignored from the very beings that compose said business, assist the legislation causing ire? Come on now, I know most you have that fancy little fucking framed paper proving your smarter than I. How are those without all that time and capital, or have “anecdotal” experience that casts doubt, supposed to react as they are told by… rrr… human beings about the changes coming to their lives and fuck your questions, it’ll work itself out cause the “greater good”. I digress, lets not play favorites as I can almost feel the smiles from those who nod to these points. What the fuck is it, is all that shit Devil’s Work or do we love the science. Everybody losing their minds over studies, statistics, corruption, biases and then you wanna turn around and try biology … psychology against trans people.

            I know, I get it. The last person you want to defend your cause is I; my apologies to all transgender/sexual beings but you’ll wish I hadn’t spoken even more so soon. Like any other, I went through a questioning phase during my early teenage years. It started around the time I began masturbating, my obsession with soft, smooth textiles would later evolve into my current fetish of lingerie and the trigger for that in particular was probably the moment as a teenager I snuck a pair of undergarments from my aunt visiting for the holidays. The adrenaline spike was insane, silently trying to find a pair that satisfied the emotion of aesthetic sensuality. Lust. Unfortunately, I got scared before I could return my stolen goods to hide my tracks and when I heard the upset commotion over the possibility of the missing clothes, I took the quickest opportunity to rid myself of incriminating evidence. How was I supposed to know she had suffered even worse abuse than I, totally didn’t have any effect on memory right? I gained enough confidence from that success to jack a slip from my mother before I called it quits until I could purchase my own little collectibles. All of my deeds performed before the age of eighteen were done under almost complete sobriety, so I was still getting horrific nightmares and not all focused on a catastrophe or gore or degeneracy. I guess depends on your definition for that last one, some of the most vivid and… thought provoking dreams revolved around myself as a woman. Sometimes I would be changed by some undefined means or just that’s how it had always been. Some were sexual while others were no different than the norm just a different sex.

            It never helped that I was “effeminate” in a variety of ways, a constant point of contention being the length of my hair. I was smart enough to have my excuses, the rebuttals to asswipes pretending my long hair made me “girly” somehow, as if it mattered, shouldn’t have even bothered wasting mental capacity. Renowned warriors across nations and eras wore their hair as such let alone everybody’s (around me) favorite Mary Sue. I still have the random moments of crushing doubt, but I’ve never liked having a question unanswered. Leaving my parent’s house gave me the freedom I needed, and I stopped questioning my gender when I stopped questioning my sexuality. For a short while, I labeled myself bisexual even though I didn’t really have any knowledge to say such. If I was a bit more tapped into the lingo, bicurious would’ve been more appropriate. Super big surprise here, I was fascinated with Greek history which initially had me spouting thoughts about recognizing aesthetic beauty in any form was the opposite of unmanly. Praising strength, efficiency, critical thinking, health and fitness were essential to building strong bonds, I wasn’t ashamed to state the physical attractiveness of other dudes. Next step was to make an honest fella out myself when I say “can’t knock it till you try it”.

            Eschtaros was more than willing to help me answer those questions. I feel bad for how the rejection went down but I hate playing games. He was quite handsome, had an SLC Punk vibe that Y’alohila, Tala’hirr, and I thought super hot, but I knew the first time we made-out that this probably wasn’t for me. I told myself, like with so many drugs, that dipping my pinky in the pool was not testing the water. I’m not advocating for channeling your inner lemming but I gave it a real attempt one night and after further foreplay I had to stop it. It wasn’t stimulating, no matter how exciting, and I ultimately blame my distaste for anal over it. I know, I’m a fucking alien, I hate cheese and anal. Not like I won’t compromise; I mean, I’m the guy with a bunch of fetishes, I can handle giving my significant other something they want. Though, I will advise self-experience before giving your girl the ultimatum that you’ll only sodomize her if she returns the favor. Practice time is over when that strap sinches. Heh, I mean I did ask for it, guess, careful what you wish for (future edit: sounds way worse than it actually was I’m just a wussy). Getting back to the point, Eschtaros took my callousness well, at least to my face, and we just went back to being friends. I was excellent at remaining friends with former romances which I thank my socio/psychopathic, mind-numbing obliviousness for aiding me in having no cares about other’s feelings or opinions or machinations involving me.

Maybe I just never shook off the shock of meeting a sexually active bisexual thirteen-year-old while my-fifteen-year-old-self attempted to edge lord away from the family at a water park. Whatever she thought she saw in me wore off fast when she realized I am tad prudish in public (subjective). It was a good learning experience for the next tween that tried to strut her stuff a year or so later while I was dating Elarraine. It’s not cheating if it’s different zip codes, yeah that was part of our last conversation. Look, I wish people peace, tranquility, joy with the tribulations foisted on them out of their control; do I wish people would refrain from mutilation for the sake of vanity (or any other emotion), yes but that is a decision I get to make for myself and not any other living thing besides me. I also recognize the gray areas – where do we draw the line of mutilation? Do we allow seriously injured flesh to rot/“heal”. Perhaps debilitating genetic/natal defects must be left to fester… destroy. “Leviticus 19:27 … Ye shall not round the corners of your heads; neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. 28 Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor paint any marks upon you…. 21:17 Speak unto Aaron, saying, Whosever he be of thy seed in their generations that hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God. 18 For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach – a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or anything superfluous, 19 Or a man that is broken-footed, or broken-handed, 20 or crook-backed, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken…. 23 Only he shall not go in unto the veil nor come nigh unto the altar because he hath a blemish, that he profane not my sanctuaries; for I, the Lord, do sanctify them…. Mark 9:40 Therefore, if thine hand offend thee, cut it off; or if thine brother offend thee, and confess not, and forsake not, he shall be cut off. It is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than, having two hands, to go into hell…. 42 And again if thy foot offend thee, cut it off; for he that is thy standard, by whom thou walkest, if he become a transgressor, he shall be cut off…. 44 Therefore, let every man stand or fall by himself and not for another, or not trusting another… 46 And if thine eye which seeth for thee, him that is appointed to watch over thee to show thee light, become a transgressor and offend thee, pluck him out…. 49 For everyone shall be salted with fire; and every sacrifice shall be salted with salt; but the salt must be good…. 10:16 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? None is good but one; that is God…. 14:19 The Son of Man indeed goeth as it is written of him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! Good were it for that man if he had never been born….  1 Corinthians 6:9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, 10 Nor thieves, nor covetous (envious… kinda), nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God…. 13 Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats; but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body…. 15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a harlot? God forbid…. 19 What! Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?”  Language is fucking lies. I’m sick of hearing about innocents, there are none. If you speak you lie, hell even if you’re mute, you’re no exception.

            Fucking tell me again how you don’t like lying. What the fucking hell is all that grandstanding you fucking play on your sleep schedule, why you fucking don’t wanna deal with bad attitudes, procrastination, and poor memory/attendance, how fucking hard you bust ass? When do those you trash fucking earn the encouragement to stay strong, or the calm, cohesive instruction patiently spaced based on the trainee’s retention (), or even your goddam outside voice without it being filled with enough vitriol () to be misinterpreted? Where’s my god damn rope cleared, fucking gear set out and I mean the whole fucking nine yards. The fuck be my properly stacked fucking brush for the fucking sake of all that’s fucking terrestrial?! Fucking christ, how many more groundworkers will I have to watch you shit on, even when minute progress is presented. Supposedly don’t give a fuck about micromanaging but your commands… advice changes with no explanation and/or any obvious alterations in surroundings. This way, no, that way, just figure it out than ten minutes later why don’t you just do this. You imagine you compound the problem by remaining an arse, or is it all their fault; you know, “not their dad. They’re adults.” Fucking literally, in every possible interpretation, you are no better than “lazy, racist, drunkard, womanizer” Jarrallelleph and he was almost ten years your senior when I was his groundman. Go ahead and keep lying to yourself about the sycamore though, not like I’ve played groundman for all y’all. Yeah, I’m speaking directly to your ass now so “you don’t read my fucking mind” (as if I fucking could, you can’t even speak your fucking mind), you fucking get why it’s taken so fucking ass long to finish this heaping hill of refuse yet? Fucking bring all your model shit in to try and accomplish something within our thirty minute lunch break and see how pleasant and fulfilled it fucking leaves you. “I’ll just shut the fuck up now.” Please fucking do, shut the FUCK up for all goddamn eternity and maybe some shit could fucking move forward… Chris. FUCKING SHIT COCK!

            Fucking shitting all over easily the hardest fucking worker in the fucking lot when the problem is every fucking one of you. Mother fucker doesn’t deserve half the dirt I threw there… that doesn’t make any of it less true; in other words, for everything I may have said at him and more applies to all the rest of you tenfold. Worthless as groundworkers and you pass that paltry effort to the next round of newbies. I have yet to see real motivation, regardless of age, for actual caring, “for taking pride in the work you perform.” Not a one, day in, day out, when present: attempts to keep a clean work area, insures they stack every pile of limbs with feeding it through the chipper in mind, always leaving a walk path, attentiveness during the moments of peace/calm, recognizing that there is always work to be done, hell, shit, even as simple as being out the god damn truck when it stops in full “uniform”. For real, absolutely pathetic how useless some of you be. How fucking hard is chalks, cones, signs – this temporary traffic control is communication for the ignoramuses like yourselves behind screaming metal death machines. Equipment properly greased, cleaned, maintained, and safely stored; brush retrieval for the trimmers nonchalantly leaving fucking chaos in their wake (cause you know, “good enough for my grandpappy”); inventory management for the old heads’ caring so much about “organization/tool placement/proper electrical insulation” leaving their shit strewn EVERYWHERE. We’ll top it off with a five hundred plus page novel you are solely responsible for memorizing. You know the one all you graduated from by demonstrating your encompassing knowledge on the information by reading it your fucking selves. Fuck outta here, jumping that groundman’s ass “you’re responsible for reading your Line Clearance Qualification Standard (LCQS)”, coopting my accomplishments like they’re your own. Keep my fucking name out your mouth and eat this dick, fuckers; you forget I watched “the old school die off”? You jackwagons finally having moved passed the basic employment level have no interest in being legit on the ground because it would only prove you just as wrong as all the “innovators”, “managers/owners”, previous generations whimpering about meritocracy. The increase in pay per step of job title is an acknowledgement of increased performance load, i.e. you are not just a fucking trimmer or foreperson but a groundman too. The disparity of income between the titles shouldn’t be as large as you all love to squawk, if there was any honesty about the tasks of the ground, it would be recognized as the most difficult, strenuous, taxing. I am flabbergasted as to how admitting this somehow detracts from the larger picture of being owed our freedom. As if somehow accepting that the most physical tasks performed (even if capable of reaching a mindless/repetitive state) by the real pace setter makes the other duties less demanding. I need to wrap this up, I’m tired of punching sideways. It’s fucking depressing.

            Only so much to go around – can’t give everybody one, might be none left or lower it’s value… utility? Supply and demand, inflation, and what about those who work harder than others and on and on and on. Keh winners and losers… you ain’t lost till you’re dead. Though, if you’re Christian, then you should agree with my unwanted belief that it’s actually the ultimate win for self. You know, dying with knowledge that your faith was strong and your works matched it so you’ll be rewarded by god at judgement day cause his son, a.k.a. god made flesh, conquered death. Swear I’m not laughing. God’s chosen people. You ever think that might play a little bit into the antagonism you “suffer”, Israel, or maybe felt your ears burning at any other sections that don’t bring you up directly? So many times, throughout your own records (the bible [from a protestant {apologies again, mother} American education that always gets it right]), your prophets railed against your “sins”, promised your destruction, the loss of your “inheritance”. I’m not interested in a (pointless) debate over who wrote what and historicity of transcription, translation, but (repetition time) I take issue with interpretation. I don’t believe the silliness I was raised on of Moses being the author of the first five books of the old testament but no matter which book of the bible I read, I hear the core of those ten commandments. The ones that boil down to don’t be an asshole… life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness… freedom for all. You’ve consistently proved you’re the same as all humanity; can’t be satisfied with such simplicity, we gotta play lawyer, doctor, scientist, economist desperate to carve exemptions, invent loopholes. Heh, like an all powerful being is gonna just be like “oh, you got me, hadn’t ever thought of that scenario before”.

            Just that quick, I’m back to being a dumb ass. Whatever, keep pretending like your shit don’t stink and watch Hamas – Ishmael burn your nation to the ground and scatter your populace in yet another tragic historical moment for all humanity, fulfilling the precious patriarchal prophecy the fucking evangelicals who installed you pathetically predict persistently. You’ve fed the rise of your own haters, same as the Third Reich, you harp incessantly on your affliction, crying for ostracization on those engaged in the slightest discussion not screaming for the blood of the offending humans. Everything is nazi, Hitler, antisemitism as though it's the only instance of affliction in your history or even the worst, how do you not see your own outrage fueling the disenfranchised, the ones shown kindness by your “enemies,” to take up these mantras? Why am I even bothering with original gangsters of white nationalism (I guess technically you gotta fight the Hindus for that one), my beef lies with the ones I mentioned earlier, the real guilty party. Us – my own nation, my people. The United States of the Americas.

            I don’t know where the line of blame is drawn between a nation’s leaders and its people. I consistently remind myself that the actions of one are theirs alone because the “reactors” bear the burden of theirs, don’t get to slough it onto another as their fault for your behavior. If an elected or an appointee of the elected gropes somebody, I don’t think we all now need to be randomly handled inappropriately… heh. I will continue blaming every soul living in this country for every death brought by our obliterating economic assimilation, no matter what soil the atrocities occur on. I will curse every individual inhabiting status presuming authority of others that leads, regardless of intent, into ignorance, conformity, obedience… just sum it as slavery. Blech, I’m just bitching over another piece of the democratic problem, popularity. Wielding such as a banner… it sucks I used you, Marshal, but you’ve got an avid enough fan base proving every last thing wrong with humanity on a scale comparable to mainstream (because never enough)… though, that’s how you attracted them to begin with, right? You’re just low hanging fruit because of name recognition; it sucks because it almost feels undeserved, but I’ve caught enough glimpses that it doesn’t matter the hate or love placed on your name. I know you’re just another human, not special, riding out your time to benefit from the fucked status quo that enables your hype – only unique cause nobody else is you. Maybe you’ll get some peace now the blacks got their colored rap savior now, I mean the whities all bowed the knee and gave him one of their awards (ah, just racism as a white writer). Shit… mother fucker, you best quit that crown portrait you keep painting. You ain’t even close to the standard to dignify adopting such symbology, too fragile to understand even a fraction of humility. Control. Keep it up, though, all the marshall maniac reactors be eating your shit right up, swooning over every fucking syllable the same as their idol. Of course, god forbid we apply the same diligence and grace when breaking down other music, we’ll just let even the most obvious doubles fly on by without batting an eye. Fuck! I can’t stop being an ass. It was not my right way for J. Cole to handle himself how he did, but it was a right way, hopefully his.

            I hate my shit all through this because this shouldn’t be imitated, it teaches nothing. I mean I threw those quotes on stan the one time (I think) I used it, in an obvious display of distaste for the term. I could sing some nonsense about how terms for this already existed like fanatic or zealot amongst others. Maybe tinge it with some distaste for ignorance or laced with superiority expounding on etymology () bs, but I almost think this is why the term exists so why do I care. I mean fan (fanatic) gets thrown around so casually had to have a word with more meaning, impact. The fact that its contentious only aids its virality, right? However, soon we’re saying everyone’s hysterical and it’s lost the outrage, so than we gotta take it back, remind… wait, huh? Cracker, Kike, Chink, Kraut, Beaner, Gook, Nip, Redneck, Raghead, Lobsterback, Injun, Cossack, Mick, Flease, Wop, Hillbilly, insults, words with no real power but that which we give them by allowing the word to be defined by the acts justified alongside its utterance. Sure, get pissed with people spouting nigger this and coon that or any of the ridiculous amount of slurs for Americans we’ve crafted, shout about insinuations as if it applies to you or the motherfuckers looking like you. Any of you religions believing in the Tower of Babel story ever ponder if there was a more obvious answer? Like someone capable of creating all the insanity on this planet, in this universe, might have just been warning about humanity’s proclivity to douchebaggery and reactive secretiveness, perhaps even changing the way we vibrate the air in our throats for whatever emotional reasons, maybe a call to those o.g. commands that (obviously to me) should have never needed to be on a tablet to help not be an ass and refrain from fucking one another? Occam’s razor? Again why do I care, I can barely comprehend mathematics due to my inability to see it as any more than invented, imaginary human bullshit; its daddy, language, is no different, hence, lies.

            So dumb, not just me but anything capable of speech using it for the praise of a chromosome, specifically, men, the one with the Y. Fucking pathetic, I’ll tell the reason for no “real men” left, cause they dead, Darwinned themselves. From what I can read, that’s what being a real one boils down to; stoicism in the face of crisis, calm when surrounded with emotion, resolve for standing firm when outspoken/outnumbered/outmatched, strength to take a hit, courage when staring down “evil” (this mockery causes pain, take note all humanity). Those actions get you killed, or at the very least incentivizes silence among those traits. I don’t wanna hear from anyone alive now, anyway, you fucks can’t even handle toilet seats, go take your lies elsewhere. I meant that statement in every way from “putting things back the way you found it”, cleaning up after yourselves (liquid falling a distance creates splash zone regardless of your “perfect” aim, CLEAN YOUR FUCKING PISS), and just what form is acceptable to use the fucking pointless invention. Barf, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” (John F. Kennedy, Address before the Canadian Parliament, May 17, 1961. Not Edmund Burke. Doubtful Kennedy was the first but it certainly wasn’t Burke.) Lunacy, the most basic thing “evil” needs is human beings acting instinctually, off their “gut”, with the presumption of “goodness”, however that’s interpreted and I’m being extremely conservative. The “men” lauded about so vigorously don’t exist, if they ever even did outside of words, just go read that speech I quoted (or go back to some other examples, might find some women matching a few of the traits). I’ll reiterate, the answer to me isn’t anarchy. Throwing out all the rules and letting nature take the reins. No, we don’t all need to be locked up or reparations because inhumane immigration, war crimes, genocide, “thugs in the inner city running organized crime rings” or inappropriate political posturing simply exists. Nor am I advocating for a French Revolution, already had one of those and look where we all are now. My wrath with you rich fucks is that none of your shit will affect you. You’re playing us, intentionally or not, since your status, wealth… sum it as power… will keep you from the very laws you espouse. I’m not impressed with the push to join the rat race either.

            I’m shit with hearing, even if spoken at with sufficient volume and annunciation, my brain is slow to process and then form a response. I always had to hide a laugh when people would make the complaint of hip hop or rap being incoherent. I consistently messed up the lyrics of all songs, I had to look them up if I wanted to know what was being said (be my vacant love… like really?). Well, still gotta do that; prefer my versions so why bother. Heh, like having it in writing makes a difference. I was drawn to Nietzsche from that silly “God is dead” misquote (confirmed, I am a basic bitch). “…and we have killed him.” The bastion of free knowledge wasn’t as readily available when I first pronounced my atheism. Once I got to college, I was able to get the context and I was instantly hooked right up till I figured out dude was a fucking theist. Totally believed in god yet your gonna lie your ass off trying to frame the man’s admonishment to organized religions twisting gospel as “atheism”. There is choice everywhere. Some of us find it easier to perform outstanding acts or expound on civil acuity, perhaps spin normality on a grand stage, and who are we to deny the fruits of their labor while benefiting in some capacity? The smart ones dress it up nicer, was that how they got you YouTube?

            I remember when the platform first took form and all my one-day hipster/gamer school yard friends of the time were all about it. No more did we have to pose as twelve-year-old girls on public chats for entertainment. Now we had weird ass clips, music videos, and bootleg episodes/movies. It took a few more years for the platform to grow on me, (I was a reader, so tv was all that was wrong with world, no matter the form) only to see it snatched away with the advent of commercials and paid YouTubers. Where’s the meme of that moment, captioned with the picture of Padme saying “so this is how liberty dies… with thunderous applause.”? Ahh, stop being a fuckwad, Chris, it probably exists anyway. I just find it difficult to see you pose as something you are not, you already sold any claim to that when you decided this was beyond art and/or knowledge, it was economy. Everything is so political now days except it always has been. Every single time, humanity just can’t seem to stop itself from categorizing, co-opting even the smallest accomplishments for personal enrichment, and if it closes the door on the rest of us… the price of business I guess? That is, till of course, the next new fad closes the door on you, then rally the troops… fans… fellow disenfranchised supporters? I love your music Hopsin and I really wanted to throw your name in previously but… my love of ancient history told me from a young age that the people who invented college did go to college. A specified location for the pursuit and respect of knowledge – the idealogue of a communal place for intellect to be garnered and shared equally. A reality for those willing to jump through the hoops.

            Politics – “1 A treatise on political science, spec. the one written by Aristotle. LME 2 The art or science of government, dealing with the form, organization, and administration of a State or part of a State, and with the regulation of its relations with other States. E16 ‣B Public life and affairs involving the authority and government of a State or part of a State. L17 (Dictionary-Ibid. pg. 32). We must, as in every human, find some way to separate emotion from the discussions of how our lives are carried out day to day at any scale, which is how I define politics. If we can’t stare into the abyss, then there will never be any understanding of overcoming it. There were many years between the time I misinterpreted that quote and realizing I had coopted the point as my own. From the get-go, I felt the quote’s intention was to caution being consumed by the acknowledgement of pain/suffering/evil, but to refuse attempting, regardless of scope, for fear of failure was not how I saw an Übermensch. Failure was just another abyss. Blah, I’m wandering off topic. The manner in which we conduct speech with one another has to change (and/or how we listen); all the parables, metaphors, labels, statistics, they’re not helping. They can be twisted, undermining any potential for progress they could hold because the focus becomes verbiage not the act. Unfortunately, I don’t see calm and logical responses…. I mean what is logic, what are facts. Ah there’s the humor. Bout murdered that confused little “Aryan” (according to him, he was as much emerald isle blooded as I am) shit that night. Couldn’t have cared less about his ridiculous ancient aliens, government cabal conspiracies right till he pulled that phrase in response to my calm and slow dismantling of his very scattered beliefs. Thank god for Y’alohila and Eschtaros.

            It’s sad I almost agree with him now days. Obviously, I don’t have any fucking answers. I can’t even claim all the words in here as my own as you can find every single letter, phrase, run-on sentence I’ve written, in better form, wherever you wanna look. I was so desperate in the beginning to give this novel at least some purpose, even if it was a philosophical one in infancy. Now, I can’t see why I cared, it doesn’t matter to me D or R, capitalism, socialism, taxes, free markets, dress your shit up with whatever words you like. I don’t need to be convinced anymore of the utility of science, of recognizing actions for what they are not what we presume. Wisdom doesn’t guarantee agreement, and it shouldn’t need to as that word should be actions on the value of cooperation… compromise and when failure occurs, no fear to change course. The other imaginary word, power. I get it, at the “exhaustion of all other options” how can you ensure peace. So many of the arguments of the day feel stupid as fuck. Just pick an economic structure, mother fuckers, they will all function just fucking fine so long as a government holds the freedom of its citizens, all of them, at the highest priority. I have no fancy string board or thousands of pages of research; two hundred thousand dollars a year on a 3 day work week is the price of basic freedom in this country (for the moment [that’s right, dad, you’ve aided in making your six-figure income, so desperately sought after, worthless, still below the threshold of the going rate on liberty]) and, not only do I think I’m understating that figure, I think if you find that amount shocking, you need to restart the book.

            Grrr… I’ve been on one again… the monetary evaluation thrown in should have nothing to do with the “American Dream”. Freedom needs to be defined by what can be touched, tasted… felt and not the emotional one. The freedom to travel, the freedom to innovate, to study, to provide, to heal, to rest… the freedom to create, artistry, etc. & etc. All of it falls prey to worth, nothing survives our desires for comfort, impatient to assign a value to quantify, subjectify. Everything is sold for a copyright, regardless of if the buyer be institutional, commercial, or just regional, and if you don’t hop on the wagon, you’re, at best, a future road bump. If you’re in, then your skin is on the line, or perhaps the skin of your kids and only then are you allowed to ponder and wax philosophically. None of this is fucking original, its why assholes like unto Elon Musk, Curtis Jackson, Taylor Swift, Anonymous, Christopher Hitchens, Andrew Tate, Oprah Winfrey, James Donaldson, Steven Bonnell, Pope John Paul II, Logan or Jake Paul, any of the Kardashians including Caitlyn Jenner didn’t make any appearances. Carbon copies of dickwads that came before paving the way for this cyclical madness, and your such unimaginatively shit versions of previous mentions that I feel the need to apologize to carbon paper. Good thing we “progressed” beyond giving everyone of note the same name else it might have been more difficult to navigate through the last hundred years than that ancient roman bull shit I quoted (and if you’re “fame” causes butt hurt about not being mentioned, insert yourself wherever you please, you qualify anywhere I assure you). That’s why I can’t stand the compliments, why I refute every comment on intelligence or skill directed at me because I fucking know for a fact how god fucking damned difficult it was for me to force my mind to accept whatever asinine task I set it. I don’t know why it seems I’m the only one who gets how having one’s focus ripped in a multitude of directions can lead to complete breakdown. Those incessant birds blasting away at the brain are just the topics necessary for fucking survival in our “modern” age let alone if you want some bastion of escapism that makes living slightly bearable. Meh, you would almost think I’m trying to tie physical and mental health together. All I know is mother fuckers I’ve worked around never seemed to associate my original good attendance and constant cheerful demeanor with the eventual missing presence as I figured out who the hell they were. Yeah, I’m blaming fucking others for me “choosing” to be absent cause I didn’t think I could handle socializing that day. That doesn’t make my call-in a lie; it causes me physical pain and sickness to force kindness and courtesy while resisting murdering you shits!

I am shit and know nothing but the same; keep trying to tell myself that I’d caused myself some kind of Munchausen disease, fighting anxiety over the plethora of “ailments” I’ve been accumulating across my lifetime. I gander the feelings were sowed young when I ran my first mile with the rest of the class. Never been the smallest but always been very thin and light. Didn’t help a lick while I took almost thirty minutes to finish the “race”. Even the majority of “heavier” kids were done and waiting on me – the only one other than the slightly overweight booger eater to take so much time, the only person I finished before and I was still winded as if I had tried sprinting the whole damn thing. “Maybe asthma, it’ll pass over time”, heh, from there heart murmur, frequent loss of vision, constant yet sporadic uncontrollable shaking/twitching/itching, gut pain, slow blood flow (cold all the fucking time… what), some weird ass spot on the left testicle… for fuck sake I still have to shake the overwhelming panic that I’m suffering a heart attack or that I’ve got something living in my ear canal. That last one was going on before I found out it’s actually possible, not a good thing for supporting logic saying you are just being insane again. Least the weed helps, haven’t had headaches in over a decade, and I will swear on my death bed it assisted in conquering pneumonia for my last severe case. What a laugh, coming from the moron that still is not completely convinced psychic abilities are fiction for us, guess blame the lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD [acid]). Heh, “faith of a mustard seed” …. You wanna “win the war on drugs”, begin with your area of expert fuckery. Shit, fuck living’s encouragement of recognition, ranking, reliance. You motherfuckers want people to buy your shit, contribute to society instead of wasting away, fucked up – start fixing the problems you fucking create when you realize that competing with the big earners means eliminating the dependance on the commoners’ pittance. Maybe after figuring that out the rest of us might be less open to sparing a parasite from the hell on earth we’ve created… oh wait I was talking about drugs… fuckers. Every time I rear my head from the music (and this piece of shit), I’m bombarded with hot takes and headlines calling for focus at another subject where nothing can be done but apply pressure to those with the responsibility for fixing the problem. Action must be taken and those who oppose are ignorant at best. What happens when the action happens and the ignorant become the opposition? What happens when the ignorant appeal to intelligence over the environment foisted on their shoulders? Why does everyone keep cheering on the cacophony of noise justifying the loss of any “progress” humanity might have had to this point? Why am I fucking hellbent on not making any fucking sense at all?

Everybody loves a good underdog story. Its why Trump’s victory in 2016 was totally unsurprising but maybe living in Missouri skews my perspective. Fuck the electoral college, so long I’ve appreciated it for my own interpretation of it, a stupid half measure of the founders to avoid the very thing they themselves sought. I know this, for here we are calling for more dissent and more control by a figurehead that was supposed to be just that, a glorified manager for our affairs. “Slow, inefficient, incompetent” congress is our voice, the only “ultimate” authority that possibly should exist with only power over those serving us and solely in their work of such because every one of them is us. All the critiques I hear become white noise as it devolves from any source of empathy and principle. No, I never expected Progressives to have any real impact but it was disheartening to see how fast the knee was bent; same as I never believed Bernie Sanders would (or should) be able to “revolutionize” the whole system. Sorry Y’alohila and Eschtaros, the earth ain’t fucked yet nor the answer in outer space. Just like our “Hoarders” style apartments in years past, the outlook feels hopeless. That feeling is only real in the mind, instead as we focused on section after small section, we finally found ourselves in a clean(ish) room. Yeah, blahdy blah, boot straps and just takes one individual; the problem stems from it taking every one individual in some capacity. That’s where it all goes wrong eh Sanders. Absolutely gold to watch you be praised for focusing on the policies not the parties only to have it one eighty on you in 2020. It’s all grand and momentous while everyone’s cheering your words till they realize that’s the actions, not just you take, but you call on them to take. Then some poorly thought/worded comments get pulled into your comrade’s context and pride has you backpedaling. Now you want to repeat the call but you’re a liar, and frustration sets in as the pressure mounts and the call grows louder. Bah, you choose the side you wanted, vote blue no matter who. You weren’t the first abandoned when the following realized no ultimate reckoning or mystical miracles were gonna deem them automatic victors, and its “leader” refused to alter their definition of peace.

I really had your side for most of my life, Judeah; fuck, I was raised for the purpose of seeing you as the pinnacle of oppressed peoples. Sadly, I still believe myself an ally, though my advice as to the actions you as a nation should promote would have (at the very least) those on the actual land convinced otherwise. I framed it in a past sense because it’s not just about you; my advice wouldn’t really change no matter who it was directed at. Alas, there is no grand enlightenment contained within these pages. Heh, talking all that shit on politics and I’m fairly certain I already mentioned I don’t even vote. Fuck politicians, I ain’t ever voting either… nope, fuck me, refusing to participate is more useless than just voting for whatever. Right there, though, could I even vote for the random homeless human I gave my change, and even if it’s not illegal does it even count and I do not only speak of that 4-year nationwide vote for an office that shouldn’t even exist in its current form. Yeah, I need to exercise my rights but there’ll never be a vote for the ones paid for attention, not while this all remains a form of tribalism. Not while we remain inundated with power, yet abstaining from the only principle I can conceive as good for managing scaled populations isn’t the example I wish to present. We can play the game “by the rules” while still not caving to instinct/demand. Just… I always found it too easy to be alone, abandon “loved ones”… choose nihilism/apathy. So many friends I cherished I left to their own devices, maybe to never hear from me again, and it hurts but family and friends are their own human beings and everything is lies. I still haven’t found a response to confrontation I find acceptable, and there’s only so many times I can get fucked before I decide it's far better to just walk away than react.

This is the wrong answer, could you imagine if we all hadn’t rallied together to shame the autocratic plagiarist villain, iilluminaughtii? I’m laughing my ass off right now, could you imagine judges, lawyers, cops all receiving death or at least incarceration as punishment for false incrimination; doctors and their corporate “sponsors” being pumped full of the version of opium they hocked on plebeians; farmers, ranchers, and their political lapdogs injected with the poison they saturate our sustenance, now I’m rolling. We have only to look in a mirror as to why this shit’s all fucked; what options do we leave each other when we’re constantly trying to play a system to shutdown looters, racists, fascists, communists (or just hoping to get a break). I try to tell myself differently, but fuck Martin Luther King Jr. Always thought el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz had a better grasp of how real change – real freedom was achieved, strength of arms. I see it as Malcom couldn’t stomach seeing the scenes of hell that would be endured down that route, hence why he changed his toon to Junior’s song of hypocrisy. Where the fuck is your rage, your fucking hate LGBTs, any fucking race other than Caucasian, especially Blacks… Ladies? God damnit, rip and tear these motherfuckers spouting off about their guns, whether literally, metaphorically, or implicitly; you fucksticks leak same as all life and I’ll paint this town with you across every corner as a memorandum of fate for espousing actions that work against all, and you can meet me at 1818 North River Boulevard, Independence, Missouri 64050 if you think you wanna hash that out. I walk my dog there every night after nine o’clock post meridiem Central Standard Time (21:00 UTC [Coordinated Universal Time] – 6). No worries on the dog either, nothing gets to fight for/with me… long as I have a say in it.

Rrrrr… old habits are difficult to destroy. The reality is, you’d have to be trying hard as hell to get a fight from me, no different than you’d probably never hear me speak in the manner I’ve written here. I’m mild mannered, soft spoken, always carrying my nigh toothless smile regardless of environment, emotions. Hence why this audio sounds like I had a robot read it while it’s written with an abundance of passion (to be generous). Half this shit I don’t even mean the way it’s jotted down, and the other half I gave half the attention it deserved (and will continue on in this manner), I guess ignore the quotations or not at your discretion (maybe insert a few too). A master of nothing, certainly not a jack of all trades. Common sense never died, asswipes, it never existed. If anything “common” existed than died by our hand, it was courtesy. The only natural knowledge guaranteed at birth is instinct, you know, killing, raping, stealing, lying, control. All of life shares it, the only thing that could separate us is the ability to stop and think, reject that gut feeling. Doesn’t matter how many times you got lucky and called it right, it only takes once which will happen when comprehensive skills on par with any other organism is good enough for you. That’s the confusion of animals exhibiting humanlike behavior; we’re recognizing characteristics of all life. Yes, I also infer that there’s no difference in them. They’re unique, every individual case just as us. This is why you kick one dog and it may obey, another will turn on you, and an even different one will turn on others, just the way you taught it – whether they were all the same breed or even of the same litter… shit, could be the same fucking dog. I’m using a traditional domesticated animal for an example but I don’t exclude wild ones, plants or even single celled organisms. This is where I truly feel insane, believing all this nonsense and still knowing, beyond any evidence, humanity can still redeem itself… the only thing that’s possible for the race. The example just needs to be enough for the world to follow and embrace the knowledge wrought from failure.

I’ll repeat myself, again. I get it, count me a belieber as I understand the purpose of all the myriad of laws and rules and fancy fucking mathematical/philosophical lingo. Though I obviously fail to grasp the nuances and details while making shit summaries doesn’t mean I am precluded from reason, nothing is. Please trust when I say I don’t want us to just wait, servile, for those engaged in wickedness to find the light and give their victims justice, or for those profiting off the suffering of others to realize they have taken their enterprises too far and assist in their demise to ensure none hold the desire to imitate them. However, all this shit ain’t fucking working, the numerous logics crafting encompassing society dissecting all of life is being used in all the wrong manners. I keep fighting the desire to see all who place themselves in high places be brought low; the trial of all the judges, artists, lawyers, doctors, celebrities, scientists, presidents, organizers, militias, leaders, officers, managers, despots would bring no peace. What I do know is your fucking nonsense leaves me defending the worst of us. Yeah, I fucking empathize immensely with all the mass murders, pedophiles, domestic abusers, serial criminals, the perturbed pariahs… heh, the “good for nothing”.  Fucking dicks, my empathy isn’t mercy, I’m not your victims. My sense of freedom desiring to keep you chomos and familial assaulters from rotting in cells or killed is the product of wanting you to choose to have some motherfucker of proportional size roll you as many times as you did it. To have every word, every act, performed by any and all of you, done back on you, lest the ones you walked all over choose mercy – this should still be self-recognized for the hell you performed… no different to those who may have placed such anguish on you… and back further and further. Fuck you assholes, making it impossible to defend you in any capacity. Every time I attempt to relax from this buffoonery, I’m bombarded with stories of you fucking doubling down taking out the fucking desperation you’ve been dealt in the laziest ways possible, ensuring those of us with any similarities attempting to keep calm and carry on get further depths of shit to deal with. Please, though, continue to prove all the fucking douchebags right about systemic racism, traditional family values, patriarchal power structures, and secret societies. Oh, look, I did it again, big surprise. We were talking about children losing their fucking minds on their peers, right…. Fear of repetition/romanticization does not guarantee avoidance as neither knowledge, no future is set for every scenario is unique.

All the shit I’ve thrown trying to claim everything is the same, if only I had the courage to end myself at times. It’s certainly what I wish those without the strength to stay their hand would do to themselves when the suffering convinces us to act in a manner we wish not on ourselves. Better that than feeding these fools the validation they desire. Gehah, I’m the fucking fool, let me prove it again. Never hated the idea of protesting, just the manner in which it was carried out. Watching people chaotically mill down streets screaming chants, disjointedly waving signs till cops give us the 6:00 highlight fills me with disgust. This distaste stems from everything I’ve mentioned till now, not the oversimplified, gramaphoned slogans I agree could alleviate some of the oppression to those in the lowest places. Somehow, I developed a fixation with the idea of all groups taking to the streets in solidarity… silence, defiant silence. No uniforms, goosestepping, or collective symbol nonsense that you should know by now I hate, but an example of individualism unified, unbroken, unwavering, immovable as a whole with quiet solitude, staring, patiently waiting – the larger the variety on display the better. Who the fuck am I kidding, wouldn’t fix shit, ax the plethora of speeches, populists, movements, demonstrations coopted by the very “principalities and powers” they rallied against… compromise. I’d like to blame a story of Christ for the obsession of such a method, but, more than likely, it’s how unnerved most get when I stay emotionless and silent (especially if they were trying to get a reaction) feeling far more gratifying than losing my shit.

Yuppers, everybody bottle up till you can’t contain it any longer then kill only yourself. October 7th was soo awful; heh, big, strong, righteous ‘merica can’t take a bloody nose? How many 9/11’s should we forgive? Seven times seventy motherfuckers, but you aren’t any better, Hezbollah. You could embrace your faith, recognize and revert the plight you assist in propagating on all including yourselves, Iran. At any moment, all in the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea could shed emotions of fear and hate regardless of legitimacy, refuse the pretense of superiority inciting distrust, feeding on control. Can you imagine Russia, having all the leaders of opposition parties that have fallen prove inconsequential for it matters not the individual martyrs (respected and remembered as should be) as all remain steadfast in not carrying out the destruction of others solely at the request of a single human. In such a case even if Putin directly went to carry out his vengeance personally, he would not succeed, as those agreeing with whatever policies or positions would stand against such displays of power. I came to these conclusions without needing the substantiation rediscovered about one of our assets getting all butt hurt and hypocritical he wasn’t getting daddy’s money anymore to fuck his own people. Did any of you actually even read bin Laden’s letter, for fucking real. In the meantime, everyone losing their mind’s over transpeople, shut the fuck up till you rectify: chopping little boys nuts off for their “angelic voices”, having them acting as females in your arts (the shit you love accusing Hollywood of, who you think taught ‘em?), telling little girls their greatest aspirations should be caretakers, breeding tubes ‘cause men got this – you’ve created whatever problems you think you see. Yes, yes, the idiot vehemently writing liberty or death is now telling everybody to shut their fucking mouths. Fuck me, using stupid details of history as a pretense for silence till past collective sins be admonished. Fuck you, especially if your Christian or think this nation was founded on Christianity’s moral principles (any “cultural christians” come get it to), you don’t believe in free speech either. “Matthew 5:37…. Again, it hath been written by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord all thine oaths. 38 But I say unto you, Swear not at all: neither by heaven, for it is God’s throne; nor by earth, for it is his footstool; neither by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King; neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black. 39 But let your communication be Yea, yea; Nay, nay; for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil. 40 Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. 41 But I say unto you that ye resist not (underscore, italicize, bold) evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also…. 1 Timothy 1:4 Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions rather than godly edifying which is in faith; so do. 5 Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned. 6 From which some, having swerved, have turned aside unto vain jangling. 7 Desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm…. 4:6 If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained. 7 But refuse profane and old wives’ fables and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. 8 For bodily exercise profiteth little; but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that is now and of that which is to come…. James 1:19 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; 20 For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God…. 2:19 Thou believest there is one God; thou doest well; the devils also believe and tremble; thou hast made thyself like unto them, not being justified…. 3:5 Even so, the tongue is a little member and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth! 6 And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity; so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell…. 8 But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. 9 Therewith bless we God, even the Father; and therewith curse we men, which are made after the similitude of God. 10 Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be…. 1 Peter 3:9 Not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but contrariwise blessing – knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit blessing. 10 For he that will love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil and his lips that they speak no guile… Matthew 13:29 And Jesus said, O ye generation of vipers! How can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh…. 32 For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned…. 19:13 Then were there brought unto him little children, that he should put his hands on them and pray. And the disciples rebuked them, saying, There is no need, for Jesus hath said, Such shall be saved. 14 But Jesus said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for such is the kingdom of heaven.” All the fucking children talk, the only difference is a damn biological process that occurs after some time that we arbitrarily measure. Their fucking humans, deserving respect, humility, knowledge – all of it. Sexual manipulation is disgusting regardless of caveats (). As I can comprehend it, only more so a “kid” because they haven’t been exposed to the knowledge necessary to recognize and make responsible decisions over their body (waiting for the biological processes to finish, recognizing that there is always a level of permanence to decisions), likely due to their innocence needing so much protection. Whatever… on top of that, we’re obsessed with so many aspects of youth (positive, neutral, negative), is it really shocking still? Acting as though we can’t conceive of such varying atrocities, how could we when the obsession is deny, hide, burn it to the ground. The public just can’t be trusted with certain ideologies, information, truth, right, Beau (of the Fifth Column)?

History doesn’t repeat, or “rhyme”. It has never changed because we’ve never changed, not in the meaningful way. I imagine it’s difficult to believe, from a third person perspective, but I am deeply remorseful… apologetic of my work. I wish I could’ve conceived and written in a useful, remunerative method. After scrapping the holier than thou/superior minded wording directed to an audience of theists and philosophers, I convinced myself the message needed to aim at my generation. My message should be hopeful, even if provocative (you know, gotta grab the attention without background gameplay graphics). There were problem points here and there, but it seemed we recognized and agreed the assholes before us had fucked everything up for us. That they had projected the “demons” that haunted them and their ancestors onto us while their preventative methods only resulted in spreading the conditions they say brings societal collapse (cause the ones not listening/obeying of course). We certainly fucked that one up, so much of the same, can’t even defend traditions’ principles of knowledge, patience, improvement by separating it from the blind faith interpretive practices muting critical thought. Apples don’t fall far from trees after all. Ha, then I thought I had to go to the next generation, get this out before the cycle dug its claws into another. Wild how trying to be the opposite ends up as repetition. I love social media, feeling my opinions die in real time is glorious. Go ahead keep laughing, I am, just still can’t help myself. No lie, I actually convinced myself that I was going to try and translate this in other languages. Always wanted to learn at least one, and instead I shoved in every conceivable Americanism, even the ones culturally appropriated. Made it damn near impossible.

Truth hurts… nah, truth just is. We’re the fuckers that hurt right down to the ways we try and frame truth. Reality brings its own suffering and hardships, of course, but those just are, as is the actions of emotion, haste, or ignorance. The best defense is a good offense, fuck that shit, the best, in all the ways that matter, offense is a perfect defense. The feelings are not the problem, I’ll reiterate, we can still think, emote while learning, listening, pursuing a method to overcome our tribulations. Even when the causes for anguish seem beyond control, our knowledge could prepare us to act in haste bringing relief before the imprint of hell overrides the mind’s perception of life. In a perfect world. I keep showing myself as a negative nancy, which I guess I am. I like to think this is what makes the joys, knowledge, wisdom I’ve found in various art/media and channels like FluffeeTalks, Stevie Knight, TopTenz/TodayIFoundOut, Breaking Points, Upper Echelon, Practical Engineering, LegalEagle, Mama Doctor Jones, Donut, ThisOldTony, MattsOffRoadRecovery, AlecSteele, JoergSprave, Shawn Woods, WhatCulture, LegacyKillaHD, Casually Comics, Superjombombo, Sifd, Estas Tonne, Hildegard von Blingin’, BlackySpeakz, so many more, even those mentioned before, a necessary component to keeping my naïve hope alive. Heh, do I qualify for terminally online yet? The goodness, the resources, the ingenuity – it all exists, always has and will, because its opposite is recorded time and again inherent in every one of us (der, hence all). There’s difficulty in the choice which we must recognize first before we can hope to understand those available so as to take the “better” one.

The civil wars, societal collapses, armageddons, extinction events, climate crises: there’s no prediction, just statistical probability on cause and effect. The whole point is to stop ourselves from bringing about our own destruction due to reaction. Yeah, that means all of us on the shit end of the stick have gotta suck it up, separate our hate for the cards seemingly cast and the work that ultimately serves us; we keep earnestly attempting our best even when it all becomes shit, suffocatingly dealt the oppression of doubt, ridicule, escalating standards regardless of self-felt improvement.  Avoid fixation, let the emotions feed focus on every aspect of each task our hands are put to but not wallow in the suppositions/invasive thoughts sure to spawn – allow the help which includes when dicks come running in to take up the labor you’ve already engaged in. You embody real humanism by moving to the next agenda they ignored. Respond to weakness, stubbornness, faux stupidity and all other forms of passive aggressive assholery with authentic calmness, graciousness, openness. Because these are part of “killing with kindness”, not the over sweet sarcasm/condescension that falls under the aforementioned dickishness; the whole point is to kill the bastardized behavior, not match it. We have to engage with one another to promote logic, peace, meaning, at times, yes, you’re the one that gets fucked – or at the very least own up to doing the fucking, be an “adult” and don’t put it on others to call out behavior you know is shitty having experienced it personally; when the rush dies and the necessity for quick obedient action is over, take the moment to explain, walkthrough the process of deciding on the plan. After achieving proficiency, don’t let the past untrain the aforementioned attributes; let a motherfucker learn/fail a few more times than once before you come running in to rip shit out their hands.  Break the cycle of our guardians/ancestors berating the next up, losing their fucking shit, even at the times the reaction was “justified”. Our minds and deeds need to teach freedom for all lives irrespective of circumstance; we accept when someone exerting power over themselves chooses a path we don’t understand. Instead of a reflection on them, see it for what it is. A reflection of those you agree/commune with… of self. All of it means resisting or at minimum rejecting our attempts to bring judgement which we know with the roles reversed would not provide counsel, enlightenment.

Pshh, no worries, I am well aware how absurd/corny/naive/cringe I’ve sounded throughout this ordeal. Mother fuckers, I ain’t getting older, only becoming more powerful. That is not a joke either. It is a fucking mantra because I crave death, but being its perpetrator means failure. So, continue to stop me from pushing, spout pseudo intellectual/spiritual ridicule as I supplement the lacking minerals and vitamins ripped from our diet, get pissy when I seek further levels of meticulousness, planning, choosing a pace for myself that everyone confuses as slander to their work ethic.  I’ll give the room to change or find another place to abuse my limits, of course I want help but not imitation/irritation/inhumanity. I’m happy as shit to torture myself to achieve all the silly little quotas constantly being invented for dirt driving and pray it fucking kills me as I attempt to show the foolish parts of it with a fucking smile. So what, it takes me longer to learn skills, that I can’t focus and recall conversations almost at all, that I need simple and quick access to books and notation because my brain doesn’t just spew correct memory at command, that corrective lenses doesn’t correct my vision causing me to second guess myself in every manner, that I can’t look past questions raised over societal common consensus that gets talked around not answered, that I can’t command my body to physically obey me consistently – I will continue to pursue hardship, pain, suffering and love it, embrace it till I crush it or it me. FUCK, either stand aside from my pursuit without commentary or finally learn some shit from the example I’ve taken solely upon MYFUCKINGSELF. I’m not god damn asking every fucking body to gather round the fucking fire, holding hands, singing kumbaya, agreeing on all the same shit, “living in perfect harmony”. I’m saying common consent on one fucking thing, just fucking one! … heheh… hah… “as ye would that men” (all life) “should do to you, do ye also to them likewise” which includes how you’d wished to be treated in prior circumstances when on their end, no matter how others are presenting themselves at you, “putting yourself in another’s shoes”: even if you’re not the cuntnut don’t be one.

Fucking jesus, easier said than done. Hence the intro, the problem I have with even good, proper language. Such a nice tidy little package of a single (grammatically botched) sentence that attempts to reference far too many environments, actions, choices to be remotely honest. It’s all fun and games till being stalked, hunted by one warped by their passion, fury, or when staring down a troop of sanctioned uniformed enforcers with weapons on you, ready to put it to you. How ‘bout when facing the individual embodiment of the continuous encouragement of depravity/bigotry which must be the dominant cause of the division and destruction of moral societies (turning from christ/allah/etc. for you religious fucks [rest of you got too many gods or none specifically and I’m sick of lists I know nothing of]), or just a prick bitch in a public area bein’ sideways to self, family, friends, partner like randomly saying you’re wearing your grandmother’s shirt whom hasn’t been cold in the dirt for a year. Just a few really dumb examples as each of those have a plethora of details – different scenarios – changing the interpretation of any reductio ad absurdum, “put simply”… t.l.d.r. blech. Take the silly cop example, how does it change your outlook if the individual being apprehended is definitively assaulting, plotting a massacre, collecting materials for a biological/chemical weapon, smuggling/crafting large quantities of harmful substances, or “evading” the warrant for an unpaid seatbelt ticket with expired documentation on their property? The last one had a small amount of pot, meaning popo totally justified. “Don’t do the crime,” to sum it up, right.

I mean, of all the meaningless, insanely dumb phrases, t.l.d.r.? Too long, didn’t read? What the fuck! Why are you commenting with the authority of having put forth the effort into understanding a subject if you didn’t actually take in all presented information (let alone the vast sources outside of the material)? Even if it’s referring to the presumed audience, what fucking disgusting encouragement of forsaking personal research. For christ’s sake, a more accurate cliché already existed and it could even be acronyzed shorter than that shit. L.S.S. Long story short. Summarized, the sum… I’m losing my fucking mind. Obviously. I already stated I place no importance on titles, nor do prior accomplishments support superiority on a subject; no amount of knowledge, information changes the status of a human so speak no matter heritage, education, occupation, or label. All the goody two shoes, ethics preachy hypocrisy hogwash I’ve tried spouting, screeching shut the fuck up at any without the expertise which I continuously berate for its braggadocios frame of mind. The hypocritical, contradictory, “mask on” behavior that I’m calling for isn’t to deny, hide, flee from our nature as living creatures but to finally be fucking honest about it with one another. The ability for us to communicate without fear and listen without inspiring it in the speaker; to channel the understanding, patience, kindness that we want when stupid shit pops out our mouths over and over again. The freedom of an owned place for communion, pursuit, solitude, if wanted, and, hopefully, the rediscovery of the courage to bring us out from it, finding joy outside of comfort for it is yet another fleeting moment. The strength to quiet the emotional distractions when facing hate, pain, branding, foolishness, or just our own inability for receiving the knowledge being imparted both outwardly and “in-between the lines”. Maybe then I might not be self-conscious about whipping out my little black book mid conversation, forcing people to slow the fuck down so I could potentially retain some shit, so I’m not a broken record… “what”. Even better, shake my trust issues I continuously self-deny from my poor reactions every time I force myself to be sociable.

You all know what I speak/write, full comprehension doesn’t matter nor whether my experiences or my suppositions reflect your own life. You cannot deny you have felt these emotions, pondered these opinions in some fashion, given pause on a revelation to horribly botch it sharing the enlightenment, excitement with others. Yet still we play with absolutist notions, quick to bask in our preferred blindness for propping up justifications of power. Fuck the police, fuck your thin blue line bullshit, disgracing the American flag your entrusted with in such a fashion. It's a blue fucking blanket, you fuckwads, and it engrosses all fifty fucking stars, separately, individually but as a fucking whole. Not for the purpose of amalgamation, not to dim the light from one beneath another but to protect, serve as the disregarded background for each individual to shine…. Fuck all this shit, fuck me, fuck all this beating around the bush, and fuck all authority fucking everywhere. In my mind, you can all get yourselves Dinkhellered, even the good ones. So eager to be part of the problem; learned nothing from the visceral evidence in failure to put down a mad dog crafted by the system you support, instead your dumping mags over acorns, getting cozy with control/power as if such will save you. The answer to his problem wasn’t heightened aggression, itchier trigger finger, but once the bullet hit, bite the fucking tongue. Maybe already dead, but not yet; focus! isolate the one whose decided death is the only answer and put them down before they carry it out on another after you…. Hmph, do I offer this advice to those facing the same which you refuse to acknowledge because of numbers, weapons, uniforms and badges; that whole spirit and pretense for the second bill of rights thing, and go fuck yourself JPEG. Least they gave that vet, Andrew Brannan, what he deserved, yup.

Such a shit effort, I… all things only have the perception of difference because of the unique characteristics serving as a distraction from what should be at the forefront of thoughts while simultaneously being the cause for all life’s beauty. How can we not understand currently: continue to refute our contributions of hate at this, that, and the others which enacts/hides the nonsense fucking us all over. No, no, no, everybody laugh at “turning the frogs gay”. You know, if memory serves, only one of you “lefties” gave even half a nod to the article covering the shit he was referencing which actually contained serious allegations of a company(ies) (tied to the U.S., though probably just fixated and twisting memory) fucking over a South American community, wrecking it’s environment, the shit you just be fondling all over yourself on correct? You ain’t no better “religious right”, fucking taking, not just this, but everything into crazy moon landing, baby eating, blood drinking territory because starring into the face of the knowledge of the offenders being the precious American/God fearing industries and associated lapdogs you’ve praised/promoted is just way too fucking hard. Bah, easily could flip that… For fuck’s sake, A.I. (the science fiction shit if that’s even truly possible) will only usher the end of us because we allow it. We keep setting the stage, like we desire such an outcome; gatekeeping, burying information at every opportunity, desperate to delegate what is learned so the skeletons stay in the closet. So covetous of what we think separates us from the rest, we lie/ignore ourselves to such fates and those which benefit the most have the greatest reasons but toughest justifications to spin and prevent “rocking the boat”. Baahh… I’m a bit ashamed at my avoidance of the Book of Mormon. There’s a lot of fascinating shit to unpack around it, even more so, I found, after being an atheist for a few years. Here, maybe this can offer a little insight to why I think so “…Alma 14:7 And now, it came to pass that when the king had sent forth his proclamation, that Aaron and his brethren went forth from city to city and from one house of worship to another… 11 Yea, I say unto you, as the Lord liveth, as many of the Lamanites as believed in their preaching and were converted unto the Lord never did fall away, for they became a righteous people…. 19 And it came to pass they called their name Anti-Nephi-Lehis; and they were called by this name and were no more called Lamanites. 20 And they began to be a very industrious people; yea, and they were friendly with the Nephites; therefore, they did open a correspondence with them, and the curse of God did no more follow them…. 24 And the King died in that selfsame year that the Lamanites began to make preparations for war against the people of God…. 27 Now there was not one soul among all the people who had been converted unto the Lord that would take up arms against their brethren… 43 And this they did, it being – in their view – a testimony to God and also to men that they never would use weapons again for the shedding of man’s blood… 46 And thus we see that when these Lamanites were brought to believe and to know the truth, they were firm and would suffer, even unto death, rather than commit sin…. 49 Now when the people (Anti-Nephi-Lehis) saw that they (Lamanites) were coming against them (A-N-L. [rofflmfao I just realized… never mind]), they went out to meet them (A.N.L. going out to meet the Lamanites [fuck clarifying every ambiguous pronoun, why couldn’t these motherfucking translators use some proper grammar]), and prostrated themselves before them to the earth, and began to call on the name of the Lord; 50 And thus they were in this attitude when the Lamanites began to fall upon them and began to slay them with the sword; and thus without meeting any resistance, they did slay a thousand and five of them; and we know that they are blessed, for they have gone to dwell with their God. 51 Now when the Lamanites saw that their brethren would not flee from the sword, neither would they turn aside to the right hand or to the left, but that they would lie down, and perish, and praise God even in the very act of perishing under the sword – now when the Lamanites saw this, they did forbear from slaying them; 52 And there were many whose hearts had swollen in them for those of their brethren who had fallen under the sword, for they repented of the things which they had done….Helaman 1:2 For behold, Pahoran had died and gone the way of all the earth; therefore, there began to be a serious contention concerning who should have the judgment seat among the brethren who were the sons of Pahoran…. 5 Nevertheless, it came to pass that Pahoran was appointed by the voice of the people to be chief judge and a governor over the people of Nephi. 6 And it came to pass that Pacumeni, when he saw that he could not obtain the judgment seat, he did unite with the voice of the people. 7 But behold, Paanchi, and that part of the people that were desirous that he should be their governor, was exceeding wroth; therefore, he was about to flatter away those people to rise up in rebellion against their brethren. 8 And it came to pass as he was about to do this, behold, he was taken, and was tried according to the voice of the people, and condemned to death; for he had risen up in rebellion and sought to destroy the liberty of the people. 9 Now when those people who were desirous that he should be their governor saw that he was condemned unto death, therefore, they were angry; and behold, they sent forth one Kishkumen, even to the judgement seat of Pahoran, and murdered Pahoran as he sat upon the judgment seat…. 12 And Kishkumen and his band who had covenanted with him did mingle themselves among the people in a manner that they all could not be found; but as many as were found were condemned unto death…. 39 But behold, Kishkumen, who had murdered Pahoran, did lie in wait to destroy Helaman also; and he was upheld by his band, who had entered into a covenant that no one should know his wickedness; 40 For there was one Gadianton, who was exceeding expert in many words and also in his craft, to carry on the secret work of murder and of robbery; therefore, he became the leader of the band of Kishkumen… 2:21 And it came to pass in the forty and ninth year of the reign of the judges, there was continual peace established in the land, all save it were the secret combinations which Gadianton the robber had established in the more settled parts of the land, which at that time were not known unto those who were at the head of the government; therefore, they were not destroyed out of the land…. 3 Nephi 1:1 Now it came to pass that the ninety and first year had passed away; and it was six hundred years from the time that Lehi left Jerusalem; and it was in the year that Lachoneus was the chief judge and the governor over the land…. 4 And it came to pass that in the commencement of the ninety and second year, behold, the prophecies of the prophets began to be fulfilled more fully; for there began to be greater signs and greater miracles wrought among the people. 5 But there were some who began to say that the time was past for the words to be fulfilled which were spoken by Samuel the Lamanite…. 9 Now it came to pass that there was a day set apart by the unbelievers that all those who believed in those traditions should be put to death, except the sign should come to pass which had been given by Samuel the prophet. 10 Now it came to pass that when Nephi, the son of Nephi, saw this wickedness of his people, his heart was exceeding sorrowful…. 12 And it came to pass that he cried mightily unto the Lord all that day; and behold, the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying, Lift up your head and be of good cheer, for behold, the time is at hand; and on this night shall the sign be given… 14 Behold, I come unto my own to fulfill all things which I have made known unto the children of men, from the foundation of the world, and to do the will, both of the Father, and of the Son – of the Father because of me, and of the Son because of my flesh…. 45 Now the Nephites began to reckon their time from this period when the sign was given, or from the coming of Christ… 48 And it came to pass in the thirteenth year, there began to be wars and contentions throughout all the land; for the Gadianton robbers had become so numerous, and did slay so many of the people, and did lay waste so many of cities, and did spread so much death and carnage throughout the land that it became expedient that all the people, both the Nephites and the Lamanites, should take up arms against them…. 4 Nephi 1:1 And it came to pass that the thirty and fourth year passed away, and also the thirty and fifth; and behold, the disciples of Jesus had formed a church of Christ in all the lands round about…. 3 And it came to pass in the thirty and sixth year, the people were all converted unto the Lord upon all the face of the land, both Nephites and Lamanites; and there were no contentions and disputations among them, and ever man did deal justly one with another… 20 There were no robbers, nor murderers; neither were there Lamanites nor any manner of ites; but they were in one, the children of Christ and heirs to the kingdom of God… 23 And he kept it eighty and four years, and there was still peace in the land, save it were a small part of the people who had revolted from the church and took upon them the name of Lamanites; therefore, there began to be Lamanites again in the land…. 28 And from that time forth they did have their goods and their substance no more common among them; and they began to be divided into classes; and they began to build up churches unto themselves to get gain and began to deny the true church of Christ…. 50 And it came to pass that the wicked part of the people began again to build up the secret oaths and combinations of Gadianton. 51 And also the people who were called the people of Nephi began to be proud in their hearts, because of their exceeding riches, and became vain, like unto their brethren, the Lamanites…. 54 And it came to pass that the robbers of Gadianton did spread over all the face of the land; and there were none that were righteous, save it were the disciples of Jesus….”

Aaahhhh… what the fuck am I even doing here anymore… had to cut myself a bit short again but I think I got the most relevant parts in that quotation. You know, the old timey bigotry, racism bs jews and christians have saturating their “scriptures” that was too prevalent for J. Smith to ignore. Couldn’t you hear how enlightened the B.M. was? Fuck, I’m an ass. The only context I’ll give here is this: Nephites are the Israelites, the Lamanites are the people outside the covenant (only more blatant), and the whole thing is supposed to be some “old testament” of the people living in the Americas before the conquistadors. I hoped to share some verse that clearly showed the strange similarity between some verses and the physical evidence archeology has uncovered on Mesoamerican civilizations but I’ve been too focused on the bible as of late and do not have the book committed to memory as I felt I did. It wouldn’t have altered anything I have to say; the damn thing gets far less right than it does wrong, no different than its influence. It’s blatant to me that the author conjured most of it up. Even giving it as much benefit of the doubt I can muster, I can’t see it as any more than coincidence. If you think I’m talking shit, think again. The damn thing is a fucking work of art, obviously a more imaginative, creative body than what you’re getting here (if you can take hearing “And it came to pass” every couple of sentences). This country should be heralding the dude(s) as the great revival, civil war era American Shakespeare. I mean, a farm-raised bumpkin with no real education for the period crafting a multi triple digit work containing a fabricated history of over a thousand years, steeped in references and symbolism of the environment – certainly sounds impressive to me – when framed the way I did. Those similarities I referred to are easily explained when you don’t assume the average pre-nineteenth century person was dumber than a box of rocks for living before most of the technological innovations of the present. I mean, the dude lived closer to the “colonizer” era (guess during depending how you count that) than I by almost a couple centuries now, but they didn’t have social media and the past was the worst right? Nazis were never the only book burners, ass wipes. You mother fuckers be playing fucking games, referencing the accounts of humanity with certainty while understanding the very same tells how much of its tales we’ve lost, and that doesn’t even include the shit we’ve fucked with purposefully. Hell, if you’ve been paying attention, you know a single individual’s thoughts isn’t what even irritates me. I fucking hate how we, “the masses”, elevate the sentiments of these very few, very, very opinionated and “free” individuals that had (have) the privilege to “chronicle” our events. My head rings with those unheard, written over, lambasted, even rightfully so. My empathy lies with the dumbasses suffering with incomprehension of language, choosing example over verbiage, characterized by their oddities… eh… empathy. Pssshhhh.  Don’t kid yourself, psycho… sympathy is the correct word. I share nothing with them, know nothing of them, about them, obviously. The proof is right here with this desperate, pathetic hollering for attention. Yeah, we gotta be ok with not being heard, with only having power over self, getting shat on for putting what we thought was our all into the effort, cease any semblance of pissy behavior regardless of pet peeves, button pushing and I’m talking to you jack wagons at the top, dickwads that I’m left with out choice to number myself among because a full time job with “benefits” (of course can’t leave out white privilege)… blech. “History is written by the victors” and it’s fucking ate the fuck up. I don’t limit victor to some leader or general or celebrity or plutocrat or academic, grrr, who can I even call that as even the custodians fuck themselves by earning/“” their prize. This leads to the more frustrating sight of peers, having previously uttered what I would deem wisdom: declare support for a side, search for subliminal meanings for future certainty, grip tightly to parasocial idioms… fuck…. I wonder if going with more obscure examples would have been the better route, least they would’ve gotten a shout out. Meh, y’all just give a fuck about your stupid goats. The ones with a dog in the fight on narratives. Nothing would have changed… you can always get a throw away mention for laughs in the locked libraries of intellectuals, be part of the argument supposedly refuting my thought on how insignificant the depths of hill dying done over bygone days are. The authority in authenticity. The shade I threw at reactors was totally unjustified when they’re just following the guidelines encouraged by y’all. Yeah, we ain’t changing shit… every time I read about someone utilizing some form of that passion, it’s all words. More fucking trash to excuse using the same tactics as the “opposition”, weighing two pounds of flesh for every nail. I find the atrocities our ancestors committed against the Native Americans worthy of worse than death, what would you have done any differently? All the immigrant (my bad “pilgrims”. Better, right wing fucks?) families just get shuffled onto their too-small-square foot piece of land to overpopulate and pollute, or better, deport ‘em back to the land of their persecution so the “rightful owners” can roam the plains free and war with one another as they religiously believe is their right?... You mother fuckers one hundred percent guaranteeing any jobs or life lasting financial support (and not no bare fucking minimums) when you fill your mouths and flood collective ears on shit about what this service worker should do, or the duty of that politician, or the integrity of public employees? Oh, wait, quid pro quo there. Bah, I’m just salty, most of us (And I refer to you fame seeking fucks, the not quite blank enough to be top dawg. The rest are lucky to get generalized in a footnote.) will be lucky to have some self-aggrandized experts arguing about whether we said/wrote a thing or not, or if we even existed a thousandish (hah lucky to be a hundred) years from now. Hence, we all gotta be reasonable, coalesce behind the ones with the whichever qualifier, assist ya boy to the rightful recognition as the pinnacle of insert category, “lest, oh dear, how will history remember us?” All the time and effort and funds and hype should lay the groundwork for “victor”y, but every individual with a claim is a variable. Especially if they can lay it out in a popular/rousing/thoughtful manner, according to enough of us. No worries, though, as we’ve unanimously agreed we’re eager to shut down our move towards more open, public communication cause it’s rule thirty-four, destroying the youth, voicing stochastic terrorism, interfering with elections, spreading misinformation, giving any layman the same platform as those like Rachael Maddow, Piers Morgan, Dennis Prager, Noam Chomsky…. Can we please stop trying to validate the theories of douchebags like Sapolsky? I ain’t asking for us to lie ourselves into refuting physical limitations, evidence; this has not been some dumbass “mind over matter” entreaty, I’m saying mind over mind for christ’s sake. Half the fucked shit causing our problems stems from there and the other half would go a fuckload smoother with the first half on lock. And I don’t wanna hear it from any of you religious fucks cause that’s the fucking thing you all got common – how special our creation was because of what?!... OUR FUCKING MINDS. So maybe we encourage putting some more focus on that shit instead of less. Let’s not forget what fucking encouragement looks like either. Silence, if the critique is seeded with the shit you hate, bite your tongue if it helps. Put that same fucking mentality of effort garnered from the anything that brings you even the smallest tickle and introspect that to be applied wherever the fuck it’s needed for you to cease enabling whatever version of dickery you participate in, i.e. stop yourself, think, walk the shit out or at very least acknowledge hindsight, with your hands, feet, manner and leastly your mouth. That’s your free will you fucking asswipes; there’s the very fucking agency you utilize to refute itself at every opportunity as if that will erase it…. Fuck, been beatin’ y’all’s ass with the bible, I just wish a god was watching. Damnit, don’t know why I’m even letting myself get worked up, every one a yas pleased as peaches crafting/seeking the echo chambers to scream in or at, despite whatever hell you raise.

            Fucking… can you just put the aluminum foil down for a moment, Chris. Is this really the method I’ve settled on, this garbage is how I’ve decided to say what I wish. Eh, guess keep reaffirming, no shame. For fuck’s sake, you people make the method look so damn fun. Chirping and bleating and gargling and emotion over nonsense, why not jump on the band wagon and see if I can’t get a little limelight. Cock, just making a bigger fool of myself, trying to throw hints, nods, silly easter eggs, surface level correlations, I’ve done nothing but spout confusing, false, and/or novice statements. Which is just hilarious as my puny brain needs all the shit we’ve crafted – the breakdowns, the elementary level walkthroughs, the long-winded redundant manuals. To pick up on so many of the double-entendres/witty references/intended inferences, I need all you other motherfuckers with the better grasp of problem solving so I’m not spending a decade just to get to the surface level shit, but please all of ya continue to craft your Voynich Manuscripts. That’ll help, shirley…. I wonder if any feel with this the same way I did listening to that poor woman who had convinced herself into leaving with her (formerly she swore) abusive husband (and her kids) to join some crazed neo Native American spiritualistic pseudo Christian Buddhist white identitarian cult down in Arizona. Don’t know why I felt like there was something more I could have said that maybe would have swayed what I saw as a chaotic state of reasoning clouding judgement, but instead, I just listened, rarely interjecting a question about the situation till I had nothing more of prudence, compassion to relay. Think about all this shit too much, and why not, it’s all the talk, our favorite pastime, our dirty little open secret. As I’ve said more times than I care to, I can’t even begin to fashion solutions to every situation which then varies by the unique beings involved, drastically, but the differences aren’t changing outcomes, and I can’t figure out the reasons till we start giving a fuck about the inconsequential. Stop glazing over them with a statistic as if it’s an explanation…. That’s where the unfortunate everyone needed come out and play. There is only the try. The do, or do not, are just the consequences of the try, and open to interpretation by everyone. No one can do the things you can because it’s only you, every human individual. Nothing in here is for anyone else but instead a reflection of my struggles to find my own path. All the antagonism saturating this work is a pathetic recognition of problems, because look where we are, but solving it is on the motherfuckers doing the shit; no one/thing can do anything for yourself, whatever help provided is just a tool. Any statements misconstrued as advice will have to be recrafted personally to be successful because it’s a solo venture, and then what success was being sought at what cost? Good fucking god, look what I’ve done here. So much worse than I could’ve imagined, fucking old testament prophets, even Yeshu himself, did better with their retarded ass, time-twisted parables/riddles. Guess I should give in and seek a little therapy, huh? For an atheist, I seem to have a serious god complex…. Huhhhh, why not let’s give a true nod to the original purpose of this book before I try to wrap it up so I can finally shave and look a little less like a renaissance artist’s dream muse for whitewashing christ’s visage (I mean right down to counting every rib I got without even lifting my arms [though I’m a bit too tall {and, you know, can’t miraculously cure my own four eyes}]) … or a modern-day wannabe cult leader….

            The way I interpret the conglomerate of nonsense, god is prolife, antislavery, small government just as they intended women as equals, approves homosexuality, transgenderism, globalism, and so much more on both sides of these redundant “culture wars”. It’s clear as day all due to how these wiseman deliciously struggled to weave their words around the shit. That’s the sum of any/all these books, the words/thoughts of humans. Wish I could have convinced myself to slow down even more and include something other than a few influential in my raising. Ah well, let’s dive in to all my wacked out thoughts on what your precious scriptures have been saying from day one, despite its human messengers (though my point of view says what I write on is the human part of them… us). Hopefully I can manage to be a bit more blunt, direct instead of trying to pretend I’m clever. I’ll start at the beginning… of the majority of Christian recognized texts and teachings, Adam and Eve. From the very get go we’ve been painting unnecessary shit onto the lessons learned. The apple, or fruit of the tree, was never the fucking sin, even the disobedience of partaking was not the point. The deflection, blame shifting, what snitching actually is! Our actions stemming from shame, the hindsight of past expectation becoming past remorse. That’s the eye opener, recognizing we’d played ourselves then seeking the most comfortable solution. Tree didn’t give us shit, the capability of understanding was already there, “made in god’s image”, but, oh, shiny new thing. As if covering our nakedness was the fucking issue, not the fucking shit we allow our emotions to convince us of. Listen here sheople, god made us disgusting and sinful looking, so we gotta really cover up so god and his debaucherous doppelganged creation doesn’t have to look at the temptuous abomination in bare form. I mean are we really this fucking dumb? Yes, yes we are. Adam got kicked out of paradise and still drove his son, Cain, into the emotions of hate, deceit with his open favoritism of Abel. Oh wait, that was God, wasn’t it, because Cain couldn’t follow instructions (or, fuck, maybe we can all blame, Eve, again. Hell, even better, the serpent). Hence, his envy being rewarded accordingly… thou shalt not covet.

            All these fucking repentance harbingers screaming about the sins of the people, so caught up in homosexuality, raucous gathering, intoxication, fornication, witchcraft, idolatry, usury… illness, poverty (to use a few more ambiguous, hopefully kinder words than they often do). These were the foolish lenses that still frame the issue. All of these were dumb attempts to solve the problem of us fucking one another over at every given opportunity. That’s why the common thread, even when a laughable side note, can’t help but be the lord god alone having the authority over all the earth. Even when they’re not saying some shite like judgement being the lord’s alone while delivering such verdicts from their lips, they crow constantly over their words being from the mouth of god. You’re not listening to some nobody, no different than you, nah, God’s saying this shit… heh, you see what god just did to us, man…. Focus up, chris. The message was always the same. The shit I’ve mentioned, that you pulpit pounders, sycophantic shepherds bray incessantly over, is a basic acknowledgement of how situations given to heightened emotions can easily slip into an environment where someone is getting their freedom stripped from them. The obsession with these very narrow instances that can also possibly be a factor for said generalization is part of the fucking nonsense that has always been the issue. Men… humans believing they have the right to be the judges, the arbiters of morality… one of the examples of those situations conveniently looked over though it’s directly tied to your “greatest commandment”. However, got yourselves in so many knots trying to thread tradition, history, and cultural perceptions that you’ve done fucked marriage six feet deep. Should be the best archetype humanity could offer this world.

I blame sex. Intercourse, making love, fucking. Why on earth are we so fucked up over an act, plain and simple. All the surrounding arguments over it seem about intent, so yeah, some of the ways it can be done are bad. How bout than we just agree that any form where any of all involved parties is hesitant, uninterested, incapable of unmanipulated/sentient engagement means no go. Oy, yes, I think it should only be about pleasure, joy but for all participants. To be achieved there must be accurate, open but thoroughly thought through communication for health, prosperity, peace, and logically, yes, the less partners the less opportunity for potentially lifelong consequences (some we’re determined to stop any alleviation for, sorry again ladies, I know I did a shit job of defending y’all’s rights), a percentage game, but in no fucking way does that tie the act to marriage. Just like I highly doubt a god ever wanted us procreating the rest of their creation, including us, into extinction across the four corners of the earth, or the highest template for what keeping our word looks like, how to treat and interact with one another, is dependent on some ordained, third party individual (or biological requisites), I do not see the same being finding an act they specifically designed into creation as sinful or solely for the purpose of making babies.  We’ve made it about power, about “carnal nature”, about all the hurtful shit we see it capable of; we’ve saturated the discussion, right up to the appearances and operations of our own bodies, with presumption, speculation, coercion. Why else we got mother fuckers out here thinking they gotta get it any way they can, and the others trying to exploit the sentiment for personal gain, on top a whole system opposed to the very notion desperately pushing it to this day. By all means, keep it up though, only got so many cheeks for turning, hmph.

            One of the many examples of christ (or the scribes of him) being an idiot. Sounds to me like the advice of one who hasn’t bothered to ponder the depravity of human beings, or at the very least, is the command still turn your cheek when it’s bearing witness to another turning theirs being struck repeatedly, mercilessly? Is it turn the other cheek as power/control/force continues to become more prevalent, popular? When legitimate authority demands compromise, not just of you but your families, neighbors, friends; when those tasked with protection, proliferation, obedience of our communities rip down our freedoms, tightening the economic noose (since open violence breeds rebellion) at the behest of the majority? If he wasn’t being ignorant, he was influenced by the same falsehood other wisemen will consistently fall prey to – change is the goal but you got to have a place to start, success dependent on playing to the populace. More flies with honey. Fuck that shit. If even a tenth of that cliché played a part in them entwining basic ethics with exemptions, paradoxes, skirting relevant knowledge on existent livelihood effectively exploiting circumstance, I see that willful ignorance, intentional hypocrisy as the evil they pretended to fight… which is my problem. Obviously, I don’t think the command was to lay down and die… and/or watch others do the same. I see the promotion of peace in such a sentiment but the embellishment provides cover for interpretation. If your gonna choose defense in the face of perceived injustice, recognize where stopping the violence ends and you adding your version to the instance begins, for the goal is not to end the being or even their desire to behave in such a manner but end the circumstances that make that choice desirable for all of us. At minimum, understand that attacking in defense means anothers’ harm and justice of your own to face; you shouldn’t set the example of fucking hiding like a scared animal from it. Just like those damn prophets of old, so terrified of touching certain nerves. Christ may have been the most principled example of the lot, but there’s why he had his own fucking blind spots. Give to caesar what is caesar’s. Tripe like that is exactly the shit… it’s why I had to give that one a specific mention earlier on. Not a fucking one of you get it, and I don’t give a fuck about the linguistic academia claims. You faithfuckers can’t say differently, I don’t wanna hear a word about how that verse finishes with some give to god what is god’s horse ninny. The thought experiment was about the foolish ways we use our minds, allowing our thoughts to focus on perpetrating the very mannerisms that got us fucked in the beginning according to them (or at least some of them [sorry, pharisees], as I understand it, but… same song, same verse, could get better, but…). It was never only about caesar, or taxes, or even the function of economy, and the only relation to god it shared was all the qualifiers of how christ viewed following god. I’ve already thrown shade on his thoughts about our behavior, and the mentions other than god were the second fiddles to those problematic points.

            Same as all the others, following the literal commands he gives for living life leaves you with nothing, expecting some fucked up reward after death. I refuse to believe that a being would have created us with such potential for creativity, joy, art, innovation, learning and their vision for heaven on earth was everybody have nothing cause all time/work/excess should be for your earthly masters; partake in nothing but sucking deity balls with our words all day, cause one day their the one whose gonna make it right. Every time, I’m over here cheering some shit on only to read/watch the plot unravel, unrelated tangents being tossed in that might even seem to say the opposite of the point just stated plainly. The message is freedom, about not forcing one another to partake in our fantasies no matter the form, kind, situation, and no force used to ensure fantasies deemed inappropriate aren’t engaged in, only protection from force. If any kind of power/control is being promoted by such a being, it’s of self. Ahh, fuck! univocality, what a laugh... That’s your god damn “inerrant bible” (other than it’s not just your books), even with fucking noah, god didn’t send the mother fucking flood, he was warning of it and despite humanities continued assholery he tried to get the one mother fucker kinda listening to get the others on board. That was noah’s dick move, so hung up on all the wickedness going around, probably spent most his time harping on some bull shit in the most dog water way possible instead of encouraging motherfuckers to save themselves. Change ways else god’ll fuck you up (great song), here lies a portion of the entire issue; gotta throw every damn little thing at god’s feet. We’ve been given the very tools to grow, to figure this shit out. A complete waste if he just wanted to fucking hold our hands the whole way, casually throwing inconveniences/calamity/luck/blessings around to fuck up the day depending on his mood.

Every time anyone be screeching about some revelation of sin, it should be viewed as a personal fucking problem. If you can’t engage in a behavior without fucking someone over than the message of restraint is for your ass alone. The information is not this thing evil don’t go near; it’s for separating the one act from those we want to associate it with, claiming reactions are acceptable in the face of the first, or at the thought of the first even being possible. We must find the strength to trust. I’m not talking about setting up contingencies, reinforcing preparation, overbearing consistent communication, meticulous fruitless planning. We need to encourage, train the power over self for overcoming the instinctual desires that come from “being lied to”; not just being coolheaded/nigh apathetic about the suspicious activity others may possibly be engaged in due to a sense of confidence in our capability of dealing with such a future when it comes, but the levelheadedness when it does happen to show that confidence. Present yourself not with only critique, but kindness – not only with pain, but compassion, and if you can’t take the hit without losing it, walk away, let another better suited attempt before you shut that future down by skewing the thoughts of the offender from opening their mind to a better way. That’s turning the other cheek… this is marriage…. Fucking god… I can’t apologize enough to survivors… breathe, here we go. Yeah, stick it out… for better or for worse…. The point is the promise, our word. The acknowledgement of we die the fuck alone doesn’t mean we gotta be so desperate to fucking live that way. Not about the progeny spawned as they grow, live, die, but the fucker you have attempted to share lives with. Not about providing, submissiveness, gratification, or even passion, but whatever asswipe chosen needing as much of the emotional/mental bullshit you think you need. Dependency is disgusting to me. One has to be careful when playing with independence fantasies as it’s easy to take it full circle. No matter who you are – what you are – if you live you depend on others living or passed. The only clarity I can give on my thoughts for such a bias based subject is finding and cultivating the desire to improve, push personal boundaries/limitations in the variety of ways available. Not just for the enrichment of self, but for the example it will help others give back to you in their methods, many hands make light the work.

            No god would have a singular “special someone” soully designated for another individual, we determine this because it could be any mother fucker chosen/available. The point is not the other individual, but ourselves the individual. No matter where on the spectrometer you fall, when promising to bind oneself to another human being there will be fuckery. The key is the reaction to it. Fuck all the vow shit, these are supposed to be actions, so how does it look in the heat of the moment? No matter how prepared, no matter the amount of information gathering, you will get blindsided, and these instances will pile up as they will be ignored, or worse, all is…. If the point arrives you can no longer act in the manner you wish returned, leave, I guess, as the damage is already done. Just like its counterpart, divorce isn’t some ceremony, it’s the actions of its components. Nor does it require both parties as its inception occurs the moment of betrayal, which is why if you can’t help show such from an understanding of your own moments to help overcome theirs… yeah, leave and find the one that will inspire that in you. Something probably assisted if there is faith the other will respond in the same way, consistently. Pfft, so easy to say, the faster you are to cut the ties as well. Kids shouldn’t be a driving factor, but they still fucking exist, and of course humans just “change”, sometimes years down the road. Then all the stigmatisms and the people’s judgement, all the emotional garbage that can be heaped up. Because all of us, can’t just be a separation, plain and simple. The knowledge it was just an individual instance, that ways were to go separately, that peace and kindness were present but not capable in a continued state.  Only you know if you’re putting your all into… any relationship cause that’s ultimately the lesson. Full comprehension of all hardships that lie in wait with confidence that each one will be handled as they come, the strength to take the hits and return it with comfort, peace; confidently understanding that you’re completely fucking wrong and the knowledge will help bring discernment when you’re not helping or becoming stronger, you’re wallowing. No, I will not make clear any of my positions with concrete details for either sex because that’s your fucking place in the position of commitment, but we gotta start figuring out quelling animosity, control, vengeance, placing these emotions where they belong. None of these have any place in building an enduring promise over our lifetime, which is how a better society is built. A society that maybe has a robust enough support system to keep the involved encouraged to pursue life and freedom even apart.

            This is how I know marriage is not about sex/gender, or even about a couple wanting to snu-snu minus an additional long term economic responsibility. Yeah, sure, it is about sticking it out through thick and thin, but no, that means nothing of what it sounds like because the whole mentality is a both a goal and a guide for promoting the traits necessary on cooperating in the most basic fashion to keep all this shit functioning in a non-pathetic halved version of itself. We can start by stop fucking with the trans people, making the whole situation far fucking worse than it has any fucking right to be. Pretending like men and women have some fucking secret list of gender qualifications god laid on mother fuckers as a prerequisite for fucking heaven. It’s only about humanity, kindness, basic courtesy, (another one) freedom. What I conclude from these personal interpretations (and the upbringing… always the upbringing) is people like Elizabeth Bathory, Grigory Novykh, John Gacy, Judas, shit, even Satan (if you’re the kind of Christian believing he’s a real character not a generalization, then what was his great sin? Wanting god’s power for himself? To force god’s creation to worship said god properly [not even himself but god]? Man, I’m getting fucking crazier) has a better shot at entering your precious paradise than mosto ya. Hell, the prison house, just nonsense. After death would bring an opportunity to know what you did not and pay penance for the assholery you committed while alive so you could then be at peace in eternal happiness. That’s why not a fucking one of us is to lay judgement against anyone’s character other than self. It legitimizes the ability to teach on the conclusions of actions taken; god’s got that other shit. He’ll be taking care of all the “bad guys” when the fucking time comes and nobody else. I refuse to believe otherwise, either, as it’s the only possible concept of a supreme creator that I could find an iota of respect towards. In other words, as someone who doesn’t believe in god and happily says short of the mother fucker showing up in a group with me (so I can confirm I’m not hallucinating solo) with concrete physical evidence of all the fucking claims in tow, I will eagerly partake in rebellion if any of your versions are even remotely fucking correct. I fail to see how a single one of you basting believers give a single fuck about any of the things I’ve covered in any meaningful way. Far more engaging to argue with non-believers over semantics that you helped craft, ain’t that right, Thomas E. Woods, Jr.? God knows I better fucking clarify that I’m only speaking for myself as an atheist for my next statement, got the whole community falling over itself to well actually comfort themselves on not being a monolith as they squawk the same points… jokes. Seems like the religious fucks got you all a bit worked up over their just like us claims. Musta hurt to watch the flagbearers on the national stage of atheism coo over christian morality, but it was all cheers when they promoted the theocratic tactics being viewed critically as a way of combating the foolishness of faith in a sky daddy. We don’t need to crush religion or its stranglehold on institutions or definitively refute the existence for the source of societal blindness because all of us just need them practicing what the fuck the core is of their fucking preaching. Show these mother fuckers that their faith does not command the actions they propagate. Listen and reveal that these traditions, interpretations have lost their meaning to be substituted as a method of control; that when you follow through these primitive, human attempts to grapple with understanding the struggle of not getting to fuck one another, their will fails because they ultimately throw others under the bus. Prove it matters not if others hold faith in similar fashion because they, having joined in acting in real faith, helped all to act according to god’s most basic will even if your true version wasn’t the credit in this life – a good and merciful god will be known even after life where all will be given the chance at redemption which I can only imagine would be more pleasing to such an entity if it could be as simple as “oh, you were real this whole time” at the moment of clarity. Who am I even fucking kidding, the loudest openly faithful seem to prefer Charlemagne’s methods anyway. Just as I see the objective morality I’ve laid out through these passages needing no supreme being for their existence, importance; I don’t believe in a fucking god or spirits or anything remotely related because I do not interpret the evidence in the same manner you do. That’s it, all there is to it. Fantastic you see god’s hand in all this shit, I very plainly, with no other fucking insinuations on the statement, do not. I see, at every turn, an equal leap in logic to materialize a view of god as any of the extrapolations humans have theorized from our species’ interactions across eras…. Rather raise the flag of correctness on each other’s hills than plainly examine, ponder, discuss all things as a means to promote universal comprehension and therefore prosperity… and I’m doing it again.

            This is why I love that misquote attributed to Luther. It doesn’t matter how he or the person who miswrote it intended the statement on faith. The messengers’ outlooks and phrasings allow poor communications of simpler proposals in all examples (including this); perhaps something to the tune of the assurance of things hoped for has to inspire compassion even when knowledge and wisdom refute the utility, sensibleness of charity. The evidence of things not seen doesn’t need to supersede, impose upon history, science, or art, and that’s because the evidence comes from the assurances, your actions. That’s what it means, you don’t get to be right in a technical sense or find proof in the cosmos. However, maybe an unwavering stance on the equality of all and the treatment that comes with it might inspire all including those with talent to imitate that belief through their innovations while understanding the movements of our universe. Feel like we gotta start here first, something about your own house in order…. God fucking jesus why the fucking hell am I even still fucking rambling, what the fuck am I trying to fucking say…. Maybe, atheists stop pretending you’re steel manning the intelligent designer argument. I mean, for fucking real, would you as an omnipotent being want to create some shit that you constantly had to manage every little detail of to ensure things kept working. Here, better example, when you go to show/teach another something, even an animal, you’re elated when the light bulb seems to come on cause you know their understanding meaning they can replicate the action without your constant fucking monitoring. You have the power and knowledge to stick around and consistently watch the attempts, so is it your fault when they fuck it up – heh, don’t answer that…. It’s just, if a mother fucker went through the painstaking detail to figure out how beauty could occur naturally without constant intervention, why would such strip the ability given to understand and promote this beauty and encourage its replication within its natural means. Eh, fuck all that shit… how bout, can we stop feeding this duopoly. They’ve proven time and time again they have no interest in the people, or the ideologies of forebearers – freedom. Just, how awesome would it be if a large portion of us decided to vote for anything but their fucking stooges placed before us… fuck… it’d take millions… like the ones abstaining from voting for anybody? No, it’s not the same, it’s still participating cause we don’t need to agree on a somebody we just need to agree on not any of them… fucking christ…. that doesn’t matter either. I was hoping to atleast beat this election but it’s August now… the name holding any position should not be influential in the way we make it. “How can anyone believe Trump supports the working class as a billionaire. He is one of the elites, not against them.”  Stupid fucking take by the admissions of prior shit talking. He’s awkward and pushy and a narcissist with a totalitarian complex right? Ever consider that’s why he's on the outside of the elite as a rich elite; that these qualities could have some pretty basic assumptions on psyche like having an axe to grind with snobs that could be relatable while mimicking the same antagonists – something history has shown time and time again. This election is as meaningless as all anointments of leaders past and yet to come. Whether it’s Kamala or Trump (listen up managers cause the point applies to far more than those two names), both have the flaws that qualify you for the marionette seat that rich fucks have happily steered us into putting more power and influence behind. All figures of all affiliations sponsor laws that affect lives regardless of party besides the one of means, status. Many have recognized that outright control doesn’t further progression as there will always be opposition to such a display. Hence, why Trump is so vehemently opposed and feared. They recognize they bullied the snot nosed weird kid in their group too hard and now one of their own wants to get back at them by taking the reigns personally. Yeah, I highly doubt a Trump path to the official end of the American experiment would be successful, but with a little help from enough of you friends… we can at least achieve decimation, chaos. That’s why you asinine trickle-on-me conservatives need to recognize blatant authoritative rhetoric and action when its promoted among you. My mind is beyond fucked, my fears over the end is paved by those who use calm, neutral… good language, point to specified accolades to cast doubt on others, those like Barack Obama, Joeseph Biden, Katherine Porter, Paul Ryan, Nikki Haley, John McCain (that like at the beginning means many others… Bernie). Which is why I fucking really fucking need you stick-it-in-my-equality-for-all lefties to be a tad bit more conscious, sorry, woke to your own institutions playing your ideals which in truth, are only phrased differently than those across the aisle, but fuck, a plethora of one sides gotta figure this shit out or we just gonna keep going at one another over some bull shit that’s handed down from the top. It doesn’t matter who has these offices because at any moment whomever can decide to start listening critically to the figures who’ve held the ear for so long and seek to comprehend the manners in which the potential to provide freedom to all stops or is flowery language for an antithetical goal, gain…. Oy, so much tinfoil horse ninny, scratch all that shit… fucking fuck, definitely not any of that last shit…. Let’s try – black community, can you just agree to find some new language regarding cultural appropriation or at the minimum, systemic racism? These dumb fucks I share a skin tone with can’t get it through their skulls that the government needs to pay for stripping the freedoms of its people away and that making a mockery of these hardships while promoting the exploitation coming from what are their masters also only keeps this fucked cycle going. Despite whatever the reality is due to the manner it’s written in here, I obviously believe I’m empathetic to your cause and yes it’s the pathetically blatant from a prior entry reason the largest portion of my blood is Irish… well if I believe the fam. “Uhh the irish were basically the next slaves, oooh so oppressed” fucking no, there was (now or will be) no replacing or filling a vacancy. The blasted treatment was a continuation of a thousand fucking years of rebellion against oppression, brought forth by the same mentality of mastery that plagued the continent they left (yeah, I’m taking serious liberties with the history and you can get it too fucking “meh, European left and right political dynamics are so different than you crazy, dumb, zealous Americans”). So any of you trying to use the suffering of the past to somehow justify any continuation or regression or consequentialism of the others deemed needing of the treatment, especially if that blood runs through your body, shut the fuck up. You understand not what they fought against, no matter how many of the verifiable accounts shared your pathetic hypocrisy – yay for me, nay for thee. By all means, though, my black compatriots, continue feeding into defining divisive line language, intellectual victimizing and finger wagging as your cultural heroes utilize the same cracker methods; perpetrate the same actions encouraging the same environment you keep screaming is white supremacy. Better yet, start rejecting all the appropriation of my culture by these mother fuckers akin to Clarence Thomas, Hakeem Jeffries, Bill Cosby, Marion Hugh Knight Jr., Cle Shaheed Sloan, Colton Simpson, Sanyika Shakur, David Barksdale, Terry Lee Flenory, Shawn Carter… Maya Angelou, Morgan Freeman, Colin Kaepernick, or is all that black culture too…. For god’s sake, I see how popular B.I.P.O.C. Jesus has gotten, well then fucking prove his standard is your culture instead of adapting all this bull shit hell on earth generating power dynamic mold that has yet to be broken. Otherwise, keep at it and watch yourselves fill the same roles you hate, witness the same cycles repeat with perhaps a new set a names and a throw away technicality here and there to drive you mad…. Just… no, no, no, chris, absolutely not… fucking wrong again, guess fuck all that last shit too… fuck all this shit from page one….

            Here we go, I know what I can talk about. I know exactly what I believe to have the experience and knowledge granting me the authority to speak/write on. Leave the fucking lolis alone (add anime geek and all the dumb ass speculations thrown around about it on me while we’re at it). For all that could even remotely be of grace on this fucking planet, stop fucking with the FICTION that’s been adopted. That’s the only reason such shit should exist to begin with; we as creatures have fucked up inclinations, instincts and some of us find such as a grateful reprieve from the constant urge to act on shit obviously a tad fucked up. A tool of willpower I would call it (fuck you again Freud and Sapolsky). So why not encourage that as its purpose rather than screaming about how it somehow incites or encourages the real atrocities? Keep the shit that doesn’t belong in this world in the only fucking place it should be entertained, our god damned imaginations. Recognize these desires plaguing us are restrained to make believe because of the real harm wrought no matter how charismatically envisioned and perhaps we can all have those oh so lauded open conversations allowing the dialed down version of our fantasies. There are literally all types of us and understanding freedom is how even in finding company for such inclinations we don’t encourage suffering, resentment, evil… losing the opportunity to show how it’s not the fantasy, it’s the interpretation than action at others and ourselves. Facing the depths of depravity with open arms isn’t an exemption from vengeance, but an attempt to purify such as the actual justice I so blathered on earlier. Hell, fuck it, let’s just keep whining about how much better we are. How alien, unjustifiable these others engaging in whatever overblown practice must believe or behave. How somebody has to do something to prevent even the most abstract association of suffering. How if it weren’t for all these ignorant/foolish/wicked/hateful mother fuckers getting in way we could finally fix shit. I swear I hear the fucking words common sense one more fucking time… just…. Yeah, here’s that bit I kept hinting at over and over again. My final fuck you to all the ass holes with their summaries and skimming, skipping to the end and pretending you fucking know shit. Fuck all of you.

            That’s fucking right, fuck literally every fucking one of you. Not a fucking one of ya will get the fucking point of this dumb ass shit. Here, I’ll do the job of you fucking fake gurus, life coaches, advisors. You want the vision of success paraded before our eyes, all you gotta do is suck the asshole of the closest proximity wealthier than you son of bitch in whatever field you can take it in and I mean bend over backwards. No task is too demeaning, too far, no offensive taken at even the greatest insults and each objective is exceeded while gathering the info on the asshole their eating. Then you just need the opportunity to stab the back of the douchebag you’re dealing with (in the most basic example) by showing you can slurp the asshole they’ve been suckling on better than they. After that, rinse and repeat up the ladder. Fuck, I hate all of you almost more than I hate my fucking self. I eat, sleep, breathe, work, play my hatred of all of you constantly. I can’t escape it, every moment I want all of you fucking dead. In the most heinous ways I can fucking conceive which has always been the crowning jewel of my creativity. Not a god damn one of you can fucking drive, this fucking nigh ton if not more of metal being moved at a deadly velocity at its slowest and you mother fuckers don’t even need cellphones as an excuse to drive like you just escaped the sanitarium. STAY IN YOUR FUCKING LANE, half the fucking time it’s got the fucking lines, you know like the coloring books anyone my age or older has no excuse forgetting to stay the fuck in the lines. Which means behind the fucking stop sign, completely fucking useless to all of a sudden stop in the middle of the fucking intersection like oopsies. Just fucking run that fucking shit. And the fucking following distance, god damn, does exhaust really fucking huff that good? Three mother fucking seconds of distance. You ain’t going fucking faster and you’re actively slowing yourself the fuck down without the room to see when you can pass a mother fucker who’s 5 mph over the fucking speed limit isn’t fucking good enough for you. Speaking of speed, if you gonna whine and cry and post signs about kids play on this street, I best not catch you on my ass going down a residential road going said speed. Rrrrr, yeah the road is where I have to unleash some of my rage cause bottling it up is gonna have it fucking explode on one of you. So just as I ignore your flipping out ass, pay the fuck attention to the drive and the rules of it rather than me spaying spittle across my windshield, beating the fuck out of my steering wheel, giving the bird (the horn isn’t for communicating anger, dicks). I ain’t got the time to waste on your asses so there will be no extreme chasing or tick for tack, only bleeding the poison before it infests my whole day. Fucking jesus am I going end this with a god forsaken drivers’ education course. FUCKING FUCK! All of you can get it, even, especially my fucking family – those who think you call me friend. I hate you all, every fucking living thing. FUCK, that’s so fucking cathartic. Fucking walking around constantly telling myself I don’t get to fucking hate you all, that I don’t wanna torture all of you starting with your fucking children, your old ones. It gets tiring using logic to know I can’t have every last one of you so I should just stick to myself if I can’t figure me out. I FUCKING RAGE, and not a fucking one of you help shit. Not fucking one of you can be served what you dish out. Over here fighting existential mind battles and you’re just throwing out daggers as if I shouldn’t just say fuck it and stab the fucking shit out your ass with em. It’s why I couldn’t stop myself from giving that dumb ass address. Not here, not where I have to be honest as possible, even if it’s (all been) dumb as fuck. I think I made it clear that I’m well aware you mother fuckers can all do your little tracking shit, just hope it’s not my parent’s house you get since I’ve gone and done something only worthy of my stupidity. Only time will tell if I can do basic math and lose the house I forced beyond my income capacity and then I’ll be toothless and homeless. Fuck ya’ll. Guess we’ll figure that out when we see each other. Fuck, it’s enough to make me hope I’m fucking wrong, and the fucking god shit is real so I can pat the seat right next to me when all of your shocked faces come to terms with burning in hell right alongside yours truly. You had two millennia of peace and love to control your asses, haven’t figured shit out so use rage. It’s what the fuck I do. I feed my hatred to the shit I do find productive, like all the hippy, namaste, freedom bird shit. Always wanting to push the threshold of pain, force myself to love suffering. The second I catch myself wanting a reprieve, slap the shit out myself and seek twice the torment… within the boundaries of what I know I can take that day within the regulations I can use without attracting to much attention…. Just something, for fuck’s sake cause motherfuckers even close to my mentality have to stop themselves from doing the actual fucked up shit. “Pathetic, wasted, soulless, compromised” Not being an asshole in whatever capacity we’re capable of doesn’t equal shit tormenting our psyche getting buried…. I don’t fucking know, fuck this world and everything in it. Fuck All.