Do You Feel Lucky?

(and feel free to comment! My older posts are certainly no less relevant to the burning concerns of the day.)

Sunday, January 22, 2017

The Tough Topics #39: The Revolution

Do you want to tell people they can't be mad and madder about society's problems unless they have a solution to offer, outlined in bullet-point form so you can poke holes in it? Maybe you better take a closer look at the situation, captain pragmatic rationalist. These people don't care WHAT the solution is. There is always a solution: it is called fire, and blood, and death to the weak and vulnerable among us, death to the elderly and the sick and infirm and poor, death to those holding unpopular minority views (or simply unpopular minority genes will do in a pinch), death to whoever is on the wrong side of the first revolution that suckers the weak into pouring their immeasurable strength into it. Death to whoever fares worst, surfing the societal collapse. And I suppose you think the rich and powerful will fare worse than the poor and powerless, as things start to fall apart?

Wow, do you?

Just wow. Is humanity perfectible as well? Is there a greater good that outweighs the good of indefinite you? Do others agree which good that is? That would be too easy, though, wouldn't it.

Don't worry. There's always a solution, and that solution is ON THE TABLE. It is on the table RIGHT NOW, as it always has been for the past 241 years. That solution is always on the table, as soon as enough people find nothing else on the table to live for that they can live with. Revolution is on the table. Nothing you say is going to take it off the table. Now you want to say you can't come up with anything better than that?

It will not come to revolution, as long as more attractive options can be found to put on the table. Anything is better than dismissing mounting fury over real problems with "there's nothing we can do to make it better" as it keeps getting worse. You can either put something more attractive on the table, or you can stand back with your arms crossed complaining how people keep getting madder and madder as hell "without providing workable solutions." There's no burden on you, here, except for a burden of opportunity.

If you don't come up with a more attractive solution, somebody will. It will be a very attractive solution. And what do you want to bet the solution will be a slick fiction that seduces a ton of angry people into getting behind something that won't do jack shit to fix things in the long run? What if in addition to that, the solution also provides a glorious hope and a huge release for their fury and frustration in the meantime? Gives all this rage something to do! Makes them feel like they're making progress. Change! Probably something irreversible, and bad.

"Mad with no solution" does not equal "mad for no reason." People are not stupid. Politics is stupid. People who would dearly love to live their lives focused on work, on friends, on family and on living are not STUPID. They are not avoiding the important things: those are the important things. They have their priorities STRAIGHT. And they have every right to feel rage that politicians and financiers are so fucking incompetent they can't milk the cow without KILLING IT.

So what now? Do regular people who don't even want to get involved have to rouse themselves and GET involved? Do all people of good will need to be coming up with some solutions here, or at the very least, joining in denouncing what is detestably unsatisfactory? If we don't, I assure you all people of bad will are looking very ingeniously for some way to harness this force of discontent to their benefit.

There's always revolution. Surely you can come up with a better idea than that.

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