on keeping quiet

In the years leading up to America's Revolutionary War, a group of persons calling themselves the Sons of Liberty cried foul of the corruption and abuse they suffered under British rule. Among the patriots was Samuel Adams, whose pamphlets, along with Paine's book Common Sense, helped convince the colonials that sharp rebellion against tyranny was preferable to dull suffering at the hands of tax-hungry bureaucrats. Time heals all wounds; it also obscures the lessons of the past. Such is the uniformity in America today, such is the average citizen's conformity to rigid social norms, that we resemble bad clones of worse stereotypes more than we do unique individuals. The lies repeated in person and in commercials by corporations, newscasters, politicians, and pastors have convinced large numbers of formerly stout-hearted Ynki that buying foods in bulk and abandoning humble personal development for brash football fandom leads to Happiness, that it's OK to hate brown people who hopped a fence in order to pick lettuce in Arizona for fourteen hours a day, and that everything in life will be easy so long as one worships a bearded White god while in the presence of one's nit-picking, judgmental neighbors.

A quote from 1984 by George Orwell came through on the tumblrbot recently, one as chilling as it was accurate. “Heavy physical work,” Orwell wrote, “the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbors, films, football, beer, and above all, gambling filled up the horizons of their minds. To keep them in control was not difficult. All that was required of them was a primitive patriotism which could be appealed to whenever it was necessary to make them accept longer working hours or shorter rations. And when they did become discontented, as they sometimes did, their discontentment led nowhere, because being without general ideas, they could only focus it on petty grievances.” Few authors have with greater accuracy predicted that Americans by the hundreds of thousands would sacrifice personal independence and self respect for consumption-oriented wage slavery.

While reviewing the pieces I wrote that are critical of contemporary American society, I realized that many of the dangers I spoke about were methods implemented purposefully in order to keep the American people docile, content, and in the dark. (“They who sacrifice Liberty for safety deserve neither.” Source unknown.) If I keep going along my current alarmist path, I may well be singled out for reeducation and forcibly lobotomized. Far better were it for me to fall into my pigeon hole along with everyone else, rack up personal debt, watch hours of television every day, eat fast food, and drive my car regularly; far better were it for me to dance the zombie dance of the blissfully aloof rather than bicycling, recycling, learning how to grow my own crops, running my household on solar power, and dialing back my consumerism to the point where I am clothed and fed but little else. I refuse, moreover, to buy chocolates on Valentine's day, to say that I support the troops without actually doing anything to support the troops, to let cars take my right-of-way while I am bicycling, to glue an American flag to an article of my clothing, or to participate in the racism that is carefully calculated to keep us little guys fighting each other rather than the conglomerated and incorporated juggernauts that have all but brought this country to its knees. Therefore, in the spirit of our Founding Persons, with thoughts turned to old man Adams and his ilk, I shall keep up this fight until goodness and Happiness have vanquished the forces of hatred and greed, risking Life, Liberty, and sacred Honor to defend this country's founding ideals. Morituri te salutamus, and huzzah.

mentiri factorem fecit – 場黑麥

on nine eleven

  On this day we mark a decade since the events surrounding the 11th of September, 2001. Many changes have taken place in our nation since that bright summer day, some that restrict us in our liberty, others that inconvenience to little noticeable advantage. Absent clear and defining purpose, we have foundered collectively among the shoals of short-sightedness and greed, bruised badly by the false promise of unlimited consumer credit, our public figures beating the drums of nationalism and xenophobia in tones ever more vituperative and religious, the cultural diversity of our peoples muted by creeping corporate homogenization, our inventiveness forgotten in the face of gadgets that rarely prove convenient to the economics of time, our artistic creativity lost in the mirror-maze of sequels, mash-ups, and gimmickry, our citizens willfully abusing the national flag in misguided attempts to prove to others their patriotism, that deep and pure sense of pride that shines most brightly when it is cultivated within the confines of the heart, a sense that shrinks when displayed too prominently.

  I was in Manhattan that day; I volunteered three days later in the dust and wreckage blanketing the North Cove; I lost a fraternity brother who had just started work high up in the North Tower. But, then as now, I will never succumb to fear, never believe in America-über-alles, never discriminate against someone because of their choice of religion, never accept torture as a means necessary to the common defense, never disgrace the Stars and Stripes to prove to another my love for country, and never cease in my attempts to secure the Blessings of Liberty to myself, my brothers and sisters, and our Posterity.

  My the people who died on that September day not so long ago continue to rest in peace.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp