Belaboring the obvious, but…
Trump followers puzzled me. “He’s just like us.” Whereas it’s been pointed out that he wouldn’t have anything to do with such riffraff.
But I’ve come to think that, riches (or show of same) aside, he IS just like them.
Even or especially his show of wealth – the gold-plated everything – the empty boasting – the nyah-hah: what his followers admire and would emulate if they were only billionaires too (or so-far-successful grifters).
The memes about adulting gave me a clue. Adulting is hard, boring and not like when we were kids and thought it meant ice cream at will.* These people mostly have jobs, but I imagine that those jobs, like 99% of same, are unfulfilling, tedious, come with being bossed around, NO RESPECT. They gotta eat, so they put up with it – but, hey, trump and the whole MAGA movement gave them an outlet: in their spare time they get to be kids again! Bratty kids. Playing dress-up and having play guns just like when they were ten. (Except their brattiness and their guns have real life consequences.) The pleasure of yelling obscenities at Daddy (Biden at the moment, Trudeau in Canada), playing in the street, bullying their more responsible peers, whining, rejecting homework, enjoying FREEDOM. Telling OTHER people for a change what they can and can’t do. Grooving on conspiracy fairy tales and rejecting all that hard, boring science stuff. Mr. Vice-principal, you can’t tell us what to do, we’re taking over the school, we got our secret clubs and gonna gang up on those losers with their noses in books and the ‘fairies’ and the ones that look different.
And the religious element: God/Jesus (one and the same only not, or something) is the permissive parent. Can run wild and claim Daddy says it’s okay…and my Daddy is bigger than your upstart government fake-daddy – and he says I can have ice-cream.
Used to be society at least played at being adult and education used to be grudgingly respected. A lot to be said for repression.
*https://www.iscaninfo.com/article/9455440/What-If-Ice-Cream-Is-Actually-Good-for-You-
04/17/2023 @ 2:35 pm
Wow. You read my mind. I have been very depressed of late watching the constant flood of bad information spreading its miasma all over us. Today, I was triggered by Windows 10, which I only recently started using because I had to buy a new computer. Windows 10 shows me ads I don’t want to see, creating a distracting environment. that fractures my focus of attention. It also shows me articles that I would never have looked at. Today’s offering was a screed that said all kinds of bad stuff about AOC – who I greatly admire – calling her a backbencher, an English term that applies to Parliament but not to Congress since we don’t seat representatives according to seniority. The point being that this screed was presented as fact but there was absolutely no sourcing information.
This sets me off because it is a primary cause of what is happening. The internet is increasingly being inundated with Right Wing slanted articles most of which are crap.
I will stop here because I am on the verge of becoming incoherent.
04/17/2023 @ 10:21 pm
“…he IS just like them…”
Yep!
This young lady appears to be in full agreement with your assessment and so am I:
04/18/2023 @ 12:04 am
Good analysis
04/19/2023 @ 12:58 pm
Thank you for expressing these ideas so well. It’s how I see things also.
Like good parents, the responsibility of those opposite to these out-of-control children is to find a way to keep them from running the household.
It seems like permissive parenting has been taken too far. Just because an idea is given a voice doesn’t mean it need be given credence, respect, or the opportunity to be put into practice. Those who can have to step up and do what’s right. Otherwise, the children will just be further emboldened to keep going.
Or is that what’s already happening and it’s too late. I fear that’s so.
04/21/2023 @ 7:58 am
Saying this makes me sound like a coastal elite lib, but good education is crucial.
Respect for truth is learned. With poor education, people don’t know that they don’t know. Misinterpretation or simply making stuff up substitutes for knowledge. They might have grown up into kinder more compassionate adults if they’d learned when young about humans who are different than they are, yet also the same. They be better equipped to enjoy life, relish it, and savor it in its brevity. What a terrible waste, to use up all your precious life energy driven by hate and the desire to hurt others.
04/23/2023 @ 5:03 pm
Aphoristic Thought
Revolutions nip everybody in the bum unless they’re on a turntable.
05/16/2023 @ 4:34 pm
Myriad, please do not use the TAGS for anything other than your byline. Tags are not effective with respect to attracting attention. I use tags only to provide a way to create pages for individual authors. I also have a bit of a problem deciding whether you are Myriad or Gina Ellis. Your byline is currently Myriad, but your username is Gina Ellis. How do you prefer to be known????