I've written a lot on fear and how Bushco uses it to keep the sheeple huddled in the pasture, but I have a difficult time accepting how people give themselves up so easily. Understanding is not the same as accepting. That's why I can see the manipulation of fearmongering when it appears as primary color terror alerts that make it simple to stay in the right stage of fear, and it's why I can take apart tactics and see that making people dump out their liquids in the airport line is training them to stand in stupid lines like herds of obedient cattle without asking too many questions or demanding too many rights. But it doesn't explain why people allow themselves to be subjected and manipulated in such a way.
Sure you say, and how do I get on a plane without being a stupid ass sheep? I don't. I haven't flown for three years. I drive everywhere. Yes, it takes me longer to drive than fly, but then I haven't really needed to go anywhere that I couldn't get to in two or three days of driving. It helps that I love traveling by car. I love stopping in small new places and going for walks and getting to know people. I don't know yet what I'll do when I have to fly somewhere because I won't have the required amount of time to drive. Maybe I'll take a train. Maybe I'll join up with one or more people who feel like I do and we can drive in shifts. I just don't know because I'm not in that situation yet. I used to fly two or three times a month for my job. I've managed to still do my job and turn the required traveling that I used to dread, into a series of mini-vacations. I feel a personal sense of victory in denying the airlines my cash for the last three years. They've lost thousands of my dollars and I've kept my sense of self intact.
I also know there are some especially distasteful reasons that people sell out and many times it is because they want something in return for that. I think of people in positions of power who could have come forward and said what they knew about Bush and his lies before all these people died. But they held their nose because it meant a promotion, an opportunity to make money, a chance to meet someone influential, an in to some situation of exclusivity they might otherwise be denied. These are the people with blood on their hands, and they will eventually wake in the night trying to wash it off and discovering that it is burned into their souls.
But the ones I pity are the poor fools who huddle in that pasture and live in such fear because they have no self to lose. They don't even know they have such a thing. And if they accidently stumble on it, if they suddenly against all odds wake up one day and discover they have a mind and it was meant to think for itself, well...I don't want to be around to see that. It's not pretty when someone realizes they've been played for a fool, especially when it's Bushco that took their religious faith and played it as it were nothing more than a shiny toy they would later discard when it outlived its usefulness. Just like Gays, any people of faith who vote for more of the same will have only themselves to blame when the door on the pasture slams shut and they can no longer leave it standing up.
Design from Ursine Logic where getting scared for Halloween is a good thing.
