I can feel my body and mind wanting to slip down the rabbit hole into a state of mental health paralysis. I am fighting with myself to maintain communication, stay updated and not hide under the duvet and drown myself slowly in a vat of molten chocolate whilst digesting my body wake is savoury snacks.
Some of this is my own internal struggle with my own mental health demons, but I’m beginning to suspect the majority of it is pending world domination by elitist, fuckwit right-wing , greedy self-serving muppets.
Part of me wants to switch off the news and hide in my own world. Ignore the multiple crises that are being expedited and escalated by ego manic, power-hungry self-interested corporate leaders, banks and politicians and potter in my garden worrying only about the speed of growth of weeds and the number of insect bites and muscle aches I might suffer. Yet ignoring the problems won’t solve them and turning a blind eye to the ever-increasing number of atrocities being created by the evil fat cat controllers would, I feel, make me complicit .
During the World Wars people and governments ignored the growth of extremist with far right and genocidal agenda until it was too late. The slow dehumanization of specific groups of humans slowly, crept into our psyche. Much as the ‘detention centres ‘ and dehumanization of illegal immigrants into the US is doing now. We are outraged but also in disbelief when we read of children , some still in nappies, separated from their parents, sleeping under foil blankets in 24-hour lit rooms, on concrete floors whilst other humans argue the point of why these kids should be allowed to wash or brush their teeth, never mind change their clothes, sleep at night or have access to their parents. We have people ( and somehow, even more shockingly, women, well one woman) standing up in court to claim that there is no need to provide these sub humans with the everyday comforts of mattresses, blankets, darkness at night, toothpaste, soap. They are attempting to normalise alienation.
Then there’s the Giant Orange Scrotum, STILL (mis)leading the American people despite being proven to be a liar, a cheat, a white supremacist supporter, a fake Christian, a failed businessman etc etc…a philanderer, a misogynist, an illiterate fool, a warmonger… Desperate to start a war , go down in history. So desperate he creates fake conflict. Is he a dangerous fool or a deranged genius. Gaslighting an entire Nation on a world stage. ….
Whilst here in the UK we faff around for 3 years neither implementing nor stopping Brexit; leaving our economy in a state of flux simply to hide or try to blind side us from the mess really engulfing us,; the slow and systemic dismantling of our NHS; our plasma supplies (from people who give blood freely)being sold to China; our NHS cuts leading to emergency departments charging for treatment; our school systems in melt down; the rise of The Orange Scrotums bestest UK buddy, The Blond Buffoon, to take over and lead our country along a parallel path in the name of Ego.
Then there’s the climate and the rapid incineration of our planet, polar ice melting at 70% faster rates than expected. Capitalist leaders, denying science in order to continue to grow their own personal wealth and power. What use is wealth, money and possessions if the food, plant and animal life around us no longer grow; if our land floods, freezes or boils? Go on , keep having those expensive foreign holidays and flying around the world; keep replacing your perfectly good car for a more modern ,more flashy one; stick the old one in land fill; let’s get that 5G and get everyone to scrap their old phones for it; let’s frack the living shit out of the ground… why the fuck not eh; as long as we have more than we need; everything we want; more more more.
Who benefits the most from all this? Corporate leaders; bankers; elitists; politicians. In the fight for or against Brexit, do any of the political parties really care or is it about protecting their individual jobs, status and party. Pharmaceutical companies and energy companies control our governments.
Do any of the politicians really give a shit about anything other than their own power and status? I look at them and I see ‘them’ separate from ‘us’. They see ‘themselves’ better than us. They bring in austerity, we’re prepared to accept it for the good of the country, then they award themselves a 10% pay rise. They (not the BBC) remove the free licence fees for the over 75’s yet they themselves are allowed to claim in (and 50% do). They spend millions trying to catch tax mistakes and small time cheats probably not accounting for something so their income actually covers the ever-growing cost of living whilst they themselves hold open the doors for them and their wealthy buddies to loopholes only big money can follow. Corporations are welcome to not pay their fair share of tax but bugger me, if you as a sole trader take a couple of cash in hand jobs to balance your books, then its prison and fines for you.
Ten years ago a expenses scandal broke in the UK, MPs in an environment of self entitlement and self servitude were encouraged by their peer group to claim for pretty much anything they could get away with; forget having receipts; forget that they only live 20 minutes from their first home and could claim travel expenses anyway. Conveniently forget they no longer owned that house and keep claiming the payments; forget that its your wife/son/daughter pretending to do that particular job at an inflated wage you can offset; isn’t a trouser press or duck moat an essential? So they implement MP credit cards to avoid the lack of receipts, yet this year we discover they have been abusing that too. I’m not stupid , I know that people will always try to get away with as much as they can, however, politicians, give themselves leeway and loopholes they don’t afford to the populous as a whole. Also they used to be more discreet about their self-serving privileges and entitlement; now they use their privileges and separate rules with a ‘ner-nicky-ner-ner’ and a middle finger to the rest of us, ‘cos they know there is absolutely nothing we are prepared to do about it. Nothing we feel we can do it. We’re paralysed by a system that fails us at every turn. Whoever is in Government. More local to home our (ex) MP ‘accidentally’ mis accounted for artwork by manually generating two invoices for them himself. It was an honest mistake guv….yeah right.
Lets not even begin to try to put any morality into our so-called living wage, working poverty and nothing-but-evil-benefits system. The rise in the need for foodbanks; the rise in homelessness; the rise in child poverty and in work poverty. Oh, I forget, its not real, not according to (some) Tory MPs, the UN report is FAKE NEWS! It goes beyond belief. The dystopian reality and lack of compassion, the lack of care and empathy our systems offer to the already struggling; sick; disenfranchised…
So yes, I am beginning to feel myself slip into a fog of despair but I am trying to drag myself out, enough to don my pink top hat , and let my alter ego rise up; to continue to call out the inequalities; failing; the (sometimes) pure evil; the (generally) self-serving ; the blind eye our governance turn to the bleeding obvious; the inhumanity of it and the stupidity. Yes the stupidity. They are fighting amongst themselves to have it all – power, money, a place in history at the expense of it all; the planet; our children’s future; a humankind at all. Nobody wants to give up even the smallest of their comforts; status symbols; growth in wealth yet until we are prepared to accept that we MUST STOP GROWTH we MUST REDUCE and yes it may well be uncomfortable, especially for those who have so much. We have to stop measuring success by GDP ; we have to start looking at the wellbeing of the whole not just the growth for the few. At the moment we say we are doing well when share prices and profits go up year on year… that doesn’t help the homeless; heal the sick; educate the youth; make work pay for the poor; all our measures simply further line the pockets of the already elite. The trickle down does not work . This has been proved time and time again. It continues to burn up the planets resources; destroy the eco system; and marginalised the masses.
What we have created is crazy, and unsustainable.
None of this is funny. The feeling of paralysis I’m fighting is prevalent I think. The governing classes love it. They love low voter turnout. The less people voting the less people the have to pander to and the more they can concentrate on growing their own personal status and wealth. They just want their yes men. They love when we feel there is no point in voting; that they’re all the same; that whatever we do will make no difference; they can then just get on with whatever they want to get on with…mining the planets resources; filling the oceans with trash; feeding their egos.
Maybe the Monster Raving Loony Party isn’t for me; but I think it is. In an insane world the only thing making sense is insanity. I will be standing against the system in the forthcoming local by-election. It’s not anarchy and rebellion in the form of the Greats, but it’s my little way of saying the system is mad, and in the madness maybe a little humour and colour will spark a little more action and interaction in the great pool of disenfranchised. As a Loony, my alter ego, Lily the Pink can point out and ridicule. Maybe I can encourage a few more people to the polls. Don’t vote for me. Vote for change. Find out what’s going on with your representatives, write to them , phone them, make them account for themselves; if none of them will, don’t not vote, vote in protest. Don’t vote for hate, vote for insanity….any vote at the ballot box gets counted; abstinence gets ignored. If necessary, vote for insanity, if it’s the only thing that makes sense.
I honestly can’t believe the current political situation. My 9 year old is fascinated by politics and astonished at how the adults are trashing the world for his generation. Thanks for linking up with #globalblogging