I grew up during the Assassinations.
Cannabis Prohibition was the window to my awareness of the hypocrisy behind the PTB [Powers That Be] and the degree of social manipulations being imposed on all of our programming. Being arrested and held in a cage at 17 for a pipe in my pocket made it clear. Cannabis was the Gateway to an Awareness that allowed me to question what Freedom really meant.
The Vietnam Nam War helped with that awakening. Knowing that fellow students were being forced to go to another country to kill people living in jungles with napalm was abhorrent to my young sensibilities so I joined my brothers and sisters in the streets and gloried in the sweet anarchy of US, and the true power of the people. My faith in US was established.
I met my first vegetarians (read “Diet for a Small Planet”) while on the streets in Albuquerque. Before Sunshine and Maggie I hadn’t thought much about what I ate. Wonder bread, any meat and canned vegetable, with some pasta and cereal from boxes pretty much covered it, until those folks blew my mind with what can be done with rice and beans. I realized that even our diet had been “programmed,” (to suit the industrial interests of western beef producers). AMERICA became more clear to me. I took responsibility for the impacts of my diet and helped start a food co-op and supported a few buying clubs.
Then I met Jack Herer and “The Emporer Wears No Clothes,” and the extreme manipulations of the social consciousness, around Cannabis made the depths of how we are all manipulated to whatever suits the interests of the PTB – which over the last 100 years or so has been wrapped up in the Oligarchy, very clear to me. We have been manipulated into compliant support of the AMERICAN machine, as oil barons and tech giants decide the Nature of the Future for US, for all of US.
That’s not Democracy and it sure as heck ain’t Natural.
Remember when in this Pandemic we were told to NOT wear masks –
(Why? because there weren’t enough for the healthcare workers – nothing to do with what’s best for US or even the pandemic)
Were we told to make our own? Eventually – but not until they felt sure there was enough for the healthcare workers.
These sorts of manipulations of the Truth and What Is are based on distrust and disdain for US and the sole purpose of maintaining AMERICA for the corporatists. AMERICA can never be great again until it learns to listen to US.
And that will never happen until we learn to Love US, again. The disdain the citizens of this country have for EACH OTHER is abhorrent and sad.
When it comes down to survival and whether or not we love our Children, there is no Left or Right.
Democrats and Republicans are just boxes they’ve created for US, and we have a choice to be in them, or not. They have both played the roles of liberation and persecution throughout American history- they have become tools to manipulate US. They use Celebrity and Demonization to pull and push US, lately it seems at will.
As Nature prods US to slow down and become more aware of our hands and our faces, and how much each other means for US and our happiness, it is my hope and prayer that many will find a new way, a new priority for their existence. One that is so much less dependent on the toys we acquire, and much more on the Life we share. We need to respect and be responsible for the STUFF in our Lives. Think about the waste we create and the pollution we pump into the environment.
AMERICANS purpose for existence has been CONSUMPTION. It’s not sustainable. We need a new purpose.
Wouldn’t it be nice if all of US became much more concerned about LIFE and how we live it?
I want LOVE to Rule US.
AMERICAN Evil must end – and Evil is a real phenomenon that must be confronted and in some ways the current administration is emblematic of the Evil we must face and transform into a force of Love on the planet. There is a very good treatise on this in the book “People of the Lie” by M Scott Peck.
“According to Peck, an evil person:[7][8]
is consistently self-deceiving, with the intent of avoiding guilt and maintaining a self-image of perfection
deceives others as a consequence of their own self-deception
projects his or her evils and sins onto very specific targets (scapegoats) while being apparently normal with everyone else (“their insensitivity toward him was selective” (Peck, 1983/1988, p 105[8]))
commonly hates with the pretense of love, for the purposes of self-deception as much as deception of others
abuses political (emotional) power (“the imposition of one’s will upon others by overt or covert coercion” (Peck, 1978/1992, p298[7]))
maintains a high level of respectability, and lies incessantly to do so
is consistent in his or her sins. Evil persons are characterized not so much by the magnitude of their sins, but by their consistency (of destructiveness)
is unable to think from the viewpoint of their victim (scapegoating)
has a covert intolerance to criticism and other forms of narcissistic injury
Most evil people realize the evil deep within themselves, but are unable to tolerate the pain of introspection, or admit to themselves that they are evil. Thus, they constantly run away from their evil by putting themselves in a position of moral superiority and putting the focus of evil on others. Evil is an extreme form of what Peck, in The Road Less Traveled, calls a character and personality disorder.[7][8].”
From Wikipedia –
AMERICA has been a force of EVIL on the planet for too long – and I’m confident that LOVE is the answer – and the challenge.
Community is the vehicle for that Love and I sit in gratitude and appreciation for each that read these words.
I’m working at Loving US.