Dump the Kool-Aid

We’ve all had that friend that gets wasted and talks like an idiot; enduring someone’s incoherent rambling about the plight of baby seals and how knees are a terrible design – especially for flamingos – and how the world would somehow be better synced if they were king.

We indulge – no, tolerate – the annoyance out of friendship.  ‘Cause that’s what friends do.  We listen, laugh or politely agree just to keep them from drifting into the rat-trap realm of politics and religion while figuring out a way to discretely snag their car keys and stuff them into an Uber.

But then there’s what I call the “stationary target syndrome” of being held hostage by the weepy unsolicited diatribe of a non-friend: specifically actors, the clergy, politicians or really anyone that has a soapbox from which to yap…. loudly.  And for some reason (probably unreciprocated respect) we sit attentively silent instead of screaming, “WHAT?”and holding up a defiant middle finger and walking away…en masse.  

I understand politicians’ motivation to chase the limelight in an effort to remain relevant.  It’s their political annuity. Just a job. A performance.  Mixing over-sweetened Kool-Aid for a thirsty jingoistic constituency that’s been thoughtfully maneuvered into tunnel-vision reality: delivering  a revisionist message dumbed-down to the lowest common denominator of the mob’s capacity for understanding.

Every venue has become an agenda-laden platform.  I can’t watch a TV show without being bombarded with a social agenda.  Every show – including commercials – has become a social message.  It’s statistical misrepresentation in an effort to mainstream and normalize something that most people simply don’t care about.  

When I go to a traveling Broadway play I’m forced to sit through a ten-minute post-performance pass-the-hat plea for the troupe’s dedicated social cause.  (This after listening to them infusing their off-script political agenda throughout the show.)

And the environment… It’s clearly the end of days.  We’re doomed.  The rainforests are burning.  The polar bears are starving.  The oceans are rising.  Weather is changing.  There are more storms than ever before! 

Hey wait a minute! When was the last serious hurricane? Just wondering ‘cause I’m kinda simple and don’t track micro-degree fluctuations in temperature or storms, although I do watch for tornadoes because they’re kinda cool and I love the Wizard of Oz.  (There’s something about creepy monkeys in tuxedos that can fly.  It never gets old.) AND THE EARTH QUAKES!  DON’T FORGET THE EARTH QUAKES! WHY ARE WE HAVING ALL OF THESE EARTHQUAKES ALL OF A SUDDEN!

It’s all our fault.  America.  Overindulged society of earth-destroying opulence!  You with your cars and refrigerators!

[For the record… that would be the record of the Food and Agriculture Organization…the United States has 8% of the world’s forested areas.  That area has increased over the last 100 years, with the most rapid growth since 1940.  WE have more trees.  And it’s South Americans that are burning the rainforest to make farmland to feed their families.  South Americans are not “Americans.”  Not my fault.  Not Trump’s fault.  Not the fault of “fat cat CEO’s in their ivory towers.” They’re not “deforesting” (i.e. lumbering) for exotic species of rainforest woods, they’re clearcutting and burning vast areas to make farmland to feed their starving families.]

It’s not America.  Not our circus.  Not our monkeys.  

But it’s my fault.  Because.  

Because I’m a stationary target for misinformers armed with snippets of fact that have been clipped and spliced into soundbites of misinformation to rile the ignorant for political gain.

The simple truth remains that America (with all of our collective faults) is the only nation on earth that follows the rules.  We follow pollution control measures for air and water (ask me how I know when you have an hour to hear what I do for a living). We don’t spear whales for food or sport. We don’t dump barges full of plastic into the oceans. We have mechanisms in place to protect our citizens, visitors, allies, the environment, and even our enemies that suffer natural and self-inflicted disasters. Yet for some reason the great thinkers believe that America should carry the weight of the world’s sins on our shoulders because we’re disgusting and unworthy unless we were to live in mud huts and eat bugs.

And I’m DONE listening to the message of projected guilt for the sins of a bunch of guys that wore powdered wigs.  It wasn’t me.  It wasn’t you.  We’ve grown up. The worn out argument is nothing more than an excuse for personal failure.

I’m sick of the hypocrisy and double standard coming from the hyper-indulged elite whose blatant narcissism drives them to unload factless diatribe on a culture of sky-screaming lemmings just to validate their existence.  

Hey Joaquin… SHUT UP!  You’re an idiot and a third-rate actor.  We pay you and your overpaid friends to pretend to be someone else, not to listen to your rambling weepy mantra about sad baby cows.  If you wanna make a difference, quit your day job (PLEASE) and work on a farm.  I’ll even send you my favorite pair of work gloves to keep your dainty hands soft.  

OK, I understand that in polite society we can’t give them the finger and tell them to shut up.  (It makes us just like them.) But there ought to be something…a common signal… a phrase…. chant… something done in predictable unison that will drown out the spewing of baseless nonsense.

How about “KOOOOOOOOOOOL AAAAAAIIID!   KOOOOOOOOOOOOL AAAAAAIIIIID!” Every time they start… until all that’s seen is their quivering lips moving as they snivel in frustration.