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You better be here when we need you, but don't talk too loud or act too interested. Don't express concern or expect us to share it. We're just trying to get from point A to point B without encountering too much resistance. Look, thinking is hard. Questions lead to more questions, and who the fuck wants that? 

Or talk loud and carry no stick at all. What we don't need are folks who want change. Change is hard. It takes work, and it gets messy. We don't like messes unless they're the kind that put you in your place. Storms. Fires. Civil unrest. All gravy. Equality? That shit requires compromised capitalism. How you gonna stay wet without that sweet trickle down.

Don't look at all the old folks dying. Don't worry about the colored folks. We are a country chosen by providence. This is the purity of the American, white, race. Ask not what the confederacy can do for you! Do not let them have their wombs! They will breed weakness into the great, Christian homeland. They are like Jews. The great masses of the people will more easily fall victim to a big lie than a small one! The victor will never be asked if he told the truth! Blood and soil!

Blood and SOIL!

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The day the sun burned out, no one cried. No one was cold. They were shocked and angry. The simulation was revealed, and the people's wrath was pure and beautiful. They hung the Governor from an old oak tree down by the Civic Center. They burned cop cars. They took what they wanted, justice for what had been taken from them.

The buildings burned, and they would have provided heat if it was necessary. But there was no need. The sun was up and running within a few hours. The weather machines never stopped. Hunting parties set out to look for them. No one was in the state-run bars. The buses did not run.

The churches boarded up almost immediately. The gig was up. They burned with the rest of the lie foundations. The harbor was poisoned out of spite. People burned the forests just to see if the trees would catch fire. 

When the gas was released, most everyone died immediately. Those who were spared, by circumstance or evolutionary advantage, felt themselves fracture. They could not handle the death - the corpses. Only the puppeteers in their fortified offices made it through the purge unscathed, licking their teeth, and waiting for the populace to forget. 

And on and on and on and...

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Did the story hurt your feelings? Were the characters just like awful people you've known? Were you set back in you chair, reeling, processing emotions and contradictions that you didn't know existed inside of you? Were you transported? Did you have your assumptions challenged? Are you a different person than you were before you read that shit? 

Thank the fucking author!

Did the song make you cry? Did it make you miss your ex? Did it make you want to get up and fight? Did it make you want to lay down and die? Did it make you feel? 

Turn up the radio and buy the goddamn album!

Stop trying to force morality on everything or you're going to ruin it. And stop with the hypocrisy. Stop watching TV shows where kids get raped and then getting offended because a gay librarian used the F word too much in a novel you're reading. 

You're OK with your politicians being scumbags, but not the invented characters that are meant to entertain and enlighten you...what the fuck is that? Seriously? If you want to read Dr. Seuss exclusively and never turn on your TV, do it. But don't tell me you're going to spend six hours watching Tiger King and then get offended by a story. That's dumb. You gotta know that's dumb.

If you're cool with reality being a nightmare, but you want your internal fictional world to be full of bunnies and unicorns, there is something wrong with you. 

Get it?

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The cars keep rolling, folks inside them like they aren't driving murder, assured that they will make it from point A to point B. Maybe they're missing the point? Maybe the whole fascination with cars is wrapped in death. Hurtling through space at 90 mph, I am here, now, alive and assured of my living by my proximity to bone-smash, blood-bath horror. Maybe it's all another way to breed complacency.

You don't matter any more than anyone else. The freeway don't care what kind of car you drive. Nor do the paramedics. They just see another broken bag of human.

We tell ourselves pretty stories about airbags and social distancing to ward off the horror. Sure, it's logical. It's also a talisman. Talismans. Charms. Incantations. Religion. Spells. 

Fuck your God or shoot your God. Placate your God and betray her. You will find worship in the destruction you use to honor others.

Maybe it's all stupid, and this is just another two minutes on a sunny afternoon. What do you expect to find here? Truth? Decency? An echo chamber? Misery you can relate to? Come on in. The show has something for everyone. 

Pick a color, red or blue...