The absence of sound.

I have discovered some things about myself in the last three years since I wrote on this. Firstly, I'm not really a blogger, because I don't have the motivation to keep doing it. I almost did with a media diary, but I lost interest in doing so as well. I suppose this will be a place I can keep random thoughts, but please do not expect frequent updates.

Secondly, I've lost all faith in America. This is a painful decision; it's not one I've taken lightly and it's not one I prefer to make. It's obvious that the real power belongs to those who possess things, the 1% if you will. The more people possess, the greater they are. With more possession, people become more insular and less willing to tolerate anything other than what they approve.

But the problem does not solely lie with the 1%. The problem lies with the average American, who not only accepts this behavior, but encourages it and wishes that they too can become part of the 1%. I've seen so many people who truly believe that if they win the lottery, their lives will improve and everything will be okay. This is false: you, as a person, have been emotionally shaped and hardened into the form you take, and the baggage you carry will simply become more expensive. You will never become one of Them. You will always be poor to Them.

The disposable culture that is modern America has come to a head, and conservatives wish to blame it all on secularism and outside forces. This is also false: the fact that Americans of all income brackets are insular and paranoid of everything is what is making this country tread ever so closely to a fascist society.

There is nothing Americans hate more than other Americans.

More so than terrorists, more so than immigrants, more so than any other country, Americans want to hurt, kill, lynch, and humiliate their countrymen. The patterns are historical in nature. First, it was the Tories and the rebels, then it was the north vs. the south, then it was race vs. race, and now it's everyone vs. everyone else. It's not a problem that is simply the 1% vs. the 99%. It's everyone vs. everyone. It's people who hate the fact that minorities have the same privileges they do. It's people who hate the fact that progressives and liberals have any voice in politics at all. It's the coastal states who belittle the Midwest and the South, and the South who declares the coastlines are ruining America. Guess what? You're all ruining America.

The conservatives wish to take us back to a society that they think existed, but never really did. The 1950s were full of tension and abuse. The 1980s were full of the dismantling of the American manufacturing sector in order to support the obscene, corrupt Wall Street decadence at the expense of the people who were hurting at the bottom.

Are there solutions? Yes, and none of them have to involve violence. We need to start fresh by ejecting everyone from political office who has an R or a D attached to their name. We need to start regulating banks and outlaw lobbying. We need to cut down our military presence and give that money to educating our children the correct way, not to standardized tests and to sterilized versions of history.

One day, we'll get it right, but I hope above all things that it will not be after we all die.