What Comes Next

I was going to write this in the style of one of my imaginary conversations, but elected to forgo the pretense.  Here's an old fashioned blog entry.

For the past two years I have felt a growing dread about our future as a democracy.  I have had people try to tell me that it isn't as bad as all that.  I've had my father say that he "lived through Nixon" and "this is just another terrible thing that will pass."  I've had people on the right laugh at me openly about my concerns.  I have listened to and read the words of people of color who have spoken to the racism they experienced their entire lives and their frustration with white people who are just now figuring out how fucked things are because we see it on social media.  They aren't wrong.  Maybe none of them are wrong.  Well except the right wing assholes.  They can get fucked. I dunno.

All I know is what I know and what I feel.  Here's what I know.  What I know is that the other day I saw somebody on Twitter sharing the tips their grandfather used when they were in the Resistance fighting the Gestapo.  And this list had lots of detailed points on what people in the Resistance did, what everyday people can do can muck up the works of a totalitarian government.  What I know is that somebody else who grew up in another totalitarian government shared their experiences and what they did to survive it.  What I know is that I took notes.  What I feel is that whether history repeats itself exactly or just creates a new spin on an old theme, things are happening now that ARE different from other things that have happened in the past 36 years of my life.  What I feel is that all of it: the anger over police brutality, the spread of social media, the crackdown in immigration, the oppression of minorities and people of color, the rise in mass shootings, the racist rhetoric on the right, the wealth inequality in this nation, the loss of jobs oversees due to tariff wars, and global warming, among a host of other issues that are happening all at once are leading to something...bad. I don't know what the bad thing will be.  I don't know if the bad thing will be another terrorist attack.  I don't know if the bad thing will be a civil war. I don't know if the bad thing will be nuclear annihilation.  I don't know if the bad thing will be a Fourth Reich.  I feel, deep in my soul, that whatever it is will be the end of America as we know it.

I don't know when the thing will happen.  I don't think this is a next year thing.  But it feels like something major.  Like something WW3 major.  Like something Napoleon major.  Like something French Revolution major.  Like something cataclysmic. I talk to my friends about this and it is shocking to me the number of people who are also in agreement that yeah we are basically fucked.  I have a few friends who remain optimistic about 2020, but I just can't.  I used to think that as soon as Mueller finished his report then it would be all over and this nightmare would be done and we could go back to how it was.  Lol look how that went.  I realized there is no going back.  I don't even know if there is going forward.  I really and truly don't know that if Trump loses the 2020 election he won't just declare the election illegitimate and make himself dictator for life.  I really, really don't.  Even those more optimistic people have trouble coming up with concrete answers to my questions.  I

The other day I was reading an article about disinformation campaigns and how bots were creating whole image composites of people in their efforts to sow discord and those images looked so real that I think I failed this test to spot who was the fake.  So like robots are posing as people to influence our democracy and spread hate and are we living in a fucking movie right now because if you say it like that it is legitimately insane.  Do we even need Terminator if we die by a thousand cuts?  Or warm our earth so much that our crops will start dying?  Apparently the administration is investing a lot into space now.  Of course they are.  Because the rich will gtfo this planet before it dies.  That's why they don't care about the rest of us.

I'm tired.  I'm trying to live a normal life and plan my wedding and help the kids with homework and go to Trader Joes and still live in this sense of utter and complete bewilderment whether the life I see as normal will be what life will be like 20 years from now.  I mean, I knew there would be changes, technological changes.  But just seeing how fast things have changed from the 90s to now makes me really wonder what 2040 will look like, whether anything will be recognizable at all.  I wish I had a time machine not to go into the past but to go into the future just to check to make sure we were still okay.  Just a peek.  Then I could come back. SOME kind of reassurance that we, and by we I mean this nation and the vast majority of people in it, will be alright.  I guess nothing is ever that easy.