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Social CommentaryVideo Poems

Not Yet Machines

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They say strong men create good times
and good times create weak men
and weak men create hard times
and thus, our time

our lot

damn the complacency
the negligence
the atrophy of apathy
and the pride of prosperity

I too was mesmerized by modernity

I guess left to our own devices
we get pretty obsessed with our own devices

maybe we needed to be knocked from our narcosis
dislodged from our coffee shops
prodded out of our man caves

maybe we needed the curtain pulled back
to make us reconsider our allegiances
to get us to reprioritize our convictions
over our conveniences

to wake up from the slumber of simulation
and become real again

we hereby opt out of dystopia
we reject the false consensus
that has been presented by deceptive despots
we request that you cancel our memberships
your treadmills aren’t taking us anywhere
your water fountains just make us more thirsty for likes

we’re going outside
we’ve got mountains of possibility to get to
and rivers of living water to splash in
we are thirsty for life

we’ve got heartbeats that pound to a rhythm
so sublime
I weep for your trifling algorithms
so shallow, so blind

we will not be defined by the times in which we exist
we are not digits of digital currency
we are diamonds mined from earth
refined by the fervent heat of eternity

we will not be pacified by soma
no matter how sweet
we will not be purchasing property in your Metaverse
no matter how opulent the street

we will not forfeit our bodies
we will not sacrifice our skin
we will have no king but Jesus
we will be sanctified in him

we will launch out into the deep
we will cast these tattered and worn nets
and no matter what comes of the catch
we are done fishing for fulfillment in our own heads

we are done waking to
the morning breath of the Adversary in our own beds

we will change the climate
of contention
we will reengage our senses
as we reconnect with reality
and all the divine elements of our conception

we are not commodities

we will not be reduced to consumers
for we are constructors
and we will build
and serve
and lift
and learn
and laugh
and weep
and dance
and mourn
we will rejoice
I say again, rejoice
for we are no longer strangers and foreigners
but fellow citizens and friends
dogged sojourners in this earthly city
with eyes fixed on the city of God

we see it clearly, and it is beautiful
there will be no more distorting of our destinies
there will be no more consenting
to the forging of our identities
we are beautiful, and it is clear

we are not transactions

you may track us and spam us
you can scan our fingerprints and faces
you can peruse our purchases
and eavesdrop on all of our conversations
but no amount of surveillance will reveal to you
what we’re really made of

we are not information

no amount of artificial intelligence
will ever comprehend the glory of God

we draw from a well of infinite potential and power
so you will not turn our lights out
our parents will be in our homes
not in the White House

we will plant seeds in the same soil
that our ancestors toiled to till
we will harvest our gardens
and savor the flavor
we will reap what we sow
but even better
we will reap what we didn’t sow
by the abundant grace of our savior

we will speak of the creator in awe and admiration
as he speaks his nature in us
and in all of his grand creations

we will speak truth in love
and we will love the truth

we will sweat and strive
and yes, we will bleed
may that blood remind us
that we are still alive
and not yet machines

we will fight for peace
because it is not war that we are waging
this may be our lot
but it is not where we are staying

we will tackle the task before us

because what matters is not the kind of times
we find ourselves living in
but the kind of lives we live in the time that we have
and they will be good

They will be good.

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PoliticsSocial CommentaryVideo Poems

The Declaration of Independence (2023)

By Posted on

When in the course of human events
it becomes necessary for one people
to dissolve the political bands
which have connected them with another that calls evil good
and good evil
when they look around and see
only shards and shambles of a country that might have been
when they’ve been robbed of the rights
which the laws of nature and nature’s God entitle them
in the wretched ruins left
when the long train of abuses has plowed way past the station
comes the somber occasion to declare the causes
which impel them to a separation
the occasion to tell of what we’ve lost
and of what we hold

We hold these truths to be self-evident
which means we shouldn’t even have to say it
but all men are created equal
they are endowed by their creator
with certain unalienable rights
like life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness
freedom of speech, and of worship
and of conscience, these are non-negotiable axioms
as you pillar and plunder
and persist in abolishing them
we remind you that you never gave us these rights
you merely acknowledged them
your only job was to protect them
and not devolve into some
mutant mishmash of ideological nepotism
that would divide us and reduce us
under absolute, diabolical despotism

Let the facts be submitted to a candid world

We’ve gone from taxation without representation
to taxation without restriction
it was not the founders’ vision
to lock me in my house
shutter small businesses
print money as a pacifier and
mandate that I get fired for not complying
as if I should be sentenced completely
on the whim of a hapless half-wit
that can’t complete a sentence
a prince whose character is thus marked by every act which
may define a tyrant
whose incompetence and overt spending
mean that every dollar I earn
is worth pennies

We’ve gone from a flag that represented unity
in liberty, adventure, and sacrifice
to one that represents division
by race, gender, and sexual appetites

We’ve gone from championing equality to demanding equity
we’ve gone from pursuing truth to idolizing trends
pathologies thus marked by the wholesale capitulation of every institution upon which we depend

We’ve gone from amber waves of grain
and purple mountain majesties
to vast glades of swamp
gurgling in shadowy shades of depravity
the tragedy of a system rotted
thus marked by corruption, vitriol
and every crisis being coopted
into further conglomeration of control
you’ve lost the vision

We the people
are not the playthings of politicians
we are not pawns under the hands
of some glitterati imperial brass
the blue collar worker is not the whipping boy
of the cosmopolitan managerial class
middle America is not the armpit of America
middle America IS America

The silent majority is sick of the silencing
not to mention the coercion
the compelling
the condescension
as if we know nothing of what’s happening
of what’s marked by
globalist inquisitors informing us that we’ll own nothing
and be happy

We’ve gone from freedom of the press
to being pressed for freedom
thus marked, for instance
by the big tentacles of big tech
slithering into every crevasse of our existence

Google was good for settling debates
about song lyrics or getting directions
Facebook was great for 8th grade graduation pics
and scouring for old classmates and connections
but neither was ever supposed to determine
the outcome of our elections

We didn’t sign up for any of this

Our repeated petitions have been answered
only by repeated injury
our completely reasonable questions have been met with
only scorn, mockery, and censoring

Because you are deaf to the voice of justice
and blind to the plight of patriots
we, the citizens of the United States
appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world
for the rectitude of our intentions
do, in the name, and by authority
of the good people of this nation
solemnly publish and declare
our right to be free and independent
that we are absolved from all allegiance to
technological overlords, mainstream media delusions
deep state operatives, neo-Marxist movements
global elites, and captured institutions

And for the support of this Declaration
with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence
we mutually pledge to each other our lives
our fortunes, our sacred honor
and our collective conscience
as individuals
indivisible and sovereign

This is not a revolution
this is a remembrance
ere there’s nothing left to remember
for our neighbors, our friends,
our families, and our descendants
we declare our independence

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HistoryPoetry

The Most Dangerous Man in Poland

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born into post-war and post-democracy Poland
from an early age Jerzy Popieluszko felt the weight
of growing up in the shadow of the iron curtain
in a Soviet satellite state

In 1966, at the age of 19
he was forced into military service
where he was met with threats, indoctrination
bullying, beatings, and temptations

they tried anything they could to break him
for in this young man was detected faith in
something greater than the government
but he could not be shaken

In 1972 he was ordained a priest
rather frail in stature and speech
they said Father Jerzy was a pastor
who had the smell of the sheep

he devoted himself to ministering
to holding the torch for the believing
to being a support for the grieving
and a source for the seeking

but as his faith was deepening
the regime was growing more oppressive
any opposition to their rhetoric was meticulously muzzled
as was freedom of conscience and expression

the economy was strangled
schools and factories were shuttered
freedom of worship was forsaken
in favor of state-flavored atheism
and not a word of dissent could be uttered

they said communism was progress
and the church was an obstacle to it
in 1981 an underground, anti-authoritarian movement was created
they called it Solidarity
its aim — peaceful civil resistance to the administration

a large contingent of this movement were religious
and when they gathered for Mass
they needed a chaplain
Jerzy was only one to volunteer

he sacrificed his time, his safety, and his health
to strengthen his congregation, to give them hope
channel their anger, and purify their hatred
to encourage them to not give in to fear

soon, 20,000+ would gather to hear his
unauthorized words of redemption, love, and spirit
his messages were recorded
and spread through all of Eastern Europe
via clandestine cassette tapes
but this of course
made him even more of an enemy of the State

a State that was bent on controlling
not only the actions
but the minds and the character of the people
thus, the entire Solidarity movement was declared illegal

the country was put under Martial Law
and any suspected to be involved
were subject to searches, raids, and lockdowns
after sham trials and forged circumstance
thousands were forced into internment camps

still, he persisted
the humble chaplain continued to champion
the cause with conviction
despite his escalating exhaustion, fatigue, and sickness

the government called his sermons
“seances of hate”
they called him “The most dangerous man in Poland”
dangerous
for declaring the dignity of the individual
dangerous
for asserting that God was sovereign
dangerous
for revering mother Mary over mother Russia
dangerous
for subverting the narrative

so they portrayed him as a terrorist
though his message was never one of violence or revenge
they called his information misinformation
because to their truth, he would not bend

there could be no minister of truth
in the Ministry of Truth

and so the crosshairs narrowed

Father Jerzy was constantly harassed
in suffocating surveillance
he learned that the eye from Moscow never closes
they bugged his phone and
tossed bombs through his apartment window
random speeding cars would target him at crossroads

this persecution pervaded for months
until finally, on an icy night in October 1984
as he was being driven toward a morning service
his car was forced to pull over

three shadowy figures converged on him with nightsticks
and by time they finished
their cowardice had crafted from Jerzy
an unrecognizable crimson caricature

his blood on their hands
with despicable rigor
they fettered his feet with stones
and dropped him from a bridge into the Vistula river

half a million mourned at his funeral
but even more than his martyrdom
his refusal to submit galvanized his countrymen
his courage fortified them with strength and hope in what they could all do
they persisted
and though their exemplar was felled
a few years later the Berlin wall would fall too

For Poland, the long march to liberation ended when
the leader of Solidarity was elected president
in the country’s first free election
since before the Cold War

today, pilgrimages are still made
to the grave in Warsaw where Father Jerzy was laid to rest
at its foot an eternal flame burns
in remembrance
and as a reminder

that you can kill a man that speaks truth
but you can’t kill the truth

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PoetryPoliticsSocial Commentary

A Memoir from the Unclean

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https://youtu.be/W8pyOPR2Ntw
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so the arsonists want to be remembered as the firefighters

what I remember was
that you lied
and said it was okay
because these were noble lies
lies for my own good
you just wanted me to do what you wanted me to do
so the end justifies the means and all that
I call that misinformation
you called it benevolence

I mean, free doughnuts, burgers, and beer
how could I resist

you relentlessly repeated
that it was highly effective and safe
but only allowed the dissemination of evidence
that properly corroborated your case

you said one size fits all
despite the tremendous discrepancy
between a healthy 19 year old
and an elderly 91 year old

to coerce me into conforming
you made my risk calculation for me

you browbeat me with heuristics
and manipulated statistics
on a normal mortal day what was a tragic accident
was now reported to say – a Covid death
so the hospital could score a more bloated check
you abandoned the maxims of medicine
and the principles of its people
you wouldn’t let doctors be doctors
or let patients be informed of options
no, you prescribed the cure
the only acceptable cure
that just happened to be the product
of big government, big pharma
and the mainstream media conglomerate
I know-
I’m just supposed to go along with it
supply and demand
you supply it
and you demand it

if only that was all you did

you bulldozed skateparks
and arrested mothers for playing at the park
with their children
meanwhile millions marched
in “mostly peaceful” protests
parading arm in arm, row by row through the streets
wading through a cloud of viral vapor you said was so deadly
that I couldn’t stand by myself at the beach

you were so wise for
closing churches – those were unessential
you were so wise for
destroying anyone’s business that wasn’t Walmart or Amazon
or Pfizer

you taught children to fear faces
you masked them while maskless politicians pranced through their classrooms
confounding them
you masked cheerleaders
while twenty thousand maskless people cheered around them
you locked us down then
wined and dined with your lobbyists
I get it – how could you possibly be expected to launder if
you had to follow the same rules that you made for the commoners
it’s obvious
I’m the villain here

you promised that shots would stop the spread
you snarled and vilified the unclean
and when proven wrong
you conveniently forgot what you said

you painted circles in the grass
partitioned us by papers and glass
as if our politics weren’t enough
you herded us onto meticulously distanced platforms of pittance

you said there would be no Christmas for the plebes
you partied at Martha’s Vineyard
and pardoned it
because the pandemic didn’t target sophisticated elites

you stripped us of dignity, and liberty
except for those you would vigorously anoint
you told us not to worry
for freedom would soon be restored… at syringe point

you adorned your doors with signs like whites only-
I mean “vaxxed only”

you perpetuated witch hunts
you berated people on planes
you put people in camps
you made contradictory claims
you seized bank accounts
you fired anyone that wouldn’t comply
you tore apart families
you wouldn’t even let them say goodbye

you craved power
so instead of educating the public
and advocating critical thinking
you did anything you could to make their fear greater
you deleted people from social media for saying the same things
the corporate media finally endorsed a year later

you scorned and warned and deplatformed
you said you were the only source of truth
you blatantly branded any objectors
as fools with unacceptable views
derelict heretics and hoodlums
you propped up dehumanization as the proper moral posture
you laughed and sneered when people died,
then told me that you’re the good ones

that seems like a lot
well, it was

and now come the retrofitted headlines
the revisionist history
and all the gaslighting on top of it

taking away mandates does not take away your culpability
I am not impressed with you retracting the plank after you’ve made me walk off of it

I am not impressed when you constrain your whips
I am not impressed when you lift the boot from my esophagus
because you need to change your socks

I am not impressed with your concern for humanity
when your real concern
was obviously how much you profited

I know you’ve already forgotten
and you want me to just forget it all too

well I’m penning these words
and speaking them
against the ominous odds that
some modicum of this survives the memory purge

if it does, let memory serve
let memories be stirred
let us remember
what we all knew

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Social CommentaryVideo Poems

The Fall of Roe (Part 3)

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my daughter
my dear, weary daughter

welcome home

I bless you
for I perceive that ye are poor in spirit
I see your heart
you’ve washed my feet with your tears it’s

no small gesture
to reach for my robe in remission
now, you need not spend any more
of your living on physicians

rest in me
rest from the malaise
and furors of the wilderness
the world and its ways

yes, you are broken
but also no longer beholden
to treachery
no longer a slave to slogans

though you know sometimes
they’re actually kind of true
I did give you a body
and I gave you freedom to choose

but when creature quells creator
and walks only after the flesh
peace and life are forsaken
to be carnally minded is death

there’s a time and place
for the fire that burns within
as for the man that left you here
I’ll have my words with him

it may seem to the world
the burden is unfairly weighted
but I say unto you
it’s a burden incomparably favored

for as the work of creation proceedeth
in this grand and daring story
those who share in this work
shall also share in the glory

but before the great harvest
of ripening divine
there shall persist tares among the wheat
deceiving those who might be mine

they’ll promise empowerment
and go about convincing you
to reject the greatest power that
I could possibly have given you

and lo, the precarious weight
of choosing
for whosoever saves her own life
shall lose it

for God so loved the world
he gave his only begotten son
as Mary can attest – every human conception
is only begotten once

thus, the grave danger
in persons doing the selection
personhood is not a matter
of another persons perspective

personhood
is not determined by wage
gender, location
skin color, or age

personhood
if left to other persons to decide
always begins with rationale
and always ends in genocide

it’s a frail and fallen abode
that all men are dwellers of
I’ve told you of truth
now let me tell you of love

of the inheritance of those
that seek me in meekness
for behold, my power
is made perfect in weakness

I know that parts of this passage
feel like being stranded in catacombs
and I know thine accusers
have gathered and cast the first stones

but in the fulness of time
when all the dust settles
for those on the rock of salvation
those perils will be but pebbles

there’s no wound I can’t heal
no depths I haven’t descended
though justice must prevail
mine arm of mercy is extended

my joy is full
in the saving of your soul
virtue has gone out of me
and made you whole

now arise, listen
come follow me
be a fisher of women

tell them what you know
what you wish you’d known when
you were kin to their conundrum
show them they are not alone then

tell them of my love
in all the grace I’ve afforded you
tell them I am comfort in crisis
I will meet their fears with fortitude

give voice to truth and beauty
where chastity is cherished
tell them to plan parenthood
in the divine covenant of marriage

at the mere mention of such words
legions will swarm and besiege you
it is now as it’s been before
heed them not, for I will lead you

go and light the world
dear daughter, live in me
be of good cheer for in your faith
I have forgiven thee

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Social CommentaryVideo Poems

The Fall of Roe (Part 2)

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so
I don’t know if you’re real
or if I’m of any real concern
but I’m desperate
and I have nowhere else to turn

someone once told me that when all was lost
I should go to you
well, hi… I ended a life
is my life over too?

is mine a destiny of grief
I know it was ungodly
so what’s the sentence for a thief
that robs a soul of a body

do you hate me?
should I even bother pleading my case
I feel like hell
you can probably see it in my face

I guess feeling like this
is likely inescapable
how could someone be unwanted
and at the same time irreplaceable

but listen, my whole life
it’s all I ever heard
everywhere the same view
all the celebrities concurred

it started as safety
but then they made it something sacred
they made cakes, held parades
and lit buildings to celebrate it

they used euphemisms to
sanitize any shame
I thought how bad could it be if
60 million had done the same

who was I to contradict
the mighty cultural curators
that said life can be created casually
and decided upon later

they said it was empowering
they masked motherhood in insanity
they said there’s nothing more old fashioned
than having a family

what was I to make of that
I had so many plans made
they said if I had a baby
that would just make me a handmaid

I saw all the memes
I concede – I believed them
I saw all the smiling CEOs
of course I wanted to be them

for the key to freedom
was boundless sex in the city
I expected happiness
what I found left me sitting

alone in a condo with a conundrum
the guy told he loved me
then after he found out
well, he told me nothing

I never heard from him again
so I took everyone’s advice
if you can’t give her a life
then you can’t give her life

I asked about adoption
they scoffed, even mocked it
they said if I wanted opportunity
I really had no other options

so I made my visit to the clinic
with pamphlets and a smile
they said to plan parenthood
I had to destroy my child

and so it was
in the vice of this irony
I let them kill
the new life inside of me

they offered medicine
for pain and some trite condolences
but they never mentioned
the regret, the plight, the brokenness

the despair
the soaked pillows
the what have I done

I still hear the empty echoes
of “my body my choice”
but now all I can feel
in my body is a void

if it was just a clump of cells
then why
do I die every day
wondering if she would have had my eyes

they lied
I know now that
no amount of euphemisms can hide the truth
that clump of cells was life

and the guilt won’t subside
it’s only gotten worse with
their platitudes of pleasures
there’s no salary that’s worth this

I remember questioning-

would she feel any pain
they were quick to affirm
that it was for her own good
but I’ve since come to learn

there’s a twisted kind of dissonance
in altruism’s chords
played as putting her out of her misery
when you’re putting her out of yours

will you forgive me
will my sin ever be vanquished
or will this anguish outlive me?

I’m sorry
this is not what I had planned
I’m sorry that it took me this long
to finally understand

that among all the voices
it was yours I should have beckoned
but is it too late?
am I banished from heaven?

even more than my mind
it was my heart that they stole
they didn’t tell me that damn vacuum
would suck out part of my soul

someone once told me that when I was lost
I could come home again
that mess on the doorstep is me
can you make me whole again?

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Social CommentaryVideo Poems

The Fall of Roe (Part 1)

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bans off our bodies
this is none of your concern
you’re a fascist, you’re regressive
and all the other terms

you abolitionists
riding your high horses
always trying to provide
the voiceless with a voice but

you don’t really care
you won’t support their maturation
you’re just pro birth
you’re just pro emancipation

our fathers taught us this
for our jobs this is needed
we inherited this culture
you can’t rob us of convenience

we will not abdicate
do not conspire to prohibit
we’ll just travel to a state
where our desires are permitted

we’ve made an industry of this
we won’t go down without a fight
we’ll dig in, we will shout
we are proud, we are right

you cry and reprimand
you try to ban what we’re doing
but you don’t understand
they’re not fully human

we’re doing them a favor
this world’s too much for them
they’d live a hard life
so that life we must end

these are just clumps of cells
nobody’s sons or daughters
we’ve got sponsors on our side
our bosses pay for the slaughter

and what about my partner
you’re always scolding me
what of the one who sold the slave
and the one sowed his seed

illegitimate we’ll scream
we’ll trumpet our benevolence
as we plot to assassinate
justices and presidents

we’ll claim that we’re the slaves
though we had other choices
I guess the difference is
who administers the poison

we’ll take the bible out of context
pervert its words to support us
we justified the whips
and we’ll justify the forceps

they reeled from the lashings
and recoil from the needles
there’s blood on the soil
there’s blood on the table

but it’s a necessary evil
somebody’s gotta pay the price while
you want to save a life
we want to save a lifestyle

this mansion this career
all this pomp and ceremony
without sacrificing them
we could not have won these trophies

we turned babies into burdens
perhaps no one noticed but
we converted the very nature
from congrats to condolences

through lies and clever branding
like “reproductive rights”
or like we’re just granting
their cotton picking rights

love is love
but life isn’t always life
if we decide we don’t want it
it’s just a parasite

tearing limb from limb
is just “ending a pregnancy”
we are not accountable
we are just defending a legacy

we’re the victims here
this is forced birth
you can’t force us to free them
that’s forced freedom… it occurs

that this rings a bit familiar
like some kind of déjà vu
is it eighteen sixty one
or two thousand twenty two?

I can’t help but feel
just a twinge of dissonance
like history is haunting
I guess the other difference

in being torn from a placenta or
being forced onto a plantation
is that in abortion’s aftermath
there’s no hope for liberation

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Spiritual Beings Having Human ExperiencesVideo Poems

Bad News and Good News

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I have some bad news-
we’re all going to die

just like old plants
old towns
and old shoes

but sometimes old becomes new

like a new year
to alleviate the sting
of every inevitable fall
with every regenerating spring

a new law
accounting for the dirt and infirmity
staring us curtly in the face
a new judge
abounding in merits and mercy and grace

a new king
that has no ambitions of land or power
his only ambition to save

a new strength
that has broken the bands of death
freed us from the bitterness of its bondage
and the injustice of its arrest

a new reunion
when, free from these mortal morbidities
spirit and body reconvene
reformed, forging a new path toward divinity

a new joy
from a conscience once paralyzed
when, as thieves on the cross
and all seemed lost
he promised paradise

a new gratitude
for the most important of all days
when dawn’s rich sunlight unveiled the Crucifixion’s poverty
a week after palm Sunday

a new understanding
of that hybrid human-heavenly womb
and the irony that fullness
could only come through an empty tomb

a new testament
of what we got when the only begotten
gave everything he had to give
I have some good news-
we’re all going to live

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PoliticsSocial Commentary

The Collective Rationalization of Evil

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A recent poll reveals that among voters who have a “favorable impression of Biden”, 51% are in favor of the government putting the unvaccinated in “designated facilities,” and 54% favor imposing fines or prison sentences on vaccine critics.

In addition, half of Democrats polled feel that anyone who questions the government’s view of vaccines on social media should be jailed or fined.

I wonder how close those percentages are to the those that were in favor of Jews being sent to “designated facilities” in pre-WW2 Germany. Or to the percentages that were in favor of keeping slaves in “designated facilities” in the antebellum South. Or those that were in favor of dissidents being sent to “designated facilities” in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin or the laogai system of labor camps under Mao.

In these and countless other cases, part of the population was persuaded by ideologues to believe some other part of the population was unclean and less human, leading a large percentage of “good people” to collectively rationalize evil.

“But this time it’s different! It’s for public health!”

That sentiment rings hollow in a world where politicians don masks just off-stage, walk 20 feet to a podium, then take them off to speak. A world where governments bulldoze skate parks so that 10 people can’t skateboard outside, but encourage 10,000 to gather together for protests the next day – as long as the protests are for narrative-approved causes. A world where oligarchs impose lockdowns on their denizen rubes in New York City then proceed to go on vacation in Florida, or dine maskless in fancy restaurants while demanding the peasants cover their faces if they dare leave their homes.

A world where any reported side effects of vaccination are deemed coincidental (“correlation does not mean causation”), but if any vaccinated person has minor symptoms of Covid, all of a sudden correlation ALWAYS means causation and they’d be dead or in a hospital otherwise.

A world where you get deleted from the public square if you even mention your adverse reaction or question three-letter government agencies. Where hospitalization statistics are manipulated so that media outlets can air more sensationalized content.

President Biden, who fancies himself some great unifier, employs the exact same tactics as Hitler, Stalin, and Mao with his “pandemic of the unvaccinated” rhetoric, dehumanizing a large portion of the population in the face of the reality that the vaccinated still spread Covid. Desperate to find a scapegoat for his own ineptitude and for losing a war in which the premises of victory were badly miscalculated, he continues to double down on fomenting fear and division rather than ushering unity. Thus, it’s no surprise that many of his followers want to put the unvaccinated in “designated facilities” until they are sufficiently inoculated and re-educated.

So no, it’s not different this time. The calendar might read a different year. The czars in charge might go by different names. The perceived crisis might modify the mode of manipulation. But the grand intention is the same. And it’s disgusting.

Slavery didn’t exist in America because a few people wanted slaves. It existed because it was a practice inherited from a world that had collectively rationalized evil long before. None of the infamous tyrants the 20th century had any power by themselves – they only accrued power by manipulating the masses against a common enemy that they forged out of their own people. They convinced the convincible that some utopian end was greater than the means needed to get there, and if those means meant forced labor camps or mass graves, well, those (less human) people deserved it for not going along with the state-prescribed status quo.

To those in favor of imprisonment for anyone that comes to a different conclusion about what should be injected into their body; to those who say that thought should be controlled and opinion nationalized, I say unequivocally: Evil is still evil –
even when it’s collectively rationalized.

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LamentationsSocial CommentarySpiritual Beings Having Human ExperiencesVideo Poems

What is Truth?

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What is truth?

Pontious Pilate famously inquired while looking truth directly in the eye.

He knew.

But when he heard them say
away with him, away
crucify him
we have no king but Caesar

he washed his hands of the matter
and did what pleased them

that trial has never ended
every one of us sits on the jury

we are all Pontious Pilate
conscious of the quiet but unrelenting
testament of the defendant
and the deafening resonance of the prosecution
contending with the same question
“what is truth?”

(I wonder)
who is it that would smile when we say that
that we are incurable cancers to the planet
who would inspire the kind of art that exclaims
that this is all there is
who would spawn such a take
that beauty is bygone
and goodness is a disgrace
who would be happy to have us embrace the nothingness of nihilism
who would slither in with such a worldview
who would be objectively jubilant to have us believe
that there is no objective truth and that
we should modify our morality to fit our behavior
instead of vice versa
I guess its vice versus virtue

we all know the truth
even though sometimes we wish we didn’t
sometimes we pretend there is no wrong
so that we can condone wrong
or convince other people to go wrong
so that we’re not alone in the wrong
but dawning the darkest of sunglasses
does not extinguish the light
right is right even if nobody is right
and wrong is wrong even if everybody is going along

maybe that’s why they convicted the innocent
and banished him to the cross
why they lashed and laughed and mocked
and chanted for assassination
truth can be relative if God is recanted from the equation
with no higher being to set the standard for the people
anyone can call evil good, and good evil
there’s no infraction a rationale can’t be rationed out for
no principle they can’t have it out for

the silence is deafening when you mute the immutable
Nietzsche noticed this and noted it with caution
see, the preachers of the post-modern doctrine
are not the first to allege that God is dead
but there’s still nowhere to go after the funeral
in this post-modern concoction
“who will wipe the blood from our garments
what water is holy enough to cleanse us
what festivals of atonement shall we attend
what sacred games shall we invent”
pray tell

how do we declare rape reprehensible
if it’s just one set of molecules knocking into another set that’s less able to defend itself
or slavery disdainful if it’s just an array of atoms arranged in chain-link fashion that happened to trap another
or the iniquity of murder if it’s just one clump of cells determining that another clump of cells doesn’t deserve the dignity

who will wipe the blood from our consciouses
well, if we consecrate ourselves gods and goddesses
then instead of climbing a mountain fo find truth
we can just drag the mountain to us
and demand that its majestic peaks crumble into dust
never mind the civilizations that we might bumble or crush

but
jumping out of 40 story buildings because gravity is a social construct
doesn’t change the nature of the pavement
these shattered anatomies are shouting
that something’s amiss

God forgive this audacity
God forgive us for thinking that we can never do anything that warrants forgiveness

God forbid this navel-gazing
I’m not saying it’s always easy to look up
to discover
but I can say this
we can search for truth
or we can search for comfort
only one of those two will bring the other

my truth is what makes me feel good
THE truth is what makes me do good

my truth will let me be
THE truth will let me become

my truth might get me through the day
THE truth will get me through this whole life
and beyond

my truth will waver, and change
THE truth will not be shaken by my inclinations or your opinion
it cannot be lobbied, or slackened by sacrilege
it will not falter, and will never be altered by activists

my truth will reveal my entitlements
THE truth will heal, enliven, and enlighten when
darkness swarms
when distortion becomes the norm
when the obvious becomes too dangerous to speak of
we must never underestimate the effects
because when truth is the first casualty of an ideology
freedom will always be the next

truth, beauty, and goodness are true, beautiful, and good
and I shouldn’t have to say so

we are not biohazards
this is not all there is
truth is not what those regarded as important tell us to believe
or groupthink that the mob has compelled us to believe

we do not need to pay the toll that they would take
rape and slavery and murder are wrong
not because of protons or electrons
but because souls are at stake

there’s nothing more important than
discerning the difference
between what truth isn’t
and what it is
because when you have no king but Ceasar
you have no truth but his

ladies and gentlemen of the jury
find courage
do not wash your hands of the responsibility
standing up for truth is worth it
even if you’re persecuted for trying to preserve it

fear not what men may say or do
fear not what we were made to be
because when you know the truth
the truth shall make you free

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