synapticjava (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
synapticjava) wrote2009-04-16 11:12 am
synapticjava) wrote2009-04-16 11:12 am
Entry tags:
Anyone want a cuppa?
I can't resist saying a few words about the perverts protesting...wait, what are they protesting again? Yes, I am talking about the ever-laughable right-wing-ish conservative-ish "teabaggers."
First, allow me to say how ecstatic I am that finally there is a movement sweeping through the country again. How proud I am that Americans are finally getting angry again, and demanding some accountability. Afterall, every great change in this nation has began from one single person standing up and saying "Hey, wait a minute!" This was true for Slavery, for women's sufferage, civil rights, and the ongoing battle for equal acceptance for LGBT rights. All of these things came about by first one, then a dozen, then a million people standing up and demanding to be heard and demanding to make their presence known. It is, in a spectacular way, one of the greatest things about living in this nation. It is in our blood, our history, and our origins as a country. Because, as Americans, when we get angry, we get loud. And it's only when we are seething and shouting that our various points reach the ears of those we elected to represent us. So with every shout, we know in a an abstract way, the anger we are announcing is directed towards not only the masses surrounding us, nor towards our representatives two thousand miles away, but towards ourselves. I believe this to be the reason we are in a place in history never before seen, with a president who won against all odds in a country that as a whole still sees anything but a white protestant male as less-than, as unequal. We finally got angry and rebelled against what we'd been taught, been shown, and been made by ourselves and our peers to bear witness to. Even in my albeit short tenure as a human being, I'm nevertheless astounded by the true resistance we have when we finally wake up and pay attention to something larger than reality TV and griping about the latest operating systems. It is in our resistance and our protest and our outrage that we, as Americans, have our greatest strength. And it has been too long since we've shown that strength to our representatives and to the world around us.
However, even in our greatness of stregnth and resistance, we are not always the brightest group. This current "movement" is only a mass-produced show of support for the very representatives that are working against the the members of our nation that fuel it, that make it run, that experience the every day life of what it means to be a true American. True Americans are people like myself - even with a college degree, twice laid off in twelve months and struggling to keep it together - and people like my parents and grandparents who struggle to stay afloat and keep their house and somehow manage to pay increasing medical bills. They are people that make minimum wage when that value was blown out of the water by rising costs of living in even the ruralist of towns. They are the people take three different uniforms with them when they leave in the morning, because one job or two jobs just won't pay the rent anymore. We make the fast food, we pump your gas, fix your cars, clean your homes, teach your children, run your prisons, build the roads you drive on and the buildings you live and work in. We are the voice of a failed economy, failing health and education system. We are the children that went to college in search of a greater life - the new vision of of the Great Migration to America. We are the current generation, the next generation, and the generation before us who have seen better times and lived through harder times.
I, like most of my peers, was outraged at the prospect of "bailing out" corporation after corporation who lined up for taxpayer dollars like depression-era bread seekers. I, too, am seething that those dollars have been wasted, it seems, on still more greed and countless benefits for those at the top who already live the benefits of having reached the top - whether by true grit or by true gift. I do understand the sentiment of "STOP REWARDING FAILURE" because I, like most of America right now, am living it day by day as the bills pour in and the cash flows out. But proclaiming an end to fail-safe rewards like AIG and Citi-Corp and countless other banking and manufacturing institutions does not qualify an end to TAXATION, nor an end to the stimulous spending we so vitally need. Without taxation, there would be no streets paved, no prisoners kept from the public, no children taught, no airports or bus stops. We all look longingly at the FICA line on our paychecks, wishing it wasn't there, and we all disdain the check we are writing out the IRS, but the educated and rational among us realize that it is a necessity to keep the country running or at least limping, as it seems to be. To protest taxation is to protest growth or even sustainability. It means that you are advocating more failing American systems, and more insiduous irresponsibility and unaccountability. And I have to ask - and wonder myself - can we afford this? Can you explain this path you are advocating to your children, when they no longer are granted public education or healthcare. Can you explain this idea to your ailing parents and grandparents when an already slow-moving system of care and treatment stops altogether? Can you explain this philosophy to yourself when your already steep losses continue to increase?
Please, be as angry as you like at those who wrongfully recieve the taxes you pay from money you have worked so hard to earn. By all means, be outraged, as I am and countless others are, by the inept irresponsibility of those who have mishandled and unsuccessfully gambled our fortunes. But don't let yourselves be fooled any longer. Stand up and be counted - but stand up for the right reasons. Educate yourselves on the facts before screaming for vengence and shouting for justice. Know your enemies before seeking them out, for they are not who you think they are. They are not who you have been led to believe they are. You have been douped again. Look only as far as the accusers to see those responsible for your anger. Look to those who have recieved gifts and donations and kickbacks from the very companies they reportedly "had to save for our own good." Understand that the chants and shouts you want heard are not your own, but are the product of those who want to distract you from their own guilty misdeeds. I urge you - look deeper than the surface, read more than the headlines, listen to more than your usual "conservative news show." Open your eyes.
I was at first amused by the fact that this "movement" itself was named teabagging. I thought, perhaps, that the orginators of this concept didn't fully understand the meaning of the term. And perhaps they do not, nor do the thousands of Americans ranting about teabagging Washington. But the more I think about it, the more I am horrified by the fact that they themselves are being teabagged by the very people supporting the idea. The representatives and congressmen and right-wing leaders who created and drafted these giant problems are now passing the blame to our current administration, not by pointing their own dirty fingers, buy by riling up the masses and directing them to do their dirty work for them. And they don't even know it. So even this massive protest is only people supporting ideas they do not understand. They are allowing themselves to be led blindly into Idiocracy yet again. So in essance, to "teabag" is be "teabagged."
First, allow me to say how ecstatic I am that finally there is a movement sweeping through the country again. How proud I am that Americans are finally getting angry again, and demanding some accountability. Afterall, every great change in this nation has began from one single person standing up and saying "Hey, wait a minute!" This was true for Slavery, for women's sufferage, civil rights, and the ongoing battle for equal acceptance for LGBT rights. All of these things came about by first one, then a dozen, then a million people standing up and demanding to be heard and demanding to make their presence known. It is, in a spectacular way, one of the greatest things about living in this nation. It is in our blood, our history, and our origins as a country. Because, as Americans, when we get angry, we get loud. And it's only when we are seething and shouting that our various points reach the ears of those we elected to represent us. So with every shout, we know in a an abstract way, the anger we are announcing is directed towards not only the masses surrounding us, nor towards our representatives two thousand miles away, but towards ourselves. I believe this to be the reason we are in a place in history never before seen, with a president who won against all odds in a country that as a whole still sees anything but a white protestant male as less-than, as unequal. We finally got angry and rebelled against what we'd been taught, been shown, and been made by ourselves and our peers to bear witness to. Even in my albeit short tenure as a human being, I'm nevertheless astounded by the true resistance we have when we finally wake up and pay attention to something larger than reality TV and griping about the latest operating systems. It is in our resistance and our protest and our outrage that we, as Americans, have our greatest strength. And it has been too long since we've shown that strength to our representatives and to the world around us.
However, even in our greatness of stregnth and resistance, we are not always the brightest group. This current "movement" is only a mass-produced show of support for the very representatives that are working against the the members of our nation that fuel it, that make it run, that experience the every day life of what it means to be a true American. True Americans are people like myself - even with a college degree, twice laid off in twelve months and struggling to keep it together - and people like my parents and grandparents who struggle to stay afloat and keep their house and somehow manage to pay increasing medical bills. They are people that make minimum wage when that value was blown out of the water by rising costs of living in even the ruralist of towns. They are the people take three different uniforms with them when they leave in the morning, because one job or two jobs just won't pay the rent anymore. We make the fast food, we pump your gas, fix your cars, clean your homes, teach your children, run your prisons, build the roads you drive on and the buildings you live and work in. We are the voice of a failed economy, failing health and education system. We are the children that went to college in search of a greater life - the new vision of of the Great Migration to America. We are the current generation, the next generation, and the generation before us who have seen better times and lived through harder times.
I, like most of my peers, was outraged at the prospect of "bailing out" corporation after corporation who lined up for taxpayer dollars like depression-era bread seekers. I, too, am seething that those dollars have been wasted, it seems, on still more greed and countless benefits for those at the top who already live the benefits of having reached the top - whether by true grit or by true gift. I do understand the sentiment of "STOP REWARDING FAILURE" because I, like most of America right now, am living it day by day as the bills pour in and the cash flows out. But proclaiming an end to fail-safe rewards like AIG and Citi-Corp and countless other banking and manufacturing institutions does not qualify an end to TAXATION, nor an end to the stimulous spending we so vitally need. Without taxation, there would be no streets paved, no prisoners kept from the public, no children taught, no airports or bus stops. We all look longingly at the FICA line on our paychecks, wishing it wasn't there, and we all disdain the check we are writing out the IRS, but the educated and rational among us realize that it is a necessity to keep the country running or at least limping, as it seems to be. To protest taxation is to protest growth or even sustainability. It means that you are advocating more failing American systems, and more insiduous irresponsibility and unaccountability. And I have to ask - and wonder myself - can we afford this? Can you explain this path you are advocating to your children, when they no longer are granted public education or healthcare. Can you explain this idea to your ailing parents and grandparents when an already slow-moving system of care and treatment stops altogether? Can you explain this philosophy to yourself when your already steep losses continue to increase?
Please, be as angry as you like at those who wrongfully recieve the taxes you pay from money you have worked so hard to earn. By all means, be outraged, as I am and countless others are, by the inept irresponsibility of those who have mishandled and unsuccessfully gambled our fortunes. But don't let yourselves be fooled any longer. Stand up and be counted - but stand up for the right reasons. Educate yourselves on the facts before screaming for vengence and shouting for justice. Know your enemies before seeking them out, for they are not who you think they are. They are not who you have been led to believe they are. You have been douped again. Look only as far as the accusers to see those responsible for your anger. Look to those who have recieved gifts and donations and kickbacks from the very companies they reportedly "had to save for our own good." Understand that the chants and shouts you want heard are not your own, but are the product of those who want to distract you from their own guilty misdeeds. I urge you - look deeper than the surface, read more than the headlines, listen to more than your usual "conservative news show." Open your eyes.
I was at first amused by the fact that this "movement" itself was named teabagging. I thought, perhaps, that the orginators of this concept didn't fully understand the meaning of the term. And perhaps they do not, nor do the thousands of Americans ranting about teabagging Washington. But the more I think about it, the more I am horrified by the fact that they themselves are being teabagged by the very people supporting the idea. The representatives and congressmen and right-wing leaders who created and drafted these giant problems are now passing the blame to our current administration, not by pointing their own dirty fingers, buy by riling up the masses and directing them to do their dirty work for them. And they don't even know it. So even this massive protest is only people supporting ideas they do not understand. They are allowing themselves to be led blindly into Idiocracy yet again. So in essance, to "teabag" is be "teabagged."
no subject
no subject
Alas, I don't think that there are many out there in any way interested in my perception of the politics. But it's a little-known fact about me: I love the politics.
no subject
(Anonymous) 2009-04-17 12:30 am (UTC)(link)Yes the original tea party was because of taxes, but this time its about the crazy spending that congress and the president seem to feel will "fix" what is going on. The people you saw at the tea parties were just like you: people who have lost jobs, have trouble paying bills, etc. I believe the term tea bag was related to people being upset that they are not being listened to on how their taxes should be spent.
I believe everyone in Washington should have listened and realized that they may not be there much longer when voters get started attempting to bring in politicians who will listen. I feel however that the politicians won't get what is happening and figure they can talk their way back into office in 2010.
Sheryl
no subject
You are correct - many of these events were not directly influenced by politicians. However, there were a few in which this was the case. And still others that were heavily publicized by several news organizations who stood to gain much from said publicity. But I digress - it was not entirely for political gains.
The basis of the whole statement did get distorted. The valid point, though, is that our current government is spending massive amounts of money. But it seems to be conveniently forgotten by those poised to revolt that a) without placing blame - this hole we've found ourselves in has been here for quite some time - we're just now really being alerted to it; b) why weren't people protesting when we were digging this hole to begin with? and c) anyone with even a basic understanding of fundamental economics should know the way to make money is spend money. Though I'm not happy it is so much, and I wish there was some other logical way, I have yet to see any real possible alternatives.
I do agree with you though - DC really does need to return to the people and the values that put them there to begin with. And I think, as I said, it is always a great thing to remind them of that. But this, I can't support.