My husband and I turned on what is now known as television the other night – a show of our “choice” from a limited menu of what is “free” via streaming services that will now charge you another $35 a year or so to not see additional ads.1 But this had really terrible ads, and it was an old series: Forensic Files, kind of a misnomer with regard to what all forensic evidence entails in my opinion. The emphasis on these dubious forms of what now defines forensics to the point of confusion is comparable to automobile technicians being thought of mechanics these days, in a way. Admittedly that’s not quite right, not the most apt comparison. But the gist of this older school media was to catapult awareness of DNA and other forms of microscopic evidence in order to solidify this guarded science as a form of direct evidence in the mind of the public, which it is not. That is somewhat beside the point, but it grates at my soul when I think and read on it, so I wanted to make note.
The case in this particular episode we were halfway paying attention to was heinous and well known at the time, mid 90s. A young woman, Shannon Melendi, was disappeared, raped, and murdered. The case had turned cold, finally solved by the “miracle” of DNA technological advancement. It was easy to feel sorry for the parents of the deceased, whom they interviewed. Funny thing, the audience doesn’t know who exactly interviewed them. Certain highlights of their interviews conducted by persons off screen were voiced over by a beloved narrator to FF’s diehard fans, and yes, they exist. Melendi’s mother remarked toward the end of the episode that she doesn’t even want the perpetrator, one Colvin Hinton, to be executed or to die for his crimes. She wanted him to suffer something much worse than death, but presented as if this desire for prolonged, painful (psychic and/or physical) death locked away forever is virtuous. It reminded me of post-9/11 “discourse” – “but torture doesn’t even work!” in response to batshit warhawk cheerleaders. Work, okay, but for what exactly? So much of the liberal rhetoric ended there, so you didn’t get an explanation. It was just a thing to say to “get” an alleged opponent.
I had to remark, oh wow, that’s so progressive of her. What a wonderful sentiment. And it’s repeated every day by perfectly “nice” individuals here in el norte. Latent sadism one doesn’t have to fully understand to be coaxed into unleashing. I can understand how raw the feeling of injustice is and the desire for the suffering of the offending party. Personally, I hold grudges and try to keep my memory sharp. But to imagine the tortuous, painful death of my enemy is energy I do not want to extend to them, and I have an idea of what this does to one’s own psyche. I think of them as obstacle, that is it, and then they will be nothing to me once overcome. In fact, they will be nothing to anyone if we all can help it with our collective enemies.
A weird thing the kids say these days, “et cetera-whatever lives rent free in my head” or something, is kind of right, in its post-USSR uber corporatized expression. It’s always said with a wink though, like “I’m not really serious”. But it makes me uneasy. It’s an acceptance of internal compartmentalization, a surrender to the usurpers and infiltrators. One cannot process an event mentally, physically, and emotionally without worrying about rent as a component of being, or having to tell everyone one is “obsessed”. And obsessions can pay the rent now, according to all the “influencer” Kontent that abounds. On the surface, it’s the type of thing to rile up the moralists, and that’s not to say they’re all wrong. But having and making nice stuff and talking about it to other people who care can be fun and it’s a totally normal thing to want to do. The bigger problem that is becoming painfully clear as 2023 comes to a close is that the churning out of this Kontent has been advertisement and simulation of a multi-level marketing scheme and only so many can do so much under this pyramid. It’s not only related to “things”, this scheme has captured journalism now, or what we have known as journalism in the digital era, which is mostly just parasitism. Talk about rent free.
So the fleet of algorithm capos prepare the downline, and the lucky ones who made it have deluded themselves into thinking they’re some type of owner and tell the others they want to recruit (why, exactly?) that they too can be owners. Kontent Kreators, Kim Kardashians. Same diff, and the center cannot hold.
What I am trying to get at is what is missing in a lot of people is significant, unable to be ignored. We make up or accept euphemisms about how things that haunt us – things that we need to sit, think, then act on – are best compared to business operations, and that’s normal. Fantasizing about revenge in this context presents a societal danger even while we are all largely angry for righteous, justifiable reasons. Currently, the KK managers are pummeling us with “dark hordes” warnings and how awful the oh so offensive DPRK is, among many other topics – picked apart from the whole – to which propagandist KKs are specifically assigned.
The production that is Jenin Younes came up in our Discord server the other day, and of course we had to have a larf at her quick caving to the vax passport scheme. She held out till August ’21 y’all, the pressure just became too much. Of course, most of those coerced weren’t simply worried about being barred from brunch or the golf course, but in any case she wanted her fawning public to know since she has done so much for you mean prats.
Such stupidity is celebrated and rewarded in her sphere. This makes no damn sense. She established herself as an influencer on people’s pain then flaunts her access – she could have obtained a saline shot for all we know, or she could have just been handed a check to type her claim out, no [little] prick necessary, and in doing all this dismisses the hard work of resistance as she goes on about what’s in her “best interests”. How can someone accept the terms of those they claim to oppose on the behalf of her supposed client base, that being the general public who continue to suffer from these mandates and the shots as well?2 Obviously, those of us she drew on in her ascendancy have done more to secure her safety than vice versa. You’re welcome, you stupid comprador bitch. It is no surprise then that her failure at being a decent human being follows her utter lack of logic –
Perhaps Younes is an easy target, but it’s not my fault she’s an object lesson in this colonizing mind decay. Related anti-logic flourished among the rainbow radlibs – “I have a healthy distrust of authority and I’m vaccinated!” No, in fact, they do not possess such courage and are currently dropping dead in steady numbers due to the dangers of their delusions and soothing themselves with zoomified fairy tales for adults with arrested development. The complete disregard for the resources available to this largely professional segment to resist the new order betrayed not only their own selves, but those whose lives aren’t as charmed and in doing so collaborated in greater, more depraved stratification. These facts disturb me in such a visceral way though I can understand the processes intellectually like anyone else, but that’s likely because my experiences from 2016-2021 with whom Younes actually shares more in common than she will ever admit were like an episodic nightmare. On the bright side, really! we are now having to deal with the fallout that brings with it ways to act on it that are becoming increasingly likely thanks to the brave Palestinian resistance.
So Younes presents herself as opposed to “the left” as she defines it, but of course she is not as she is referring to pro-covid dem voting protofash liberals, that is, a crowd as reactionary and anti-labor and -resistance as she and her cohort are. I’m not the first to point this out, but I acutely experienced the laying of the groundwork for apathy toward Palestinian resistance and quiet acceptance of genocide among professionals in a somewhat shared sphere with Younes wherein the aforementioned nightmare occurred. The hyper-focus on Trump was of paramount importance with an entire media wing that promoted all he represents to the faux-progressive protofash who could only bark for more. This was inescapable if you were in law so thoroughly infiltrated by the TFA (Teach for America) effort, a highly effective front. It is shocking in retrospect, from 2014 on. Trump was merely a rotten shell in their warped view that they needed to molt in order to openly scapegoat and purge those who have always stood with Palestine and human liberation throughout covid.
Many of us still stand and now we know where else we must concentrate our efforts and energy going forward. Does all this psychologizing matter? I mean it’s not just that. If the internal goings on in Israel prove anything, it’s that the chaos of the broken colonized, rotted mind presents its own dangers as we face each new battle that will only intensify in the coming years. The missing pulls back under the pyramid quickly turning into loose sand as we attempt to slouch – to realize the unstoppable beast-like fury that only appears as ugly to a very few who really top the pyramid as it still stands, as they try to arrange every grain just so in their panic to remain.
- This resurrection of more traditional advertisement as we move into 2024 and away from the subscription model deserves greater attention as @mojowjowjow7 recently pointed out with an article he shared. The author provides valuable perspective when thinking about the multi-pronged, well mapped out plan for destroying all remnants of the social production of knowledge that we continue to suffer from. ↩︎
- @corruptedbysin also caught her doing this pseudo-opposition forgiveness shtick in which she benevolently speaks to all our benefit, once again! ↩︎
kariflack 