Monday, November 7, 2016

One Bully Or Another

Millions have said it, hundreds of millions know it, billions around the world feel the pain caused by it. Our systems of government have been broken. The oligarchs install the people who best suit their needs. In my lifetime I have seen the results of letting this continue. The breathtaking paucity of ideas expressed by the two major candidates for President of the United States of America breaks the hearts of virtually everyone who has been paying even a shred of attention to their antics over the past two years or so. We are seeing the seething hate of folks who think they are discriminated against by the current system morph into hate for "minorities", who collectively make up the majority of the population. We are also seeing those who have been abused by the system the most being bullied into supporting a candidate who has applauded every step of their trail of tears, not as a compassionate supporter, but as a cheerleader for business as usual (in other words, greed, racketeering exploitation and continuous exploitation at the hands of the uberwealthy). Is it any wonder that the average United States citizen just wants the electoral process to be over?

Is it really a choice when you must choose between a corrupt and merciless political pawn, seeking to be Queen and an avowed racist, sexist and former billionaire who has squandered his fortune destroying the lives and fortunes of countless people? The majority think not, however, according to the oligarch-owned media, these are the choices which confront us. Their minions and "believers" tell us that the other choices are futile "throw away" votes, worth less than an old tissue. Some even claim, with a sense of self-righteous authority, that a vote for a candidate that you actually believe would make a good President, or that represents the only viable option for saving human life on the planet, will be a vote for the person we dislike more. Those who are buying the big lie are convinced that this is the best we can do. I have voted for people who lost elections before and that rhetoric does not scare me. I know, in every fiber of my being, that if I had voted for the lesser of the two evils more than once, I could not live with myself. When we make mistakes, we must learn to live with ourselves. Part of the act of self-forgiveness involves making sure we never make that mistake again. Learning from the mistakes we make is part of the healing process.

My mother used to teach me that bullies do not care one whit about their prey. The actions of every bully, down through the ages has been about their own feelings of inadequacy, their own feelings that have grown out of a sense of lack of love, their own belief that they have to "prove" their worth by their attacks on others. I believe that I have posted the Power and Control wheel before, but to give this post some visual content, here we go again:
Once you understand these terrible processes, once you have felt the sting of them perpetrated upon you, once you understand that the only reason those who use these tools of oppression continue to use them is because our culture inculcates the values upon which they are based, only then can one realize the depth of depravity that gave rise to them in the first place. The psychological point of view from which these actions grow is the abused and neglected child that lives within all of us.

I have had many people argue, claiming "My parents loved me.", "I had the best parents, they never raised a finger toward us." or "In my family, we always knew that we were loved." Some have even claimed that, "Some people are just born psychopaths." Science has proven otherwise. all children are born compassionate, concerned for the welfare of others, cooperative and gregarious. One of the best proofs of this comes when a baby cries in the supermarket and all the other children turn to look. They actually care about that child that they don't even know. We were all like that once and only through experiencing our own abuses and neglect at the hands of those who raise us do we become callous and/or annoyed by the cries of people who are hurting. I have seen abusive doctors, lawyers, teachers, soldiers, politicians and religious leaders reduced to blubbering snot-nosed children when they uncover the deepest roots of their own belief that "tough love" is a thing, that abusing others and trampling others rights to be supported and affirmed are less than their own. The justification we use is simple enough once we learn to see it. It goes like this. I felt hurt by people who loved me, so the act of hurting others is actually an expression of love for them. However, when we learn to read the messages that lie beyond the kaleidoscopic lens of the power and control wheel, we see that continuing this abuse, generation on generation can only create more pain and suffering.

Please share this post with as many people as you know in the U.S.of A. We have the largest tool of oppression on the planet, the U.S. military and we are allowing them to export hate around the globe. If for no other reason than to stop the bombing, going on right now across seven nations illegally, we must turn our backs on these practices and call out the power and control exhibited all around us, every day. I have said it before, but I will end with it again, "We are peaceful, loving people and we are voting, voting for our lives!"

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