So then, literally concentration camps. Congratulations, America. This time, we do the clapping.
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I can't possibly be the only person here noticing the world seemingly going off-center these past few years, can I? I mean, I know everyone likes to think they're living through epoch-setting events – everyone thinks they'll witness the Armageddon – and that this is a possibly universal cognitive bias, but as far as my memory goes, these past few years have been a departure from the previous times.
One of those eggheads who supposedly predicted the end of the USSR, 9/11 and shit has 2020 pegged as the end of America's uncontested hegemony, and I really can't think of a more appropriate agent for that than Trump. With that much, I agree, I think capitalism is just past its highest point. But this alone doesn't, I feel, account for all the insanity going on.
Snowden said something to the effect of "the worst scenario possible is if all those massive leaks make no difference", and lo and behold, there we are. Now, we can't claim anyone doesn't revolt simply for lack of awareness of the crimes committed both for and against them. Anyone with access to Google can know that no entity is the world has done more to destroy democracy and human rights than America, yet few people bother doing so, and what's more worrying, the people who do know so don't act, if only because they can't act. Leaving aside the speels Porky wove around the globe in order to control it to such as astounding degree, the end result is that the system itself, capitalism in its present stage, is incapable even of being reformed, which is a portentous omen if there ever was any. Venezuela is in a worse state now than that which prompted the Caracazo, yet noteven the left dare depart from Maduro's utter trainwreck of a "guided capitalism". Brazil is becoming clown world as we speak. And France, of all places, had major riots which somehow achieved nothing before evaporating (and I apologize in advance to the user(s) who claim that seeds have been planted in the form of local-level councils, but I can't see it from where I'm standing).
Like I said elsewhere, something about mankind seems to be fraying at the edges, and I can't define it. Cue the myriad morbid symptoms, which seem to have been multiplying at an alarming frequency; the Venezuelan, Brazilian and French cases, among many others, showcasing the apparent lack of any alternatives; the revolting calloussness over the refugee crisis, rampant alienation and isolation; normalization of the atavic imbecility of fascism again; widespread anomie in the face of universal commodification; the Spectacle reaching its apotheoses as people elect veritable sitcom characters as leaders; the infocalypse unleashed by the internet and the right wing's weaponization of it; and sho on.
Is this "psychic crisis" caused by capitalism's current phase of recrudescence? Is it a consequence of ubiquituous technology (RIP in F, Unaman)? Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if this descent into collective madness is caused by a wholly unknown side effect of progress. I always think about how the ban on leaded gasoline caused a significant reduction on violent crime. It was a positively Greek case of hubris and nemesis, and capitalism's incessant reinvention is particularly prone to such a thing. For all I know, mankind is literally being driven insane because LCD screens fuck the brain's frequency rate or some shit.
Anyone else feeling like this?
