Thread by @thrasherxy

1. I’ve been thinking all day—all week, really—about what George Carlin called the old “American okie-doke, which has been dominating the last few news cycles, amirite?
8:24 PM · Oct 8, 2019·Twitter Web App

2. BC there is “just enough bull shit to hold this country” together, the elites are constantly singing the praises of the American okie-doke. Politicians, legacy journalists, pop culture icons: The all use the social control of “can’t we all just go along to get along?”

3. There’s a reason elites are weaponizing friendship & shaming dissent: it helps keep the “bull shit” going, so that the power structure remains unperturbed. They want hugs without accountability to mitigate anger & dissuade responsibility for injustice.

4. Why do you see @jessesingal saying there’s nothing racial in Guyer’s hugs? Why is @mikiebarb praising Ellen & Bush’s embrace? Why is ELLEN hanging w a homophobic war criminal?

Signal, Barbaro & Ellen are embracing the American Okie-Doke: they want you to SMILE & not SCREAM.

@jessesingal @mikiebarb 5. Ellen posted this message in a blatant act of what we queer scholars call pinkwashing & homonationalism: She is giving cover to a war criminal under the banner of loving America. This is an imperial tactic To dissuade dissent “for the good of the country.”

@jessesingal @mikiebarb 6. If you want to listen to a lesbian in this moment, listen to Audre Lorde on the uses of anger. The elites like Ellen would have us believe anger isn’t worthy of even George “I’ll use fags marrying to win Ohio In 2004” Bush! Audre wouldn’t have it.

@jessesingal @mikiebarb 7. Elites want you to swallow your anger and let it eat you. They don’t want you to act on it. But as our good sister Audre taught us,

@jessesingal @mikiebarb 8. I mean, why on earth is CNN paying @CillizzaCNN millions to write such drivel? It’s because he will sing you that ol’ lullaby, the American okie-doke. He will try to narcotize you from any sense of critical thought, anger or desire to undo injustice.

@jessesingal @mikiebarb @CillizzaCNN 9. Now, the okie doke doesn’t start with entertainers or “journalists.” Nope. It starts at the top. You had Obama not prosecuting Bush war criminals & Wall Street frauds. theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

@jessesingal @mikiebarb @CillizzaCNN 10. Pelosi did NOT want to go after Trump. He wasn’t “worth it.”

Bc this country HATES to hold power to account.

Or to wrestle with history.

Or to deal with reality as it is! It prefers a fantasy of forgiving Negroes, punishment free bank fraud & mindless happiness

🙃

🎤

@jessesingal @mikiebarb @CillizzaCNN 11. One more thought: Of course, what I have been trying to say was already better said by James Baldwin. As journalists, politicians and humans, it is a disservice not to face reality with one another. We owe it to each other.