In the end we went the way of the dinosaur
not because of any asteroid or apocalyptic disease,
nor because we failed to adapt quickly enough to environmental changes,
but because we got bored. caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/we-ended-it-…
We let the bastards (who were just as bored as the rest of us)
wave their warheads around like dongs at a bachelorette party,
even egging them on, calling for starvation sanctions
and no-fly zones and endless escalations in brinkmanship,
because there was nothing new on Hulu,
because CNN needed the ratings,
because they canceled Jerry Springer,
because they don't let you smoke anywhere these days,
because snarling at Putin made us feel giddy and euphoric
in a way we didn't quite understand but kind of scared us,
because our friends stopped letting us masturbate our drama addiction on them,
because we shuddered at the thought of a boring world where nations simply get along
and collaborate toward the highest interest of all beings,
because that wouldn't feed our egoic hungry ghosts,
wouldn't give us the exhilarating conflicts we've been trained to expect by Hollywood,
wouldn't distract us from the echoing screams of our early childhood trauma,
wouldn't engorge our sex organs and release adrenaline and endorphins
and assist us in our interminable quest to be
anywhere but here.
We ended it all out of boredom.
Because we never figured out how to be okay with what is.
Because we never learned how to let our restlessness drain from our legs
and from our minds and down into the earth which birthed and sustained us.
Because we could never create enough space to let the beauty in
and be uplifted by the sunlight and the birdsongs and the wind in our hair
instead of by fighting and hating and selfing and othering.
A strange primate species showed up,
looked around,
couldn't quite make sense of the place,
and checked out.
And now we are gone,
like the tyrannosaurs and the mastodons
and the dead stars and the forgotten gods.
A foolish mistake made playing foolish games
opened a Pandora's box labeled "NO TAKESIES BACKSIES",
and the rest, as they say,
was the end of history.
But hey.
Bright side.
At least we're not bored anymore.
We Ended It All Out Of Boredom (Audio)
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The word "detente" has been deliberately scrubbed from the western lexicon. This has created a false dichotomy where everyone thinks the only choices are either escalate until we have a nuclear war or "OMG SO JUST GIVE PUTIN WHATEVER HE WANTS AND LET HIM TAKE OVER EUROPE???"
Any time you oppose freakish world-threatening escalations that's the response you always get: "SO JUST GIVE IN TO THE BULLY AND LET HIM HAVE EVERYTHING???" They're sincerely unaware that there's a third choice between World War 3 and making Putin Emperor of Planet Earth.
This is by design, because detente and US unipolar hegemony are mutually exclusive. You can't let Russia be its own nation and also dominate the entire planet; it's either one or the other. Detente was a popular concept back when we lived in a *multipolar* world, during the USSR.
I've lost count of how many times I've seen major western institutions humiliate themselves with propaganda glorifying Ukrainians who on closer examination turn out to be neo-Nazis. It's a daily occurrence now.
The US empire has had a standing policy of preventing the rise of any rival superpowers since the USSR collapsed. Both Moscow and Beijing have refused to kiss the imperial ring and crippling Russia is an essential part of hamstringing China's rise. This was all planned years ago.
Gilbert Doctorow described back in 2017 how Moscow and Beijing have formed a mutually beneficial "tandem" based on their respective strengths; Russia as a major military force willing to confront the US empire, and China as a rising economic superpower. consortiumnews.com/2017/10/23/rus…
Empire architects had previously expected that Moscow would be forced to pivot to Washington and become a member state of the empire. The fact that it chose Beijing instead to retain its sovereignty is what set all this in motion.
I reckon it's not about fweedom and democwacy at all but is in fact really all about uniting the entire planet under one power structure by working to absorb all countries into the US-centralized empire and toppling any government that refuses.
Can't help but wonder if Australians like myself will soon be labeled "of strategic interest to Russia" for circulating unauthorized ideas about this conflict.
"The men targeted are journalists, authors or Putin's press officers."
We don't make a big enough deal about how MSNBC fired Phil Donahue for not supporting the Iraq war. Couldn't ask for more damning evidence that mass media institutions care about ratings and propaganda and not truth or facts or holding the powerful to account.
Corporate media have every incentive to beat the drums of war as loud as possible 24/7, from ratings to maintaining access to government officials to defending the status quo their plutocratic owners have built their kingdoms upon.
Anyone who wants to make money in news media now knows that in order to do that you've got to consistently demonstrate that you will always promote the interests of the oligarchic empire at every opportunity. Donahue didn't play the game.