Mea Culpa

Sometimes you have to clarify, if only in your own mind so that you can show yourself what you think. Then again, later on in life when you’re being considered for that important secret government mission, it’s a good fallback in case your loyalty is questioned.

I don’t hate America at all, sometimes I think I should but I don’t. Unlike others, neither America nor Baiseball has been berry good to me. In fact, during my time in America my country treated me pretty poorly because of my foolish assumption that the amendments to the Constitution meant something. Sure, I acted out under the false impression that anyone wanted to hear the truth to begin with and my idea of guerrilla theater probably pissed off legitimate theater the same way my Socratic annoyances pissed of the Scientologists. But still, it didn’t work out well.

All of that aside, I love America. I love the idea of America anyway. America isn’t really a country. It’s an idea. The problem with ideas is that they are hard to translate into material conditions. It was the same thing with Communism. Some of my happiest moments were living on communes. It worked there. It didn’t work in Russia or anywhere else that I know of so far. The reason it didn’t work there and the reason that the idea of America doesn’t translate into the America that you see is because people got involved in interpreting it to the advantage of those looking to take advantage.

America is the idea that anyone can make it if they work hard and play by the rules. It is supposed to favor the entrepreneur and the Horatio Alger prototype. It’s supposed to exemplify freedom and other ideals long cherished in the human spirit. It’s been a failure at that. It is, in fact, not so gradually, mutating into tyranny. Things turn into their opposites. It happens. Now, in order to protect freedom, freedom must be sacrificed. What it comes down to is that someone doesn’t want to share. Someone missed that part of pre-school and kindergarten. That’s what happened.

That’s what happened to Communism too. Someone didn’t want to share. Both systems are beautiful ideas. You’re just not going to see them any time soon.

All the other explanations from the most simple to the most intricate are mostly bullshit. It comes down to people not wanting to share. This leads to the belief that there won’t be enough to go around and that leads to people being trampled in their efforts to buy a cheap laptop.

The thing is, there’s always enough to go around. There is always more than enough to go around. If you have an apple tree and that apple tree is healthy it is going to give you more than enough apples to eat. That’s Nature’s way and that extrapolates into all of the other areas of existence. There’s always more air than you need to breathe and more water than you need to drink. I don’t care what anyone says about this, there’s always more.

So when I rail against what I see America up to it doesn’t mean I hate America. I’m just disappointed. I also don’t like seeing people get hurt for no other reason than that people don’t want to share. That’s what’s behind Iraq and all the other bloodfests. That’s what’s behind the genocide in Palestine and that’s what’s happening in The Congo and Myanmar and anywhere else. People don’t want to share.

They don’t want to share power or resources. They don’t want to share the stage. They don’t want to share the fruit but would rather feed it to cattle that drink up all the water and account for a whole lot of not sharing and lead to some fat-cat braying over his martini glass something like, “How do you like those apples?” He’s not talking about tree apples, if you catch my drift.

So all of the people who don’t want to share come up with the most creative explanations and theories; like ‘trickle down’ and privatizing social security. They create charities where the money disappears. They respond to disasters and create new disasters and nothing is ever anyone’s fault. It’s certainly not the fault of the people whose fault it is and it’s definitely not the fault of whatever stooge they set up; whoever they hired on the basis of his incompetence to take the heat for what ‘they’ did.

This is the same thing with war. Wars are created because people don’t want to share and then the blame for the war is placed on all kinds of circumstances and people who are only momentarily connected to it. When I say people don’t want to share I should add something else. That’s not the only thing; not wanting to share. Not only do they not want to share but they want more too. This is the state of Israel today where not sharing and wanting more has been turned into an art form.

This is the state of America today where not sharing and wanting more has led to a whole lot of other people wanting more because they hardly have anything at all. That’s why you see all those homeless people and why you have all that crime and why people are unable to get medical treatment and you can add just about anything here. It’s all about not wanting to share and wanting more that you also won’t share and wanting more still that you will still not share.

So, when you hear me go on about America, or Israel, or ‘The City’ in London or anywhere those who don’t share and want more get together to squeeze a little more out of whoever has less than them well... remember. It isn’t because I hate anyone. It’s because it’s wrong and because it disappoints me to see it when I know it doesn’t have to be like that. It also shames me to be an American.

I was at a dinner last night that was attended by people of various nationalities. At one point I was speaking to a group and I noticed that some people were staring at me with their mouths open and something that was either shock or surprise on their faces. So I asked, “What’s wrong.” This woman said to me. “Nothing, it’s just that I never expected to hear an American say these things.” Others chimed in as well with pretty much the same response.

How do you think that makes me feel? First off I have to live as an expatriate because I couldn’t live as I do and say the things that I do in my own country or they would put me in jail. They’ve already done that several times before. Then I have to live in other countries while my country is behaving badly and killing people because they don’t want to share, while also bullying their supposed friends into going along with it. It creates resentment. Meanwhile, I am one of the very Americans that doesn’t have any connection to this bad behavior. Man... it just ain’t fair.

The killing truth is that none of it has to be this way. Why all of the people who don’t have enough or are pushed up against the wall by circumstance allow these people to go on as they do is a mystery to me. Stranger still is why so many of them support people who are in the business of taking away still more of what little they have to begin with.

It’s past tiresome to watch all these silicone slick faces telling the same old lies about what they’re going to do and then watch them do none of it. In a real world where the idea was the reality these Teletubby monster pigs would have long been driven into the exploding hog lagoons that they’ve turned everybody’s landscape into. They’d have been dealt with according to the laws and principles inherent in the idea of the place that- unfortunately- does not have any recourse to the laws and principles upon which it is based.

Well, there it is. If we could just find our way back to understanding and acting out of the things we should have learned as little children I wouldn’t have to say the things I do. Until that happens I can’t see as how I have any choice but to continue to.

Visible sings: ♫ Pure Sweet Love ♫
'Pure Sweet Love' is track no. 8 of 11 on Visible's 2001 album 'God in Country'
Lyrics (pops up)