So figured I should write a little something. Beckett seems to have gone all doom and gloom, so I guess I’m just gonna brush on that. No full treatment, just some fun.

I give you Beckett’s

Something Bad Isn’t Coming, It’s Here

If you’re paying the least bit of attention, you can see there’s something very wrong with our world right now. If you read or watch just a bit of news, you can see that politics throughout the West has reached a level of ineptitude not seen in over a century. And if you have just a bit of magical awareness you can see that this badness extends across the Veil and into the world of spirit.

Has it really though? Frankly, given my studies of history the present political landscape looks much the same it has for the last several hundred years. Demagogues, criminals, socialists, totalitarians, and the occasional rationalist or libertarian trying to speak reason. Admittedly, there’s an uber-feminist in charge of Canada establishing his cabinet based on gender rather than merit, the present leader of Germany has no problem with “refugees” raping the women of her country, Sweden has thrown it’s people completely under the bus, and in America we’re looking at our best option being a demagogue because the other two consist of a Criminal responsible for dozens of deaths and a socialist who doesn’t understand money.

Then again, when hasn’t this been the case in history (especially politics).

Now, are things bad on the other side of the magical border? Well…yes. I’m not going to deny that some really bad shit is happening over there. Part of the reason I’ve been fairly quiet. But to paraphrase from MIB…there’s always something horrific coming on the other side. That’s why we have Gods.

Fools deny there’s a problem, politicians insist everything will be OK if you’ll just vote for them (and the world will go to hell if you vote for the other party), and skeptics insist it’s just the ups and downs of life and it will all even out over time.

Well, yes, fools will tend to deny there’s a problem. On the other hand, not every problem truly exists and to call people fools simply because they don’t believe in your “problem” is bad form. As for politicians, they always believe they have the solution and that the other side’s answer to the problem is going to make it worse. If the other guy’s solution actually was a solution, they would be voting for him.

Why do you think the GOP had like 30 candidates to start off with? Everyone had a different solution for the problems they saw and decided to step up and do something about it. That’s how a democracy works.

This is complicated. Let me be blunt. If you think there’s one cause to this, you’re wrong. If you think there’s one root cause, you’re still wrong. This is a complicated situation with its roots in Nature, in human nature, in our political and economic systems, in our religions and their many manifestations, and in our history and the countless decisions we and our ancestors made that brought us to this point.

Well if the problem arises in nature, i would say that is the “root” cause.

Still, we are the results of many choices over the centuries. Though their are a few points in time where something drastic could have changed things, or are responsible for where we are now. For example, if the English had sided with the Germans in WWI, it is likely that the holocaust and WWII would not have happened for a lot of reasons. Separate post, but it shows how things decades ago can radically shape our present world.

Most people don’t like complexity. They want everything reduced down to one thing they can focus on, and they’ll get behind anyone who tells them a complex world is simple, even if there’s no more substance to it than “make America great again.”

Oh, you mean like this guy who I’m pretty sure Beckett voted for?

Yeah, Trumps dangerous and bad because he uses slogans promising hope to a downtrodden people. Of course, our present president did the exact same thing when he got started and I don’t recall seeing Beckett compare Obama to anyone nasty.

Politics, huh?

And speaking of Donald Trump, he’s a not the cause of this. He’s both a symptom of the larger situation and someone who’s observant enough and amoral enough to take advantage of it.

So….Cruz is bad because he’s a “Theocrat” driven by his morality. And Trump is bad because he’s amoral. K. I guess we’re making moral judgements about people if they aren’t following our morality, eh Beckett?

Well, at least Beckett is one of the few who hate Trump that can at least see Trump isn’t the cause of all this…

We’re living in the early years of The Long Descent, so named by John Michael Greer. It refers to the decline of Western society in general and the American empire in particular. I disagree with John Michael on some of the specifics, but his general hypothesis – that every empire in the history of the world has eventually collapsed and this one is no exception – is strong. This will not be a sudden shift – we won’t hit bottom for a couple hundred years. But make no mistake – our empire is in decline, and no fascist nativist strongman can stop it.

Okay, I’m going to disagree with the whole “American Empire” thing here for a couple reasons. 1) America does not work like any empire in the history of empires. Yes, America does have the strongest military in the world, with military bases around the world, and it does have some minor influence on the politics of other nations. However, America does not own the nations in which it’s bases are located. At ever turn (outside our originating land mass, and even then in some cases) any invaded nation is then returned to it’s people. 2) In order for there to be an Empire, there must be an Emperor. That’s where the terms come from. You can’t have one without the other. When the British had and empire, they had a King and Queen and they were the emperor and empress of that empire. The American president is not an emperor.

Now, is the USA in a Long Decline? I can’t say. It’s too early to say. You really can’t say that historically until long after it has passed. Nations rise and fall, some to rise again. Sometimes a fall is just a dip. Look at Rome, High times, low times, then high times again. To say that a nation barely 300 years old has already peaked and is now falling forever is bullshit and fearmongring. Sure, I get it, times are tough, but to just presume that means failure is inevitable is what will make failure inevitable.

As for some “fascist nativity strongman” correct me if I’m wrong, but right now Beckett is backing Sanders. a “Socialist utopianist.” The only kind of people on the planet with a worse record for saving anything than fascist strong men. Except that I can actually point to places in history where the “fascists” actually managed to make things better for their people.

The Neoconservative warmongers try to sell us on the idea that victory means wiping your enemies from the face of the Earth, after which all will be well. In the real world this is not a recipe for victory, it’s a recipe for endless war.

Actually, I’m pretty sure that war is endless anyways. There is always going to be war, there is always going to be some people fighting a war. At least with the idea of “wiping out ones enemies” you do remove those enemies from fighting you in the future. Sure, there will be new enemies, but there were going to be new enemies regardless. Typically in the form of some group who wiped out their last enemies and figure their luck is going pretty good, they can take you on.

But then I worship Bellona and Mars, so I could be biased.

However, what is the counter idea here? If we’re going for the opposite political spectrum I would say the “social justice” folks in which case I’ve not seen any general attitudes of mercy in them towards those who believe differently. If a neocon wants to wipe out his enemies, an SJW wants to exterminate them.

It’s a bit like watching Cybermen and Daleks, when you get down to it.

Whatever this “something bad” is – and to the extent that a combination of multiple separate forces can be spoken of as though they were a singular “something” – it can’t be defeated, at least not in the short term, and not by any individual or small group.

But it can be resisted.

Well…I guess Beckett’s given up all hope then.

The first part of being defeated is admitting that you can’t win. I never admit defeat because I always believe there is some way to win. I believe that any individual can overcome anything if they put their will and mind to it. It would seem that as a far as Beckett is concerned he’s already lost and now he wants to throw a tantrum about it.

And the thing is, Beckett isn’t even saying what this “bad thing” that’s here is? I mean, if I was going to start wearing a sign and screaming “the end is nigh” like Beckett here is, I’d at least have a concrete thing to say “this is the end which is nigh.”

So what is it to even be resisted?

Deal with it. I can’t believe we still have to protest this shit either, but we do. Don’t think for a minute that the battle for marriage equality is won and the road to full LGBT acceptance is all downhill from here. Do what you have to do to make the world a better place, and do what you do best.

On the one hand, I would point out that gay marriage is now technically a right in the Constitution so…yeah. You pretty much won. No small or large business would dare deny you anything (in fact, they pretty much can be enslaved to aid gay marriages), gay marriage is legall recognized throughout the land, and almost every gay couple I know anywhere near that stage in their relationship is getting married so…kinda the norm. Sure, there’s some salty people worried that this new law is going to get their religious labeled as hate organizations, but hey, you’ve already all but won that fight too.

Be awake. Be observant. Listen more than you talk. Read and listen to people with different political, economic, and religious views than your own. Don’t listen to rebut, listen to learn. You may pick up some facts you’d otherwise miss. You may learn that people who think differently from you aren’t ignorant, stupid, or mean-spirited, they just have different ways of seeing the world and different priorities around what’s most important.

Beckett, I want you to please take this attitude and go to a Trump Rally. And a Cruz rally. Please, please do this.

Because I find it absolutely hilarious that a man who has done nothing but strawman and vilify Trump and Cruz, along with their followers, as ignorant, stupid, mean-spirited, and down right evil would have the balls to come out and tell people to do this.

Build your tribe. You aren’t going to survive this alone. And at the risk of sounding like a Libertarian, do not assume the government or government-run programs will take care of you. For centuries, families and communities took care of each other. Not nuclear families (a mid-20^th century American perversion designed to make every man a king so he’d buy a “castle” in the suburbs), but extended families – several generations living in the same house, with other relatives living close enough to drop in on a moment’s notice.

Okay wow, way to try and make Libertarians sound like the bad guys there Beckett. (You sure you’re not thinking of Anarchists btw?). Also, for a guy who hates Trump for being a nativist and who called McNallen and Abel racists for being folkish tribalists…

Damn Beckett. There is just so much hypocrisy going on here. Like, A++ man. You are good for doing the exact same things that make your enemies Evil.

Hela Bless