Okay, seriously, it’s been fun. But I am getting exhausted by the amount of Salt that presently is flowing through my country. Juno’s Fucking Cunt, you’d think the Nazi’s had won, Japan had laid waste to our cities, and that Constantinople had just fallen to the Muslims. I’ve never seen more people be as self entitled in their doom and gloom in all my life.

And honestly, I don’t want to pick on Beckett, but he’s writing more stuff consistently and frankly using him as a platform I can get some of the stuff that’s bothering me on my chest. Because I have seen a lot of shit. So let’s start with Five Days Later

One of my jobs as a Pagan blogger is to be a voice of reason. Or at least that’s what you’ve told me over the years. Some of you, anyway.

Beckett, man I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think I’ve seen a post where you were reasonable since the whole business with Halstead wrapped up. For a man who was preaching ideological tolerance back then, you have jumped off that boat ages ago and turned into one of the most depressing, nihilistic, and ideologically intolerant people I have been reading. And I read a lot of people.

Honestly, it’s sickening. You think your ideological enemies are going to burn and salt the earth from existence, but instead of offering solutions you insist the earth is going to be burned and salted out of existence anyways, you just have a plan that allows us to live a bit longer and suffer a bit more before it happens. You have no solutions, you cannot affirm life, the only thing you do is tear your garments, pour ashes over your head, and lament that everyone and everything is evil and doomed.

I think we need a lot of voices of reason right now. Not necessarily voices of moderation, but voices of people who will look at a difficult situation and tell it like it is. This situation is so complicated I don’t think any of us can get it completely right, but between us all we can sort out the likely dangers from the unlikely ones and come up with a course of action – several courses of action – to make things better.

Actually, at this stage, some voices of moderation would be fucking welcome. But hey, I would settle for some voices of reason. Not that I’m really finding any, but I’ll settle for them if they start taking over the dialogue rather than the air being filled with the screams of petulant, narcisistic children screaming about not getting their way (and the laughter of those mocking them).

But look, the “situation” is not complicated. The situation is, in fact, very simple.

There was an election. People voted. You lost.

You. Lost.

See, that’s very simple. I have just addressed what the situation is. I have gotten it completely right. And you want to know the course of action that will make things better?

Get. Over. It.

Seriously, have some dignity in your defeat. You’d have demanded it had you won. Hel, from the way you petulant children are acting, you would have demanded outright submission or given over to slaughter. So really, I get it. It sucks to lose. But you don’t get to flip the table, toss the board against the wall, and scream about how you should have won and gotten your way.

It doesn’t work like that.

I’m going to try to be a voice of reason right now.

I’m not going to tell you how to feel. You feel what you feel: disappointment, anger, fear, betrayal, depression, even hatred. Whatever it is, whether it’s justified or not, whether you’re proud of it or not, allow yourself to feel what you feel – because you do.

“Your feelings are all the justification you need, because you’re feeling them.”

Oh yeah, that sounds reasonable…

EXCEPT IT’S NOT!

Fucking Juno’s Cunt man! What ever happened to emotional maturity? What ever happened to personal dignity? What the fuck ever happened to looking at a situation’s facts (i.e. being reasonable) instead of giving into your harebrained emotional overreactions!

You’ve got people rioting in the street, destoying shit that isn’t theirs, hel apparently causing people to die because the roads are blocked, and all because they’re pissed that Trump got elected….when half the god damn “protestors” didn’t even fucking vote!

But nooooo, you’re feeling it, and you should give into feeling it, because you’re feeling it! That’s what’s reasonable!

I had a few drinks watching the election returns. Alcohol doesn’t put things in your head, it just lowers the filters so you say things you’d otherwise keep bottled up. I said some things late Tuesday night that I’m very glad my wife was the only one who heard. I was so angry. I can compromise on economic issues, but on issues of individual rights I can’t compromise an inch, and it pisses me off that anyone wants to take away the rights of others. I was angry. I’m still angry. I expect I’m going to be angry a lot in the next four years, and I’m not going to pretend I’m not.

Oh, you mean like how you’re wanting to undo the election, put your person in the office instead, protest a lawfully won election, and disenfranchise millions of people in your own nation of their vote simply because you don’t like the outcome of a free democracy, thereby violating their individual rights?

Well, no wonder you’re happy people weren’t there to hear your angry sputterings. Sounds like it was a whole tirade of violating individual rights simply because you didn’t like their beliefs and can’t practice the tolerance and diversity you preach when it’s towards the “Untermensch.” I can only hope you’re wife is tolerant enough to forgive you the hate that obviously lies within your heart.

Take the time you need. Feel what you feel.

I’m not going to tell you how to respond. I’ll be honest – I don’t think protest marches accomplish anything, and they haven’t since the 1960s. But if marching helps you deal with this situation, then march away.

Well, given the fact that people are marching against a lawfully won election and demanding that the results of that election be ignored in favor of giving into their tyrannical demands….I certainly hope the marches don’t accomplish anything.

Look, we had an election. Everyone who was legally qualified was allowed to vote. Hel, a lot of people who were not legally qualified were allowed to vote. In fact, if we remove the couple million who voted illegally, Trump actually won both the Electoral Vote and the Popular vote. So, you know, double whammy there on the losing side guys.

But, perhaps, instead of marching in the street and making harder for the little guys to go about their lives, earn their pay, and try to keep on living, you stopped being a punch of self-centered twats and actually do what you were insisting the other side do all the way up until you were losing:

Accept The Results. Admit your defeat. Take this chance to learn about yourselves and what might have cost you the victory.

Or you could keep being a bunch of bigoted twats. I mean, that’s worked out great so far.

Beyond that, there is no standard playbook for stopping a fascist dictator wannabe and his anti-science theocrat accomplices. Let’s try a lot of different approaches. If something works, let’s do it more. If it doesn’t work, let’s try something else.

Well, I can tell you that throwing around a bunch of non-factual labels to discredit your foes via character assassination rather than dealing with objective facts about who you’re up against is certainly going to work.

I mean, clearly these tactics of shaming were so successful this last time. It’s clear to me now that if only you guys had screamed “sexist, fascist, racist, bigot!” harder then you would have won. I mean, let’s be honest, these are nothing more than virtue signalling buzzwords with actually no inherent value anymore, but doubling down is always the road to victory.

I’m not going to tell you it’s going to be OK. It’s not going to be OK. It’s going to suck, a lot. It’s going to suck for me, and I’m a straight white man with a middle class job. I can only imagine how much it’s going to suck for those with less privilege and more vulnerability. We have to see things as they are even when they’re painful and scary.

Wow, that’s painful and scary. The idea that we might have peace with Russia and Syria, start getting the middle east under some kind of stability, restore relations with one of our longest allies, the economy is recovering, and our two neighbors want to see about setting up better trade. And that was two days in. We’re now approaching ten days and the news just keeps getting better. Relations with the UK are improving (Trump’s going to bring back the bust of Churchill that Obama locked away in a broom closet), he’s announce that “Gay marriage” is safely the law of the land, and his first three appointments are a woman, a gay man, and a black man.

It’s scary just how wrong you guys have been about him.

Hela’s grace, the fact that we’re not about to jump straight into WW3 means that shit is absolutely okay. It’s fucking great. Anything else is going to be icing on a double chocolate rum cake. And that’s coming from a lower class, pansexual non-human. So, you know, perhaps listen to the “less privileged” position there buddy.

But there are some things I am going to tell you.

The immediate need is for personal safety. There aren’t any more xenophobic racists in the country than there were in 2008 or 2012. But the election of Donald Trump has empowered and emboldened those who were already here. Do what you have to do to protect yourself.

How right you are, Beckett.

Which is why I have been knife shopping, so that when a bunch of xenophobic racists decide to start shit by beating up people simply because they voted for a pro-gay, immigrant marrying populist, I am prepared to protect my personal safety. Because believe me, the racists have certainly been empowered this election, and I look like their favorite kind of target.

To my friends who voted for Trump: if you see or hear anyone being the least bit rude – much less dangerously aggressive – toward an immigrant, a religious minority, a woman, an LGBTQ person, or anyone else – stand up. Say something. Intervene if you can, get help if you can’t. Not because this is your fault, but that’s what good people do when bullies attack the vulnerable. Needless to say, the same goes for the rest of us.

Why do you think I’m writing this stuff, Beckett?

And that is just one example of thousands.

The short-term future is uncertain. Like all politicians, Donald Trump made a lot of campaign promises he cannot or will not keep. He’s said some nasty things, but we don’t know what he’ll do, or what the Republican-controlled Congress (many of whom don’t like Trump, for reasons that may not exactly be comforting to those of us of a progressive orientation) will allow him to do.

Well, some of the stuff is easy. The “get rid of Obama’s executive orders” thing…he can do with just a couple executive orders. Obamacare is probably going to go. Immigration is purely under the executive branch so he’ll be able to at least work on the deportations he wants. The Wall might be a bit tricky, but that’s okay. The term limits thing is going to be tough, but as much as many republicans hate Trump, they fear their voters, and this election was a wake up call as to what the people could do when motivated. Every republican out there knows that his seat is not secure unless he follows the will of the people. Because the old rules about how to get elected have been broken.

Peace with Russia, defeating ISIS, renegotiating trade deals? I think he’ll probably be able to put in some good work on those. But we’ll have to see.

But given the amount of steps he’s getting done before he even goes in…he could go far.

The monster you can’t see is always scarier than the one you can see. Reality is bad enough – be mindful and don’t let your imagination make things seem worse than they are.

Actually, I can clear up some of that imagining as to the “Worse.”

Pence is the ultimate death curse on you guys. I’m honestly loving it.

The mid-term future isn’t going to change as much as you think. Remember how little President Obama was able to get done in his first two years even with the Democrats controlling both houses of Congress. A country is a huge thing that turns slowly, even in this era of rapid change.

Well, you know, unless you guys keep it up the way you have been. Then not only will the mid-terms be red, but the next election after that too. Which…frankly I don’t really have a problem with at this point. The Progressive “Left” has been such a massive amount of racist, sexist, bullying bigoted twats that if you guys get crushed by your enemies for the next several decades, I’m going to be sitting back with a beer and enjoying myself.

Here’s the thing. The Dem’s didn’t get much done because they figured they had the whole thing in the bag. Obama was going to get 8 years, and the Hillary was going to come in after that. They had all the time in the world. And they fucked up. Trump and the Reps at this point know they were fucking lucky and they might not get another chance. They realize that the people are not loyal to the party, but to a set of ideals, some of which are in line with the republicans, some of which are not, and the republicans only get to stay in power so long as they abide by those ideals. And they are motivated to get stuff done so that they will be re-elected.

The Affordable Care Act will be repealed (though Trump is now saying he wants to keep parts of it), but it will be replaced with something. That new something will help some and harm others – until we know what it is, you can’t know which group you fall into. It would be prudent to plan as though it will harm you, to the extent you can.

Well, given that at present the affordable care act is neither affordable nor caring (it literally would eat up 100% of my income to sign up and use it), honestly I doubt I shall be greatly harmed by its removal, and possibly benefit from its replacement. The funny thing, when you’re down at the bottom, there’s no where to go but up.

Marriage equality and the right to an abortion are constitutional rights. Neither the President nor Congress can repeal them, and Trump’s first Supreme Court appointment merely restores the status quo. Pray for the health of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and pray that John Roberts develops a conscience and a backbone.

Pretty sure John Roberts already has a conscience and a backbone. He just might not be an ideological bigot clinging to the same morality that you are Beckett.

But hey, even if Ginsburg lives a long and healthy life, and Roberts does succumb to your bigotry, Trumps still looking to get, what, four or five judges in his presidency? Oh well. Sucks to be you.

That being said, I’m pretty sure congress could repeal them if they wanted to. Marriage equality was established as law via an unconstitutional act of the court. As for abortion…meh. I’m still amazed at your species ability to butcher their unborn children and call it moral, while insisting its immoral when done to lower lifeforms. But hey, you guys do you. We’ll just keep figuring out what to do with all the dead babies in Helheim.

The long-term future was always going to suck. The American empire is crumbling – not even electing Bernie Sanders would have reversed that trend. The ultrarich continue to siphon money from the poor and squeeze the middle class out of existence. Reproductive rights have been under attack even during the Obama administration. We’ve passed the point of no return on climate change. Trump will accelerate it, but Hillary would not have stopped it.

Hillary was literally going to start WW3 with Russia and we were going to have a nuclear war. Slowing it down nothing. She was cutting the brake lines, pouring nox in the engine, and strapping rockets on the back of the car.

But seriously man, if the world is that bad to you, why live? I’m not going to tell you to kill yourself, but seriously man. If you cannot affirm life, end it so as to lessen your suffering.

Which is not to say there was no difference between the two. There was. A Hillary Clinton Presidency would have been much better for women, immigrants, racial and religious minorities, and LGBTQ people…

Superpredators.

Bill’s rape victims.

The Defense of Marriage Act.

I mean, the list quite literally goes on and on for ages. Hillary Clinton is, was, and always will be, a horrible, corrupt, evil person who destroys the lives of everyone around her for political gain. She has taken millions of dollars and started wars to help nations that slaughter their gays and enslave their women. She has fought against gay rights, she has enacted some of the most racist laws post the Civil Rights movement, and she has harassed and threatened dozens of women that her husband raped.

…Donald Trump has said – directly and indirectly – he intends to make things worse for all those people. It is no surprise they, everyone who knows someone in one of these groups, and all of us who generally believe in treating everyone with compassion and respect, are scared to death and mad as hell.

Women, Blacks, Gays, they’re already part of his administration. Hel, give it some time and you’ll find some Latinos. We’re talking about a man who previously “ran” for president with a drag-queen. A man with a lifetime achievement award for helping the black community. A man who married an immigrant who used to do nude modeling. Hela’s grace, people are requesting he make the most fabulous gay man imaginable his white house press secretary. He’s got atheists, he’s got Christians, he’s probably got some Jews, his campaign and white house staff is filled with the kind of diversity you hear lauded by the left so much…and this is based on a history of working and supporting “minority groups” longer than I’ve been alive.

But no, Trump is the racist who is going to make it worse for “minorities.”

I cannot tell you how to feel or how to respond. I encourage you to acknowledge and express your feelings as deeply as necessary, for as long as necessary.

honestly, I’m feeling stunned at just how ignorant you are, Beckett.

And then when you’re ready, start turning those feelings into reflections, reflections into plans, and plans into actions.

Why do I have the sinking suspicion that these “plans and actions” are ultimately going to be about disenfranchising your ideological opponents, up to and including treason, sedition, and open warfare?

And I’m not saying that to be hyperbolic. That quite literally is your only option at this point. You lost the vote. You lost the election. You. Have. Lost. By every legal means out there, you are defeated. Nothing you can do, short of armed violence, is going to have any effect now or later, at least until the next election. And given the way you guys are talking, I’m not giving you much odds on the election bit. At which point…what difference would there be between you guys…and actual fascists?

Well, other than the fact that fascists have better taste in clothes.

I’m going to be a compassionate presence in a xenophobic world. I’m going to support people and groups doing progressive work. I’m going to take care of myself and my community. And I’m going to work on my flying skills.

Flying huh?

Don’t see any problems with that.

What about you?

I think my position can be summed well with this:

 

 

Hela Bless