He's Not The Messiah, He's A Very Naughty Boy!

As many of you know, in a former life I was an evangelical Christian. I still like to keep tabs on what happens in this world. My go to is a website called the Christian Post, who post a variety of articles from Christian thinkers and their positions on real world events. These articles are often thought provoking and an interesting insight into the culture. Sometimes I agree, sometimes I do not. But the real fun is to be had in the comments section that follow each piece. Now I've been around the internet, and I know that there's a lot of crazy out there. But if you want to find it all in one place, then dive into these realms. You want Trump fans? Tick. You want election deniers? Tick. Covid conspiracy theorists, mask objectors, climate deniers? Tick tick tick. It is the wild west. It is the most bizarre enclave you can imagine. So naturally I spend a lot of time there. Now please note that I do not go there to troll, but I do have a tactic that I deploy. I might, for example, gently point out that Trump lost over 60 court cases, that his own Attorney General along with the FBI and local government have failed to find any evidence of fraud. I get some serious flack for that. The insults are predictable, as is the obsession with ALL CAPS and appalling grammar. These good ol' boys and girls do love a bit of Trumpty Dumpty. You'd think he was the Messiah. Any talk to the contrary results in a whirlwind of crazy. I've been labelled as an Antifa lover. I've been told to "Mind my business" more times than I can recall. I've been accused of getting my news only from CNN and refusing to acknowledge the facts. Talking of facts, if you really want to put the cat amongst the pigeons then suggest, as I have, that despite every attempt to get Trump removed, it actually took a small army of gun toting, confederate flag waving Christians to get the job done. You can be certain that it was Trump loving Christians that comprised the majority of the zombie army that blundered into the Capitol building. But when I point this out, well let's just say the results aren't pretty. It was antifa plants apparently. A leftist conspiracy, no less. When I gently invite them to watch the Youtube confessions from the hoarde directly, this results in even greater agitation. You see, what has happened is that many are so far down the rabbit hole that there is no turning back. It isn't entirely unlike lifetime Christian's who've invested body and soul into their cherished belief. I have no issue with the latter, because a person is free to hold the views they wish to hold. I may find them perplexing. I might wonder how it is these views can be reconciled with the way the world is. But most of the Christian's I know here in the UK are just lovely people. Kind, wise, warm, and considered. I expect this is true in America, but they certainly aren't the one's posting on the Christian Post. This appears to be a holding area for the deranged, for the grammatically challenged. For those whom have been bewildered and deceived into believing what many of us find absurd. What is interesting is that if you look at the profiles of some of the people who post, you see that they often hold the same suite of views. Again I refer to climate deniers, mask objectors etc. Now whilst it is amusing watching these people try to square the fact that it was Trumps base that actually destroyed him rather than his real enemies, it is also really sad. These people are reeling. The entire edifice is crumbling, and they've no enemy to point to but themselves. And what we are seeing is a sub section of people having to come to terms with this real time. They destroyed their own idol, sacrificed their own golden calf. And they did so at his command. The die was cast the moment the zombie hoarde set off in the direction of the Capitol. All fired up with conspiracy talk and a hatred of the establishment. All of them signed up to every last dismal lie that Trump ever told and which they had imbibed. An army of the credulous discharged by a conman. How did any of us think this would end? Still, there remains a part of me that hopes there's a way back for these lost souls. They are not all bad. They are just lost right now. Reeling. My nature inclines to compassion for the defeated, and there's never been a defeat so great and as self inflicted as this one. We don't have to agree with these folks. It won't hurt to show a little pity.

The Last Year And Me. . .

I hit a wall this week. I find the dark nights and the cold wet conditions wearying, and I suspect I'm prone to a little seasonal adjustment disorder. From the outside I'm just Rob being Rob. Not to be taken too seriously, blathering on about this and that. But inside I've felt different. Off. This has everything to do with the last year. Since Covid-19 came to town we've all found ourselves in a version of reality nobody could have predicted. Unable to do many of the things we previously took for granted. Waving at relatives through windows. Unable to give those who need a hug a big squeezy one. It's crushing. But I'm resilient and I usually just play the hand I'm dealt and forge ahead. I mean what other option is there? Yet I think it has taken a toll as the months have dragged on. We've had the full pandemic experience now and we're up to speed, right? Only that isn't how these things work. So many have done as I have and just taken each day as it comes. A bit of humour here, a grumble there. Just the normal stuff. But the hell with it, this is not normal. I no longer know what normal is. That particular reference point has receeded. These days I often feel fuzzy and my thoughts unclear. Having to self isolate has not helped this because I'm a guy that has to be doing, contributing. It's a kind of self medication for me. A work laptop was delivered on the final day of my shift pattern. I won't comment in detail what I thought about that because I've already made my views on this clear privately and it isn't appropriate I do so here. Suffice to say that it actually left me feeling somehow bleaker. Not being able to leave the house is crap, although I am grateful that I appear not to have been infected. It's just that we've all got this thing hovering over us right now. And we're not going to really surface until later in year during which time who knows what the cost will be? 80,000 dead, businesses destroyed. And as for the cost to people's mental health I wouldn't even want to estimate that. I fear we'll be paying back that debt for years. When things go tits up we can normally go to friends and family, which is why the pandemic has been such a cruel mistress. It takes what you love but doesn't actually remove it. Instead it just say's that everything is still there only you cannot touch it. Now I'm generally in favour of delayed gratification but fuck this. Talk about dangling a carrot! Anyway's, there's no real wisdom in this post. It's just me bleating really. Bitching about the current state of the universe. At heart I think I've probably got a softer center than I care to admit. Bit of an armadillo; hard on the outside and soft on the in. I don't like seeing people hurting and lonely and lost. I don't want to live in a world where this has become the norm rather than the exception. On a lighter note, today is the first that I have been able to hug the offspring and snog Joy for several days. I've had to make do with the dog, which isn't the ideal solution as much I adore him. Hugs matter, don't they? The proximity to another person. To feel their warmth, their humanity. If we ever took this for granted then perhaps the last year may have reminded us that we should not. Even I, who has hermit inclinations, appreciates it when somebody comes close. It must be so much harder for single people whom live alone or the recently bereaved or those still having to shield. Nothing I can say will make it easier for you. But know that if I could give you a hug I would. I hope with all my heart that within a few months we're all in a lighter place. Perhaps coinciding with the longer and warmer days. I want to hear the bustle of humanity, the clink of glasses in a pub garden, the sounds of groups of kids playing in the park. The normal things. The life enhancing things. The world we've all had to leave behind.

Are You Truly So Blind?

This is my question for those of you who really don't have any concerns about the actions of Facebook, Twitter, Google, Amazon and Apple over recent days. I am referring of course to the mass censorship of an entire Social media platform, Parler, in the wake of Trumps deranged call to arms. For the uninformed, Parler is a platform used predominantly by those who have a more right leaning political disposition. It's a haven for conspiracy theorists, Trump loyalists, and those whom would self define as conservative. I do not have a lot in common with these folks. I do not have a lot in common with the far Left either, who are more than capable of weaponised stupidity. It's fair to say that I find more extreme voices tedious irrespective of the direction they hail from, yet today I find myself defending freedom of speech yet again. I know, we've been here before. Only we haven't ever seen such a coordinated effort to silence an entire demographic. To those of you who claim that a private company can choose whom they offer a platform to I say you are in some respect correct. You are also staggering ill informed if you think that silencing voices of dissent ends well. It doesn't. How could it? And what a time to pull such a blanket move. Tensions are just below the boiling point, and society is more fractured than it has ever been. If ever we needed to reconcile it is now, yet we're awfully close to destroying any hope of this. Let's use a hypothetical example, and I conceed an imperfect one. Let's imaging that Jack Dorsey, owner of Twitter, finally decides to sell up and offloads the business to Trump Media. Indulge me, I know this isn't a likely example. Upon assuming control, the new owners decide that, as a private company, they no longer wish to allow a platform for the trans community. Men are men and women are women, and if you don't like it then go find another platform. Only then just as Twitter sells up, all the other platforms do likewise and again find themselves under the ownership of right leaning management. They too decide that the trans community are not welcome and also refuse to host voices of this kind. If it helps, substitute trans with Muslim, or Jew, or African American. Suddenly from having a platform to air your position you have none. How is that likely to leave you feeling? OK, so an absurd and unlikely example perhaps, but let's be under no illusion that millions of people have just been put in this position. Now you may find their views repugnant. They may be an example of everything you stand against. But how can we as fair minded people afford ourselves a voice yet deny it to others? And are not our existing laws around hate speech sufficient? I recognise that the owners of Parler were particularly lax and enforcing violations, but what in God's name do you expect to achieve by silencing an entire demographic? And how is that going to heal anything? It's a classic I win you lose. We've crushed the opposition. This may sit well with you but it stinks to high heaven to me. Again, are you truly ignorant of the risks here? You increase the chances of extreme behaviour because you've validated every grievance these people ever held. They suspect you wanted to shut them up and now you have. This does not feel like a victory to me. This feels knee jerk. Now there is no question that Trump by his actions deserves to be dispatched, but to extend this to all whom hold a candle for him is naivety of the most self evident kind. It cannot end well. It can only worsen an already awful situation. We live alongside people who hold views we find ghastly. That's the way the world is. But the way to defeat bad ideas is through engagement and the deployment of better one's. This takes time. And my word it takes patience. And there's never any certainty of success. But when we stop talking what does that leave? What are the other options? Spoiler alert, history has answered this many times over. In the name of reason I implore these large tech companies to weigh and measure what they are in the process of doing here. It is every bit as dangerous as what took place at the Capitol building, and over time the collateral damage will be higher. . .

Donald J Trump - A Whole New Ball Game Now

I don't typically do sequels, but today I must. What happened at the Capitol building somehow says everything and nothing at the same time. Everything, because it is the culmination of 4 years of lies, hysteria, and delusion. Nothing, because the runes have been suggesting this endgame for a while. You all know that Trump disgusts me, but what are my views on his supporters? My feelings are mixed, to be honest. For his enablers, those with whom he shares power or seek to use him to pursue their own vain ambition I have contempt. They are terrible, dark, insidious people. But what of rank and file Trump supporters? To them I feel a certain sympathy mixed with an everpresent frustration. You see, back when I was losing my evangelical faith in 2006 I came to value evidence and reason and the need to go to multiple sources for my information. It showed me that Christianity was a charade and easily dismantled. It taught me that you have to seek out the truth and never be wholly dependent on other's to provide it. This, I suspect is why so many Christian's have climbed aboard the Trump train. They here the siren song of a man who, whilst an imbecile, does have the ability to con the credulous and the charisma to pull it off. The average Christian is a trusting soul. Kind and generous, wanting to give a person the benefit of the doubt. Under normal circumstances this would be a fine quality, but when it encounters a creature such as Trump, who is good at making the right sounds and whispering the right platitudes, it does render them vulnerable. My understanding is that 82% of evangelicals carried Trump in 2016, and many remained for the 2020 vintage. They are his base, and it was those he sent in the direction of the Capitol building. Imagine having a hoarde of easily disposable followers that hang on your every word. An army of the credulous, a phalanx of well meaning fools. You may have heard the term "Useful Idiot" before? It refers to a person who tends to be in lower ranges intellectually, but sufficiently well placed to serve a purpose for those with malicious intent. Well what you saw yesterday was a hoarde of useful idiots, all fired up on the rhetoric of a chronically obese orange pied piper who had been playing them a tune that was irrisistable. He used them. They are pawns. I can find little by way of malice for them. Malice should be reserved for Trump himself. In error I once thought of him as merely a fool. Now I am quite sure he is a monster. He is a giant inverse bat signal, shinning high into the Gotham night. A warning of what happens when the unthinkable meets the succeptible. All that said, it does appear that many of his enablers have jumped ship overnight. The majority of them, in fact. Leaping from the flaming prow of the good ship "Imbecile", seeking refuge in the freezing cold waters of conventional wisdom. We should not give these individuals a free pass. We should remember that they were complicit in history. I for one am entirely fed up with the sheer amount of history we are living through right now. Covid-19 still rampant, our nation adrift from Europe. And Trump, King of the fools, finally self destructing like a firework on New Years Eve. So what do we learn from this? For me, we challenge evil, we stand against it, we never let it get comfortable. It will make a home in us if we let it and we often will not realise until the damage is done. I take some comfort from the fact that there is enough kindness and decency in the world to see us through these darkest of times. We will rise. We'll drag each other up by the bootstraps. We all share a common humanity. We need to encourage one another to be the best versions of ourselves. And as for the 45th President of the United States? He has become a footnote. Our descendents will look back in astonishment and horror at what almost happened. It was a terrible day. Tomorrow will be a better one if we can just find the courage to make it so.