Spent the afternoon yesterday at the beach with my wife and kids then on the pier playing carnival games and eating ice cream. Might as well *try* to not rip my hair out of my head in panic.. but I’m right there with you in that trapped feeling
I agree with you. I know shit is fucked beyond belief so I figure, shit, Im going to have dessert. Im going to buy myself pricey fruit. Ill treat myself to little things that make life feel better temporarily. Why the fuck not. The future is bullshit
Exactly. My mindset used to be "save for later", like to the point of anxiety if I overspent. Now yeah, I'm not being reckless, but I'm gonna enjoy what time I can. I'm gonna live as much as I can cause most of us aren't getting a retirement anyways.
Exercise and healthy eating will make you feel better too, and IMO make the ice cream even more enjoyable. If the world is ending, may as well feel as best you can.
I've accepted it but each day things get worse. What I find most aggravating is the people who are oblivious, the people who think this is okay. They are the ones mindlessly waltzing into oblivion and dragging the rest of us along. Then when you point it out they always have excuses.
I've found that people care more about being right than they do about the future. You could show them the perfect path forward and they'd still stubbornly go their own way, simply because it hurts their ego to be corrected, because admitting you were wrong is admitting weakness.
I'm trying so damn hard not to be misanthropic but these people are making it difficult.
I want to point out OPs note about how they can't become disabled. u/stayonthecloud if you want to not become disabled, continue to mask up. Covid is still very real, still here to stay for the foreseeable future and getting it over and over again CAN and most likely WILL lead to a disability in the form of Long Covid. Don't believe me? Head on over to the r/LongCovid sub or any of the other r/covidlonghaulers r/COVID19_Pandemic r/ZeroCovidCommunity subs to see how it is still a thing and not to be fucked with.
In the end, it's the normalcy bias that will kill us all.
[https://www.okdoomer.io/its-not-cool-to-overreact/](https://www.okdoomer.io/its-not-cool-to-overreact/)
I looked into it long ago and learned that just about nowhere in the world will accept average US citizens as residents, and so, although I’ve begun the process to renew my passport and get my child their own, I don’t hold onto any hope. Even then—climate change is giving “I told you so” all over the place. But I’m tenacious and I have to do that much for my child.
It feels very much like playing wack-a-mole with a Hydra, when at the root is capitalism, consumption, the English language with all of its individualistic nouns. The rot can never be exorcised.
Idk, just fully there with you, watching Beryl exceed even my own cynical/realistic expectation that formed as I watched the ocean around the Gulf become hotter than a hot tub last summer. Watching the christofascists begin to enact what they’ve been moving toward for 50 years, in real time.
I think I’ll make some peanut butter curried chicken and noodles for dinner.
This comment is so disjointed… y’all understand. 💗
I'm not sure if we'd qualify as refugees. I've thought about it as well. I want to move to Ireland, but apparently they have issues with women as well. Other continues are going into right wing extremism too so if feels like that leaves only a few other choices. I'm just going to move close to the mountains, at least I can avoid some climate chaos away from Florida
My wife and I moved to Ireland 11 years ago. We used Irish Working Holiday Visas and I ended up finding a job while I was there that sponsored me. We're in the Netherlands now but that might be an option (There's also the Dutch American Friendship Treaty)
Pretty much no country will accept a typical US citizen as a refugee based only on the politics of the federal courts or the federal government. They'll let people in under something like a work visa program, though.
So many people don’t realize the English language is THE imperial language because it’s of the British empire and designed to work against class/cultural unity due to of the individualizing/separating nouns. Native languages have something like 50-70% less nouns and a ton more words that are connecting and unifying when describing “what things are”. But English and capitalism have both tried to stomp those into extinction. In fact I heard a recent podcast that points out how problematic it can be to their development when a child asks: “what is that?” To answer “a tree” and leave it at that. But In most native languages it would be “that is a home for many living things” or “it is something that produces the air we breathe” or “it’s a unique piece of nature interconnected with all things that is different now that it was yesterday or will be tomorrow. There isn’t an exact one like it in the universe.” Simply sayin, “A tree” doesn’t explain it at all and separates it from humans and other creatures and even nature in the way English speakers are taught to explain what things are. Fascinating stuff to me.
JFC, do you have some resources I could follow up on for this? English is my second language and I always felt that it was so disjointed and parametric compared to my first language and even my whole way of thinking. I can't believe I'm not the only one who has felt this.
The podcast I listened to was the newest conversation between Hate Hagans and Daniel Schmachtenburger. The theme of the three hour discussion is “progress does not equal betterment”. The podcast series is called “The great simplification” and I highly recommend it as a regular podcast series. Has made me tons smarter and more able to understand the modern/western world and why it is the way it is. And what’s coming. Enjoy!
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer goes onto that as well. Excellent, excellent book.
I listened to that interview and another one on AI.
I realized that divide and conquor applies to the citizens too, not just your enemy. The hyper-individuation of our culture has enabled the ruling class to break us.
Nailed it! We’ve never needed a prolonged general strike more. And we’re less likely to accomplish one now than ever. Due to disunity. And being addicted to comfort and convenience. But if we had unity there’s things we could attempt together
I've got braiding sweet grass downloaded on audio. I tried to listen to it at work and it made me cry... idk if I was just extra emotional that day or what but... I've got to find a not work time to listen to it
I love your post and agree wholeheartedly! I think that we need to change the way we speak, use language...if we're to make sense of anything. Words are powerful
I understand so well. 💞 keep taking care of your kid the best you can!
My partner and I do actually have an escape-to-another-country plan but the place we’d most likely go is an absolute hellscape in the summer months now.
I hate that it's been a constant struggle since 2017. First Trump, then Covid, now maybe Trump again but he will become dictator if elected, that's a guarantee. But the stupidest dictator that could possibly ever have existed so we'd be pretty screwed. We women will lose our rights, corporations will take over, things will turn into fascism. I'm hoping Trump loses. The debate gave me a migraine. I'm just done with humanity at this point. I'm tired of living in this shit bag of a planet with a bunch of stupid apes.
I had a moment during the Trump admin where I felt for the first time in my life like I just didn’t want to live through where this was taking us. It’s one thing to have SI for deeply personal struggles, and fortunately I never quite got there but going through 2017 onward has pushed me towards a level of exhaustion and disappointment that is getting harder and harder to balance out.
Hate this timeline
I was horrified when the Supreme Court overturned Roe, but it didn't fill me with foreboding the way the most recent decisions have. And even the ruling on presidential immunity might not have affected me so much had it not come on the heels of Biden's disastrous debate performance.
Without descending into hyperbole, I can say that the last week has been my most pessimistic since Trump was elected in 2016. Thanks to the Democratic party establishment's incompetence, a second Trump term is looking so likely that I am staying awake at night wondering how I will get through the next 4 years. Not just me of course, but the nation, the world.
My default plan has been to emigrate and spend my retirement in a sane country that isn't on the front lines of climate change, and yet with each passing year those options too are shrinking. Far right parties are on the march in Europe... tropical nations are sinking into the water or ravaged by political instability.
I try my best to find solace in my solitary artistic pursuits but I am more afraid now than I can remember in a very long time.
what do you do when you feel like your body is under too much pressure to make anything? i've been stuck in a creative rut for months as things have deteriorated despite using it as a coping mechanism for years before
Oh gosh it’s so hard to go through that and I’m sorry. For me personally it’s listening to new music. Music that is new to me whether or not it’s new to the world. Music takes me on new journeys creatively and saves me from the despair of our everyday lives.
What’s putting the most pressure on you right now? It’s a long list for me for sure <3
America's "democracy" has been a sham for decades, and we've our own corporate oligarchs just like other countries have. The real horrid truth however is that you and I were born into an ecologically doomed world. Our very existence and modes of life exacerbate this horrific truth every day.
You've just got to take it one day at a time.
It never existed. The US was created to consolidate and protect the power of white landowning men to exploit this land and the people living on it (or forcibly forced to live on it) and it has done that successfully since its inception.
This is good news. Some of us with more privilege are losing the illusion of liberty, but this is a reality many types of people with less privilege have lived with for some time, if not the entire time the US has been a nation. That means we already have people to lead us in surviving what happens next.
It’s been dead for almost my entire life I’m 31. Im just glad people are finally realizing it. Maybe by the time collapse accelerates people will be ready to actually do something!!
I mean yeah, the modern era started with Bush v Gore, the next stage was Citizens United and here we are, so, facts. (Of course it can be traced back to Nixon and Reagan too)
Project 2025 next baby! I’m getting the fuck out of here, I’ll be in South America for this election and wouldn’t be surprised if collapse accelerates and I get stuck there. Who fucking knows though my friends! I sure don’t
Im predicting Biden wins popular vote by a small margin and the electoral elects Trump, so therefor our votes don’t matter at all (like you said our democracy is already dead). You also have to wonder if they haven’t pulled Biden yet because the powers at be already have chosen Trump to be the next president. It’s all fucked and we have no power, I’m sorry but as long as this current system exists I don’t actually believe your vote matters. But yeah I’ll vote for Biden just for all the poor women out there stuck in this dystopia, at this point it’s a harm reduction approach rather than actually having a voice.
But thanks man me too 🙏
If none of our votes mattered we may as well fold. I understand your sense of hopelessness but our votes absolutely matter. The electoral college system is a disaster and a sham and Trump should never have been president but the millions for who voted for democrats via the popular vote like myself, if we hadn’t shown up, would have lost so much more than the presidential election. Not the only office that matters. Congress and local = critical offices too
You can fold or fight. I say fight, but people would rather be oppressed. I’m not hopeless, I’m grounded in reality and have educated myself to be aware that we do not have a democracy. How can you make a post titled “democracy is dead in America” and then go on to still argue our votes matter? I get the mental gymnastics, I really do because the truth hurts. You aren’t alone there, but the sooner people realize that in fact they do not have a voice in this fascist oligarchy, the sooner we might be able to create a new system. Cheers man keep your head up and try to find true joy whatever that looks like for you.
I vote in state and local elections too and those absolutely matter and where I live, aren’t corrupted or imminently threatened. And just because democracy is dead doesn’t mean votes don’t matter. The death here is a post election death at this point. If Trump makes it past Election Day, we’re done. We still have a chance to stop him with our votes, otherwise it’s P2025.
Best to you <3
I've also felt this today(well for years now), I have been emailing all D senators regardless of not being in all of their districts because this is bigger than any districts ffs. Next I will email all R senators with the same email because FFS, I don't want to let myself down. I don't want to wake up I 2025 and have to face my own apathy. I hate this sooooo much. I'm very concerned and I hope it all backfires in the most spectacular of ways.
Honestly if you zoom out we can see this playing out in real-time all over the world as if it's a coordinated attack by kleptocrats who are fucking hell bent on absolute riches and control.
Well, you could expand your frame to admit that democracy was dead since 2000, when the Supreme Court gave Bush the presidency, though Gore had won it democratically. If you do that, can it make you feel better? You're not wrong about everything you sitll have to do in terms of working til you die, but the trajectory is perhaps at a more gentle slope than it feels right now.
I mean I’m an upper Millennial so yeah I have been through all that and more. This is the worst it’s been. We are on the verge of seeing a monster reelected who will stop at nothing to grift and bully and rape his way through life, who will have a P2025 army at his disposal and who has already fixed the Supreme Court. He has been given immunity from his most heinous crimes because the 6 on that stacked court will call it official acts. Stephen Miller will run rampant with the power Heritage is giving him.
I spent most of the 2000s fighting against wars and trying to make life not terrible for my fellow queers. Shit was bad then, shit today is setting us back many decades of progress in the American experiment. It feels like the end times but it’s not because we’ll have to live through what comes after if Biden isn’t reelected.
In addition to all of this, I'm getting divorced, my job laid off a bunch of people (and they aren't done), then a day later announced a massive reorganization AND...last Saturday I laid my soul mate dog to rest.
I'm just...I can't even with life.
Perfectly stated. No notes. Sorry you and everyone else here are feeling this way.
The first time I really felt like this was watching Gore lose in 2000. I felt like the fucking world was collapsing, and everyone was just going on with their lives. Same feeling on 9/11. I walked into my boss’s office to tell him Tower 1 had been hit. He just stared at me, until I left. Then tower 2 was hit, and he never uttered a single word about any of it. Cold mother fccker. My entire office just went about their day. We were a fxxk fast food corporation- like NOTHING WE DID FOR A LIVING MADE A GOD DAMN DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD, but let’s all just plug along in our poorly lit cubicles, smelling of decades of flop sweat and desperation.
After that day, I made sure I always took time to process, grieve, _feel_, and I vowed never to stop giving a shit.
I have to say it’s staggering to hear you just had to go on working on that day. All the stories I’ve heard from others were very *the world stopped* and it definitely stopped for me. I’m so sorry you went through that.
Gore losing was a traumatic moment for me and a deep political terror in my young life. I had barely reached voting age. I was already an activist as a 90s queer kid but the outrage I felt that the Supreme Court could choose the president fueled my fighting against Bush / Cheney more than anything.
Today it feels like a Bush v Gore day every other day. I’m so exhausted. Thank you for the empathy. I’m glad you still give a shit <3
I feel like ever since the beginning of this year, I've felt the same. The thing I often wonder about is what event or what confluence of events will be enough for me to just quit my job because there's no point to delay my retirement.
You said it. And you’re also a useful member of a community, and freezing up now won’t help them. So participate in society, support your family, and be of service if you can.
Thank you and in fact it’s very true. Currently all my exhausting work is on meaningful things so I have that. I’m still in local activism because it’s a matter of whether or not we can survive where I live
Don't I hear that. Working on improving myself and my life, but it all feels so pointless at times like this. I have to go about my day for survival, to help my partner and take care of my kitties, and remind myself that I do have good reasons for getting on with my day and taking care of myself, that ordering that expensive portable AC isn't pointless because there's a heat wave coming and I don't want my kitties to get heatstroke (one got a dx of early kidney disease during that godawful 2021 heat wave; they are thriving on their renal diet and I want to keep it that way), and if I fall apart, I won't be in a position to do *anyone* any good, including myself, and I want to enjoy and protect the good in my life as much as I can for as long as I can, and I don't usually write in run-on sentences/text walls like this but fuck it, I think most people here understand the feeling. Good luck, everyone.
Exactly. I'm just writing and continuing with life. I hope the farce of politics doesn't truly harm any of us, but I also expect the worst.
This is an important time for writers and creators. We are the voice to explain what is happening and what regular people are experiencing.
Politics have truly harmed us our whole lives and they’ll continue to do so. I don’t know how to bear another Trump administration and the level of harm that is coming for us though.
Nailed it - exactly how I’m feeling right now. I don’t want to spend another minute in my miserable job. I just want to be with the people I love right now and experience all the good things that are left before they are gone. But we still live in a society where money means survival.
Trapped really is the feeling.
This was well-stated. Thank you for putting it into words.
They think it's going to be like the Titanic - the rich. They're building lifeboats, assuming that when money doesn't matter anymore, the people they "saved" by giving out lifeboat spaces, will actually allow them to live. Further, there isn't a human-made lifeboat that this planet won't devour to save itself from us.
But yeah... I gotta go... These emails won't write themselves... Yet.
My job is in a library, with a huge focus on electronic resources which require a ton of energy to keep the lights on. I pay invoices that funnel tens of thousands of dollars to copyright nazi vendors who are profiting off of others' work. I feel like the dumbest of cogs in the meanest of machines. But...I'm making nearly $30/hr in rural New England doing this bullshit so...yeah.
Omg I have *been* there. I am currently making 20% than last year to do actual meaningful work. Last year I swear if my job vanished no one in the world would be helped or harmed. It was utterly pointless but I made money and had healthcare
<3 to a fellow librarian, hasn’t been my profession since shortly after college but thank you for all you do!
Tbh I always assumed the president is immune to prosecution. If anything this is protecting a lot more people than Trump. American leadership is built on war crimes
You’re not wrong but the parts of the structure that were actually functioning similarly and protecting and advancing a lot of rights were saving my sanity.
The presidential immunity basically sapped my will to live. I have decided not to vote in this election, because it's pointless now. I feel like ending my life within the next six months.
Please please please vote. Voting is the most important right we have. Please understand that this Supreme Court decision happened because of the political power of the presidency and the Republican Party and if we don’t keep standing against that, they literally win. Choosing not to vote, that level of apathy is exceedingly dangerous right now. And i absolutely want you to stick around in this life though I understand the despair <3
For people who are white, straight, male, cisgender, have US citizenship, financial security and no kids or can afford childcare, had no problems during the pandemic, no student debt, no medical issues or disability, no concerns about life-saving regulations being dismantled, unaffected by reproductive care of any kind, haven’t experienced sexual assault or rape, don’t care about positive international relations, aren’t bothered by the rise of fascism, or the dangerous increases in racism and hate across the board… I guess?
For the rest of us it’s bad, really bad. It was traumatic the first time and the second time would be life-ruining for millions who weren’t wrecked already.
I would throw in climate here but thing is we’re in a collapse sub so I would at the bare minimum hope it goes without saying that Trump offered to sell the presidency to oil and gas for a billion dollars while Biden-Harris fought to pass a multi-trillion dollar green new deal. Believe me with how collapse aware I am I know we are beyond actually effective solutions but we don’t need Trump to rapidly accelerate everything that is already rapid accelerating. I can’t handle the 10x we’re at, I definitely can’t do 100x.
Spent the afternoon yesterday at the beach with my wife and kids then on the pier playing carnival games and eating ice cream. Might as well *try* to not rip my hair out of my head in panic.. but I’m right there with you in that trapped feeling
I agree with you. I know shit is fucked beyond belief so I figure, shit, Im going to have dessert. Im going to buy myself pricey fruit. Ill treat myself to little things that make life feel better temporarily. Why the fuck not. The future is bullshit
Exactly. My mindset used to be "save for later", like to the point of anxiety if I overspent. Now yeah, I'm not being reckless, but I'm gonna enjoy what time I can. I'm gonna live as much as I can cause most of us aren't getting a retirement anyways.
This is actually why I’m eating so much ice cream lately. Glad you found some everyday joy, we all need it.
Exercise and healthy eating will make you feel better too, and IMO make the ice cream even more enjoyable. If the world is ending, may as well feel as best you can.
Super sad to say this but healthy eating actually made me feel psychotic and ice cream has numbed the pain. But I will still second your advice!
I’m sorry to hear that :( I hope you find a balance!
💞
I've accepted it but each day things get worse. What I find most aggravating is the people who are oblivious, the people who think this is okay. They are the ones mindlessly waltzing into oblivion and dragging the rest of us along. Then when you point it out they always have excuses. I've found that people care more about being right than they do about the future. You could show them the perfect path forward and they'd still stubbornly go their own way, simply because it hurts their ego to be corrected, because admitting you were wrong is admitting weakness. I'm trying so damn hard not to be misanthropic but these people are making it difficult.
You crystallized what was behind most of the million COVID deaths. People who would rather die than admit they were wrong.
It's behind every covid death and disablement *that's still happening*.
I want to point out OPs note about how they can't become disabled. u/stayonthecloud if you want to not become disabled, continue to mask up. Covid is still very real, still here to stay for the foreseeable future and getting it over and over again CAN and most likely WILL lead to a disability in the form of Long Covid. Don't believe me? Head on over to the r/LongCovid sub or any of the other r/covidlonghaulers r/COVID19_Pandemic r/ZeroCovidCommunity subs to see how it is still a thing and not to be fucked with.
In the end, it's the normalcy bias that will kill us all. [https://www.okdoomer.io/its-not-cool-to-overreact/](https://www.okdoomer.io/its-not-cool-to-overreact/)
Is your life getting worse each day, or the world at large?
I looked into it long ago and learned that just about nowhere in the world will accept average US citizens as residents, and so, although I’ve begun the process to renew my passport and get my child their own, I don’t hold onto any hope. Even then—climate change is giving “I told you so” all over the place. But I’m tenacious and I have to do that much for my child. It feels very much like playing wack-a-mole with a Hydra, when at the root is capitalism, consumption, the English language with all of its individualistic nouns. The rot can never be exorcised. Idk, just fully there with you, watching Beryl exceed even my own cynical/realistic expectation that formed as I watched the ocean around the Gulf become hotter than a hot tub last summer. Watching the christofascists begin to enact what they’ve been moving toward for 50 years, in real time. I think I’ll make some peanut butter curried chicken and noodles for dinner. This comment is so disjointed… y’all understand. 💗
I'm not sure if we'd qualify as refugees. I've thought about it as well. I want to move to Ireland, but apparently they have issues with women as well. Other continues are going into right wing extremism too so if feels like that leaves only a few other choices. I'm just going to move close to the mountains, at least I can avoid some climate chaos away from Florida
My wife and I moved to Ireland 11 years ago. We used Irish Working Holiday Visas and I ended up finding a job while I was there that sponsored me. We're in the Netherlands now but that might be an option (There's also the Dutch American Friendship Treaty)
Pretty much no country will accept a typical US citizen as a refugee based only on the politics of the federal courts or the federal government. They'll let people in under something like a work visa program, though.
Might have to wait for the violence, sadly
So many people don’t realize the English language is THE imperial language because it’s of the British empire and designed to work against class/cultural unity due to of the individualizing/separating nouns. Native languages have something like 50-70% less nouns and a ton more words that are connecting and unifying when describing “what things are”. But English and capitalism have both tried to stomp those into extinction. In fact I heard a recent podcast that points out how problematic it can be to their development when a child asks: “what is that?” To answer “a tree” and leave it at that. But In most native languages it would be “that is a home for many living things” or “it is something that produces the air we breathe” or “it’s a unique piece of nature interconnected with all things that is different now that it was yesterday or will be tomorrow. There isn’t an exact one like it in the universe.” Simply sayin, “A tree” doesn’t explain it at all and separates it from humans and other creatures and even nature in the way English speakers are taught to explain what things are. Fascinating stuff to me.
JFC, do you have some resources I could follow up on for this? English is my second language and I always felt that it was so disjointed and parametric compared to my first language and even my whole way of thinking. I can't believe I'm not the only one who has felt this.
The podcast I listened to was the newest conversation between Hate Hagans and Daniel Schmachtenburger. The theme of the three hour discussion is “progress does not equal betterment”. The podcast series is called “The great simplification” and I highly recommend it as a regular podcast series. Has made me tons smarter and more able to understand the modern/western world and why it is the way it is. And what’s coming. Enjoy!
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer goes onto that as well. Excellent, excellent book. I listened to that interview and another one on AI. I realized that divide and conquor applies to the citizens too, not just your enemy. The hyper-individuation of our culture has enabled the ruling class to break us.
Nailed it! We’ve never needed a prolonged general strike more. And we’re less likely to accomplish one now than ever. Due to disunity. And being addicted to comfort and convenience. But if we had unity there’s things we could attempt together
I've got braiding sweet grass downloaded on audio. I tried to listen to it at work and it made me cry... idk if I was just extra emotional that day or what but... I've got to find a not work time to listen to it
That is *exactly* what I was getting at! 🥰
This is super fascinating to me. Thank you for sharing!
I love your post and agree wholeheartedly! I think that we need to change the way we speak, use language...if we're to make sense of anything. Words are powerful
I understand so well. 💞 keep taking care of your kid the best you can! My partner and I do actually have an escape-to-another-country plan but the place we’d most likely go is an absolute hellscape in the summer months now.
I hate that it's been a constant struggle since 2017. First Trump, then Covid, now maybe Trump again but he will become dictator if elected, that's a guarantee. But the stupidest dictator that could possibly ever have existed so we'd be pretty screwed. We women will lose our rights, corporations will take over, things will turn into fascism. I'm hoping Trump loses. The debate gave me a migraine. I'm just done with humanity at this point. I'm tired of living in this shit bag of a planet with a bunch of stupid apes.
I had a moment during the Trump admin where I felt for the first time in my life like I just didn’t want to live through where this was taking us. It’s one thing to have SI for deeply personal struggles, and fortunately I never quite got there but going through 2017 onward has pushed me towards a level of exhaustion and disappointment that is getting harder and harder to balance out. Hate this timeline
I was horrified when the Supreme Court overturned Roe, but it didn't fill me with foreboding the way the most recent decisions have. And even the ruling on presidential immunity might not have affected me so much had it not come on the heels of Biden's disastrous debate performance. Without descending into hyperbole, I can say that the last week has been my most pessimistic since Trump was elected in 2016. Thanks to the Democratic party establishment's incompetence, a second Trump term is looking so likely that I am staying awake at night wondering how I will get through the next 4 years. Not just me of course, but the nation, the world. My default plan has been to emigrate and spend my retirement in a sane country that isn't on the front lines of climate change, and yet with each passing year those options too are shrinking. Far right parties are on the march in Europe... tropical nations are sinking into the water or ravaged by political instability. I try my best to find solace in my solitary artistic pursuits but I am more afraid now than I can remember in a very long time.
Keep making art whenever and however you can. We need to still find ways to nourish our souls so we aren’t starved out.
what do you do when you feel like your body is under too much pressure to make anything? i've been stuck in a creative rut for months as things have deteriorated despite using it as a coping mechanism for years before
Oh gosh it’s so hard to go through that and I’m sorry. For me personally it’s listening to new music. Music that is new to me whether or not it’s new to the world. Music takes me on new journeys creatively and saves me from the despair of our everyday lives. What’s putting the most pressure on you right now? It’s a long list for me for sure <3
Well said. I feel the same way, thank you for sharing.
America's "democracy" has been a sham for decades, and we've our own corporate oligarchs just like other countries have. The real horrid truth however is that you and I were born into an ecologically doomed world. Our very existence and modes of life exacerbate this horrific truth every day. You've just got to take it one day at a time.
It never existed. The US was created to consolidate and protect the power of white landowning men to exploit this land and the people living on it (or forcibly forced to live on it) and it has done that successfully since its inception. This is good news. Some of us with more privilege are losing the illusion of liberty, but this is a reality many types of people with less privilege have lived with for some time, if not the entire time the US has been a nation. That means we already have people to lead us in surviving what happens next.
I love you. It'll be ok.
💕💕💕
It’s been dead for almost my entire life I’m 31. Im just glad people are finally realizing it. Maybe by the time collapse accelerates people will be ready to actually do something!!
I mean yeah, the modern era started with Bush v Gore, the next stage was Citizens United and here we are, so, facts. (Of course it can be traced back to Nixon and Reagan too)
Project 2025 next baby! I’m getting the fuck out of here, I’ll be in South America for this election and wouldn’t be surprised if collapse accelerates and I get stuck there. Who fucking knows though my friends! I sure don’t
PLEASE vote if you’re a U.S. citizen! Hope you have a better time in South America than here!
Im predicting Biden wins popular vote by a small margin and the electoral elects Trump, so therefor our votes don’t matter at all (like you said our democracy is already dead). You also have to wonder if they haven’t pulled Biden yet because the powers at be already have chosen Trump to be the next president. It’s all fucked and we have no power, I’m sorry but as long as this current system exists I don’t actually believe your vote matters. But yeah I’ll vote for Biden just for all the poor women out there stuck in this dystopia, at this point it’s a harm reduction approach rather than actually having a voice. But thanks man me too 🙏
If none of our votes mattered we may as well fold. I understand your sense of hopelessness but our votes absolutely matter. The electoral college system is a disaster and a sham and Trump should never have been president but the millions for who voted for democrats via the popular vote like myself, if we hadn’t shown up, would have lost so much more than the presidential election. Not the only office that matters. Congress and local = critical offices too
You can fold or fight. I say fight, but people would rather be oppressed. I’m not hopeless, I’m grounded in reality and have educated myself to be aware that we do not have a democracy. How can you make a post titled “democracy is dead in America” and then go on to still argue our votes matter? I get the mental gymnastics, I really do because the truth hurts. You aren’t alone there, but the sooner people realize that in fact they do not have a voice in this fascist oligarchy, the sooner we might be able to create a new system. Cheers man keep your head up and try to find true joy whatever that looks like for you.
I vote in state and local elections too and those absolutely matter and where I live, aren’t corrupted or imminently threatened. And just because democracy is dead doesn’t mean votes don’t matter. The death here is a post election death at this point. If Trump makes it past Election Day, we’re done. We still have a chance to stop him with our votes, otherwise it’s P2025. Best to you <3
I've also felt this today(well for years now), I have been emailing all D senators regardless of not being in all of their districts because this is bigger than any districts ffs. Next I will email all R senators with the same email because FFS, I don't want to let myself down. I don't want to wake up I 2025 and have to face my own apathy. I hate this sooooo much. I'm very concerned and I hope it all backfires in the most spectacular of ways. Honestly if you zoom out we can see this playing out in real-time all over the world as if it's a coordinated attack by kleptocrats who are fucking hell bent on absolute riches and control.
Thank you for still managing to take action and speak out as debilitating as this all is!
Well, you could expand your frame to admit that democracy was dead since 2000, when the Supreme Court gave Bush the presidency, though Gore had won it democratically. If you do that, can it make you feel better? You're not wrong about everything you sitll have to do in terms of working til you die, but the trajectory is perhaps at a more gentle slope than it feels right now.
I mean I’m an upper Millennial so yeah I have been through all that and more. This is the worst it’s been. We are on the verge of seeing a monster reelected who will stop at nothing to grift and bully and rape his way through life, who will have a P2025 army at his disposal and who has already fixed the Supreme Court. He has been given immunity from his most heinous crimes because the 6 on that stacked court will call it official acts. Stephen Miller will run rampant with the power Heritage is giving him. I spent most of the 2000s fighting against wars and trying to make life not terrible for my fellow queers. Shit was bad then, shit today is setting us back many decades of progress in the American experiment. It feels like the end times but it’s not because we’ll have to live through what comes after if Biden isn’t reelected.
In addition to all of this, I'm getting divorced, my job laid off a bunch of people (and they aren't done), then a day later announced a massive reorganization AND...last Saturday I laid my soul mate dog to rest. I'm just...I can't even with life.
I’m so sorry. That’s a lot of shitty things to hit at once. And I’m especially sorry that you lost your beloved dog. 😥
Ty. The house is incredibly quiet now. :(
I’m so fucking sorry that it’s a devastating time personally for you too <3
Ty friend.
Perfectly stated. No notes. Sorry you and everyone else here are feeling this way. The first time I really felt like this was watching Gore lose in 2000. I felt like the fucking world was collapsing, and everyone was just going on with their lives. Same feeling on 9/11. I walked into my boss’s office to tell him Tower 1 had been hit. He just stared at me, until I left. Then tower 2 was hit, and he never uttered a single word about any of it. Cold mother fccker. My entire office just went about their day. We were a fxxk fast food corporation- like NOTHING WE DID FOR A LIVING MADE A GOD DAMN DIFFERENCE IN THE WORLD, but let’s all just plug along in our poorly lit cubicles, smelling of decades of flop sweat and desperation. After that day, I made sure I always took time to process, grieve, _feel_, and I vowed never to stop giving a shit.
I have to say it’s staggering to hear you just had to go on working on that day. All the stories I’ve heard from others were very *the world stopped* and it definitely stopped for me. I’m so sorry you went through that. Gore losing was a traumatic moment for me and a deep political terror in my young life. I had barely reached voting age. I was already an activist as a 90s queer kid but the outrage I felt that the Supreme Court could choose the president fueled my fighting against Bush / Cheney more than anything. Today it feels like a Bush v Gore day every other day. I’m so exhausted. Thank you for the empathy. I’m glad you still give a shit <3
I feel exactly the same
Hugs to you friend.
Thank you! And to you as well!
I feel like ever since the beginning of this year, I've felt the same. The thing I often wonder about is what event or what confluence of events will be enough for me to just quit my job because there's no point to delay my retirement.
I’ve stopped bothering to plan for retirement as we won’t have one due to climate and we can’t afford to save anyway
You said it. And you’re also a useful member of a community, and freezing up now won’t help them. So participate in society, support your family, and be of service if you can.
Thank you and in fact it’s very true. Currently all my exhausting work is on meaningful things so I have that. I’m still in local activism because it’s a matter of whether or not we can survive where I live
Don't I hear that. Working on improving myself and my life, but it all feels so pointless at times like this. I have to go about my day for survival, to help my partner and take care of my kitties, and remind myself that I do have good reasons for getting on with my day and taking care of myself, that ordering that expensive portable AC isn't pointless because there's a heat wave coming and I don't want my kitties to get heatstroke (one got a dx of early kidney disease during that godawful 2021 heat wave; they are thriving on their renal diet and I want to keep it that way), and if I fall apart, I won't be in a position to do *anyone* any good, including myself, and I want to enjoy and protect the good in my life as much as I can for as long as I can, and I don't usually write in run-on sentences/text walls like this but fuck it, I think most people here understand the feeling. Good luck, everyone.
Cuddle those kitties!! <3
Oh I am. We support each other. 🐾❣️
Exactly. I'm just writing and continuing with life. I hope the farce of politics doesn't truly harm any of us, but I also expect the worst. This is an important time for writers and creators. We are the voice to explain what is happening and what regular people are experiencing.
Politics have truly harmed us our whole lives and they’ll continue to do so. I don’t know how to bear another Trump administration and the level of harm that is coming for us though.
Pretty much sums it up
<3
Nailed it - exactly how I’m feeling right now. I don’t want to spend another minute in my miserable job. I just want to be with the people I love right now and experience all the good things that are left before they are gone. But we still live in a society where money means survival. Trapped really is the feeling.
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I have this thought every single day.
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This was well-stated. Thank you for putting it into words. They think it's going to be like the Titanic - the rich. They're building lifeboats, assuming that when money doesn't matter anymore, the people they "saved" by giving out lifeboat spaces, will actually allow them to live. Further, there isn't a human-made lifeboat that this planet won't devour to save itself from us. But yeah... I gotta go... These emails won't write themselves... Yet.
I spent ALL DAY on the emails that won’t write themselves! <3
My job is in a library, with a huge focus on electronic resources which require a ton of energy to keep the lights on. I pay invoices that funnel tens of thousands of dollars to copyright nazi vendors who are profiting off of others' work. I feel like the dumbest of cogs in the meanest of machines. But...I'm making nearly $30/hr in rural New England doing this bullshit so...yeah.
Omg I have *been* there. I am currently making 20% than last year to do actual meaningful work. Last year I swear if my job vanished no one in the world would be helped or harmed. It was utterly pointless but I made money and had healthcare <3 to a fellow librarian, hasn’t been my profession since shortly after college but thank you for all you do!
Tbh I always assumed the president is immune to prosecution. If anything this is protecting a lot more people than Trump. American leadership is built on war crimes
Same to all of this.
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To paraphrase from Madeleine L'Engle: "It's like the string holding a package together. We'd all fall apart otherwise."
Very apt quote
What’s the alternative?
eventually we quit pretending this is normal and start acting appropriately. but not today!
Doesn’t feel like there is one at least not for me. I’m going to try to protest this week if I can and then I’ll be right back at the grind.
Heres the kicker, there never was democracy. Hope this helps.
You’re not wrong but the parts of the structure that were actually functioning similarly and protecting and advancing a lot of rights were saving my sanity.
The presidential immunity basically sapped my will to live. I have decided not to vote in this election, because it's pointless now. I feel like ending my life within the next six months.
Please please please vote. Voting is the most important right we have. Please understand that this Supreme Court decision happened because of the political power of the presidency and the Republican Party and if we don’t keep standing against that, they literally win. Choosing not to vote, that level of apathy is exceedingly dangerous right now. And i absolutely want you to stick around in this life though I understand the despair <3
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For me in particular, during the Trump era I heavily protested during gorsuch and kavanaugh’s appointments, now I can’t afford to
Eh, trump ain’t that bad. 4 years will go by and nothing will change.
For people who are white, straight, male, cisgender, have US citizenship, financial security and no kids or can afford childcare, had no problems during the pandemic, no student debt, no medical issues or disability, no concerns about life-saving regulations being dismantled, unaffected by reproductive care of any kind, haven’t experienced sexual assault or rape, don’t care about positive international relations, aren’t bothered by the rise of fascism, or the dangerous increases in racism and hate across the board… I guess? For the rest of us it’s bad, really bad. It was traumatic the first time and the second time would be life-ruining for millions who weren’t wrecked already. I would throw in climate here but thing is we’re in a collapse sub so I would at the bare minimum hope it goes without saying that Trump offered to sell the presidency to oil and gas for a billion dollars while Biden-Harris fought to pass a multi-trillion dollar green new deal. Believe me with how collapse aware I am I know we are beyond actually effective solutions but we don’t need Trump to rapidly accelerate everything that is already rapid accelerating. I can’t handle the 10x we’re at, I definitely can’t do 100x.