Division

Scrolling through my facebook feed the other day, I saw a post/picture that stated something along the lines of “Not once in the last eight years (meaning the time before our current President) did I have to wake up fearing that WW3 was going to start today”. My initial response was, “You're welcome. Those of us who served during the Cold War managed to remove that threat for a little while”. Before I hit the enter button, I stopped and thought about the young person who had shared this bit of tripe. I erased my comment and let her post go unanswered because she wouldn't have allowed anything contrary on her page. This is a problem on several levels that needs to be explored.

Political Divide

The gulf between the dominant parties in American politics is getting wider. Civility is rare whenever politics get brought up (one of the reasons we don't cover politics on this blog) and I'm starting to see an increase in the dehumanization of those who disagree with either side. This is not a good way to run a country, having people inciting hatred for anyone who doesn't agree with a certain political opinion. When we have black-clad idiots facing off with skinheads (and the police standing by doing nothing), we have a recipe for a riot. I'm old enough to recall the last major riots we had in this country and it was not a pretty situation.

Politicians get changed, we have this cycle of elections that makes sure of that, but nobody is being taught how to get through the periods where their guys aren't in power. Instant gratification and lack of long-term thinking are pushing people away from each other in alarming ways.

This is one of the reason I'm a prepper- so I can identify and avoid situations that have a strong potential of boiling over into a riot. I'm too old to get involved in fist fights in the streets, I never really enjoyed the few from my younger days.

History is a Lost Cause

For some reason, the two generations that were raised since the end of the Cold War were not taught basic world history. I saw this begin in the 1970s, but it is much worse now. The pause in global conflict from 1989 until now is just that, a pause. War has been the default setting for mankind since the beginning of recorded history. Just because the USA managed to outspend the USSR on war preparations, or at least cause them to bankrupt themselves trying to keep up with us, doesn't mean that war will never happen again. The blame lies with the schools and the idiots in charge of them that replaced history with “social studies” or whatever they're calling it this week. The history of our own country and those most likely to be in conflict with us should be more important than learning about the dress code of an island tribe in the Pacific Ocean.

Another reason I choose to prepare for disasters, some of them are man-made. This issue is why I have old books set aside. Any history book written in the last decade or so (which is as old as most schools are allowed to keep) is to be read through carefully, looking for what they left out.

Evil Exists; Deal With It.

Since the 1960s, there has been a push to rewrite human history in shades of gray. There is no black and white any more, no good or evil. Everyone and everything is more or less the same shade of gray when you look at everything about them, according to those who want to excuse evil acts. The impetus for excusing evil is to be able to conduct even more evil in the future. The belief that all peoples and cultures are equal disregards the teachings of history, and common sense should be enough to show that such beliefs are false.

Religion is a part of this problem. I make no distinctions between sects or even entire beliefs, I'm seeing every religion being watered down and made “palatable”. Very few churches are willing to teach that evil exists, they're much too busy extorting money so they can build another wing on the building or hire another “preacher”. The “heathen” or pagan religions are not exempt from this, I've met several “pagans” that know nothing about what they claim to follow, but they love the tattoos and art work.

This is why I'm a spiritual prepper. My way of life is fading, being replaced by a foggy, washed-out searching for a utopia that can not and does not exist. Evil seems to be getting a foothold and I am doing what I can to fight back.

The Debate is Over

With the invention of facebook, twitter, instagram, etc. we have given up on actually communicating with each other. Anyone who voices a contrary opinion is now a sub-human monster whose words don't deserve to be shared. Most of the social media outlets are working on ways to censor “fake news” or at least anything that gets reported as fake news. That sounds like a great way to have a one-sided debate to me.

I have a lot of young friends, close to half of my Facebook friends list was under 30 years old when I added them. I've lost count of the number of times my comments have been deleted and how often I've been unfriended by nominal adults (they can vote and most can buy alcohol legally) just because I disagreed with something they posted. Most of the time it's something they copied from a political site, since very few of them know enough about history or politics to be able to form their own opinions. Someone they like said it, so it must be true and anything to the contrary is heresy. Movie stars and musicians that want to moonlight in politics have found it very easy to get time in front of cameras and microphones when they want to spout their version of “the truth”.

I do have two or three friends whose political views are drastically different than mine and they are intelligent enough to be able to debate those differences. We rarely change the others' minds, but we can talk in a civil manner and discuss the differences. This is becoming harder to do with every election cycle.

This is why I prepare for different kinds of disasters. A tornado will usually rip up a section of land a mile or so wide for a dozen miles or so. Car crashes don't normally involve more than two or three vehicles. Blizzards hit fast and last a week, with the roads and power being affected for days at most. In the aftermath of any of these, nobody is really going to care who I voted for in the last election if I can offer them aid. I'm not likely to turn down a warm place to sleep just because my friend voted for the “wrong” politician.

Unless I win the lottery and can buy that private island, I guess I'm going to have to find a way to deal with these issues. I'll keep trying to educate the ones who are willing to learn and I'll miss the ones who choose to remove me from their lives over something as petty as who gets to sit in the Oval Office.