Washington's Public Face - Social Dynamics (part 2)

Political Correctness, the craze of the 80's and 90's, was a simple enough concept. "We, as a people, no longer wish to offend." Beautiful, masterful, and almost utopian in its simplicity.

We had such strange connotations such as "vertically challanged" dwarves, "people of color," or "African Americans," for our black citizens, and "cellulite gifted" obese people.

Comedians wrote about it. Joked about it. Everyone was coming out with a new example of political correctness. There were even books rewriting children's fairy tales to "clean them up" as to not offend, frighten, or give the children ideas of the true nature of the world around them. In fact, 'Politically Correct Fairy Tales' can still be found in bookstores all over the country or online at such outlets such as half.com and amazon.com.

Deep underneath the surface of this, however, another insidious cultural shift was taking place which would have long reaching and devistating concequences for us as a country.

With the advent of political correctness, no longer would our elected leaders be able to firmly stand their ground, confident in their convictions, look the world in the eye and say "we're doing this, piss on you!" because we could no longer stand to offend. It started the trend that we could no longer speak our minds or be true to ourselves, but had to sanitize and sterilize our own thoughts. This shift in thinking was subtle, erroding the superiority of the majority, and the patriotism of being an American. It was the start into the trend of majority guilt.

Fast forward to today, and see the concequences....We now are a nation divided, split assunder by warring factions all demanding to be pandered to. Washington now flits to one small subsect to another, desparately trying to please everyone, and ending up aggravating everyone. We've gone from sticking to our guns to sticking it to the people we're trying to govern. From action on a solid plan for the good of the many, to reacting to the needs of the few whining with the loudest voice of the day.

Political Correctness, in all its glory, is the pregnancy of the nanny state mentality we've given birth to today.... the belief that the government has to direct and mandate each and every decision for the masses, instead of guiding them to make their own decisions.

Why?

We've become a nation obsessed with image. Symbolism over substance. If it looks good, that's all that matters. Washington has taken this one step further, their particular brand of symbolism being throwing money at each and every special-interest group who has the balls to come to Washington and complain. After all, they have to be seen to be doing SOMETHING. Action, whether right or wrong, is all that matters.

But this is a slippery slope. You can't continue to throw money at half-baked, poorly planned directives without the money running out at some point.

You have to know where I'm going with this, people......

The will of the people is being ground into the dirt, replaced by the will of the corporations who, quietly at first, but now quite openly, have been bailing out our government. They have allowed Washington to continue to keep its image, but at the terrible cost transcending money: the erosion of our basic civil liberties. Now, we exist to serve the interests of the monolithic industries, and we have a government far too concerned with its image to protect the rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness - these same gifts procured for us at staggering costs by our forbears.

Image. Glammour. The glossy cover of the magazine. The rest of the magazine is all blank pages, and we have a cizenry well on the way to being too naive to notice. Welcome, then, to the shell country of the United Corporations of America.

On this, the 233 anniversary of the birth of our nation, I would like to offer a little history lesson.

Some of the most powerful words ever spoken, penned, and set in stone as a governing statement are "...the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness..." Right there, larger than life on our Declaration of Independence, these words were a challenge to our oppressors, and our promise to our citizens. Our founding fathers went to war with England over these words. They fought battles, made life-altering sacrifices, counted staggering losses, and endured unimaginable hardships over the right to speak these words.


Their belief in these words forged a juggernaught of incredible strength of conviction, and gave birth to a democracy that has endured through the ages - our America, the land of the Free and the home of the Brave! A country of proud and opinionated people of all races and backgrounds, come together for the purpose of being free to pursue whatever goal we have the audacity to dream, within a loose framework of rules put in place to guarantee the continuance of our nation and the safety of its citizenry.


How low have we fallen, America. We need to wake up, shake off the dependence we're being force-fed, and state, as one voice, that our government needs to work FOR us, the PEOPLE, and not be allowed to perish from the Earth.

Revolutionary thoughts, for a revolutionary day. Enjoy your holiday.