Outside The Box

It’s political season again. The wiser among us are more concerned with hunting season, or Christmas decorations, or just about any other activity that produces a tangible result for the effort invested.

Unfortunately, wisdom, never abundant for humanity, is increasingly rare in this world, so we’ll use this opportunity to review some of the tools we have that can provide a prophylactic effect in our inevitable exposure to all things political.

First things first. Relax. Some of us are past weary of, as my sister-in-law says, “the tyranny of urgency.” Civilization itself is at stake every time we vote? I don’t think so.

The most weary of us are confident that national elections are decided by a “cartel” anyhow. It’s the same Democrat/Republican cartel which has narrowed our choices to a single two-sided coin all of our adult lives.

Think about it. Every four years the cartel pours gasoline on the embers of our fundamental disagreements: Abortion, guns, social differences, etc. The political pendulum appears to swing back and forth, but the hands of the clock don’t move. The fiat currency continues to steadily transfer the wealth of the productive to the parasitic class. The bomb business continues to boom. Distracted and enfeebled by our gaslit differences, learned helplessness becomes real.

It is indeed learned helplessness which maintains this status quo, like an animal caged all of its life that stays in the pen even when the gate is open. We have tools to break up the cartel, but they are not widely known or utilized. Search the term, “Convention of States” if you’re curious.

Only a true grassroots effort will bring any significant change, but don’t look to any elected officials to make a difference. Consider the deeply flawed non-politician, Donald Trump. He sought to dismantle large portions of the entrenched Administrative State, and then his unforgivable sin: Attempting to normalize relations with the Russians.

Trump was never supposed to win. He was to be the sacrificial goat, an unelectable opponent who would guarantee a win for Hillary Clinton. His electoral victory and the popular vote behind that shocked the establishment, and they have worked hard to ensure that nothing like that can ever happen again.

If you have been properly conditioned, you will read the above paragraph as an endorsement of Trump. It isn’t. Rather, it’s an attempt to gain perspective on the political process, but we are programmed to view all things as a dichotomy.

Which brings us back to the current political season. The debates have begun, and morbid curiosity urges me to observe at least part of the spectacle. I’m convinced that if I watch political debates long enough I might actually catch a glimpse of one of the participants catching a fly with his or her tongue.

It is somewhat of a relief to still be able to use the pronouns, “his” and “her” in this context with confidence. And that brings us to our next subject for review: gaslighting.

It’s worth quoting Webster in its entirety here. Gaslighting is the “psychological manipulation of a person usually over an extended period of time that causes the victim to question the validity of their own thoughts, perception of reality, or memories and typically leads to confusion, loss of confidence and self-esteem, uncertainty of one’s emotional or mental stability, and a dependency on the perpetrator.”

You’re racist and privileged because you’re white, and there is nothing for you to do but confess, genuflect and relinquish your wealth and power to someone more deserving. You are a victim because you are a person of color. You are incapable of providing for yourself because all the odds are stacked against you, and you are owed compensation. Black or white, if you disagree with any part of a progressive paradigm, you are “phobic.”

You get the picture. The gaslighting is brilliant. Submit because you’re bad and wrong. Or get angry because you have been wronged. Or get angry because the other side hates you and wants to take away what you have, or prevent you from getting what you should have. With a voting population either ambivalent or divided into camps, the cartel continues unchallenged.

Gaslighting is not limited to American politics. Consider the United Nations’ recent scold of developed nations, Americans in particular, to eat less meat in order to reduce greenhouse gases (GHG) and save the planet. We’re selfish, bad and wrong because we take more than our share and in doing so we cause everyone else to suffer.

Sometimes all it takes to expose a gaslighting campaign is a bit of fact, like a drop of Dawn dish soap clears a greasy film on a sink full of water. The entire US agriculture sector contributes only 1.4% of total global greenhouse emissions. It is one of if not the most efficient ag sectors on the planet and has made great strides in reducing GHG production. By comparison, China produces almost three times the GHG emissions as the US and is the world’s largest producer of pork and the third-largest beef producer.

There are times when it appears that the “cartel” extends far beyond the Democrat/Republican dichotomy. It doesn’t take a conspiracy when global business interests and aspirations to power are aligned by similar goals, but that is a rabbit hole for another time.

In the meantime, stay alert when you begin to smell gas, though with new technology there may be a greener method of gaslighting in the works. Don’t forget your other basic tools when you’re exposed to politics. Remember the logical fallacy: The ad hominem attack, the strawman argument, the slippery slope.

Better still, get up off the couch. Put on that raincoat and take a walk in the rain and feel it soaking into the ground, replenishing the water table, putting out the fires, cleaning the air. Buy a real Christmas card, not a pixel one, and surprise someone with it. Don’t like Christmas cards? You must be Christmaphobic. Do I smell gas?