I continue to find it very aggravating that we’re experiencing something of a “vibe shift” in pop culture…and yet it’s not really being breathlessly documented by some new podcast, or Website or whatever. I mean, Julia Fox is someone I’m so interested that I’m willing to step outside my passive Twitter media bubble to find out what she’s up to — and there’s no central repository of information about her.
So, again, it seems to me that there is money to be made via say, a podcast that would direct people to a Website. Something like that. Something that would be multimedia in nature.
And, yet, the argument could be made that even podcasting is pretty much mature. The Web is definitely mature. And it would take millions to bootstrap a new print magazine.
So…lulz? I think this is it. No one wants to be cool and make money by documenting Julia Fox’s every twitch in a snarky way. I suppose that something unexpected might pop up at some point, but things are looking kind of bleak when it comes to pop culture coverage at the moment.
During the course of working on these now six novels, I’ve made many, many, many mistakes. One of the many mistakes I made is I’ve been way too vocal about the fact that I’m writing a novel (or novels.) I compare the reaction to this to when a woman at a church tells everyone she’s pregnant and all the old wives come out of the woodwork to scare the shit out of her with their breach birth tales.
Anyway, a lot of people have a lot of opinions about how you’re suppose to write a novel, or screenplay or whatever. And it’s usually people who are the most full of shit who have the strongest opinions. I’m writing my novels in third person intimate with rotating POVs like Stieg Larsson and I’m also referencing people by their surnames like he did. Both of these decisions have made people get really mad at me and tell me that it’s just not how things are done.
It gets even worse when some people learn that I’m at times I’m going to be a man writing as a woman from a third person intimate POV. The fact that a middle aged CIS white male might do such a thing makes some woke people EXTREMELY ALARMED.
They can fuck off, is what I say.
The point is to tell a great story. If you can accomplish that then you’ve written something that you can be proud of. I get really angry with people who tell me I can’t write the novel in the way I want to write it for this or that dumb reason. I know how to tell a story and so please shut up.
Anyway, things are going well with the novels I’m working on. At least for the moment. It will be interesting to see how long it takes me to wrap up the first novel and how long it takes me to finish all six novels. With this first novel, at least, I think I’m facing querying it not during the spring 2023 season, but the fall 2023 season.
Ugh. Anyway. Maybe I’ll have finished more of the novels by that point.
It’s clear to me that America, as a nation, has collectively given up. The forces of autocracy or civil war that are tearing us apart are just too strong. As I keep saying, we’re past the event horizon.
We’re either going to implode (autocracy) or explode (civil war.)
America is in this strange post-accountability era where Trump and his cronies are all above the law because we’re afraid to upset MAGA. This, of course, only emboldens them to commit more crimes. And, in the end, either we get some accountability through murdering each other in cold blood for political reasons or we turn into a MAGA autocracy and that’s that.
Given empirical evidence at the moment, I think we’re going to become an autocracy. Blue States just don’t have the willpower or leadership to leave the Union en mass. I get really irritated when people say our future is the “Troubles” like what they had in Northern Ireland. That is total bullshit. That says more about MAGA wanting to use all those guns they want to fuck to murder people like me than it says anything about what our future may be.
A “Troubles” situation is not applicable for the United States. We’re far more likely to simply skip that step and become an autocracy. And if we do have large scale political violence, it’s going to be because Blue States leave the Union.
Anyway, because of macro, tectonic issues this is the twilight of traditional America. Either this is a modern antebellum period, or we just going to become an autocracy and then the issue is how much do we drift into being a Russia clone.
Now that I’ve finished the outline of this new draft of the novel, I’m turning my attention yet again actually writing it out. And, really, the only issue with this draft is I’m really self-conscious about making the story as interesting, fast paced and “thriller-like” as possible.
I keep flipping through the competition and those novels have an edge to them that my novel just doesn’t have at the moment. I’m worried about this issue to the point that I’m going to pay ANOTHER manuscript consultant to help me sex things up some.
And, yet, it’s possible that that just isn’t my writing style. It could be that while I can produce interesting, engaging, page-turning copy…producing a true thriller just isn’t my bailiwick. And, in a sense, these first three novels in this six novel series are far more Mare of Easttown than any of Stieg Larsson’s stuff.
Anyway, at the moment, at least, things are moving at a reasonably fast clip. If all goes according to plan, all I have to do is follow the outline I have and ta-da, finished first (or second) draft in no time.
The ebb and flow of history can lead to some pretty strange outcomes. The fall of Constantinople in 1453 flooded Europe with Greek scholars that led to all sorts of new thinking and, ultimately, the Renaissance.
Well, flash forward a few centuries and here we are — the barbarians are again at the gates of civilization and they’re probably going to break through. So, once MAGA turns the United States into an autocracy a flood of well trained, well educated wealthy liberals will flee the country for parts unknown. It also happened with the ascension of the Nazis in Germany and it’s going to happen in the United States.
These days, I find myself wondering not only where all those Americans will go, but how they will change world culture. I’m assuming that the first stop all these wealthy Blues will go to is Canada. But Canadians hate Americans, so it seems like Europe and Oceania might be a bit more receptive. I could see Perth — one of the more interesting cities in the world from my experience with individuals from there — might see an influx of Hollywood types.
Then, of course, there’s the chance that somewhere unexpected like the Philippines. The living is cheap, it has great weather and it’s big enough that a lot of wealthy Blues could land there and fall in love with the place. (I know I did when I visited a few times.)
But the thing we have to appreciate is end of American democracy will bring massive change to global culture. The States has about 335 million people. So, given the massive income inequality here — I mean, who can afford to use Blue Apron on a regular basis? — I could see as many as 10 million wealthy Blue Americans having the means, motive and opportunity to leave the country starting around 2025. That will be when MAGA Republicans seize power in the United States finally and permanently.
At the moment, it definitely seems as though the United States is careening not towards civil war but autocracy. There might be a it of a frantic spasm in late 2024 – early 2025, but in the end the forces of autocracy will be too great. Then at least a million wealthy liberals will flee the country en mass — maybe more. They’ll flee to Canada, Europe and Oceania, taking wealth and the cream of American thinking and culture with them.
Despite all the demands that people “vote harder,” the United States will become a Turkey – Hungary style autocracy with permanent minority rule. That’s what happens if we’re lucky. If we’re not lucky, we become a political clone of Russia.
I say all this because of the limp wristed reaction on the part of Establishment Democrats to the the end of Roe. There have been no major protests. No general strike. Nothing. The center-Left just gave up. So, as such, it seems as though the same thing will happen between Election Day 2024 and Certification day 2025.
We’re just going to give up.
There’s no indication that the center-Left is going to make any type of last stand for democracy or that there will be any sort of “National Divorce” that would lead to civil war. About 250 years of democracy will end not with a bang but with a whimper.
Nothing will change at first — especially if it’s President DeSantis we’re talking about — but gradually, year by year, white minority rule will be established and a whole host of very unpopular Republican policies will be enacted without any viable recourse for now largely disenfranchised Americans.
And, remember, for all the talk about Reds starting a civil war, they have no reason to. They have a vested interest in keeping the peace since they’re getting everything they want via SCOTUS and regular old anocracy politics. We’re fucked and get out of the country while you still can — even though I still think it should be taboo to do so in the face of our impending doom.
If there is a civil war in late 2024 – early 2025, it will be because officially losing our democracy will just be too much for American self perception and because of macro forces individual center-Left people will bubble up to the surface and be the leadership of some new Blue State Union.
But that seems extremely doubtful. We’re fucked. The bad guys are winning and will ultimately win.
10. Graphic Porn I retweet pictures of hot chicks all the time, but even I sometimes see really graphic porn tweets and blanch. There’s no need to go THAT far. Calm down, people. Use PornHub.
9. People Begging For Money I just don’t care if you need money. *I* need money. We all need money. Shut up.
8. Joke Quote Re-Tweets Sometimes, you’ll see a series of quoted re-tweets that go nowhere. It was funny in 2012 when the world wasn’t collapsing in on us.
7. Preening Writing Community Tweets Anytime someone preens about this or that thing they’ve done — or not done — as a writer I want to vomit. I talk about writing all the time on Twitter and do a lot of videos, too. But I actively avoid self-conscious preening. No one wants to read that.
6. Dumb Question The Dumb Question type of tweet is so grating on the nerves that it makes you want to stop using the service altogether. Shut up with the stupid questions, you fucking idiots.
5. Old People Crowing About Their Birthday I do not care how old you are. Shut up.
4. Passive Aggressive Tweets Whenever someone says, “Woe is me, no one ever interacts with my tweets” I get very angry. Shut up, you idiot.
3. Injured Animals No one wants to see that. Why do I want to see a cat or dog that is horrible mutilated?
2. Too Woke For Your Own Good These people act like college sophomores and blame everything on CIS straight males even when they have nothing to do with whatever the problem is.
1. Begging For Followers This is the absolute worst tweet imaginable. Shut up. If you want more followers, produce better content.
As much as it pains me to admit this, my Traditionalist relatives — whom I love dearly — are fascists. They want white autocratic minority rule, even if they would deny it if confronted with the idea. But in total what they support is fascism.
A lot of different things are happening at the same time. A number of macro forces that have been brewing for decades are coming to a heads at the same time. Of late, the issue of trans rights has come to the forefront of the minds of Traditionalists. It’s such an effective wedge issue that whenever my Traditionalist relatives need to piviot to something else, that’s what they bring up. They get rather worked up about “groomers.”
It’s very, very unsettling.
They would rather live in a white autocratic state with minority rule than risk the whims of the “woke cancel culture mob” that wants to “turn everyone gay” and to “groom” 3rd graders. Ugh. They come out and say that while they don’t like Trump, they really like his policies.
And, as such, even if we magically got rid of Trump politically, there are a dozen other would-be autocrats waiting in the wings to finish the job he started. Chief among them being, of course Ron DeSantis. He’s so popular among my Traditionalist relatives that they keep saying how they want to “vote for him three times.”
Just from my personal interaction, I can tell you that conservative white men are enraged by the “woke cancel culture mob” to the point that fascism seems very attractive to them. What’s worse, they’re in complete denial about MAGA is ascendant and all they have to do is be patient and they will get everything they want politically.
It’s rather surreal. They act like some sort of oppressed group when very soon their ilk will control everything and never give up power — at least as long as I’m alive.
I don’t have any solutions for you. I think we’re past the point of there being solutions. We’re in the montage before Something Bad happens. What that Bad Thing will be, I still don’t know. It will either be autocracy or civil war. For the time being, I’m just not prepared to believe we’re going to have a civil war. While I’m well aware of how civil war is on everyone’s mind, it definitely seems as though we’re just going to turn into an autocracy without even a blink of an eye.
Then, of course, we begin the process of gradually becoming a Russia clone and I have to worry about escaping ICE agents.
It’s quite regular for MAGA New Right people to float the idea of there being a National Divorce and, as such, a Second American Civil War. Here’s the latest example of this, found on Twitter:
Walsh’s hot take is sooo dumb because Red States would lose everything if they started a civil war. They have SCOTUS and they are politically ascendant. They’re one stolen presidential election away from controlling all three branches of government and away we go. And yet, here we are, with Walsh making it clear that he wants a civil war.
I really struggle with why the MAGA New Right does this when they have no reason to. The only thing I can think of is their grievances are so deep seated in racism and misogyny that they are extremely impatient and want everything they want NOW, rather than simply being patient.
The great irony will be, of course, when they do, in fact, get everything they want and then they have the audacity to complain when wealthy, well educated and trained Blues begin to flee the country in the millions. Not to mention how they will howl if there’s an actual civil war when Blue States, not Red States leave the Union.
I don’t know what to tell you. Republicans love to wallow in shameless hypocrisy and it’s meaningless and moot to point it out at this point.
I’ve all but given up talking to my Traditionalist relatives about politics. They are really, really upset about the evils of the “media narrative” and anything that doesn’t fit THEIR media narrative is dismissed as “bogus.” One thing that they often raise is what they feel is the lack of objectivity on the part of the mainstream media.
This really upsets them a whole lot.
And I honestly don’t understand why they’re so upset or what, specifically, they want to change. If you give a lie (MAGA) equal value to reality (everything else) then you’re pretty much lying to the audience. Of course, they like the lie and they get really angry when anyone calls a spade a spade and a lie a lie.
Which brings us to The New York Times. I love The New York Times and all my occasional interactions with them have been pretty cool — other than Maggie Haberman who was really mean to me on Twitter. Anyway, the Times on an institutional level, despite being liberal leaning, always tries to square the circle by going out of its way to give some validity to the MAGA lie.
Given that our democracy is in something of a long term, structural crisis, such behavior does not help anyone — especially not the Old Gray Lady. Conservatives already want to burn the paper to the ground and they totally ignore the fact the paper struggles with being objective, to the point of doing a disservice to its readers.
This is yet another example of how totally fucked the United States is on a macro basis. We’re careening towards a very, very dark future of either autocracy or civil war.
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