Tag: Big Ideas

2025: Tyrant Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There are a few things we have to take into consideration before we think about Trump’s second term. The first is, we have to work on the basic assumption that Trump is simply going to ignore the Supreme Court if they rule in any way he doesn’t like.

So, if he fires several hundred thousand civil servants using his Schedule F idea, then, lulz, he’ll just do it no matter how much SCOTUS rules against him. He will invoke Andrew Jackson and go about his business.

Another issue we have to think about is the total fucking chaos Trump is going to cause when he begins to build out the infrastructure necessary to put millions of undocumented people in concentration camps. Just providing these people with food and housing will be a logistical nightmare.

What’s more, I have serious doubts with the idea that a variety of other people that Trump doesn’t like — everyone from trans people to loudmouth cranks like me — won’t find themselves in any sort of dragnet that Trump begins to employ across the country.

And I’m sure there are all sorts of bonkers counter-revolution things that Trump will do as early as possible in 2025. One key issue for me is if Trump will have the abstract thinking ability to propose a Constitutional Convention that would pass Amendments that would make America a white Christian ethnostate. It could be he will be so stupid that he just announces that he’s going to stay in office the rest of his life because “he deserves it.”

No matter what happens if Trump wins in 2024, we have to accept that the U.S. Military will ultimately decide the country’s fate. If the country collapses into chaos, whomever can convince the U.S. Military to take their side will determine who has power.

Of course, there’s a non-zero chance that not even the U.S. Military will stay stable. It, too, could collapse for a variety of reasons. Then you have WMD that might begin to be lobbed here and there across the country in the context of a global WW3 erupting.

Good times!

I just don’t know what to tell you. It could be that Biden wins and we muddle through another four years. But….I have my doubts.

The Conditions Exist For An Election Catastrophe Starting In Late 2024, Early 2025

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continue to just not know one way or another what to expect this fall. It definitely SEEMS as though the conditions exist for us to collectively lurch into a dark and uncertain future because of MAGA Nazis.

But, at the moment, I just don’t know.

A lot will depend on how close the election is in the fall. If it’s really close, then, oh boy, buckle up. There would just be too much of a temptation for MAGA Nazis to pull some sort of shenanigans.

But, really even if it’s NOT close, there are no assurances that Trump won’t rant about the need for a National Divorce for the pure personal reason of him not wanting to go prison. The country is primed and ready for us to destroy ourselves on way or another because of “vibes.”

The two sides just don’t like each other and MAGA Nazis, in particular, because of macro changes in culture, thing the center-Left is out to get them. The believe this so much that they often pull some pretty crazy scenarios out of their asses just to justify the absolute worst things they can think of for people who simply don’t agree with them.

A lot will hinge on states like Texas. If Trump loses and he really leans into the idea that conservatives need their own nation so they can be “left alone” then….maybe? Maybe Texas, because of how fascist and autocratic their state Republican Party is, could call up a secessionist convention?

And if Trump wins, it’s not like things are going to be all that peacefully. My key fear is that Trump is so lazy and so fucking stupid that he might go full tyrant on us to the point that he’s deposed in some way, which, in turn would cause….Red States to begin to leave the Union.

As I’ve said before, that leaves the following scenario as the only way we may it out alive in 2024 — Biden wins, Trump rants about the need for a National Divorce and no one listens to him. Then he announces his run for 2028 and we punt all of the structural issues that might cause the greatest nation in the world to collapse because of “vibes” down the road another four years.

Of ‘Woke’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Because we live in an age devoid of nuance, it’s really difficult to pin down exactly what being “woke” means. It seems to me the whole notion of “wokeness” is more about the *fear* of being “canceled” by the “woke cancel culture mob” than it means something concrete.

And to figure out who is “woke” and why, requires one to juggle a few different causes in one’s mind at once.

One issue that has prompted the debate over “wokeness” is social media. Social media allows the most extreme points of view to dominate the discussion of any subject. Meanwhile, it is clear that a lot of GenZ people honestly do have different cultural tastes than their older peers.

As such, social media causes the most sensitive of GenZ people to put the fear of God into older people who fear being “canceled” for the slip of the tongue or something similar. I can tell you from my own life that I know people who are on a hair trigger for the possibility that their life will be ruined because they’re recorded by someone saying something that “doesn’t fit the media narrative.”

But again, all of this is very murky.

It is interesting than comics are often the ones who bitch and moan the most about the “woke cancel culture mob.” I think that may say more about older comics not understanding the comedy tastes of GenZ than it does there being some sort of raging band of woke people who scour the earth for people to cancel.

The more I think about it, the more I struggle to understand it all. I’m a loudmouth crank at times and I have, indeed, been attacked by people on my Left who are extremely touchy about the usual “woke” things. But these incidents are actually few and far between — but they leave a mark because of how fucking annoying they are.

But wait, there’s more.

Because MAGA Republicans, by nature, work only in bad faith, they have latched onto the idea of “wokeness” as a catch all for anything that they disagree with. To the point that they don’t even know what it is they think “being woke” actually means.

If pressed, I would say “woke” is a form of cultural Leftism that is has a sometimes absurd orthodoxy that is hypersensitive. Or something. It’s one of those “I know it when I see it” type of things. I don’t feel comfortable getting into too much detail about such things because, well, “woke people” might get angry at me. (Which kind of proves my point about the fear of being canceled is more powerful than anything “woke” people might actually be able to do.)

But I also think it’s a very, very small number of people who qualify as “being woke.”

But because of the bad faith arguments of MAGA Republicans and the nature of social media, that tiny minority of “woke” people has a huge amount of influence on the cultural as a whole. It all boils down to the FEAR of being “canceled” by the “woke cancel culture mob,” even if pretty much most of the “canceling” that happens is just regular old accountability.

So, in some sense, the fear of the “woke cancel culture mob” that a lot of older people have is simply the generation gap. They just don’t understand younger people and they have a wistful anger towards people they feel should know better.

Anyway. I’m sure I’ll get canceled one day.

A Conundrum

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It is becoming clear that there is a pretty good chance that I will wrap up A Version of the Third Draft of my first novel pretty soon. I’m kind of trying to pace myself now that I’m near the end of the latest version of the third draft so I don’t rush through the last few chapters.

Something I just don’t know is how important it is that the draft you query is as absolutely perfect as possible. I say this because, lulz, I just don’t think I’m going to be able to afford a proper editor anytime soon. Given some of the prices I’m being quoted from possible editors, it could be as long as a year before I could save up enough for an editor.

And I’m just not getting any younger.

As I have mentioned, I have a friend who has agreed to go through and carefully look at the manuscript. I fear that’s about all I’m going to get with this novel. And, what’s more, I still don’t know how long it is!

Once I do finish A Version of the novel, I don’t quite know what I’m going to do. I will either hand it over to my friend to edit or I’m going to just sit tight for a little bit so I can work on my backup scifi novel before I return to the main novel with some clear eyes.

I continue to be taken aback by the chatter of other writers discussing their process. I reflect on how I’ve done things and just don’t quite know what to think. Like, apparently coming up with a synopsis of your novel is really hard? I feel guilty(?) that I can write a synopsis of my novel quite easily.

This is where I interject that one of my personal adages about writing is, “Every writer’s journey is different.”

The only thing I can think of is it’s difficult to write a synopsis because you have to be really careful what you exactly talk about in it? Is that why it’s so hard? I just don’t know. Then other people keep talking about all this research they’ve done for their novel and…uhhh….I’ve not really done ANY?

But, then, my novels are really personal and I draw upon my own personal experience to the point that I don’t really need to do any research. But that doesn’t stop me from feeling like I’m doing something wrong.

Anyway. I’ll be done with A Version of the Third Draft of my first novel soon-ish.

Now To Finish This Damn Novel

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve finally reached the point where all I have to do is finish the latest iteration of the third draft. I think once I finish this latest version of the third draft that I have one more version to go before I feel as though it’s “finished.”

Once I reach that point, then I going to turn the novel over to someone I know who has offered to go through the third draft and give me detailed suggestions on each scene in the novel. My hope is that doing this will be a way that I can have some sort of developmental editing of the story.

It just doesn’t seem like I’m going to be able to afford *any* editor of the novel before I begin to query it. Or, to put it another way — it would take me over a year to save up the money to do such a thing and I’m not getting any younger.

As such, I will probably begin the querying process for the novel at some point after the July 22nd deadline. It may be as late as August or September, but it will definitely begin this year.

Of course, in the back of my mind there is the lingering fear that all hell may break loose this fall. There is a greater-than-zero chance that the United States, the greatest nation in the world, may collapse into the anarchy of revolution or civil war in late 2024, early 2025 because of “vibes.”

Only time will tell. It would definitely be poetic if that was the endgame of all my hard work on this novel over the years — everything works out but the end of the world happens.

The Center Shall Not Hold

Let’s Talk About The Prospect of AI-Powered Androids In Homes

Pondering The Querying Process

What The Fuck Am I Going To Do About An Editor?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

In an ideal world, I pay an editor to look over my first novel before I started to query it. But I live in poverty — no joke! — and, as such, it would probably take me around a year to save up the money to pay for a traditional editor.

So.

I have a friend of mine who has expressed an interest in going through and reading the third draft once I’m done. This is a hopeful development, but I’m still uneasy about not using a professional editor to make sure the novel is up to snuff before I try to query it.

My big fear is, of course, that even if I could afford a professional editor that the one-two punch of me being a well-documented freaky weirdo AND how “spicy” the novel is will turn off anyone actually willing to help me.

Ugh.

But I have my vision for the novel and I’m sticking to it. I have to accept that either the novel may never be published or, if it is, it’s only published because of the success of the scifi novel that I’m beginning to work on currently.

I’m cool with those possibilities.

The point of all of this was to prove to MYSELF that I could write a novel that wouldn’t embarrass me. I feel, in general, that I’m just about to accomplish that goal.

What happens after that is going to depend on luck and pluck.

The Mystery Of My Novel’s Word Count

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

For much of the development of my first novel, I’ve dealt not in words as my metric, but scenes. So, here I am, just about to wrap up a solid third draft of the novel and I honestly have no idea how long it is — at least in terms of words.

In general, your scenes are supposed to be about 1,000 words on average. Just eyeballing the scenes and their length found with this novel I…dunno. My fear is that I’m going to pay a little too much of an homage to Stieg Larsson and the novel will be ~160,000 words.

The idea of it being that long makes me wince.

A first novel is SUPPOSED to be somewhere between ~80,000 and ~100,000 words. The second draft of this novel came in about just about 80,000 words. A few things led to the second draft potentially being longer.

One is, my beta readers said I crammed too much into the first act too quickly. So, that got me thinking about how I could stretch out the beginning of the novel so readers wouldn’t feel overwhelmed. What I didn’t expect was I would spend months and months spinning my wheels, trying to figure out the details of this new, extended first act.

Finally — FINALLY — it occurred to me that for the purposes of giving the novel a clearer point that I needed to split the novel into two. The first novel would be about my heroine’s quest to own a small town newspaper in Virginia and the second novel would be about her investigation into a murder that took place in the third act of the first novel.

This plan has worked out really, really well. My first novel now has a very clear purpose and objective for its heroine — owning a small town newspaper. Everything else hangs off of that goal in a really cohesive, coherent manner.

But.

The issue of how fucking long this novel is going to be continues to linger in my mind. I just don’t know. If it’s about 140,000 words, then I will be cool with that because the novel The Girl On The Train is about that long and was a success. Anything beyond 140,000 and…I dunno what to tell you.

I suppose what I can do is just accept that the novel is on a structural basis too long. While I will still query it, in the back of my mind, I will understand that my best shot at getting published will be the new scifi novel I’m working on that is built from the ground up to be as marketable as possible.

That’s the goal at least.

But it’s still sinking in that I’m on the cusp of finishing my first novel. It’s really deep! After all these years of drifting towards my goal, I’ve just about reached it.

Now watch me drop dead like Stieg Larsson. Ugh.