Monthly Archives: October 2016

Presidents

“We have a large public that is very ignorant about public affairs and very susceptible to simplistic slogans by candidates who appear out of nowhere, have no track record, but mouth appealing slogans” 
~Zbigniew Brzeziński

We ought to rethink the way we perceive our presidents.
They are not what we think they are, they can’t be.
We need someone who is comfortable in the arena of being able to make the best decisions possible in horrific situations. All the while understanding and weighing out the negative implications of those decisions.
Their job demands daily, hourly, and sometimes minute to minute decisions to be made with varying degrees of extraordinary complexity and negative consequences.
They don’t live with the luxury of right answers.
Every answer has a significant down side.
That’s the job.
We need to grow up.
It’s time to own what a president does.
It’s time to own and understand what we demand.
Do you think it’s just a coincidence that presidents leaves the office grey?
Can you handle the truth?
Humanity depends on it.

We are dependent upon access to affordable and plentiful resources. All these resources have a multitude of consequences behind them. To further the complexity, we are outgrowing our resources and our global population levels are unprecedented. Cultural tensions and clashes are bringing about problems never before dealt with.
So what’s to be done?
What’s a president faced with?

Is it justifiable to kill ten to save ten-thousand?
Is it worth it if you radicalize ten-thousand more?
Are some resources worth human lives?
What’s of more value, cultural heritage or the safety of millions?
Do the intrinsic problems of drones outweigh the benefits?
Is there a place for covert warfare?
How do you handle covert warfare? Is secrecy paramount?
What if there is an intelligence breach?
Do you employ damage control?
Should you just tell the truth?
How much truth?
What are the consequences of exposing covert actions?
Are there times which warrant the public being lied to or misled?
How do you handle the demands of cultural clashes that unleash xenophobia and racism?
How do you find peace for a polarized public?
How do you handle the political arena in an election year when 90% of what the job demands, is by necessity, veiled in secrecy?

The old rules don’t work any longer.
Wars are no longer fought the way they once were.
The demands on our resources have never been higher.
Humanity stands at a precipice.
Our leaders can’t save us.
Only we can save ourselves.

The geopolitical sphere is akin to a chessboard. Each piece and move is strategically used to manipulate and gain control of the board. The players are masters who are dozens of moves ahead of each other and incidentally are all playing by their own rules.
Confused?
Everyone is.

“History is much more the product of chaos than of conspiracy”
~Zbigniew Brzeziński

We’re not told how the game is played because the game is a game of manipulation. Winning moves are made by manipulating the mind. The strings of indoctrinated ideologies are easily pulled. Subtle, and often unrecognized propaganda surrounds us and manipulates us from all sides including our own. In the information age, wars are waged covertly. Information is a weapon. A weapon to manipulate all the pieces on the board. These strategies are played out by monied interests that have little national interests.

“Nation state as a fundamental unit of man’s organized life has ceased to be the principal force: International banks and multinational corporations are acting and planning in terms that are far in advance of the political concepts of the nation states.”
~Zbigniew Brzeziński

The media pushes the middle east and the Islamic State, trumpeting the fear of these insurgencies. It’s not to say they are not of value and significance. What’s worth understanding is that what we are dealing with in the middle east is a byproduct of purposeful actions taken many years ago. With that knowledge, it is vital to understand the geopolitical maneuvering that is occurring in Eurasia. These are the sights of the wars of the future. Understanding why this area of the world is important is vital for an informed public to make informed decisions.

“For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasia… Now a non-eurasian power is preeminent in Eurasia and America’s global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained.”
~Zbigniew Brzeziński

With information weaponized, the power of propaganda needs to be recognized. The heard mentality is strong. Our desire to fit in and be loved far supersedes our rationality and altruism. The utter inundation of media consumes us to the point there is little time to think outside of the prescribed parameters.

“Shortly, the public will no longer be able to reason or think for themselves. They’ll only be able to parrot the information they’ve been given on the previous night’s news.”
~Zbigniew Brzeziński

Understand this, change occurs in only one place,
Your mind.
You’re either freely dictating your own thoughts or you’re ruminating over the thoughts of others.
We are all told what to fear and what to hope for. We submit control by choosing to allow the media to think for us. We allow them to be our primary source of information.

“The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.”
~ Mark Twain

So what does this mean?
We don’t understand global conflict.
We don’t know where, why, or how we wage war.
We don’t understand the grievances of our enemy.
We don’t understand how our covert missions are waged.
We don’t know who the “Gang of Eight” is.
We don’t understand how we use private military contractors.
We don’t know about the multitudes of CIA interventions around the world.
We don’t understand our alliances with Saddam Husain, Bin-laden, and those of their ilk.
We don’t understand the geopolitical significance of Eurasia.
We don’t understand the concept of economic espionage.
We don’t understand the global currency market.
We don’t understand how the dollar benefits from the blackmarket.
We don’t understand the drug trade, specifically heroin.
We don’t understand fractional reserves.
We don’t understand how our own currency is created.
We don’t understand the privatization of all the world’s fresh water.
We don’t understand the sources of our resources.

Instead we spend our time processing prescribed problems.
Contemplating the varied solutions which have been previously provided.
Ruminating over the cornucopia of these prescribed possibilities.
Because of this, we miss the bigger pictures.
We are awash in blind ignorance.

When was the last time you really changed your mind?
Where did that thought originate from?
Those moments we actually change our mind are pivotal and rare.
It’s hard to have an original thought.
It hard to authentically change your own mind.
It’s likely that your mind was changed.
This isn’t to say this is intrinsically bad, it’s more of an appeal to recognizing the source of our thoughts and ideas.
We’re told how to think.
We’re told what to say.
We’re told how to discredit the opposition and bolster our position.
Prepackaged ideologies that are so neat and tidy.
It’s all quite simple really. With free thinking being such a rare commodity and fear being such a clear motivator, the corporatocracy has a relatively easy job.

The fight is for your mind.
Only you can transcend beyond the propaganda.
Only you can choose to see outside of what you are told to see.
So how do we find each other?
How do we come together?
How do we handle the deluge of polarities pushed upon us?

Read books.
Ask questions.
Read more books.
Ask more questions.
Read what offends you.
Read what frightens you.
Be brave with the books you choose.
If you always ask the same question,
you’ll always get the same answer.
Read banned books.
Think critically.
Think hard.
Think.

Healthy, well informed, balanced criticism is the ozone of public life.
~ Mahatma Gandhi

Tall Grass

It was about fifteen years ago, around this time of year, early fall, midday, and warm. The prairie grass was long. I was riding my mountain bike on a trail that was almost entirely obscured. The thick, yellow grass was so tall that it was rolling over my hands as I rode through it. I was near Cedar Lake in Minneapolis riding on an area that, at one time, was an old lake bed. Flat and featureless, without trees. I was fit at the time, so I was riding fast. As far as I could remember, I’d never been on that particular trail before. I assume, by the density of grass covering the trail, that no-one else had ridden it in a long time either. It’s a rather public area. The trail was maybe two hundred yards from a two lane bike path we call the commuter trail. It’s heavily used and takes you into downtown Minneapolis. I’m sure people were around, but I wasn’t paying much attention. The trail, barely visible, was a blur. Like I often did, I was pushing it. I knew I couldn’t see the trail, but I’d gotten used to ridding in conditions where I couldn’t see well. That’s mountain biking, pushing your bike just past the point you’re able to consciously process what’s happening. When it’s good, you’re in a buttery flow just reacting to the moment in front of you. The grass was whipping my fingers and stinging my hands and legs. I was fully in the zone and happy to be riding something new. I lived less than a quarter mile from there and had ridden nearly ever trail possible.
New was nice.
Before I could process what was happening, I was over my handlebars. As I was flying through the air, my hands were the last thing to leave my bike as my legs catapulted over my body. My bike came to a sudden and violent stop. As mass does, my body maintained the velocity that had been interrupted only milliseconds beforehand. I crashed onto the ground in a violent heap. Landing on my back with a blunt hard thud, my entire body compressed like a great bellow, and the air from my chest exploded from me with a deep guttural burst. Recoiling on the ground, my body contorting from the blow, I dizzily tried to understand what had just happened. Straining my neck to look behind me, I saw a railroad tie across the trail. Immersed in pain and unable to catch my breath, I curled into a ball and moaned.
The tall grass obscured me.
I wasn’t lying there much more than thirty seconds before a man was standing over me.
“What-cha doin’?”
“I just… crashed… my bike”, I said in a week slow voice.
“What-cha doing?”
Knowing something was off, I reached behind me and grabbed my bike. Using it as a crutch, I slowly pulled myself to my feet.
Annoyed, I replied, “I just crashed my bike!”
“What-cha doin’?”
Without the ability to move quickly, I started to step away from this guy who was creeping me out.
“Where ya goin’?”
As I took another step, he reached out and aggressively grabbed me in the groin.
I paused for a second, shocked.
Instinctively, with as much force as I could muster, I punched him between his right eye and temple.
Presumably stunned, he stammered and ran away.
Astonished, confused, and still struggling to gain my breath, I fell back into the grass.
Stunned, I just laid there.
It took me a week to admit this to anyone.
Waiting for a time I could ask him privately, I asked my boss at the time if this was normal or accepted in gay culture? Taken aback, he assured me that it wasn’t.
In hind sight, I see the question was offensive.
I wish I hadn’t asked, but I was trying to make sense of what happened.
My head was still spinning.
Did I do something wrong?
Was that a pick up spot?
Maybe I shouldn’t have been there?
Did I look like someone that would be ok with that?
Could I have done something to prevent it?
I couldn’t process it.
Aside from Bryce, I didn’t tell anyone else for at least six months.
And then, I only told my wife.
Embarrassed, ashamed, and confused, I was slowly able to understand the assault for what it was.
To merge this fucked up thing into my reality wasn’t something I wanted to do. That’s the thing with assault, I didn’t get a choice. It happened and there is nothing I can do about it.
I swore that I’d never forget his face and someday I would find him.
I never did.
I wanted revenge!
I wanted him to pay!
Assault isn’t something you gleefully share.
Quite the opposite.
I think it’s common not to talk about it, don’t you think?
If you were assaulted, would you talk about it?
A great conversation starter, right?
No, it’s the opposite. You bring that shit up, over and over, and no one is going to invite you to the party any more.
That’s the reality, you know it’s true.
No one wants to talk about that.
When I tell people this story, it’s always awkward. They always ask the same question, “Do you think he put the railroad tie there?”
How should I know?
I doubt it.
If he did, he had to have been the most patient molestery freak ever!
My guess is, like most people that do this sort of thing, they are opportunistic, narcissistic assholes. Selfish people who pray upon the weak. I guarantee you he wouldn’t have done this if I hadn’t just crashed my bike and was gasping for air.
That’s the way this works.
Opportunistic, weak, selfish, immature, insecure, narcissistic assholes do this shit!
Imagine if the person who assaulted you was a person with power and influence?
What are you going to say?
Bill Cosby touched me?
Dr. Huxtable?
Bill Cosby, Bill Cosby?
What! Are you crazy?
Turns out, nope. He’s a sexual predator!
Who would have thought?
More to the point, who would have believed it?
When did it become convincing for you?
Was it when the first woman accused him? I doubt it. Bill Cosby? No way!
I was judgmental too.
It wasn’t until the numbers got upwards of twenty that I said, “What’s the likelihood they are all lying?”
Me, the guy who’s been assaulted and I still doubted these victims.
Which makes sense considering I even doubted myself.
That’s what the victims are up against.
That’s why victims stay silent.
In today’s world, if you say you’ve been assaulted by someone who admits they assault people, who brags they can assault people, and brags they get away with it because of their celebrity, people still doubt the victim.
Look how we treat these people who swallow their pride and admit something that’s so shameful to them!
They’ve been assaulted!
And then publicly shamed.
Ah, ya know, I’m probably making up that shit in the tall grass too.
Never mind me.
He’d make a hell of a leader,
No worries,
Carry on…

Injustice

Did you hear that Amy Goodman was charged with trespassing and then when those charges didn’t look like they would stick, they changed the charge to inciting a riot?
Ya know, for reporting on something that wasn’t being reported on?!
Yea, reporting!
What’s further alarming is the lack of coverage by fellow journalists that a fellow journalist was being criminally charged for being a journalist. Oh wait, I mean rioting.
I’ve become accustomed to the extreme bias and distortion in reporting, but this seems to be counter intuitive for reporters to not report on a reporter who is being repressed.
I’ve seen arguments that suggest she had no right to be trespassing. I find that curious since those charges were dropped before they were even filled. Maybe she wasn’t as “trespassy” as the trespassing charges suggested?
Maybe they were a bit trumped up?
It’s hard to argue they weren’t. Especially when she wasn’t accused of inciting a riot until the trespassing charges didn’t look like they would stick. It seems like they were looking for anything to stick her with, don’t you think? It’s hard to argue they weren’t bogus accusations when the judge stopped the charge levied against her by refusing to sign the charging document.
Is it illegal to levy false charges?
Or is it ok to just make up charges willy-nilly?
Can you charge someone for charging someone with charges that have no merit?  Can you charge someone for using public resources to threaten someone who is challenging private interests?
Of course not silly, this is America, you can’t do that to corporations. They have rights, ya know!
I heard arguments that Amy wasn’t being an objective reporter? Because she was “siding with the protestors.”
Does that mean she was standing on the wrong side?
Would she have appeared more objective if she were standing on the other side?
Behind their dogs?
To that point, would the pipeline company and their private security have welcomed “objective reporting”?
Would they have welcomed Amy objectively reporting the Native American point of view?
Would that have been a problem?
Or is that the wrong sort of objectivity?
Should she have been as objective as the super objective reporters from the mega media?
The reporting that’s known to be rife with such objective objectivity.
The irony is rich, even cliche.
Their lack of objectivity, that is.
I’d argue the objective of the folks building the pipeline is objectively blocking all objections. Unfortunately, that gets really hard to do when the largest gathering of Native Americans in years has gathered to get all “objecty” to the pipe line they object to.
I’m sure they thought it wouldn’t be that hard to quell the decent.
The Indians know their place, right?
We beat them down years ago.
We haven’t played cowboys and Indians in decades.
We’re on to new bad guys who wear robes and pray on carpets.
Who even talks about Indians anymore, anyway?
Indians are so pre-coldwar.
No one cares about them anymore, aside from their casinos…Jackpot!
I’m sure they thought they could quell the images of decent.
Well, until, that pesky Amy Goodman got all reportery.
So what did they do to this reportery reporter?
Try and throw her in jail?
That’s right, they tried to throw her in jail!
How dare she report on things corporations don’t want reported, right?
You know the age old question, if a tree fall in the woods and no one is there to hear it, did it make a noise?
Would the same be true if a private security company used attack dogs to quell decent and no one is there to witness it? Would it have still happened without that reportery reporter?
I wouldn’t have known, would you?
We know that’s the case with police brutality.
But that didn’t exist unit Obama became president and did all that race baiting, right?
Or was it those pesky cell phones that are to blame?
Taking all those unauthorized videos and showing them to people.
Or is it, as they have always said, the police have been brutalizing African Americans for years and now, for the first time, there is proof?
Sorry, off topic.
Back to these uppity Indians. I mean really, who do they think they are?
Being all demanding and telling us how to use our land. Right?
What rights, I mean right do they have?
The Indians have their reservations.
Those deals were made fair and square!
They have their land, and we have ours, and we can do what we want.
This is our America now!
Ours, as in the corporations who finance the lobbyists to write the laws that support the corporations who use the laws to justify the corporate policies and profit.
Ours!?
It’s all by the book though, right?
Where was I?
Oh, Amy Goodman.
I signed the petition, Don’t imprison Amy Goodman.
I think the charges were dropped about the same time I signed.
You should know the judge’s name.
He did the right thing.
I don’t fully understand the politics behind these charges but that North Dakota state prosecutor was, from my point of view, working for monied interest, not human interest.
As we know, all too well, money and power usually win.
So when someone stands against the tide, in the name of liberty and justice for all, that should be recognized!
That judge’s name is District Judge, John Grinsteiner!
His name should be spoken with pride, District Judge, John Grinsteiner!
He declined to sign the charging document.
That’s special, he’s special.
We can all stand and do the right thing.
My mom made me so proud and stood up for a Muslim woman that encountered hatred. She stood up in front of her peers; disregarding judgment and condemnation. When one of her church peers refused to let the Muslim woman into the church on a cold day because they weren’t open yet, my mom stood up! She took this woman in out of the cold and gave her a chair and a blanket.
Disregarding her peers!
Think about that…
That’s radical!
Understand, when the tide of peer pressure is weighing on you to not do the right thing, and you do it anyway, that should be recognized!
That’s powerful…
Period!
That makes me glow with pride.
The woman who filmed the black man being harassed in Edina saw an injustice, stopped her car, and was a voice of reason and justice.
Her name is Janet Rowles, a revolutionary, standing up for justice and freedom. Think about it, stopping your car to be a voice of reason, and a witness to injustice?
She willingly put herself in harm’s way for a stranger!
There is no way she could know the consequences of her actions.
For as many accolades as she has undoubtably received, I’m sure she has received an equal amount of condemnation.
For a stranger!
Janet changed the world that day.
Judge John Grinsteiner changed the world, My mom changed the world, and Janet Rowles changed the world.
We all can change the world.
Evolve…

“In the beginning, there was only a small amount of injustice abroad in the world, but everyone who came afterwards added their portion, always thinking it was very small and unimportant, and look where we have ended up today.”
~Paulo Coelho

If you want to heal the world, heal yourself

There is a divide in our culture that is fracturing friends and families. I think it’s important to recognize that this isn’t something we are just experiencing here in the U.S.
It is a global phenomena.
We are not alone in this plight.
If there is any future where this divide could be healed, it is not being discussed.
For the moment, let’s take a closer look at ourselves.
We are going thorough a difficult time of growth in the world. Growth that will require a shift in consciousness.
People of different cultures and religions are finding themselves intermixed at levels that have never been seen before.
The thing with culture and religion is, the very essence of them is rife with dogmatism. They need to be. They wouldn’t be effective if they weren’t.
Every religion is right. Every religion is speaking to an element of truth and attempting to express the wonder and awe we all experience. They are an attempt to show an elevated path and provide answers to the difficulties we experience and the questions we have. Every culture has remarkable beauty and pride. They have traditions and language that define them.
These are their truths.
This is what we are up against.
Everyone knows they are right, because they are.
With the advent of the internet and social media, the transfer of information has accelerated at an unprecedented rate. A consequence of this is that ideas don’t stay put, quite the opposite. Ideas can make it around the world in a matter of days or even hours. Ideas that would have never found a global audience, do. Ideas that wouldn’t have traditionally taken root in cultures, can find support. Isolated people find others of like mind, and contentious ideas emerge. These contentions exist in our nations, in our families, and amongst our friends. Destabilizing the security we formerly took for granted when our neighbors maintained similar beliefs.
This all fosters a sense of isolation that is growing at an unprecedented rate due to the advent of social media.
Now, we all have access to our neighbors’ subconscious.
Realms that, at one time, rarely saw the light of day.
The subconscious is an imperative component of the human psyche. It’s the place we sort out our ideas. It’s the place to make mistakes and reconstitute future ideas. It’s not meant for mass consumption. Now these undeveloped, immature ideas are regularly thrown about.
Reckless and reactionary dialog constitutes the new norm.
Every impulsive and adolescent thought is acted upon and shared. Feelings are hurt and people are incensed, and it snowballs.
No, it’s more like an avalanche.
Triggered by an unintentional act and within moments, homes and communities are being destroyed.
People don’t even need to leave their homes to feel attacked.

There is something called integral philosophy that can help us grow to understand this divide and give us the tools to grow through it.
It isn’t going to be easy.
Growth is hard.
From this perspective, the root of the problem is conflicting levels of stage development.
In order to understand this, you need to understand the levels of stage development I’m referring to. The first is “world view”. The stages build in a hierarchical fashion. It is important to understand that each stage builds upon the preceding stage.

1) Egocentric: Concern for self
2) Ethnocentric: Concern for family, tribe, or culture
3) World Centric: Concern for all of humanity
4) Cosmo Centric: Concern for all sentient beings

I’ll also refer to the developmental stages of human consciousness.

1) Archaic: Base level awareness.
2) Magic: Egocentric, superstitious, omnipotent, a belief that your gestures and ideas influence and control your external environment.
3) Mythic: Ethnocentric, conformist, petitionary prayer, pre-rational, traditional fundamentalist religious world view.
4) Rational: Industrious, capacity to take third person perspective, trans-rational, subscribes to the scientific method and objectivity.
5) Pluralistic: Everyone is equal, multicultural sensitive, with a deep desire not to marginalize or exclude. Politically correct.
6) Integral: Ability to see a partial truth in all stage structures. Has the ability to meet people where they find them. They have the ability to have respect for someone as they are, versus how they want them to be. Understands the hierarchy within the stages of consciousness development.
7) Transpersonal: Transrational and transverbal.

We are experiencing such cataclysmic divides due to the conflicting stages of development we are in. Speaking in generalized terms, it was the status quo for the majority of the population to be at an ethnocentric/mythic stage of development a little over a hundred years ago. But the world was a bigger place at that time. There was a very real possibility to live your entire life without experiencing another culture or religion.
Rationalism emerged as a recognized stage of development as the understanding of science and the scientific method infiltrated into our societies and cultures. Pluralism is a relatively new phenomena that gained traction in the 1960’s. What the mythic, rational, and pluralistic stages have in common is a dogmatic adherence to their stage perspective. They are unable to discuss opposing views without encountering conflict.
It is the integral stage of development that is able to see the value of all underlying stages. Although the integral stage is emerging, there isn’t a critical mass that supports it at this time. I believe the Dalai Lama was the first cultural leader who embraced this stage of development in his leadership. It was unprecedented for a religious leader to encourage a scientific study of his religion’s practices. To speak in stage development terms, this is an alliance between the mythic and rational stages of development.
An analogy that is often used to illustrate a hierarchical structure is understanding the relationship between cells, organs, and the organism. Cells are the building blocks for organs and organs are the building blocks for the organism.  The more complex structures wouldn’t exist without the less complex. Higher stages of development do not negate the value of the former stage, quite the opposite. The higher stage and more complex stage wouldn’t have been attained or even exist without their less complex counterpart.
This is where it gets difficult.
It may be easy to see the hierarchal structure in our biology, but to transfer that understanding to the human experience is an entirely different thing. The cultural war we are experiencing is between the ethnocentric/mythic/rationalist and the world centric/rationalist/pluralist. As I said before, the complexity arises in the dogmatism that all of these stages adhere to.
It’s the integral stage of development that can help us move through this. If we can speak to the problems that we see through an integral perspective, this would be a radical evolution in consciousness.
We all have so much to say and so much wisdom to share. There are so many opportunities at the dinner table, the water cooler, or talking with extended family. Social media has such broad reach and the tenor of the comments could definitely stand to be scaled up. It’s the orator alone who can transmit their message in a way that is heard and that will find success. Re-postulating your ideas, so they can be understood and appealed to by someone who embraces a different stage of development, is truly what we all want. I, so often, hear people say, “I don’t how anyone could think that way.” Remember, they don’t understand how you could think the way you do either.
You have three choices. Continue to argue from your perspective, surrender to an apathetic stalemate, or attempt to extract yourself from your dogmatism and reframe your argument to appeal to the stage of development of the person you are speaking to. The latter is the most evolved choice, but it isn’t easy and it will demand an evolution in the way you see and interact with the world.
That process will require the ability to learn to speak at a former stage of development and clearly understand the imperative value within that stage you’re appealing to.
Awareness is the key.
Recognize to whom you are speaking.
Honor their stage of development.
Reframe your argument in accordance with their stage.
Let go of any projections rather than reverting back to an old argument.
As they say, the art of a good therapist is for you to see your own folly.

Security

A few years ago, I refused to go through the full body scanner at the airport. The TSA agent was notably surprised. No one was happy, least of all me, but I thought, I’ll be damed if I’m going to submit myself to this injustice. Little did I know, the TSA agent would make a mockery of both of us. He pat me down as though I was entering a high security prison. With the unreasonable amount of time he took on one of my arms, I knew it was his intent to make me regret my decision. I was surprised how far he took this. Slowly and methodically, he went over every square inch of my body. With my legs spread and my fellow Americans staring, the TSA agent pushed my left testicle to the side pushing his hands up into my groin. His fingers between my scrotum and inner thigh. Upset, I looked him in the eyes and bitterly asked him if he was enjoying himself. Flustered and irritated, he glared at me.
My guess is he was in his fifties.
I wondered how he saw himself?
I’m sure I wasn’t the first to refuse to be scanned.
Was he a supervisor showing his agents how to handle the uppity?
Could it be he was just as uncomfortable as me?
Or was he on his own power trip?
As more of my fellow Americans submitted to the injustice of exposing themselves one by one, I stood there as he went slowly up my right leg to the point he touched, what under no circumstance, he should be allowed to touch. Pushing it aside, he again slid his hand firmly into my groin. I again growled, “Are you enjoying yourself! This is bullshit! I hope you are proud of yourself!”
As I attempted to make a mockery of all of this, they made a mockery of me.
I was prominently displayed and publicly fondled.
I was clearly made an example of.
When it was all done, I was beyond furious. The gritty charge of adrenaline pulsed through my body. I swore I’d never submit, but one extremely drawn-out public fondling was all it took.
A public fondling the TSA refer to as an “extensive pat-down.”
Today, I bitterly exposed myself, for the umpteenth time, for the theater we call security.
I assume that TSA agents saw all my dangly bits.
My wife went through first, exposing herself.
Who gets that job?
What are their credentials?
Presumably, they saw through all of her clothing.
My beautiful wife, who has handled herself with such dignity.
Exposed.
Curiously, they pulled her aside and said they needed to pat down her shoulders, why!?
With multiple lines merging, my wife and I were separated. Not paying much attention, I did notice the woman in front of me was pat down after her scan as well. I didn’t think about it until they told me they needed to pat down my legs after I went through the scanner.
Annoyed, I found myself spread eagle again.
Didn’t they just see through my clothing?
Isn’t that the point?
Didn’t they see my legs and everything in between?
I asked the agent, “What are you looking for?” He didn’t respond. I asked, “Did the scanner see the steel rods in my legs?” He nodded and chuckled and said, “Ya.”
There are no steel rods in my legs.
What’s the point of all of this?
What’s the point of all of us standing spread eagle with our hands in the air, in a machine that can see through our clothing, if they are only going to further grope us?
What was the point of making a public mockery of me if the scanner I refused to use doesn’t even provide them the information they need?
When I have traveled with my baby recently, the agents have taken us out of the scanner line and brought us through the metal detector. No “extensive pat-downs” for budding families. It would appear they are reserved for those with the bravado to demand their rights not be violated.
Unfortunately, the irony is all too clear.
I knew a twenty-something who was a baggage handler. He told me he could have put anything he wanted into the cargo hold of a plane.
Anything!
He assured me the security was just as lax for all of the baggage handlers.
Aside from his background check when he got the job, he could come and go from his breaks to Taco Bell and Super America, unmonitored.
That’s an interesting contradiction, isn’t it?
Upstairs in the theater of perceived security, I have my shoes off, my belt off, and my pockets are empty as I walk past garbage cans filled with water bottles and other bits of naughty paraphernalia.
All in preparation to pose with my legs spread wide.

I flew to Mexico. It was on my way home that a TSA agent found a 4oz bottle of sunscreen in my bag. There was just shy of an ounce left after my beach vacation. Throwing logic out the window, he reprimanded me and threw away the remaining sunscreen. As he threw it away, I condescendingly reminded him that the other agents had failed to find the sunscreen the other three times I passed through security.
To that point, every time I fly, I break the rules.
I don’t use plastic baggies.
I bring too much liquid.
I know I’m being contentious.
I also know my shampoo isn’t the reason they put these bans into effect.
Maybe it’s not my place to test them?
But I find it curious that their enforcement is so ineffective.
I don’t know what the exact number is, but since 9/11, I’ve likely gone through TSA security over a hundred times.
They have only caught me once, with a nearly empty bottle!
This is beyond a coincidence.
In fact, I inadvertently flew with a pocket knife in my carry-on about six months ago. I didn’t figure it out until I had unpacked my bags.
This all brings home the uncomfortable reality that any notion of security is an illusion.
It seems the role of the TSA is that of the director.
Ensuring we all know our lines in this masquerade and theatrical performance we call security.
The TSA knows the screening doesn’t work.
With their own self imposed test, they failed to find 95% of the explosives and weapons they attempted to bring through their own checkpoints.
Let that soak in… a 95% failure rate!
They were able to get explosives and weapons through the TSA screening in 67 out of 70 attempts.
The testers, by their own admission didn’t use any advanced techniques to disguise the explosives and weapons. They were acting as untrained civilians. Imagine what the failure rate would be if these same people were trained to evade detection.
Would they fail 100% of the time?
With a failure rate that high and no aviation based terrorist attacks since the establishment of the TSA…
This speaks to an awkward truth.
Reason would suggest they could not have prevented any threats in the first place.
That’s what’s so ridiculous.
They know their organization is a failure.
Yet, they continue to exert their authority suggesting everyone needs to continue to expose themselves.

This is what we have bought into.
A dramatic increase in the price of admission to the security theater.
The price is our dignity and our civil liberty.
This is what the TSA will provide: If you allow federal agents to see through your clothes, they will in turn, assure you that you are safe and secure.
Wink Wink.

The point of this is to further illustrate that our fears are unfounded and security is an illusion.
This is our truth:
We dogmatically adhere to ideas that provide an illusion of security from threats that don’t exist.
In the name of security, we surrender the freedoms that we are fearful of losing to ensure that we maintain the freedom and security we have already given away.
A paradox of our time and culture.

 

 

Addendum: Our TSA experience on our way home is worth mentioning.
The first thing the TSA agent said to us as we approached the scanners was, “Today is opposite day. You’re going to do the opposite of everything you normally do. Leave on your shoes and belts. Just put your phone in your carry-on. Leave everything else in your pockets. We are going to see how well you are listening.” Perplexed, my wife and I walked forward, expecting to be ushered towards the body scanner. Instead, we walked right past it into the metal detecter. They sent us all through so quickly that we were all bunching up waiting for our bags to go through the scanner.
TSA agents were scattered about not doing much of anything as far as I could tell. Some of them were chuckling as though they thought this was absurd. If there was any order to what was happening, it wasn’t obvious. For the life of me, I don’t understand what they were doing.
I thought to myself, you just can’t make this stuff up!

Asleep

Missing shingles and holes in the roof leave the house exposed to the elements.
Chandeliers with missing crystals coated in dust and cobwebs hang tenuously from their mounts.
The remnants of expensive wallpaper hangs loosely from the walls.
The once elegant kitchen smells of rot.
Fixtures are covered in corrosion.
Mold and mildew permeate the air.
The wood floors, now soft and rotten, have given way in places to expose the dark, dank basement.
Books that have been ravaged by water and time sit yellowed and wrinkled on warped shelves.
Unreadable.
Money, long ago, lost its value.
I vaguely remember the desperation I’d feel when I would lose my phone.
How silly social media was.
Arguing with strangers.
Strangers I would gladly hold and hug today.
I was never so sure of my ideologies.
What a luxury it was to have someone to hate.
I see how foolish I was, when I have no one to love.
I haven’t spoken to another human in years.
I don’t even know what time is any more.
It lost its use long ago.
The cement foundation is crumbling and brittle, leaving a wet gray sludge strewn across the floor.
I forgot the fear of death as desolation devoured my days.
Death, what a luxury.
Will today be the day the house finally falls?
Will I feel the debris crashing onto my body?
Oh, the luxury of pain.
I haven’t felt anything in so long.
Without any story to share, I stare.
Without the tension of death, I’ve lost the meaning of life.

Like a distant memory from the past, I say, “I’m ready”.
I’ll step into the abyss this time, I won’t turn in fear.
I welcome the looming darkness and deafening quiet.
I’m not afraid anymore.
Peering into the vast, open, and endless void, I willingly fall forward…

My senses flash like lightening in a storm.
With a start, I gasp as though I forgot to breathe.
I push myself up sharply and try to blink my world into focus.
I vaguely recall the dream of a personal apocalypse.
Pulled from the abyss, I’m bathing in the light of a distant looming rainbow.
Sitting on the swim dock with my sister.
Sailboats heeling.
My parents waving from the shore.
I promise I’ll never leave you!
I dive in and the cool crisp water envelops me.
Diving deeper and deeper, I turn towards the surface.
Spreading my arms wide, relaxing, and floating…
With a hard, swift kick I burst forth from a field of fresh dry powder.
The brisk mountain air kisses my cheeks.
Snow pouring over my chest.
My sister in stride.
Stay with me!
I’ll never leave you!
The steep pitch is perfect for the plentiful powder.
Charging forward, fearlessly, faster and faster.
The landscape, an unrecognizable blur.
My path, like the rhythm of a wave.
Bounding weightlessly.
The mountain sun, so bright.
I can hear my dog in the distance.
Howling, happy.
Is that coffee I smell?
But, she died years ago?

I wake up, confused.
My face mashed into a matted pillow, wet with drool.
Was I dreaming of a dream dreamt?
My head dizzy with deja vu.
The morning sun is pouring through my windows and my neighbor’s dog is barking. I hear my wife down stairs making espresso.
Disoriented, I grab my phone and text myself a quick note.

When I come home from work, I tell my wife, “I had the craziest dream.”
“What?” she says, distracted.
“I had the craziest dream. I wrote it down so I wouldn’t forget.”
“Oh…”
“It’s in my phone, I texted it to myself.”
“Oh”, She turns to look at me.
Here it is, “I awoke with a fright, only to realize, I was asleep while sleeping.”
“What does that even mean?” she says confused.
I’m not su…

Beep
Beep
Beep
Beep
Beep

Fumbling, I find my snooze.

© Tim Trudeau 2024
Copyright

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