The Unbearable Whiteness of Being
July 22nd, 2015 | 
Author: If you have medical insurance and you make less than $50k a year and you still get a bill from the emergency room you should just toss it. I had to visit the emergency room about eight months ago. I was passing a kidney stone and was really only there for the morphine. I wanted to land on a cloud instead of the bathroom floor if I crashed again.
I knew there was nothing else they could do for me.
They did some scans of my torso and gave me an $800 saline drip ( $1.75 wholesale).
Long story short, I got the morphine.
Now I drink lots of cranberry juice and lemon in my water.
So far so good.
I don’t care about that bill. If I ever make any money again I will. If I can’t pay you and I’m not even sure why I owe you, I could not give less of a shit. The hospital can sue me. It will still be my go to emergency room if I ever have to go through that again. It’s really close by.
I live in Los Angeles. If you make less than $50k a year here you should qualify for food stamps. I want a handicapped placard for my rear view on account of my ingrown toenails and sciatica.
I don’t qualify for shit.
It’s not like ever I tried.
I’m your typical liberal.
Lazy and shiftless and just looking for a free ride.
I don’t have a goddamn thing, not on paper at least.
I used to.
A good job, a house, cars.
I didn’t lose my job or my stuff because of the recession. But afterwards it took me a couple years to find something that paid at least a living wage. I had to sell a lot of my stuff. I had to live with my parents. It’s been a struggle ever since. I’m not complaining. I’m a hell of a lot luckier than millions of other people. I’m a white male with a resume in the best country in the world.
I doubt I’ll ever be able to retire.
We live in amazing times. We work harder, longer and more efficiently than any other country. We are afforded less vacation time and sick leave than any other country. Education and healthcare cost about a ten times more than they used to. Seriously, a thousand percent more. Way more than any other country. I don’t make any more than back then and neither do you. We can no longer afford either.
Something like half of us are living check to check.
That’s insane.
It’s not sustainable.
This is why we’re fucking nuts.
White people need to stop voting republican and scare this shit out of democrats by overwhelming them. We simply don’t have time for a third party, it’s too late for that. White people need to understand that we are no longer the shit in America or be complicit in becoming a third world country.
Acting like it matters in the scheme of things that an immigrant mother gets $12k a year in government subsidies for her seven children is moronic. Standing in front of all the modern horrors we can casually survey everyday and thinking this is worthy of anyone’s attention is moronic. We live in a country that blows people just like her to fucking bits all over the world every day.
Find something meaningful to give a self righteous shit about.
White people can still save us. But only if we stop worrying about black men running amok and Mexicans raping our women. Only if we actually realize this isn’t any longer about the color of our skin or the content of our character.
This is not about takers vs. makers.
This is about a concentration of wealth. Income redistribution but not like on the TV. The wealthiest one percent have always gotten that way with a leg up and by shitting down the backs of thousands but now they are getting away with too goddamn much. Power is their crack. They drool and careen behind closed doors, drunk with avaricious obliquity. These fuckers are out of control. They hate us. They’re no longer bothered by what anyone else thinks. It’s a harbinger. An omen.
Us white folks used to be somewhat excluded from the military industrial complex, the financial industrial complex and the energy industrial complex leveraging the political industrial complex. The beginning of the the end of that was Vietnam. These days it’s rolling over all of us with impunity and without regard to complexion. These days being fucked is an equal opportunity liability. Rich people no longer despise the poor and minorities nearly as much as they see the middle class as an inconvenience. An obstacle not to be gotten over or around, but eliminated.
They disenfranchise voters, craft and pay for the passage of profitable legislation, implement policy and ultimately buy our elected representatives and the very elections in which they run.
It’s a goddamn disaster and they don’t give a mad fuck what color we are.
The quicker we understand that we are no different than anyone else and never have been, the quicker we can get on with what needs to happen next. We need to get over all this bullshit they would have us spend the rest of our lives in hand wringing self righteous despair of. They have at least half of us pining and whining to take our country back from the other half by jerking at the strings of a sense of entitlement that is now archaic and obsolete.
Take our country back from what?
From who?
Nobody is coming for your guns, gay people don’t lust after your brats, black men just want a decent job and Latinos wouldn’t mind finally being recognized for how unbelievably fucking hard they work. We don’t all want man caves and nurseries and lawns and cement ponds and fancy eatin’ tables.
We aren’t all the same and we need to stop being distracted by that.
The big secret to equality and justice is one of economics. Racism is a symptom. Greed is the disease. Class warfare has always been the hallmark of an aspiring plutocracy.
You gotta hand it to them, they swindle us with our own egos. Rob us blind with fear and gyp us out of our dignity. White people are kinda new to this. We really need to catch up. White people today are indisputable proof that the cancer of absolute power has metastasized absolutely. We aren’t as bad off as other races yet but it won’t be long.
Yes, we need to take our country back.
From the people who actually took it.
Drinks for my friends.
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You absolutely nailed it! Keeping us divided at the more local levels prevents us from seeing and acting en masse against the right wing billionaires who are issuing their marching orders to the Republican Party sell-outs. These Republicans are, at these billionaires’s ‘grateful’ behest, intent on raping and robbing us of our pensions, our schools, our small businesses, our Social Security, our natural resources and anything else they either (1) deem having value, or (2) can use up, abuse and discard in any reckless way necessary – all to make even more money. And all without a single responsible or rational thought to the widespread devastation left in their wake.
They now control our legislative branch of government at nearly all levels. They have significant influence over the highest court in our land. God help us if one of their puppets gets elected. They’re privatizing our schools, and perhaps soon, our railroads, our highways, our postal system, water inlets and more, all off our backs.
Sadly, until Americans can ‘smarten up’, and set aside our blinders – our prejudices, our religious differences, our hunger for guns, our ‘right to discriminate’, Fox “news” amplifying our fears, hate and idiocy to join together to force these elected representatives to represent US by excising the cancer of the corporate influence from politics – I can’t see much reason to hope. The ‘dumbing-down’ of America is a success, our schools teach lies, women’s doctors are forced to lie, history’s being rewritten even now and half of us are convinced that half of us are lazy, pathetic losers. God bless America.
I can’t see billionaires’ money ever leaving politics without the sort of public actions throughout our once-great nation that we’ve long ago forgotten how to undertake. “We’re mad as hell” – but we’ll keep back-biting one another and rolling over and taking it. The new American way.
Hello????????
I agree with what folks are saying…glad ( and I Know I am not the only Cracker who thinks this way)
Your momma my momma was. Wonderful bright Black Women..who would fight to protect her family, our Grandpa was Black too..Way Back When…Hell We are all Star Dust..Yes Big Bang Star Dust…Even the Corperate crooks have the same birth history…we are more like each other…us Humans…we are destroying Mother Earth…Bring on some Whiz Kid Aliens…I don’t know if we can fix this ..
Compassion Kindness a Peace is where my Heart and Spirit Vibrate.
Peace my Brothers and Sisters…Love your Mother ..Your Mother Earth.
Well said sir. With your permission I will post it elsewhere with attribution.
This is superb! A very much needed talk from the heart.
Nailed it.
They got my house and most of my stuff in’08. I am on Social security that is pretty low. So from a life of middle Class and even almost in the upper end of it for awhile, I’m not there anymore. But I can clearly see that the .01% want it all. I’m done. but now they are coming for the whole middle class. Class war, hell yes, it is time. Welcome to the end of Capitalism.
We came to Rockville in 2009 because family promised us a place to live.
They have broken that promise and we have until the end of July to get out.
Since the first week of May, I have been trying to find a place for us to go.
We have no more resources now than we did six years ago. We have no other family,
and as you know Public Assistance is not of assistance.
The only income I have is Snap $375 and Cash Benefits of $475.
My daughter, Beth is going into her second year at UConn on scholarships and grants,
with a part time job at Berger King. She will be expected to pay $500 toward rent and utilities.
My son Joey is going into his sophomore year at RHS.
He is in the STEM Program and finish his Freshman year with a 96 average grade.
The only shot they have in life is with a good education.
To do that, Beth must stay in CT, and Joey must stay in Vernon.
We have many friends that would love to be a roommate of ours,
each paying $500 a month. That give us $2,000 to cover Rent and utilities
on a four bedroom apartment.
We can’t find a property owner/manager that will work with us.
Because no one has good enough credit.
Most Sincerely,
Tammy Milliken
(Beth & Joey’s Mom)
28 Talcott Ave, lwr flr
Vernon Ct 06066
860-926-4145
From: Tammy Milliken
To: “Bryan Flint, Sr.” ; “aletendre@vernon-ct.gov” ; “jkopec@vernon-ct.gov” ; “vgingras@vernon-ct.gov” ; “jclay@vernon-ct.gov” ; “bcampbell@vernon-ct.gov” ; “kappleyard@vernon-ct.gov” ; “pastor.ray@unionchurch.us” ; “trinity.lutheran@sbcglobal.net” ; “rectory@saintbernardchurch.org” ; “office@firstchurchofvernon.org” ; “info@stjosephct.org” ; “churchoftherisensavior@gmail.com” ; “Claire.Janowski@cga.ct.gov” ; “Brimotola@aol.com” ; “Brimotola@aol.com” ; “mwinkler@vernon-ct.gov” ; “swakefield@vernon-ct.gov” ; “pschaefer@vernon-ct.gov” ; “speterson@vernon-ct.gov” ; “hdsyriac@sbcglobal.net”
Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2015 1:41 PM
Subject: Re: Soon to be Homeless in Rockville.
Does anyone know a property owner or manager that will at least try to work with us?
Or are two bright hardworking students going to be homeless because of Credit Score?
Right. It is so easy to fall and slide from comfort into poverty & homelessness. The formula to success is merky, I thought I was playing the game to keep myself in the upper middle spectrum of comfort. So many people in CA work hard, but just don’t make enough to even dream of becoming parents, or owning a home, let alone having a college education. One thing we know we can look forward to is more unnecessary shootings and deaths of innocent people, along with more distance and senseless wars. The question I often ask is what are we as a nation really about?
You are 100% correct with each and every word.
Nailed it, except for one thing: I don’t quite get the phrasing of scare this shit out of democrats by overwhelming them. I say, help the Democrats get their message out to more people and reinforce the malevolent truth about the GOP. That’s my 2 cents
For the democrats numbers to swell. I wouldn’t trust it, especially after all that has been said and done by the republicans. He’s right. It would scare the hell out of me.
Divide and conquer is an old, old tactic, and it’s working frighteningly well. The only thing I would add that any resistance is eliminated through the opiate of entertainment – I believe that as long as Americans get their entertainment, they will lie back in their opium-like daze and let the country rot. If you doubt, recall what we as a society are happy to pay for sports events and concerts; how much top actors make, etc., yet how fiercely we object to near-invisible tax increases that would support our public servants. Yes, hatred is being force-fed to us to keep us apart, but how hard is it to force-feed the somnolent? Our skewed priorities make us much more susceptible to being manipulated.
It’s worse than just not voting. When enough people to win DO vote, there’s no guarantee those votes are correctly tabulated. No one is checking- there’s little opportunity to verify since it’s all digitized and run on private software code (crappy code at that) which is impossible to check without permission of the voting machine companies -and we’ve all heard the nightmarish accounts of previous owners of Diebold and or ES&S (the major voting machine suppliers through the early 00’s) assuring a GOP audience they’ll make sure Bush won.
To see accounts of this, Google: common dreams, Voting Machine Controversy