#dandy's world being the exploiter capital that it is

[rabbitriceball]

alright first off this is long overdue from em. No photo this time but eh-

KIDS IT'S NOVEMBER!!!! :D

with that out of the way, I encountered this earlier today in Dandy's World.

there's your meme fodder for tonight.

[lenin-it-to-win-it]

the lorax, but everytime a character appears its bnha and every time u read it u want 2 die

summary: oh you know damn well whats coming, sweetie 

notes: its 2:35 am. i spent over an hour writing this. pls clap. 

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it was a suny day in thneedville and the sun was shining but it was COLD and DARk in dekus hart as he gazed sadly off intot he distance. “mommm wy doesnt todoroki senpai-san NOTICE me???”” he lameneted to his mom.

“maybe its ur ugly little pissbaby child face” inko suggested as she cooked up a spaghety for brekfast.

“how can i impress him??” deku questioned

“try lifting, cucklord” said his grandma recovery girl as she casually bench bressed 600 pounds of rocks.

“how bout i find him  a plant insted?” deku sugested thinking about the tre todoroki painted on his house. he had asked todoorki if he liked trees and he sed ‘ya sur i gues’. “bitches lov plants”

“yeeee i kno wat u mean giv him some *lettuce*” recovery gorl winked

“wat a bout a tree” “but TREEs are DEAD” inko exlciamed! she threw the spagheti on the floor for dramtic effect and cltuched dekus head in his hands. “Son do not SPEAK of such things or The All For One’HAre Corporation Copyright TM wil BUST thru the ROOF and kill you! Now sit down and eat ur capitalism! Consumerism is god hallejeuluah amen!”

“tree” deku whisperd

the hose exploded and every1 died but they were okey. avaracious all-for-one’hare, a tiny liitle with a shiny bowlcut and tiny little man feet bitchslaped deku across the face. “NO TREES ALLOUD!!1!”  he shrieked. he bloo a kiss ot dekus mom “that plate of capitalism u have is cooking upped looks lovly mam”

inko blsuhed. “thanks”

“just make sure to keep the kiddo here away from any” all-for-one’hare, lowered his voice, which was hard bc he was already so short and low and close tothe flor. “trees”

inko gASPed! “of CORSE! i wil keep him away from the place where the trees once were by the Forbindden WAll u buildt with ur money to keep out the Bad COmmunist SentimentsTM”

recovery girl made shifty suspicious looks on her face “sure yea me too”

all-for-one’hare, was convinced. “I AM CONVINECED” he sed “by felicia!” he hopped on his hoverbord and hoverborded away.

inko cleaned the spaghety off the flor and recovery girl pulled deku by the leg into the backyard. “YO FUCKER U BETTER RUN UR ASS OVER THE COMMIE WALL AND GET A TREE SO U CAN START SLINGIN SOME MAD PUSS”

“but gramma im gay”

“then start slingin some nuts my d00d the POINT is get a TRE e” she scremed. “when i was, a yung boi, my ffather, took me over the wall, to see a bunch of trees, he sed son when, u grow up, dont kill them , the trees, and bring the nonbelievers, to come and plant new trees”

“k”

she siezed dekus sholders “GO FORTH CHILD BRING THE TREES SO WE CAN MAKE THEM GROW ANEW AS THE PROPHECY HAS FORETOLD, OUT BEYOND THE WALL LIVES A MYSTERIOUS MAN CALLED THE ONCE-FOR-ALLER, FIND HIM, HE WILL TELL YOU HIS TRAGIC TALE OF TREE AND BRING NEW LIFE TO THIS BARREN CAPITALIST HELLSCAPE, NOW GO”

“k” deku hopped on his totaly radicel scooter headed 2 the wall. a robot cat watched him forehsadowingly.

it was hella empty over the commie cuck wall with not even a bORger king in site!!!1! tree stumps covered the flor and clouds of smonk from a thousand vape pens darkened the sky. a ded bird lay deadly on the ground while its bird children cried over its bird corpse. it was sad. deku took a sad face selfie with the ded bird then did a sick ollie over the corpse and headed toward the mysterious shack in the distants.

the shack had  a bucket in front of the dor labeled “piss”. deku hopped on in the piss bucket “YO ONCE-FOR-ALLER U GOT KIK??” he cried. wind wistled past his ears and he coffed from the vape smoke but then the pis buckt got pulled up on a ROPE and deku found himself hOISted up to a wINdOW!!!! he stareed face to face at a pair of black eyes with blue spots in the middle like limpid tears and some long bony arms with glvovs and yaoi hands reached out to slap him.

“WHAT” he yelled “ARE YOU DOOING” he leaned closer “IN MY SWWAAAAAAMP!????”

deku wet his pants and criied. “i sutjj,,, i jstu  wann, t  a t;rree,,” he said sobbily. “i,m tr yiyng to get s enpai , t o noticnse me,, an ,n  and i  thgout,, i fi  got, hima   t,r,ree, he wo uld liek me”

“fucken millenials” snarled the once for aller “its always senpai this, thrussy that, my neck my back, my snapping-chat, wy wold i giv u a tre??”

“b-because i,, i brought u a SPAGHETTY” deku exxclaimed, pulling pounds of spagheetyi out of his pockets

the once for aller slorped up the spaghetti hongrily “ya ok i gues i can tel  u my storey now. its a dark and trageic tale of capitalism, like the star wors preqols” a tear ran down his bony old cheek. “but insted of jar jar binks thers only me, booboo the fool”

there was  a crossdissolve and suddenly they were in the once-for allers past where he was a big bara man with bara tiddies and twinky skinny geans no where near the size needed to accomodate for his phat dong. he rode along in a cariege puled by a single muel

“FASTER AIZAWA KUN” cried the once-for-aller hapily. “those proletariats arent gonna exploit themselves!”

aizawa the mule grunted sexily and plowed on, workin that tight little mule ass.

the once-for-aller started shredding out a sick nasty solo on an elextric guitar and it was RAD AS HELL as he blasted out the opening cords to jake pol’s magmnum opiss “its everyday bro”. “we gotta dab on those haters aizawa kun” said the once-for aller with  a very gay wink

aizawa the mule grunted in annoyance. he could not dab, for his sexy mule bodey had no arms.

they fond a metric shitload of trees and there were like wildlifes and shit running around. bears (like endeovor) froclikced int he woods with their hairy bara nippels exposed 2 the world, tsuyu and her frog pals swam in the woter, and tokoyami the borb boy  floo in the sky wich was pure and clean without a single trace of vape smoke. the tres looked fuckable so the once for aller busted a nut against one trunk then wipped out a glock and started shootin them down “YEHAW fuCKERS iTS HIGH NOON” he screamed in texan, his native language, as he mowed downt he trees the way present mics sexy voice mows down the pussey.

sudenly DANY DEVITO IN A FURSOOT APEARED. he was tiny and magestic and orange and so fucken valid. also he was grand toledo. “CUNT” he yelled kicking the once for aller in th e kneecaps. “THIS IS THE ENVIROMENT!!!!1! YOU CANT JUST START WEED WACKIN THES TREES WITH YOUR YANKEE DONGLE DANDY AND SHOOTING THEM WITH GUNS!1! THAT IS BAD AND WRONG! CAPTIN PLANET DIED FOR OUR SINS”

the once for aller looked down at the tiny orange man then down at his own big bulgin bara tiddes “i cold crush u 2 deth with my tiddys, maybe u shuld stay out of my way dude’

dany deveto gasped angrely. “how DARE!!1!” he screamed, punching the once-for-allers big toe. “BUDDY I WILL PERSONALLY FUCK YOUR GRAVE WITH MY OWN TWO ASSCHEEKS IF YOU SAY ONE MORE FUCKING WORD, I DEFY U TO TALK SHIT, COME AT ME SCRUBLORD IM RIPT”

“try me gardfielf” the once for aller laffed “iv ben drinkign plenty of nut milk so my boneses are helthy and Stronk”

daney devito pulled out his 20 inch thunderdong and beat the once for aller in the head with it until he was past oout on the ground. the woodland crreatures danced hapily around the bodey but then he woke up

“u kno wat” he moaned “mabye capitalism isnt so good, lets al liv together in communism and friendship, and i wont cut and/or fucc any of the trees”

danny deveto was mostly appeased. “ya ok, but if u try anymore fuckin shit ill go back in time and cuck ur grandparents.”

dannneie dievoto tried to hav the once-for aller killed on at least 10 separate occasions and the once for aller did slip in some clandestine tree fuckage now and agein, but other than that the communism and friendship was good. but everything changed went he fire nation atteacked, they defeeted endevor esily but then the once for allers slutty, sluty family showed up to REEK HAVICK :0 !!!1!

the once for allers ugley mom, sir nighteye, stepped out of their cheap car and did the anime glasses thing “toshi u commie thot” he said with distaste “stop being poor”

“but MOM” the once for aller wined “i HAV to be por! its good for the envorionemnt and my new animal frends and if i dont dany devito will beat me over the head with his massive meaty man-canoe!”

“dont b lil bitch, do a capitalism.”

the once for allers loud cosin hizashy jumped out of the wagon. “YAINT” he shrieked at 1000000 decibels, killing 90% of life on erth. “ARE WE GON FUCK SOME TREES OR WHAT”

the once for aller looked at his disproving mom, then at his loud cosin, then at the very fuckable trees. his eyes lingered on a sexy sap hole. “yea we are” he said, pulling out his gitar sexily. “how bad could it posbiley be??”

the answer was prety fucken bad as it turned out. a metric fuckton of people paid to watch the once for aller and his family fuck trees to deth by throwing moneey at them like they were stripers, but then al the tres were fucked ded!!11! the bears starved into ity bity twinks, unable to maintain the THicc, tsuyu and the frogs choked and coffed up water ful of human piss as they peed in the water while laughing in delite at the once for allers antics, and tokoyami and the birbs coffed out their organs from the clouds of vape smoke filing the sky.

soon ther was no one left. the once for allers familey left with al the money, aizawa the fuckable mule was ded, and it was just the once for aller allone in the rouns of his former capitalistc glory with only the bright yellow banana suit on his back to remind him of those days.

dani devioto looked at the once for aller with sad eyes before kciking his own ass so hard he got sent rocketing thru the stratusphere, leaving behind an imapct crater with a single word

“cunt” deku whispered softly in the present as he gazed into the crator.

the once for aller sighed sadley. “iv wondered for years and yeers wat he ment by that, but i think i understand now. unless some1 like u stops being a cunt, then nothign is gona get better, u nut”

“shit fam thats deeep” sed deku

the once for aller looked at dekus pissbaby child face. “i lost evrything to capitalism, my friends, nature, my family” teers rolled down his cheks “i even sold my organs to buy cocane and strippers so now i hav a total of 2 orgens in my hole bodey.”

“kinky”

“but we can change that!” cried the once for aller passionetely. “i am going 2 giv u a tree to plant in thneedvil so communism can return and bring back the life stole from this world with my big stick diplomacy. go now, young midorieya-shonen my boy, GO FORTH IN THE NAME OF COMMUNISM AND UN-CUNT THIS MISEREBLE WORLD!!1!”

ther was an epic radicel chase seen wher deku had to fite the The All For One’HAre Corporation Copyright TM and his grandma recovery girl did sik triks on her moped and deku almost but not quite got to kis todorki senpai but they made it to the town square.

deku held todorokis hands and tenderly put the baby tre in it “here” he sed “take my seed”

todoroky noded solemly. “i hav never wanted anything more than to be given ur seed midoreya” he was about 2 plant the seed in the ground when all for one’hare appered! “NOT SO FAST FUCKHOLES” he yelled capitalistically. “this TRee is COMMuNISM!!1!” he cried to the townspeople. “do u RELLY want to be FILTHY COMMIES???”

“Commies hate micdonaleds!!1” screamed one impassoned townsperson.

“LETS BOIL THEM IN OIL” some one else agred.

“but guys wait!!!” deku cried “dont u want like, nature n shit?”

“CAPITALISTS WANT TO REPLACE EVERY REMOTELY FUCKABLE PERSON WITH A TREE” all for one’hare screamed

teh twonspoeple gasps, thens tarted chanting for deku todo and grandma to get boiled in oil

deku sweated nervosly “um but,, treees,, r good?”

“OIL OIL OIL”

“BACK IN MY DAY WE FUCKED TREES AND WE LIKED IT” recovery girl rored!

that was acomeplling argument. the boil in ooil chanting slowed

all for one turned to his henchperson stain “STAIN” he yelled “TEL THESE HIPPY DIPPY COMMIE TREE FUCKERS WHAT WE REALLY THINK OF THIS CAPTEN PLANET B-ROLL BULLSHIT”

stain cleered his throt and burst into magnificent song “let it gro let it gro, so we can have trees to bone” he sang. he was The Ultimate ChadTM so every1 agreed with him imediately. they throow all for one’hare into a pit of spiders where eh was eten and killed and planted the seed in the fertile butthole of the earth wher it could blosom and gro.

in the folowing yeers trees started groiwng beyond the wals and the once for aller crawled out of his shame sahck to water them with his nut as an act of penanc.e

slowly, magesticsally, danny devito in a fursewt flew down from the sky. “ya done good cunt” he grunted, tenderly slapping the once for allers boney ass with his furry orange old man boner. “ya done good.”

they both floated up to gay heaven by their ass skins wher the once for allers big bara past self greeted them with open arms. “all of ur trubles are ogre” he whispered tenderly in their tidditlyated ears. 

the once for aller caressed his past self “oh oncey” he whispered sweetly “are u shure we should do this?? can u even,,, oh, how can u love me in this broken down form??” 

past once for aller smiled and did the kabedon thing with his future self who whimpered arousedly and blushed carnelian. “its not who we are on the outside” he shoved his entire arm up his entire ass“its who we are inside” 

danney devito cheered the once for allers on as they fucked together for all of eterneity and it was very communiest teh end 

[wazaux]

The Incredible Exploits of Wazaux and RALF: we set the stage.

Hello friends, and hopefully soon to be readers! This is a blog about a dandy guy in space trying to scratch his way to the top with a cutthroat syndicate of pirates. It was inspired by the outstanding work over at @kitty-and-razgriz and takes place in the same canonical universe. And now, without further ado, let’s meet Commander Sulimon Wazaux: the Slave King.

General Information

Full Name:

Sulimon Wazaux(Formerly Yedid Chernovsky)

Nicknames/Aliases:

Waz, “the slave king”, Grifter (call sign), and Dandy

Age:

??

Birthdate:

February 4, 32??

Gender:

male

Pronouns:

he/him

Place of Birth:

Unnamed Imperial Ice-world

Current Place of Residence:

the “Aloha Oe”

Relatives:

Current status unknown; presumed dead.

Previous Profession, Occupation(s):

slave, corporate saboteur, mercenary, smuggler, transport pilot

Current Occupation:

Noirceur Executive.

Primary Ship(s):

Cutter: “Aloha Oe” a high end cutter filled with various luxuries and antiquities from through the galaxy. The “Aloha Oe” is operated by a cadre of drones linked to a “dumb” AI: the R. A. L. F. (Robotic Assistant for Logistical Functions). Of course such automation comes at a price and the system was incredibly expensive; even with Wazaux’s considerable underworld connections. It also means that in combat the “Aloha Oe” must rely on its thick shielding and fighters. This ship serves as the primary ship and base of operations for CMDR Wazaux.

Courier: “Little Aloha” a gift from his former teacher: colonel Kurtz. It is a modified courier with retracting nacelles allowing it to be stored on the Aloha Oe.

Character Appearance

Eye Color: right: cybernetic replacement. Left: Blue-green

Hair Color:Brown with purple accents

Build:6’6” and a solid build, could be described as “stocky”

Scars:One vertical above and below the right eye continuing to the upper lip

Distinctive features:

CMDR Wazaux’s right eye and arm are cybernetic replacements. He also has a sub-dermal mesh and neural lace.

Visual Description

CMDR Wazaux is a a large man standing at 6’6” and weighing 250lbs. His skin is rather pale due to his time in space. He also has Brown wavy hair and a well kept beard. He typically wears fine, but worn, imperial clothes: a long black coat with intricate gold filigree with a white shirt/tunic underneath. At his waist there is a sword on his left hip and a pistol on his right. The sword serving more as a symbol of imperial status than a weapon. Though it can be used as one when times are dire. His pants are black like his coat with matching gold details at the cuffs. Underneath this all of course is a standard remlock suit.

Character Personality & Details

Strengths, Talents, Skills:

CMDR Wazaux is an exceptional pilot and brilliant tactician. Wazaux is classically educated and trained in the finer points of imperial society, including swordplay. He has three degrees from the imperial academy in early earth history, political theory, and philosophy. While he operates best independently he does not have any desire to lead others. Wazaux is also a very logical and calculating individual; this has given him a reputation for being cold and aloof. These traits makes him a loyal and dedicated associate to anyone he does business with.

Fears:

As a child of an ice world CMDR Wazaux had never seen an ocean until he was 6 years old in the imperial academy. The site of that much water made his blood freeze and to this day he has an innate fear of large bodies of water.

Wazaux also greatly fears failure and mistakes sometimes leading to inaction.

Flaws:

Wazaux’s chief flaw is his independence. He tends to forgo flesh and blood copilots in favor of black market “dumb” AI software and various automata. This antisocial behavior has led to problems with Narcotics and alcohol, usually bast snake gin and any number of exotic psychedelics. Besides his social flaws, Wazaux also tends to take enormous risks in combat which has led to spectacular results, not always positive. Wazaux also struggles constantly with self doubt; fueled by his background as a slave and his innate fear of mistakes.

Handedness:

Right handed.

Alignment:

True Neutral

Motivations:

Wazaux’s motivation stems from his early life as a slave. The son of a once powerful imperial dynasty, he struggles to reclaim his family’s honor. A struggle made even more difficult by his stolen identity. Wazaux’s ultimate goal is to gain enough power and influence to rival the Emperor through whatever illicit means necessary.

MBTI Personality Type:

INTP

Quirks/Mannerisms:

When agitated Wazaux has a tendency to pace and smoke. When he is uncomfortable he will begin tapping his foot rapidly. Wazaux is also often described as a man of few words, however when he does speak it is always an exercise in elocution. A product of his time in the imperial academy.

Religion/Philosophy:

Wazaux is not a particularly religious man, though he does hold to a few superstitions. He values logic above all else and views emotions as a hindrance. An Existential Nihilist; his philosophy can be best summed up by the phrase: “What’s in it for me?”

Sexuality:

Wazaux is Pansexual

Public Rumors or knowledge about you:

There are rumors about Wazaux’s origins as a slave though no records or proof can be found. This has earned him the title of “Slave-King” and has given him some minor fame with imperial slaves. Despite this there are also rumors that Wazaux has made money from the slave trade.(true) one of the more fanciful rumors about Wazaux is that he isn’t a man at all but rather a sentient machine. This comes from his lack of social interaction and his robotic crew.

Miscellaneous Interests:

Likes/Hobbies:

Wazaux maintains a strict regiment of sword practice, firearms practice, and flight maneuvers. When not engaged in some form of training he spends his time reading ancient texts and playing the flute. A passion he acquired in the academy. Wazaux also has a love of old-world books and music and has a small museum aboard the “Aloha Oe”. He is particularly interested in the post classical era of earth music known as “disco”.

Wazaux also spends a great deal of time improving on the design of his semi-autonomous robotic aid “RALF”.

Dislikes

Wazaux has little tolerance for people and things he deems “useless” or “obsolete”. Concepts like religion and tradition infuriate the CMDR as he believes they only hinder progress.

Favorite Food(s):

Double cheeseburger with extra bacon and ketchup.

Favorite Drink(s): Coffee or tea with milk, besides that anything with alcohol; preferably a very dirty gin martini. 

Favorite Color(s): Blue, purple, gold, silver, Black. 

 Character History

: Childhood: Sulimon Wazaux was born Yedid Chernovsky on an ice planet under imperial rule in 3277. Yedid was born to a former nobleman who was accused of treason and forced into slavery with his pregnant wife. They were sold to the king of the small ice world.  His father was put into hard labor while his mother, formerly a brilliant physician, became the doctor to the king’s children. When Yedid was three years old his mother killed the King’s son in his sleep and replaced his biometric data with that of yedid. That was the moment Yedid became Sulimon Wazaux. After this she crept to the King’s wing of the palace and murdered him as well. The fire she lit in the master chamber turned the entire palace into a roiling inferno. Using her last remaining connections in Imperial society she managed to have her son placed in the care of an imperial patron. At the age of 6 however Wazaux was placed in the prestigious imperial academy on Facece. At the academy Wazaux learned all that an upstanding imperial noble should: classic literature, multiple languages, fencing, political theory, and more. At the age of thirteen he was selected for the imperial naval academy.

Adolescence: Much of Wazaux’s adolescence was spent at the imperial naval academy. It was there that he met his most valued teacher: Colonel Archimedes Kurtz. Colonel Kurtz was a harsh teacher. He instructed Wazaux in the history of warfare and strategy as well as hand-to-hand and ranged combat. At the age of 15, Kurtz  decided to teach Wazaux his most valuable lesson. During an exercise in swordplay Kurtz deftly cut off Wazaux’s right arm and slashed his face gouging out Wazaux’s right eye. Kurtz explained that Wazaux was too trusting of the man and that “trust in anyone but yourself will get you killed.” It was then that Wazaux had his first cybernetic surgery to replace his missing limb and eye. Kurtz had given him the option of simply regrowing the limbs but Wazaux refused, opting instead to have cybernetic replacements. He intended to carry that lesson with him. As a parting gift the rarely sentimental Col. Kurtz gave Wazaux his former Imperial Courier: “Titania” (later renamed “Little Aloha”). At the age of 18 Wazaux left the academy and joined the Imperial Navy.

Adult: Wazaux’s adult life begins in the Imperial Navy. He was first stationed on a majestic interdictor; operating a fighter via holofac. During a particular battle the holofac system malfunctioned and Wazaux was ordered to fly his fighter manually. His fighter was struck by a glancing beam laser and the cockpit caught fire. He was able to bring the fighter back to the capital ship but his body was horribly burned. It was then that Wazaux was fitted with a sub dermal mesh capable of healing minor wounds and applying painkillers or stimulants as needed. It also served as the base for his skin regeneration. After his recovery Wazaux served the final two years of service as a glorified chauffeur to the imperial high command. While this was ideal for making contacts in the upper echelons of imperial society Wazaux felt his time was being wasted on these old desk jockeys. After his service was up he left the navy with his courier “Titania” and began working as a corporate saboteur. Operating out of Slipher Hub in Faust 68 Wazaux would accept contracts demolishing security drones and turrets at ground instillations throughout the sector then the corporations of Slipher Hub would offer new and improved security systems for a moderate price increase. This occupied Wazaux until he felt a desire for something more and a rift in his soul that only power could fill. Using his connections in the Faust 68 underworld he began building a black market cartel. On the surface Wazaux was the head of a respectable transport company: Fhloston Paradise. Under the hood however Wazaux oversaw the smuggling of anything from slaves, to Narcotics, to military weaponry. It was around this time he Acquired the Imperial Cutter:“Aloha Oe” in a high stakes wager from a drunk imperial Duke. He quickly outfitted the vessel with top of the line modules and prismatic shields all crafted by the reclusive engineers. He also renamed his courier the “Little Aloha” and modified its nacelles.(edited)At this point he moved his headquarters from Slipher Hub to the opulent “Aloha Oe” and purchased his black market “dumb” AI R. A. L. F. Robotic Assistant for Logistical Functions. RALF was technically an illegal AI but only a copy of a much more advanced program. His status as “dumb” came from his purposefully limited memory which caused him to develop something akin to personality. Wazaux is able to communicate with RALF via his neural lace. In early 3304 Wazaux received a very rare invitation to the Noirceur Syndicate.  After observing the syndicate’s methodical expansion and lack of moral scruples Wazaux was convinced that such an organization would be the perfect stepping stone  and a powerful ally as he attempts to claw his way upward. Currently Wazaux is an executive in the Noirceur Syndicate operating as a smuggler, saboteur, and information broker 

[theliterateape]

The News and My Feelings

By Elizabeth Harper

It’s my own fault. I charge my phone on the nightstand by my bed. I don’t jump out of bed bright-eyed and bushy-tailed each morning. I sit in bed and check my phone: the notifications, the news app, email, and worst of all, Facebook. I do this to see if there is anything urgent I need to respond to, and also because I’m not ready to get out of bed yet. But scrolling through the news and my friends’ posts makes me not want to live in this world, much less get out of bed.

I know the news is not about my feelings.

I know I’m coming from a privileged place–a home, a bed, access to technology, no obstacle to obtaining food except my own lack of appetite and will to live, etc.–to even have the luxury of having feelings about what is happening in the government and to other people. On the other hand, given my own lack of energy and preoccupation with obtaining and paying for my own health insurance, I must say the spending of effort and funds to make people’s lives objectively worse galls me.

What was the price tag on the recent ICE raids in Mississippi? Was that a good use of time, resources, manpower? Whose interests did those raids serve? And speaking of costs, I don’t just mean financial. There are emotional costs to wars, inadequate healthcare, imprisonment, and many more injustices, including these latest immigration/ detention/ ICE policies that are getting so much attention. But I’m saying something obvious here. Apparently everyone already knows this, as I see post after post about traumatized children.

When I first saw the news about the ICE raids in Mississippi and how many people were involved, 680, and what kind of businesses, food manufacturing, especially chicken processing, I thought, aren’t these raids bad for business? Won’t they hurt those industries by causing labor shortages, lower productivity, supply chain issues? How does this make any sense at all?

So I started searching on the handy-dandy internet, looking for more information to confirm my suspicions, to try to understand. And I do find a statement explaining that yes, indeed, these raids are bad for businesses and communities. I found this and this and this.

But I also found more about how some see these raids as retaliation against workers standing up for their labor rights. Some speculated that one of the raids was retaliation against workers because of a sex discrimination/ harassment lawsuit.

One of my friends posted that it was common knowledge that, when workers join a union, their employer calls ICE–on their own employees! Some do it so the raids happen on payday, so they won’t have to give workers their checks, and then they can just have a job fair and hire a whole new batch of immigrants, who will also be potential targets of ICE raids if they dare to advocate for treatment in accordance with state and federal labor laws. Here’s an article claiming a company used the threat of ICE to intimidate employees. Here’s an article about how some unions are supportive of immigrants while others are not.

Is this common knowledge? If I didn’t know it, then I should have. But then I think, maybe I did know this, and maybe I forgot. Maybe it wasn’t forefront in my mind because I was worrying about my own life, aka, what to do about health insurance. Or maybe it’s that if I kept all the terrible stuff going on in the world at the forefront of my mind all the time, I couldn’t function in my own life. Why would I want to get up, get dressed, eat, wipe my ass, play my role, complicit in the system of violence and exploitation that pervades every aspect of my life and makes it possible?

Why is this so upsetting to me? It’s the duplicity, cynicism, the populist pandering to disguise the most egregiously unethical abominations of capitalism. It’s being afraid of the government, the abuses of power, but also the shortsightedness and incompetence.

I can hear my friends’ voices in my head say, “Elizabeth, why do always act like you just woke up? Atrocity is nothing new. Class warfare, racism, Karl Marx, capitalism needs an underclass, politicians need a scapegoat, etc.” Yes, yes, I know. I know all of this. I read Marx as a teenager, and Hegel, too. I’ve read plenty of history and theory (anarchist, Marxist, feminist, queer, post-structuralist, crip, economic, etc.). I’ve written at length about the Chinese Exclusion Act, Trail of Tears, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and more, so much more. But I don’t know everything. No one knows everything. I read, but that doesn’t make me an expert on a particular industry, issue, or country. I bite my tongue. I can’t be confident in what I say until I collect more information. Maybe I don’t have access to all the data. Who has access to all the data? Is there more to the story? Why is this story getting the attention? Is it a distraction from something else?

Meanwhile, the loudest voices prevail. The ones that oversimplify, gloss over complexity, distort the truth to serve their own agendas, pander to the desperate and disenfranchised.

And even if all the news is always old news, even if exploitation and violence and misery are the same old same old, that doesn’t make it any less of an affront to my feelings, my desire for truth and decency and integrity and for things to work in a way that makes sense and for history to progress towards freedom and flourishing for all.

I know terrible things were happening before the current US president took office: an overpopulated prison system in which prisoners don’t get appropriate medical care or due process; torture at Guantanamo Bay; drone strikes killing civilians, etc. Still, the blatancy of the current racist, xenophobic, populist rhetoric is disturbing, unsettling.

My Facebook newsfeed is filled with a Diary of Anne Frank quote and comparisons to Nazi Germany. If the comparison is so apt, why aren’t any of the political representatives able to nip this nonsense in the bud? Are the majority so lacking in intelligence and integrity? You would think people in power would want to stop it for the sake of their own self-preservation.

But what do I know? Maybe all my questions are merely rhetorical, and I’ve already answered them all myself. Thus the feeling that I don’t belong in this world where people repeat the catchphrases of debunked ideologies and lie with impunity.

Here’s a poem:

Journal Entry 8-8-19

The news makes me sad I try to understand

Something feels very wrong I reach out to a friend

He says it’s class warfare As if I didn’t know

But if feels like more than that Populism, ignorance, resentment A very bad show

I wonder, is it the news or is it me? What’s making me so upset?

Why do I pay attention? Why am I so distraught?

Something feels very wrong I hope my efforts aren’t for naught

I collect information Try to read between the lines Make sense of the contradictions Look for signs

Yes, I know, systemic racism, but … Aren’t ICE raids bad for business?

Whose interests are being served? Who benefits when people are scared And truth is obscured?