I beg you not to crush me for the sin of being slight, Let not my fragile form decree the measure of my right. I beg you not to scorn me—no malice have I earned, You don’t curse the tide for turning nor the moth for being burned.
But I know it’s in your nature, you were shaped by colder hands, Taught that strength is only proven by the wreckage where you stand. No one showed you tenderness, no balm to soothe your blade, To beg for grace feels futile when the world in blood is made.
So why would you show mercy when there’s glory to be claimed? No requiem for shadows, no lament for the unnamed. But if you must, then grant me this: be deliberate and be swift— Let the world not taste my trembling nor the wind my hollow rift.
My existence leaves no imprint on the ledger of this earth, Neither curse nor benediction from the moment of my birth. But the atoms that composed me will return to dust and dew, And tonight, perhaps, the stars will dim as one light leaves their view.
As I take a break between the chapters of my dystopian book, let’s look at our present state of political turmoil and lurch toward authoritarianism. What we currently see developing is a merger between far right-wing tech magnates who want their own corporate thiefdoms and MAGA who want a white Christian nationalist theocracy. Trump, a silver spoon grifter and sociopath who is in the process of turning America into an oligarch-run mafia state like Russia, happens to be the convenient ‘charismatic’ figurehead for the MAGA movement. Our Conman-in-Chief reads at the level of an eleven-year-old and, despite wrapping himself in the cloak of religion, cannot even quote a single line from the Bible. Yet, a majority of his followers say they believe he is their god’s anointed one, as hypocritical and preposterous as that sounds. More than half of American adults read below a 6th grade level, thus the fertile ground that would give rise to such an illiterate and deceitful character as Trump. As an old Turkish Proverb states:
“The forest was shrinking but the trees kept voting for the axe, for the axe was clever and convinced the trees that because his handle was made of wood, he was one of them.”
Trump’s first term was simply a trial and error period for how to corrupt and subvert the levers of government to his bidding. His second term will be much more effective at doing so. Among the most alarming moves by Trump and the so-called Project 2025 thus far are the dismantling of environmental regulations and science research and funding. Typical of authoritarian dictators who often disregard scientific consensus when it contradicts their political agenda, prioritizing the maintenance of their power over evidence-based decision making, Trump is suppressing information to suit his narrative of expanding fossil fuel consumption. What I find most interesting, however, is this far right faction of the tech industry which is swiftly and precisely carrying out its agenda, exploiting Trump exactly as they had so openly discussed and planned. A linked video above explains it in detail, but here is a very condensed synopsis:
Just watch the videos above and you will understand that what we have witnessed since Trump 2.0 began on January 20, 2025 follows the Tech oligarchs’ playbook to a T. Their plan of hollowing out and taking over the US government is characterized by attacking swiftly and breaking things in order to sow chaos, destabilize institutions, and demoralize public servants. This also plays to the MAGA crowd who have been fooled into believing their fate and well-being is better served by corporate interests unfettered by any regulations and rules designed to protect the public. And nevermind that the global population is seen by these oligarchs as mere parasites whose sole purpose is to generate profits from consumption of corporate products.
Coupled with the increasingly chaotic and collapsing biosphere, we are ushering in a dystopian future I shudder to even imagine. Also, keep in mind that what the Trump administration is doing to Ukraine is exactly what Britain and France did to Czechoslovakia in an attempt to appease an imperialistic Nazi Germany in 1938. See video below for a clear-eyed explanation of why we are repeating history:
Where do we go from here? Nowhere but into the abyss as long as there is a large swath of the public so easily manipulated and a government and news media that is beholden to the highest bidder.
Collapse of Industrial Civilization 