REALLY NOT THAT BRIGHT; MENTAL SHARK BITE
A MEDITATION ON BULLSHIT
“Bullshit” is so different from “shit,” they shouldn’t even share the same root word. As exclamations, they mean totally different things. If someone were telling you an outrageous lie, you wouldn’t yell “SHIT!” If you knocked a glass over in your kitchen and it broke on the floor, you wouldn’t yell “BULLSHIT!”
(Sidebar: although…you might yell “BULLSHIT” in the face of disaster if the disaster were, say, completely non-dangerous but especially stupid and pointless, like your trash bag ripping on the way to the dumpster; or if some extremely simple machine had failed to perform its very simple function [see the aforementioned trash bag]).
THIS PART IS POLITICAL, I VERY RARELY SAY ANYTHING LIKE THIS, EXTEND ME GRACE TO DO SO THIS ONE TIME
Bullshit is also the word when troubles are individually maybe not that bad, but they just pile up and up like Executive Orders and occur frequently. Like every day. Multiple times a day. Every hour. Bullshit is when you are like oh god what now. When you’re like really?
If you made reference to “a shit time in your life,” people would know you were talking about either major depression or big bad life events. If they were to inquire about said time (prying! rude!), they would not be expecting you to say, “just, you know, all the bullshit” and list daily frustrations and ways in which we are very slightly killed, all the time.
*That’s another thing about bullshit! It is hard to get specific about it! Sure, you could sum it up if you were forced to. You’ve graduated high school. Wait, that means a lot less than it used to and by no means should we assume that having graduated high school means that an essay—nay! A “passage”! Often whittled down to a single paragraph!—-can be summarized, more or less understood, and explained or restated in one’s own words. I do not think we can assume that of the nation’s high-schoolers, anymore. That is starting to sound like undergraduate-level work.
“That Was A Bullshit Time In America,” camera 1: President Trump and his friends used the power of their positions to make multiple proclamations and proposed laws regarding human rights, foreign and domestic policy, the budget, which federal bureaus will be eliminated (under the banner of “reducing waste,” but you don’t audit a federal agency in two weeks), and environmental issues.The formal opposition was weak and most of what outcry there was came from the people.
TWABTIA: camera 2: President Trump—duly elected as far as we know, and who has less self-awareness than a dog; you have surely seen a dog feel shame or embarrassment and those are things that Donald Trump has never felt, does not feel, and will never feel; also dogs can learn things, and Donald Trump is all done learning things; he will never learn anything new again in his life—anyway, him and some unelected hangers-on decided to flood the world with bullshit. Some people involved in the current administration sincerely believe they are going to reduce government waste/rid the world of queer people/whatever their agenda is. Others just want to be rich and in charge, and they know that the constant-bullshit thing will work. The opposition is feeble beyond belief. The populace is more into outrage than mobilization. The US has no coup experience; a version of January 6 that is successful and results in actual governmental changes happens every few years in some faraway place and most of us hear about it on NPR if we hear about it all. The bullshit helps keep things chaotic while those in power finish chewing up and spitting out little balls of the Constitution.
The thing about bullshit is that it makes you tired and apathetic. Living through a time of Big Shit is not fun, but sometimes it coincides with artistic movements, big social changes, new ways of thinking. (It also results in a lot of lost lives, both literally and figuratively; believe me, I am not discounting that.) Living through a slow drip of Bullshit coincides with more people turning off the news and putting a microwavable eye mask on their faces. (Get this one! It smells a bit but it is very nice.)
I am not advocating armed revolution. Am I? I don’t even know anymore. Get to the dispensary (or call your connect if you don’t live in a legal state), watch seasons 7-9 of It’s Always Sunny, and heat up your new eye mask for your post-TV meditation, where you go against your supposed core beliefs to sincerely wish a painful, sniveling death on every heartless oligarch and also on every spineless Democrat sputtering “you can’t do that!” before going on their three-day weekend.
Definitely don’t write dumb diary entries like this one.
—mimi smartypants looks so absurd, she looks so obscene.