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Contemporary

Complacency has set in over the entire population, down into the black depths of the american memory hole. Millions of jobs are forever lost. Tens of thousands are evicted. The homeless population have swelled to unmanageable numbers. The service institutions are chronically overwhelmed. Bank accounts are overdrawn yet banks are bigger and more influential than ever. Economic relief has been exhausted on government spending on vaccines and some measure of economic relief but not nearly what is required to eliminate homeless, full employment, universal healthcare, and finding for green infratructure throughout the country, not to mention equitable economic distribution, a progressive tax structure and a host of other projects to invigorate a democracy. Pharmaceutical corporations are seeing unimaginable profits. Insurance corporations profits too are unimaginatively profitable!

The chain link fence surrounding the White House remain fully intact. Seversl hundred of .the National Guard patrol the premises in the belief that it is still potentiallyl under siege by the groups that attacked it on January 6, 2021. These beliefs linger firmly in the minds of all the elected officials of government. No date has been yet set for their removal, nor for the removal of the chain link fence surrounding the White House. Republicans dominate--again. The Biden presidency failed to adequately address all the fundamental problems of american society. As a consequence, the democrats lost critical seats and the presidency too.

The population, demoralized by decades of economic disparities under both parties before the pandemic--resulted from political decisions and policies buttressed by "law", exponentially exacerbated by the pandemic, scramble chaotically for jobs; largely low wage service jobs with expensive benefits and no labor protections because unionizing is still strongly prohibited.

Infantalized, the adult population depends parasitically upon the very government that has undermined them politically and economically as the government parasitically depends on the population for it's continued existence. In every state thousands of citizens line up in cars, motorcycles and bicycle's--for miles--for the food pantries that run out of food and supplies by 2pm on a daily basis because, just like during the pandemic, there is an absence of serious planning and the adequate distribution of food and supplies is likewise haphazard. The american people learned nothing from the pandemic--even in the face of 600,000+ deaths--because of their thoughtless obsessession and compulsion with a "return to normalcy" instead of using that time re-thinking the kind of society they would want to live in and taking the appropriate organizing actions.

American foreign policies remain on a war footing, with not one of its over 800 military bases closed down in an effort toward world peace and stem catastrophic global warming. America is now totally alone in the world, insulated to the converging catastrophies of nuclear war, global warming, and the internal threat of a police state by its belief that it is unique in the entire history of the world. It is still a consumer society--if one can still refer to it as a "society".

The education system is set up to train students to fit into the existing system which can be described as a corporate Oligarchy. From pre-k to post graduate schooling, the student is incrementally guided in the arts of adaptation, obedience, and drill. Instruction is totally structured in advance of classes, regardless of all the differences in personality, temperament, giftedness, and interest's that still might remain in varying degrees--even after the subjugation efforts of the family to instill integration of their children into the society.

But the typical adult is infantalized, exhibiting the affect constellation of a spoiled 12 year old: easily bored, impulsive, credulousness toward authority to the point of awe, and insulated from any self-correction through genuine experience: instead, they block themselves from genuine experience by the driving forces embedded in society that form a fixed mental template, if you will, that closes off every thought, every sensation, every act that is not socially desireable. Of course there are rxceptions. Many of them. But they tend to live on the margins of society. Furthermore, behavior is easily fitted into statistical analyses for greater manipulation by advertising and government. It is as though an entire population, with few exceptions, have been made feeble minded as in senility!

Lacking the critical capacities of healthy, mature, psychosocialized adults, there is a significant rise in superstition. Monsters, demons, witches, ghosts, vampires, skin walkers and werewolves gain access to vulnerable minds. All kinds of TV shows, movies, and groups related to this subject proliferate. But there is more to this insurgence of superstition gaining access into the american psyche: hidden deep in the collective american unconscious is the attraction to violence, death and the feeling of dread. This is not conscious. Much is tied to childhood traumas that remain throughout adult life which american society does so little to address--in spite of all the superficial propoganda encouraging self-care, empathy, respect for diversity, and so on.

But the irony is that most americans think in economic terms; thoroughly materialistic! How is this contradiction to be explained? The deadening effects of thinking predominantly or exclusively in economic terms, leaves a vacuum, as it were, or a sense of emptiness in the psyche that must be filled. It gets filled by superstition. Superstition is easily absorbed. It does not require the effort of critical thought. It does not require subjecting superstition to a knowledge base that has criteria for checking it's truth and its reality. On the contrary, The belief becomes its own "evidence".

The political space for political action among members of society is shrinking. And as long as cliche's stand in for genuine thinking, little can be accomplished in post pandemic america.

Much has been written about "dystopias" in fictional form, but the post pandemic society of america is a real dystopia. Europe has broken it's trade ties to america and established them with Russia and China. The middle east is still a hotspot for triggering a nuclear conflict that threatens to engulf the world. There has been a average sea rise of 3 ft. Venice has lost some of its city streets and the state of Florida has lost miami beach. India has lost valuable land due to the flooding from the sea rise.

March 08, 2021 02:30

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Pamela Berglund
02:44 Mar 18, 2021

This is your first submission so I will be kind. When you write a story you want to grip your reader with your imagination and so the story you were supposed to be telling was about how a character was handling the pandemic - what he or she did to move past the issues. In your story you gave us a run down of what we already know. Open your mind. Make it creative and create your voice. If it helps you can read some of my stories. Just click on my name. I will follow you

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