Thank you. I am writing about what is happening in our state too. It sickens me to see the glee some people seem to feel at what may very soon become martial law. And for the record, I thought it was shameful when some people on the left celebrated Kirk’s death. How do we step back from this abyss?
A note is that, in a sense, we have justified political violence since the very inception of our nation, and the particularly grotesque manner in which it is now being unleashed on our own people is simply a psychological context of our own making.
For the last 50 years we have slaughtered people globally, whether it be in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. under political pretenses. And we have curated a culture of blood-thirst to support our imperial endeavors. Only now, this culture is coming back to bite us in the ass; for you cannot run a nation on blood forever, and sooner or later it will be your own blood being demanded to feed the infernal machine.
I'd say the exportation of violence goes back at least a century to the Philippines, but we could go back to the war with Mexico or the establishment of the Texas Rangers or the various wars with Native Americans that riddle US history, which brings us almost back to the founding of the republic.
But even all that has always had the veneer of justification. I think it's something new that the justification hardly matters and is, often, beside the point. Like, we're not even attempting to justify kidnapping Maduro. We just did it!
I think it's very different, though, to begin celebrating the murder. People hemmed and hawed about why Chauvin was justified in the murder of George Floyd in 2020, but by 2025 we moved past justification into straight up celebration. That's a quick transition!
Yeah I totally understand your point I’m just bringing attention to the fact that before this process of eroding justification for murder occurred internally, it went through each and every step externally. So the celebration of the death of neighbors is less of a surprise, though it is of course nonetheless shocking and horrific, and more of the natural progression of our participation in imperialism.
To shamelessly insert an excerpt from my own writing:
“We are ruled by people who, in the absence of ideology, choose to fill their souls with masturbatory acts of violence enacted wantonly on the Other to prevent having to sit still for a moment and think about the Self.
This ‘Other’ increasingly comes closer to simply meaning ‘anyone besides myself,’ at which point one would imagine that the concept itself would simply open its maw and swallow this country whole. You cannot run a country on blood. Eventually you run out of blood.
Perhaps this is simply the natural conclusion of a nation which for so long, ironically, has in fact run on blood. It is simply the ghosts of the past coming back to haunt us in the present, our own skeletons breaking out of their closet to strangle us once and for all. It is us dying by the sword we reached down over and over again to pick up.
The never truly healed wounds of the Civil War and slavery. The psyche of a people primed to not only accept but encourage endless war and killing abroad. The socioeconomic landscape of a country adamant on not addressing the fundamental contradictions of its own economic system. It is quite incredible to witness Americans cheer for the slaughter of their neighbors, but maybe this is simply the chickens coming home to roost. If one were to come up with a synthesis of American history they would probably face down the barrel of something not unlike what we see around us now.”
Thank you. I am writing about what is happening in our state too. It sickens me to see the glee some people seem to feel at what may very soon become martial law. And for the record, I thought it was shameful when some people on the left celebrated Kirk’s death. How do we step back from this abyss?
A note is that, in a sense, we have justified political violence since the very inception of our nation, and the particularly grotesque manner in which it is now being unleashed on our own people is simply a psychological context of our own making.
For the last 50 years we have slaughtered people globally, whether it be in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. under political pretenses. And we have curated a culture of blood-thirst to support our imperial endeavors. Only now, this culture is coming back to bite us in the ass; for you cannot run a nation on blood forever, and sooner or later it will be your own blood being demanded to feed the infernal machine.
I write a little about this here:
https://open.substack.com/pub/alexanderalava/p/the-inversion-of-our-humanity-and?r=63s4up&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=overlay
I'd say the exportation of violence goes back at least a century to the Philippines, but we could go back to the war with Mexico or the establishment of the Texas Rangers or the various wars with Native Americans that riddle US history, which brings us almost back to the founding of the republic.
But even all that has always had the veneer of justification. I think it's something new that the justification hardly matters and is, often, beside the point. Like, we're not even attempting to justify kidnapping Maduro. We just did it!
I think it's very different, though, to begin celebrating the murder. People hemmed and hawed about why Chauvin was justified in the murder of George Floyd in 2020, but by 2025 we moved past justification into straight up celebration. That's a quick transition!
Yeah I totally understand your point I’m just bringing attention to the fact that before this process of eroding justification for murder occurred internally, it went through each and every step externally. So the celebration of the death of neighbors is less of a surprise, though it is of course nonetheless shocking and horrific, and more of the natural progression of our participation in imperialism.
To shamelessly insert an excerpt from my own writing:
“We are ruled by people who, in the absence of ideology, choose to fill their souls with masturbatory acts of violence enacted wantonly on the Other to prevent having to sit still for a moment and think about the Self.
This ‘Other’ increasingly comes closer to simply meaning ‘anyone besides myself,’ at which point one would imagine that the concept itself would simply open its maw and swallow this country whole. You cannot run a country on blood. Eventually you run out of blood.
Perhaps this is simply the natural conclusion of a nation which for so long, ironically, has in fact run on blood. It is simply the ghosts of the past coming back to haunt us in the present, our own skeletons breaking out of their closet to strangle us once and for all. It is us dying by the sword we reached down over and over again to pick up.
The never truly healed wounds of the Civil War and slavery. The psyche of a people primed to not only accept but encourage endless war and killing abroad. The socioeconomic landscape of a country adamant on not addressing the fundamental contradictions of its own economic system. It is quite incredible to witness Americans cheer for the slaughter of their neighbors, but maybe this is simply the chickens coming home to roost. If one were to come up with a synthesis of American history they would probably face down the barrel of something not unlike what we see around us now.”
https://open.substack.com/pub/alexanderalava/p/the-cruelty-is-the-point?r=63s4up&utm_medium=ios&shareImageVariant=overlay