Teodrose Fikre
21st Century Wire
All throughout the world, we are witnessing events that could either spiral out of control or potentially serve as watershed historical moments. The Yellow Vest movement is entering its eight’s week as Parisians bravely take to the streets to defy a French government that insists on giving austerity to the people while it continues to enrich the globalist oligarchy. Wall Street is teetering as wild gyrations in the markets threaten to collapse an economy that was built on debt and pyramid schemes that only delayed the day of reckoning.
On the genocide front, multiple wars throughout the planet continue to indiscriminately kill and maim men, women and children as outlaw countries make a mockery of both the United Nations Charter and the Geneva Conventions. This morning, ten Syrians met a gruesome death when US-led airstrikes in Dayr al-Zawr leveled residential buildings. Despite Donald Trump’s promise to withdraw from Syria, the undeclared war continues unabated, a wholesale massacre taking place hidden by distance and euphemisms like “collateral damage”.
Meanwhile, as the world continues to burn, our famous “free press” is focused on a crass outburst by a newly elected Congresswoman and a dancing scandal of another incoming legislator. On any given day, mainstream “journalists” and “reporters” complain about the war on media that Trump declared by calling them the enemy of the people. They are right, there is a war on media except it’s not Trump who initiated it. The war against a free press is being waged daily; the combatants are the very corporate shills who pretend to be news professionals.
The synergy between media and politics has destroyed the “fourth estate” and replaced it with a manor of idiots. Pundits and politicians willingly traffic in buffoonery on a regular basis as they jostle with each other in a concerted effort to drive up their ratings and fortunes. Truth is the first and last victim of those who insist on broadcasting smut and publishing sensationalism that makes the National Inquirer seem like scions of journalism by comparison.
As I’m writing this article, I’m watching CNN right now to get a sense of how deep into the abyss of fatuity mainstream media has sunk into. Don Lemon is interviewing a cast of talking heads who stick to their narrow ideological lanes and pretend to actually care about justice. It’s like watching the Brady Bunch tweaked out on crystal meth as they shout past each other and murder journalism in the process. Mainstream media is the antithesis of a free press, it’s a business that is out to generate revenue by aborting news with click bait.
The adults have checked out, we are being led by a carnival of blowhards and narcissists. Donald Trump and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are perfect encapsulations of our time; the former a megalomaniac who offends decency every time he tweets or opens his mouth while the latter is determined to be America’s preeminent meme generator.
https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1081234130841600000
The gap between the wealthiest 1% and the rest of Americans is exploding from a crack into a chasm that has turned the United States, and the world by extension, into a caste system of the have all and the have little. Every year, more and more people are being swallowed whole by financial anxieties or outright poverty. These economic imbalances are rooted in policies that transfer wealth from the vast majority into the accounts the neo-aristocracy.
Therein lies the rub, the reason why these asinine stories and foolish narratives are being spun and injected into the public square is to keep us perpetually distracted. It’s like killing two birds with one stone, sensationalism sells and lunacy numbs our ability to think. We enhance the profits of media corporations and politicians while we simultaneously allow ourselves to be dumbed-down to point of impotence. We partake in these puerile narratives at our own expense; the more we consume these toxic stories, the more we forget that we are being grounded into dust. After all, how many people would have clicked on this story if the title was about income inequality and the feature picture was of a child starving in Yemen?
But who has time to think about these things, there is a dancing Congressman, a swearing politician and an imbecile president to Tweet and Facebook about. It’s like sheep who cheer for either foxes or jackals, guess how that story ends. We truly have a government that we deserve.
They divide us, we conquer ourselves
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Author Teodrose Fikre is the founder and editor of the Ghion Journal, and a former defense consultant was profoundly changed by a two year journey of hardship and struggle. Going from a life of upper-middle class privilege to a time spent with the huddled masses taught.
An original version of this article was first published at The Ghion Journal.
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