I realized the other day that I haven\u2019t really felt the economic downturn at all. In fact, I\u2019ve been better off these last few years than the last 20. Yes, I work six jobs, but each one of them is secure. At my regular salary serf jobs, I\u2019ve seen huge annual raises, absurd quarterly bonuses, and a general sort of blank stare from bosses and co-workers alike when you mention the economy.
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Elsewhere, book sales are on the rise, and I have more freelance gigs than I can take.<\/p>\n
I had no property to lose, and I\u2019ve always been a credit union kid. My publishing-related debt to the credit cards, after three years of stagnating, is now about ten months from being completely paid off. My hideous and annoying day job is giving us all a 25% raise in January. Which seems like it should be a typo, right? <\/p>\n
Good times are here again for everyone, as far as I can see from my vantage point. I don\u2019t even notice the weak dollar. I\u2019m going to the UK for three weeks next month and the exchange rate is better now than it was the last time I visited in 2007 \u2013 before the economic collapse.<\/p>\n
With dawning horror, I realize that I\u2019m in that 1%. Perhaps not financially, but I\u2019m certainly the One percent\u2019s bitch. Everything seems fine.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s the problem with the revolution, dear street occupiers. The 1% is bigger than you think. My day job boss, the quintessential armchair liberal, was talking the other day about how Occupy Wall Street is the first step of an \u201cAmerican Spring.\u201d<\/p>\n
(It\u2019s very hard, by the way, to keep from lunging across my boss\u2019s desk and biting his face.)<\/p>\n
He says the Occupiers are going to change the country and we\u2019re going to see the movement snow ball into something that will change our way of life. Like they\u2019re going to be filling up The Mall, or walking across bridges as the police set the dogs on them and guardsmen fire indiscriminately at children. <\/p>\n
I told him \u2013 these are polite fucks who are obeying the law, getting permits, operating in cooperation with the police, and, most importantly, nobody I know understands what\u2019s going on or what they want. And, apparently, they don\u2019t quite know either. That\u2019s no revolution. That\u2019s no threat. That\u2019s no game-changing social civil war. It\u2019s a sit-in that\u2019s obtained the blessing of the government. Call me when they link arms, sing \u201cWe Shall Overcome,\u201d and get hit with fire hoses and rubber bullets. <\/p>\n
Which, I gather, is the story at Occupy Oakland. Though I always thought that was how Oakland was normally.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m always ready for revolution. I embrace it. I have no particular goals or purpose. I don\u2019t care about changing anything. I just think revolution is human nature and we should indulge in it as often as possible, from small scale defiant acts to toppling governments. My main motivation: I think it would be amusing. I don\u2019t care how many people are strung up and how many landmarks are burned by a bloodthirsty mob as long as it\u2019s entertaining. Edge of your seat popcorn action \u2013 like much of the Arab Spring has been. <\/p>\n
The world is always a very boring place, life is always very dissatisfying, and our bosses and leaders will always be a bunch of corrupt monsters who need to be put against the wall and machine gunned as soon as possible. Their revolutionary replacements will be exactly the same. There\u2019s no way to win. Revolution, then, becomes simple catharsis. Get it out of your system and then get back to the status quo. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Etc\u2026<\/p>\n
Without revolution, the angst sort of builds up. America hasn\u2019t seen true revolution since the early 70\u2019s, so we\u2019re starting to get into #firstworldproblems country and getting overly enraged when we burn the popcorn. <\/p>\n
But we don\u2019t yet have a focused enemy that appeals both to the people who can and do \u201coccupy\u201d a place and the ones like me, who are wealthy sociopaths looking for a good time. <\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the revolutionary secret \u2013 you need the guys like me. You need the 30-something well-heeled sociopaths who suffer from chronic boredom. We\u2019ve seen the dynamic in every modern revolution \u2013 from the democratic movements of the 18th century down to Nazi Germany, Communist China, and the 60\u2019s in America. A disorganized mass of often youthful rebels are led by people in their 30\u2019s and 40\u2019s who have too many liberal arts degrees and a trust fund or two. Hell, look at Jesus. A well-heeled 30-something who\u2019s completed his apprenticeship for a reliable trade. These leaders are guys who understand how things work, and how you get things done, and how you turn a mass of angry people into an army, into a force that doesn\u2019t need permits or zoning but can truly occupy a place and face the government response. For better or worse.<\/p>\n
These people are always with us. Maybe they\u2019re the fathers of nations, maybe they\u2019re genocidal madmen, maybe they\u2019re just anarcho-goodniks like MLK, or Abby Hoffman, or Tom Hayden. There\u2019s never a shortage of leaders because \u2013 as you may have noticed every couple of years \u2013 it doesn\u2019t really take too much intelligence to lead. You simply need a dash of charisma and a goal. <\/p>\n
But, as long as the people like me are comfortable (and we are), we\u2019re not going to come out of the woodwork. To get these leaders of men \u2013 who are, in the end, simply wealthy hobbyists \u2013 to take action, you have to really get in their faces. In the 18th century, you needed tyrannical fucks to kick you around a few times with almost Hollywood-like villainy. You needed social and political disaster in the 19th and 20th. For the leaders of the 60\u2019s, you needed a forever-war that weighed deep on the consciousness largely only because it was the first war that was televised and we only had three channels to choose from and nothing but colorful musicals in the theaters. Of course Vietnam freaked us out. Even so, it took five years of in-your-face coverage to start to freak us out, and eight years before we lost our cool. And then only because our government didn\u2019t know how to react to a sit-in. You can only club so many peaceful demonstrators to death before we start to wag our fingers. <\/p>\n
Oh, and, you have to club quite a few demonstrators to death. Oakland is just a tiny blip. We don\u2019t care. Call me when a woman and her baby are eaten by police dogs. Then it\u2019s time to have that first flicker of outrage which, several deaths and many horrible burning riots later, turns into revolution.<\/p>\n
I wish it didn\u2019t take so much. But it\u2019s really a big step, so I guess it\u2019s nice that there are safeguards. If you think about it, our whole society is built on keeping the over-30 crowd pacified. We start to get tired, we age out of our weird college and post-college relationships, we\u2019re encouraged to settle down with families and accrue debt. Our governments have always known where the revolutionary leaders come from. They\u2019ve always feared youth, but they\u2019ve also always understood how the revolutionary leadership works. They\u2019ll take care of their middle-aged citizens before they help the college kids. They\u2019ll bail out homeowners in trouble at the expense of anyone who needs a student loan. <\/p>\n
And, so, I sit here, without any real worry in the world. I\u2019ve got three computers running in my apartment right now, all geared towards providing some sort of mindless entertainment. I bitch about my idiot jobs and my idiot bosses and sit all day in a dark office ho-humming through the hours. I\u2019m worried more about what Edward Olmos is going to do next on Dexter<\/em> than anything that\u2019s going on in the world.<\/p>\n And that\u2019s why the Occupy thing is going to fail. You\u2019ve all noticed, of course, that it has no leaders. And, without leadership, has adopted a laughably na\u00efve attitude that it doesn\u2019t need leaders. The 1% is not frightened because they\u2019ve pacified that dreaded Silent Majority. We\u2019re all, really, okay. Even if there are a few bumps in the road, it\u2019s nothing serious. <\/p>\n This segues into the homogenization and emasculation of the media. Unlike the world prior to, say, 1980 or so, we don\u2019t really see the problems. We see glorified local news, and saccharine world reports. We\u2019re confronted with a single, Orwellian voice that pulls every punch, even when hundreds of thousands are dead. A lullaby of death and despair that gently coaxes us to change the channel, roll our eyes and say we\u2019re just soooo tired of that tsunami, and get on with the candy-coated jokey stories. Even with the occasional high-level intrusion \u2013 Katrina, 9\/11 \u2013 we\u2019re lulled to sleep. Our media \u2013 TV, print, internet \u2013 is really the 21st Century equivalent of a state-run, censored press. Government ignores Katrina victims. But all hail the Great Leader! Meanwhile, on the Breaking News Blog, when are they going to get around to fixing the sidewalk at 14th and U? Seriously! I totally stubbed my toe the other day.<\/p>\n We should be scared of that, you know. That\u2019s where we should begin. Corrupt bankers will always be there. Come on kids \u2013 they\u2019re an easy target. That\u2019s like saying, gosh, I hate being mouth-raped by a razor gang. Yeah! Me too! What\u2019s your point?<\/p>\n If we want to revolt, we have to destroy the media. Bring those monsters to their knees and machine gun them all. Then go back to actual reporting, to being forced to decide on the truth between very differing versions of a story in a liberal, conservative, and government paper. An active, free, non-corporate controlled press will wake everybody up. Why? Because the world is a very bad place. Because four billion humans are basically disposable slaves right now, and these are the last of the good times. Just imagine what\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n And imagine is all you\u2019ll be able to do. The corporate, pussy media will hold out and whisper softly in your ear right up to the point when the wave hits. And then it\u2019s too late.<\/p>\n But don\u2019t listen to me! It\u2019s the \u201cAmerican Spring,\u201d right? So go ahead and waste your time. I\u2019ve got to clear out my DVR.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I realized the other day that I haven\u2019t really felt the economic downturn at all. In fact, I\u2019ve been better off these last few years than the last 20. Yes, I work six jobs, but each one of them is …<\/p>\n