<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the truth, and it\u2019s a sad truth for some.\u00a0 Turning thirty does not mark adulthood.\u00a0 In fact, life as a 30-something is simply an empowered childhood.\u00a0 And in this current America, that might be a good thing.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m white and I live in a condo in a gentrified neighborhood full of people who actually do call the cops if a \u201cperson of color\u201d (as the chairman of the condo\u2019s security committee says) is walking along the sidewalk.\u00a0 No kidding.\u00a0 Worse still \u2013 the cops show up and hassle that person of color.<\/p>\n
Tell me you don\u2019t feel that power.\u00a0 The eyes of cops everywhere just sliding off of you.\u00a0 People calling you sir even when you\u2019re an obvious fuck-up.\u00a0 Nobody bothering to check your ID.\u00a0 High school kids clamming up and freezing when they\u2019re assing around and you walk by.\u00a0 Women\u2026trusting you.\u00a0 Looking for a mature man.\u00a0 Tired of the boys.\u00a0 Can\u2019t stand the meat market scene anymore.\u00a0 Just looking to have fun.\u00a0 Want to settle down.<\/p>\n
Really?\u00a0 Will you walk into my parlour?<\/p>\n
Why I make such a point about being a white American is because everyone else in the world is disenfranchised.\u00a0 White Americans of my generation, upon turning 30, are all immature fucks who haven\u2019t experienced a single day in their lives, have fought no battles and no real wars, have never truly known struggle or despair.\u00a0 Even if they went through a year of their lives being fisted by their cruel short-eyed uncle, the rest of the time in the lap of Zoloft Luxury has balanced that shit out.\u00a0 Even if your father put out his cigar in your eyeball while raping you, the extraordinary and absolutely disgusting level of privilege given to the white American makes your complaints nothing but the feeble tears of a big, soft, weeping pussy.<\/p>\n
Think of it like being in Hitler\u2019s favorite SS corps.\u00a0 That\u2019s the best analogy, I think.\u00a0 It both illustrates the privilege and the problem with the world.<\/p>\n
Most people I know \u2013 all of them, I think \u2013 hit 30 and give up.\u00a0 Oh dearest me, how old we are.\u00a0 How much my bones ache.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Even though the opportunity is there to really be fucking crazy, they avoid it.\u00a0 Now, look, we can all be Caligula and get away with it.\u00a0 That\u2019s how sick and demented this society is.\u00a0 But, at 30, everyone seems to want to struggle and be a part of that society.\u00a0 Pretend you\u2019re grown up \u2013 time to settle down and get a wife, a house, a life, babies.\u00a0 Call the cops when you see a black man 500 miles away in Rhode Island through your high powered radio telescope.\u00a0 After the third call, they\u2019ll helicopter in and shoot that black man if you want.\u00a0 Because you\u2019re a family man!\u00a0 You own a house!\u00a0 Your fucking marmy little wife has two screeching babies in her arms.\u00a0 You\u2019re a pencil neck.\u00a0 Yes, sir!\u00a0 Amen, sir!\u00a0 God bless America, sir!\u00a0 Protecting the civvies, sir!<\/p>\n
That\u2019s really what you want to become?\u00a0 To join this society? \u00a0Or, worse, a waterhead, armchair liberal eating fistfuls of Wellbutrin and trying to pretend you care about shit from the nest of your 13 hours a day job?\u00a0 That\u2019s even worse.\u00a0 In a time of fascism, everyone who says they\u2019re a liberal and shows that fake indignation should be out there on the fucking street, should be gathering together and throwing a revolution.\u00a0 No, don\u2019t turn your nose up at me, it\u2019s your duty.\u00a0 Get out there and fucking put your face in the faces of the institution or shut the fuck up.\u00a0 Because what\u2019s the white American liberal got to say?\u00a0 Don\u2019t blame me.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t vote for him.\u00a0 Passive excuses.\u00a0 I wash my hands of this Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Like you all think you can be innocent of the blood.<\/p>\n
And the response, quick in coming:\u00a0 Well, what can we do?\u00a0 If you have to ask, you\u2019re more demented than I thought.\u00a0 Aren\u2019t you outraged?\u00a0 I mean, really outraged?\u00a0 Sickened?\u00a0 What can you do?\u00a0 Get off the pills and think about it for once in your pathetic life.\u00a0 You\u2019re not a slave needing other people to tell you where to step.<\/p>\n
We are living in a time of apathy and despair because we\u2019ve been told that turning 30 is the final step in some sort of great plan.\u00a0 Because we need to be like our child-burning daddies and housebound mommies.\u00a0 Or maybe your mommy and daddy were hippies, right?\u00a0 That\u2019s cool, right?\u00a0 They were worse than the child burners.\u00a0 It\u2019s the hippies who turned their backs on us, who surrendered in the great revolution because they were too ignorant and disorganized.\u00a0 They betrayed us.\u00a0 Our parents sold us out so they could be happy and wealthy in the \u201cMe Generation,\u201d and then they turned around in fear of their youth and they told us to never do what they did.\u00a0 Never enjoy yourself, never try to fight for what is right.\u00a0 Even if the words are different, the lesson is the same.<\/p>\n
No, I know, your daddy taught you right from wrong.\u00a0 But do as I do, that\u2019s how our very basic core learns the lessons of life.\u00a0 We fought a war \u2013 both away and at home — that tore our souls out, and we didn\u2019t learn a thing.\u00a0 We simply scared ourselves into a corner and our parents hysterically preached my generation to please, god, just be quiet and take it.\u00a0 Just be careful.\u00a0 Just be worried.\u00a0 Just be sad.\u00a0 With every strong bedroom talk and proud speech at a wedding, our parents are telling us in body language and through their personal history:\u00a0 Give up.\u00a0 Give up now and hunker down.<\/p>\n
That darkness has never left us.\u00a0 Our souls never got out of the goddamn jungle.\u00a0 Maybe our souls simply died on the grounds of Kent State.<\/p>\n
So here we stand, in our 30\u2019s, a generation moaning and whining about how old we are.\u00a0 Boys and girls, we\u2019re as young as we always were.\u00a0 And our youth has the power of this whole insane system that wants to think we\u2019re all growed up and responsible.\u00a0 We can date multiple women and get away with it because, hell, what kind of 32 year old does that?\u00a0 We can smoke pot while walking briskly down a crowded street and people will say that\u2019s a funny smelling cigarette.\u00a0 We can dance in the rain drunk and girls can go to a party without panties on and it all becomes acceptable.\u00a0 We can tell people to go to hell and\u2026well, they just might fall through the Earth.<\/p>\n
Oh, our hair is short now.\u00a0 Balding, maybe.\u00a0 Grey, maybe.\u00a0 We\u2019re in suits and ties and always going or coming from the Great Machine.\u00a0 We have nice shoes, always.\u00a0 We have property.\u00a0 Things.\u00a0 We have a car that\u2019s shiny.\u00a0 We put mail in the box and the UPS man waves when he sees us. We tut-tut when the kids skateboard past us, and we tip our hats to the beat cops, who nod right back at us.\u00a0 On dark and lonely nights, the mist of early spring gathering around us, the cops in the car give us a sparing glance, then move on in search of trouble.\u00a0 We are America.\u00a0 We are the blood and bones of this nation.\u00a0 The 30-somethings.\u00a0 We are America, and we are given this respect, because the revolution comes from us \u2013 not from the kids.\u00a0 Everyone who led the groups in the sixties \u2013 from Hoffman to the Black Panthers \u2013 were in their 30\u2019s when they had no choice but to become active.\u00a0 Everyone who truly saw the evils of Vietnam and the sickness of society were 30-somethings.\u00a0 We are the head of the snake, and everyone in authority and everyone from our parent\u2019s generation knows it.<\/p>\n
So they whisper:\u00a0 Settle down.\u00a0 Wife, life.\u00a0 Responsibility.\u00a0 Let the job and debt crush you.\u00a0 Let life swallow you whole.<\/p>\n
Behind us is a dark wall, doing everything it can to stop us from moving forward.\u00a0 It is a blind creature.\u00a0 There is no conspiracy, no true ignorance.\u00a0 It is a creature born of fear, because it saw hell.\u00a0 It witnessed Vietnam, and it witnessed the hatred on our streets simply exploding.\u00a0 As a blind creature, it doesn\u2019t see that we now stand between it and the rolling freight train of autumn\u2019s first thunderstorm.\u00a0 Those dark clouds rushing in from the north, lightning laced, raining blood down on us.\u00a0 Soon, the pills won\u2019t keep the voices quiet.\u00a0 Soon, our houses won\u2019t keep the rain out.\u00a0 It\u2019s nighttime again in America.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[352],"tags":[111,353],"class_list":["post-2536","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gsarchive","tag-commentary","tag-gs-archive-2004-2008"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2536"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2642,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2536\/revisions\/2642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2536"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2536"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2536"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}