Talkin’ De-Evolution Blues
For the past two weeks, between the pro wrestling highlights and my oh so targeted ads for vibrators I see a question being asked over and over.
“How did we get here?”
Seems like it’s on the tip of everyone’s tongue lately. It’s in my group chats, my brunch chats, my social media, hell even the fogies who just found out what a Reddit is are asking!
And it’s not hard to understand why.
Misinformation is spreading faster than the blue chew at a Mar A Lago.
Excessive displays of grandeur and aggression have taken over any sense of intelligent or even productive conversation. See: Pissing Contest
Don’t even get me started on those we long looked to for answers, the elder statespeople, they’ve either joined the pit of bullshit or they’re largely silent.
I think what maddens me most, though, is that I know how we got here.
As a species we’re inherently tribal. We stick with our tribe because that’s how we survived not getting eaten by something really big and really teethy. Big teeths. Sharp ones. It’s how we took care of each other and how we built community.
But while we still have our personal tribes, our community isn’t as small as it was when we first slithered out of the primordial ooze and onto the beach.
We’re connected to the world at large. Hell, one of my friends donated $50 to a big cat charity and they sent him a live feed of a tiger eating a big honkin’ piece of meat that had TRUMP written on it. Fuckin A. Modern living baybee.
But even so, it seems we too often rely on that instinct to stay close to our own. In large part too many of us are still scared of the unknown. It leads to allegiance without analysis. Loyalty without logic.
It’s why we fall for bullshit narratives so easily. Why we trust the same institutions without question just because they’ve always been OUR institutions. Why we’re so quick to defend our tribe. Even when they’re dead fucking wrong.
But how did we get HERE?
The gross rhetoric and the culture of attack. The constant outrage, the need to “win” a conversation rather than having one. Of needing to feel better than others.
Sure, it’s fun to dunk on the dummies sometimes, but if pretty-sounding sludge is all they’re offering, are these the types of chucklefucks we should be putting on a pedestal?
I don’t know about you, but I think the world works a hell of a lot better when we reach out to our neighbors. When we learn from each other. When we share in the joy of each other’s tribes. When we help each other evolve.
Look at this way, we have the power of these lil machines right in our pockets, full of knowledge. Full of history. Full of different, beautiful points of view and experience that you can find without even having to get off the shitter.
So can we please, pretty please, stop fighting about which pro wrestling company is the RIGHT pro wrestling company?
Why should there even be a WANT for there to be such an authoritarian monopoly on wrestling? . Who wins that situation?
Is it you, the loyal fan? The unwavering die hard?
Well…we’ve seen what that looks like before. And ya’ll…it wasn’t pretty. You could even call it one of the most horrific periods in pro wrestling history. Real hard-to-stomach shit.
So, I laugh. I have to. If I don't, there's no way I'll make it through the other side. If there's even an other side to make it to. Some days, I honestly don't know.
