Hurricane Ida and the leftovers have done a number on my migraines yesterday and so far today, so I’m about worthless for anything around the house. So I’m ranging about the Intertubz, catching up on “things”.
If you’ve been around here for a while, you may remember that my criteria for who goes into the blogroll is that they interest me in some form or fashion. To facilitate the addition of new entries, I keep a list on my internal home page of those I’m checking out.
One of those is BigCountryExpat at The Intrepid Reporter. His latest has been noted on a lot of blogs, including some in the blogroll. If it’s even partially accurate, we’re in for a larger shit storm than I have been figuring on. Shocked face, etc.
But what really caught my eye today was this quote in his sidebar:
Middle class America is no less violent than any other people. They seem passive because they’re results oriented. They rise not out of blood frenzy but to solve the otherwise insoluble. Their methods of choice are good will, cooperation, forbearance, negotiation and finally, appeasement, roughly in that order. Only when these fail to end the abuse do they revert to blowback. And they do so irretrievably. Once the course is set and the outcome defined, doubt is put aside. The middle class is known, condemned actually, for carrying out violence with the efficiency of an industrial project where bloody destruction at any scale is not only in play, it’s a metric. Remorse is left for the next generation, they’ll have the leisure for it. We’d like to believe this is merely dark speculation. History says it isn’t.
Ol’ Remus
Perhaps it’s just my addled brain and subsequent mood, but it seems as if all men’s hands are turned against us. Middle class America has tried everything except appeasement, so expect that to start shortly. That won’t work; it never does. You’ve read what comes after that.
Get ready and prepare to harden your hearts, boys.
There is a saying I heard years ago that can sum up Ol’ Remus’ description of the middle class’s response to what is going on. “The first one is expensive, the rest are free”.
We in the middle class are not willing to pay for the first one. Yet!