The setting: The year of their lord, 2026. An end-stage capitalist hellscape, built by slaves on land stolen through genocide. The wages are no longer fit to live on. Rent and food consume all of the income you earn from your job, and more work is harder and harder to find. Slaves to labor, health insurance is becoming a thing of the past, or a luxury of the chosen few.
For decades, we’ve watched bands of roving “law enforcement officers” murder people with impunity for slight infractions or for no reason at all. The darkness of the shade of your skin creates a direct correlation with the likelihood of being chosen for summary execution by these gangs in blue. Talking heads on television discuss the land of the free, with their motto of “comply or die.”
We turn on our television to watch as our politicians sign their names on bombs used to drop on children, schools, churches, mosques, hospitals, and refugee camps. We get to watch as children get shot down, starved, and burned alive, but we’re told that they deserve it, they were (autocorrect tried to get me to change “were” to “are”. Sorry autocorrect, these children won’t get that opportunity) going to grow up to be bad people. Besides, that land beneath their feet will make an excellent beachside property once they are gone.
Over the next weeks, we get to watch as bombs with our flag fall on Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Somalia, and then Nigeria and Venezuela. We are bringing peace to the world, one bomb at a time- each one killing more people. When there is no one left, our peace will be obtained.
A federal police force is militarized and sent to the streets to kidnap and disappear tens of thousands of people from all over the country, especially the parts of the country deemed oppositional to the dear leader. A woman, this one white and deemed worthy of legal existence, was murdered as she fled the secret police, on film for the world to see. Within hours, the highest officers of the land had determined she was a murderous terrorist. We were told to stop believing our eyes and our ears, that we must believe them instead. TV stations hired experts to argue over which sets of laws correctly justified the murder we witnessed, and why it wasn’t murder at all. Politicians from both authorized political parties argued over how much money they should give these secret police. Some discussed whether they should reduce the budget to the secret police, so they could only kidnap the most illegal people deemed illegal to exist, while others suggested more money to train them to better kidnap illegal people.
Many of the people began seeing through the facade. They took to the streets to protest. In response, the president deployed more secret police than ever to these cities. He went to his propaganda machine and tweeted for the world to see that Minnesota would face a day of reckoning and retribution for their deadly criminals- criminals that did not exist. His Secretary went to a podium with Nazi propaganda on the front, “One of Ours- All of yours” written on the face to deploy more soldiers against their own people. The secret police- no longer acting in secret- posted “We will have our home back”, the official song of the KKK, before moving their secret police to kidnap those deemed illegal, and anyone who got in their way.
The authorized opposition party discusses kinder, gentler ways to dispose of undesirables and those deemed illegal. Jails for the homeless, with softer slavery. Better training for the roving guards and militias. Trans people can still exist under the opposition, as long as they aren’t in public or using the restroom. We won’t build a resort where we eradicate that population; we will build a memorial.
I dissociate. This can’t be real.
The new Jacob the Horse song plays…
Immediately, the lyrics beckon images of killing nazis. A voice of reason. He calls those who demonize trans kids the devil. This is finally a voice of sanity. “This is an endorsement of violence; those who are in charge are fascists and eugenicists”.
YES! I feel seen. I’m not crazy. The pro-eugenics slogans, the strategic murder, deportations, disappearances, and kidnappings. The “one of ours, all of yours” – the “we will have our home back”. It’s not a coincidence. It’s real. Two plus two does equal four.
“We can’t post our way out of this one. The most responsible thing you can do is buy a gun. It’s delusional to think anyone can save us in a way that won’t involve a city burning down,”- the lyrics preach.
Ironically, on the other side of the world, in Iran, the people are protesting their own corrupt government. In my foggy state, I can’t remember if they are Eurasia or Eastasia or perhaps Oceania, but we’ve always been at war with them, or perhaps we’ve always been their ally. Our dear leader’s propaganda machine churns out another message.
Iranian Patriots, KEEP PROTESTING – TAKE OVER YOUR INSTITUTIONS! Save the names of the killers and abusers. They will pay a high price. I have cancelled all meetings with Iranian Officials until the senseless killing of protesters STOPS.
Meanwhile, back at home, as protests erupt over his own officials’ senseless killing of protestors, he orders a larger crackdown.
The Jacob the Horse Song continues to play.
Scenes of violence in the street, allusions to the guillotine, and our own revolutions. A chance to be free to end the institutions that wish for our death. Salvation becomes possible only when we act to seize our freedom. Our freedom will not come from social media posts. It’s not going to come by asking the less aggressive opposition party to murder us more gently. As our dear leader said in his message to our enemies (or are they our allies), we must take over our institutions and write down the names of our killers and abusers. They will pay a high price.
“Bad New Religion” helped me feel less alone as I looked at the world around me. I know I don’t feel alone. This is the 2nd single off their upcoming album “At Least It’s Almost Over,” due out March 20th.
Written by Gimp Leg
