Better late than never…
I have realised I haven’t been keeping to my desired schedule of writing every day so I am throwing a quick dribble up. This has not been for lack of trying though. I have written and then deleted a couple of posts, throwing back to my notes app instead, because I have thought too much about who could stumble upon my random musings. I am disappointed in myself as the whole point of this, isn’t for me to write for, or with, anyone’s opinion in mind. A weird byproduct of being an “elder millennial”, we understand and remember the world before opinions were recorded so have that freedom of thought, but we went through puberty unedited and have some shame. We became adults as the internet was going through its awkward early stages so we remember and some of us, choose our words carefully. Disappearing content and ability to edit messages, posts and photos, gives the new, and the previously burnt, a strange confidence that impresses and concerns me.
I think it’s more on my mind of late as i have fallen back into the trap of getting lost in the world of social media. A simple check on a message will turn into a 2hour scroll of the metaverse and down the rabbit holes of stupidity, which due to the current political climate are everywhere. It’s just gone ANZAC* day here, last weekend was Easter (or as I refer to it ZOMBIE JESUS weekend), Australia has an election next weekend and the madness of That Orange Bastards confidence is once again, bringing the maggots out of the woodwork.
I wonder how history will look back on these decades, if they will be able to. The sad truth is that the people who are shouting their ignorant opinions from the safety of their screens (and those being foolhardy enough to do it in public) don’t realise once those in power start taking away rights, they wont stop. As the rights of our Trans brothers and sisters are being taken, these cold hearted meatsacks will be working on their next target, whether that be sexuality or body autonomy, no doubt we slide further backwards again. Don’t think so, last month a US State Senator told reporters that the Supreme Court was wrong to legalise interracial marriages…like what the actual fuck?!?!?!—and yes he has walked back this statement, saying he “didn't understand the question” but really, are they out being this blatantly ignorant?! The only upside to that shit stain of a human being existing in the White House, is the monsters let their masks slip.
The awful thing about it, the ignorant wont see it affect them till it is too late, after all those who have spent their lives fighting for HUMAN RIGHTS are silenced and dead, there will be no one left to defend the rights of their sons not to fight in an inhumane war or a daughters right to choose to whom she marries and breeds with. No one will be there to defend the right to worship the religion of your father or the right to be free of the shackles of religion entirely, when we are dead and gone and being poor is a crime and they are the wrong type of “white”, will they even have the histories of protest to look back on? The hand holding of those who control media and those who want to strip away rights is like something out of a YA dystopian fiction. If you cant see it, i would love to know what you see, like am I just letting my imagination run wild? Like we are still battling with racism in 2025, doesn’t that show just how little we have made progress, that the world is currently witnessing a genocide and you still have public figures defending it? Oh but…oh but fucking nothing, you are going to punish a group of people because of a decision made in 1948 based on a fantasy book thats been rewritten numerous times, you are allowing the slaughter of thousands of innocent people because a terrorist organisation wont back down?! Cause, ya know if they surrender, surely the oppressors wont spend the next 100years finishing the job, like colonialism isn’t a thing anymore right, like eradicating Indigenous culture isn’t something that still happens right…?
There was actually gronks fucking booing the ‘Welcome to Country’ at ANZAC memorials here in Australia yesterday…yip, booing. The ‘Welcome to Country’ is a relatively new inclusion in Australian culture, a modernisation of an Indigenous practice that pays respects to the Traditional Custodians of the land and the land itself, which like so many Indigenous cultures around the world, is seen and treated as an ancestor.** This is a simple, respectful gesture that has no negative affects on the privileges of anyone, oh…except those who still believe the have ownership on land their ancestors were sent to after pissing off the OG colonisers from their mother country…go figure. And all this while at a ceremony to remember our ANZACS, soldiers, fighting and dying in wars, that were never ours to be involved in. Wars that the “good guys” won, but no lessons seem to have been learnt. Wars that destroy families and end bloodlines, wars that prove that the world remains a board game for a lucky few to play.
On that joyful note, I’m off to ponder my place in it all and feel some grass under my feet…it may be a bit disjointed but it feels better to get it out. Remember to check your privilege, whether it be how you can pass, your education, economic freedom or simply you can exist without fear, every day someone in the world is fighting to be where you are.
*ANZAC day is observed annually on April 25 and is a day of remembrance that commemorates all Australians and New Zealanders “who served and died in all wars, conflicts and peacekeeping operations” and “the contribution and suffering of all those who have served”
**This is what I know of Welcome to Country as an immigrant living in Meeanjin, land of the Turrbal peoples.
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