Newspeak

Image by Gordon Johnson from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

"There are some ideas so wrong that only a very intelligent person could believe in them." -George Orwell

(I'm sorry this week's column is late. I was arrested on Friday for illegal word use and didn't get out till today (Sunday, 11/12) when a lawyer from the Poetic License Association was able to get me released on a technicality.) 

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),  

When we read (a condensed) 1984 in high school I was blown away. Not just by the story but also by the writing chops of its author.

When I read Animal Farm on my own a few years later I was blown away, Not just by the story but also by the writing chops of its author.

When I re-read (an uncondensed) 1984 a few years after that and again a few years ago I was blown away by the writing chops of the author.

Orwell, a democratic socialist incidentally, who wrote two globally recognized literary classics that are still studied today, before dying at the age of 46 from tuberculosis 73 years ago, is currently under attack by Wokies for thoughtcrime.  

Author Anna Funder, for example, feeling that she had been "spiritually drained by the monotonous demands of motherhood" came across a collection of Orwell's essays in a used bookstore and "embarked on a project of re-reading his work, hoping his explorations of tyranny would help her liberate herself from the 'motherload of wifedom I had taken on'".

Long story short, she winds up writing a biography of Orwell's wife detailing what a monster he actually was (much of it speculative) and how the patriarchy was, and still is, responsible for repressing all women all the time. 

He was dead less than a year after 1984 was published and personally I see no point in digging him up and killing him.     

George Orwell was obviously right about the unmitigated disaster that was/is communism (Animal Farm) but may have been wrong about what life in the average dystopia of the future would be like (1984). 

Communism is (dis)credited with a body count of 100,000,000 H. sapiens, more or less, and although the killing — and enslaving, and torturing, and imprisoning — continues, the running total, communism's mur-dom-eter if you will, racks up the bodies at a much slower pace these days. 

{Not bad, but I would've used kill-ometer myself.}

Clever, but that doesn't quite work, Dana. A murdometer keeps track of total deaths; a killometer measures how fast people are being deliberately killed. Think odometer v. speedometer. 

What I find fascinating is that irregardless, there are still plenty of people in the world who declare, with a straight face, that if communism was ever properly implemented somewhere, by someone, it would finally have a chance to shine.

{There's no such word as irregardless, it's regardless, without the ir.}

That's what I thought, however, if you go a-googlin' you'll quickly discover that while irregardless is considered to be nonstandard by the language police (and verboten by my spellchecker), it's not illegal and has been in use since 1795 according to Merriam-Webster.

While I admit that logically it makes no sense when you think about it, I like the sound of it. 

If China's current emperor and his minions can claim with a straight face that China is a communist country (socialism with "Chinese characteristics"), and certain American college professors and no shortage of Zoomers can claim communism is a valid political philosophy — logic be damned. Irregardless, it's my column. 

{Okay fine, but what's any of this got to do with 1984? And whaddayamean China's not a communist country?}

1984 features a world-class traditional dystopia with an evil dicktater, and a relative handful of minions. Everyone else is, for all intents and purposes, a miserable slave.

{Right, like China.}

Nah, that's old-school China. With occasional limited and brief exceptions, China was a relatively traditional dicktatership for millennia and a Communist Utopia for half a minute, but now it's a new-school dictatership. 

It's a dystopia for certain minorities, of course, but that's for their own good. Once they're assimilated, and so far resistance has been futile, they'll be happy, well-adjusted, and productive members of society striving to help make China the planet's most powerful hegemon... while keeping an eye on their social credit score. 

{So what exactly is socialism with Chinese characteristics?}

Easy peasy:

"...Marxism-Leninism, Mao Zedong Thought, Deng Xiaoping Theory, the Theory of Three Represents, ...the Scientific Outlook on Development, and the Thought on socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era as well as the Party’s basic line and basic policy." 

For more details please refer to: 

Hold High the Great Banner of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics and Strive in Unity to Build a Modern Socialist Country in All Respects. 

This is the catchy title of Emperor Xi Jinping's Report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China — 58 pages of sparkling and inspirational prose.  

In other words, just now, socialism with Chinese Characteristics is Xi Jinping's name for a hooge-steaming pile of Bonkercockie, the official rationalization for a dicktaterhip that promotes capitalism and limited liberty when it's convenient but exerts central control (with an iron fist) when it ain't.

This is how you pretend, with a straight face, that the CCP, the Chinese Communist Party (the Emperor and his minions) is running a communist country, the Chinese version of a "dictatership of the proletariat."   

Socialism with etc. is whatever Emperor Xi says it is, subject to change. 

If he changes his mind, dies of natural causes, is assassinated, or is just removed from the chess Go board and put back in the box by someone who has ascended to the apex of the Yellow Patriarchal Hegemonistic Sino-imperialist Dominance Hierarchy, he/she/they will decide.

{Who/What?}

Whoever takes over the Emperor's current job. As everybody knows, the world is currently run by Pasty Patriarchal Hegemonistic Euro-imperialists, but the Emperor has made it clear that he thinks China should be in charge and I suspect that any given potential successor will feel the same.

{China in charge... wasn't that the name of an 80s sitcom?}

You're thinking of Charles In Charge, starring the anti-Christ, Scott Baio. 

{So you're saying that since Orwell didn't predict a dystopia like China he missed the rickshaw?} 

No, let us not forget Cuba, Venezuela, my personal favorite, North Korea, and other lesser-known, much less powerful/threatening um... poop holes.

In his defense, he was a man of his time. I don't think anyone would've predicted that Stalin's Russia would eventually become the Pooteen's Russia; the Pooteen plays the Tzar and a gaggle of greedy, corrupt oligarchs play nobles. At least the stores actually have stuff on the shelves. 

Irregardless, I'm just grateful I live in a country where people can legally say, within certain limits, almost anything they want wherever they want without fear of being doxed, de-platformed, or disappeared for hate speech. 

{You're being sarcastical... right?}

And although everyone knows there's no such thing as online privacy we gracefully accept this as a small price to pay for personalized advertising that points us to cheap merchandise and expensive iPhones (often, unfortunately, made by virtual slaves) in the People's Republic of China. 

Also, don't forget being able to watch perfect strangers getting naked and/or having sex 24x7x365 via the worldwide web of all knowledge without feeling any guilt, shame, or responsibility now that what used to be called porn is now called female empowerment.

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged on either site. Cranky don't tweet (X-claim?).

Disrespected

Image by Nathan Wright from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device

"Old age is no place for sissies." -Bette Davis 

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),  

I apologize for disrespecting anyone I judged to be old and out of it when I was a callowyute. I've been 39 for 31 years now and I'm disrespected almost daily so I'm paying for my sins. But I strive to not take it personally, it's just how things are in a youth-worshiping culture going 99 mph 24x7x365.

{I thought you didn't like the word disrespecting?}

I don't, Dana, it looks, and especially sounds, ugly, as does disrespected. In fact disrespected looks and sounds particularly ugly. 

{Then why...}

Well, I'm an old man and I associate both of these words with those who aren't. I don't recall them being commonly used when I was younger and they're both very commonly used nowadays. So I'm trying to um... reach across the temporal gulf that separates me from both the truly young, and the younger than I, which is the point of this column. 

{Huh. So you find certain words in themselves to be ugly, not necessarily what they... represent?}

Oh yeah. Take a word like misanthrope, hideous. Paradoxically, misanthropic is gorgeous.

{Huh.}

It's not you, it's me, I'm old.

This was supposed to be a column about Old v. Young but I quickly became entangled in so many possible threads that I decided to take the high road and instead warn/advise the young and younger than I, those who are still young enough to rarely if ever think about their inevitable decline and deletion. 

When I was young, and I suspect this is true of most H. sapiens, I gave virtually no thought to getting old. On those rare occasions that I did, I was confident that this was even farther off than say... a term paper that was due by the end of next week, so why worry? HT: Alfred E. Newman. 

But once H. sapiens mature a bit, but are still relatively young, they would be well served to be at least a little more aware that they will wake up one day, note that there's more sand in the bottom of the hourglass than the top, and live/plan accordingly. 

But if they're anything like I was 100 years or so ago, they won't pay much attention when it's pointed out to them, even by a non-famous, non-syndicated, virtually unknown columnist.

{A 100 years? It appears that temporal distortion works in both directions.}

No doubt. Hey, apropos of not much, I once had a brother-in-law whose nickname was No-Doubt, about 75 years ago. He... 

{Anyways...} 

Although attempting to point out to the young/younger the utility of being prepared for, and/or maintaining an awareness of, one's eventual personal decline and fall is likely to be a fool's errand, perhaps a few tips on what being old in America is going to be like might be helpful. 

{Say, do you know that "falls are the leading cause of fatal and nonfatal injuries" for geezers/geezerettes?}

I do, a not-so-fun fact that comes to mind every time my wrinkled bum and I get in/out of the shower, but what...

{We need to do more public service announcements.}

Anyways...

I know that you zany youngsters are already tired of hearing this, but you're not going to believe how fast your life will seem to have gone by once you can see the end approaching. 

[Dana groans, loudly... there's exaggerated eye-rolling]   

Seriously. I know-I know, you've probably experienced this to a certain degree, but trust me, you ain't seen nothin' yet; don't say I didn't warn you. 

Now, more importantly, one day it's going to dawn on you, or you're going to be forced to admit, that even if you're still relatively sharp and young at heart, no one mistakes you for a spring chicken and that you may even be...old. 

(On average: 70 or better. Warning: may be earlier.) 

Note the word relatively; you will have lost some of your edge. It's important that you face up to this (not everyone does) and compensate accordingly. 

The good news is that striving to fool the young and younger will help you to stay sharpish. Use it or lose it, right? Even better news: when you forget something or screw something up (accidentally or deliberately) that pees off the young/youngers you can invoke the Senior Moment defense.

Please manipulate responsibly (and judiciously). They may be looking for, even documenting, excuses to park your butt in a senior storage unit of some sort, particularly if they're seeking money, or revenge.  

{Pees off?}

Sometimes a silly word choice can turn an uglier (and now ubiquitous) version of a word (that I heard a nun use the other day) into something funny. It's not you, it's me, I'm old. However, all gentlepersons should always be aware that often, funny may be a better option than crude.

{But not always?}

No, not always. It's a judgment call, context-dependent. 

There are radically different kinds of old people. You must be aware of this early on so as to strive to avoid becoming one of the less-than-optimal versions. 

You undoubtedly already know many people who began aging early on and have been calcifying ever since. Never particularly self-aware, they've embraced stereotypes all their lives. There will come a point where they have been at it so long they may be damaged, even shatter, when confronted with unwelcome changes. 

They're so numerous that many young/youngers, due to unpleasant personal interactions magnified by the tendency of all sorts of media to lump all sorts of people into overly broad categories, may not realize that it's truly possible to age more or less gracefully, and keep a more or less open mind. 

But watch out for obsessives and would-be immortals. 

There are fine lines to be drawn between people attempting to maintain a reasonable standard of physical and mental health, people who are obsessed with maintaining high levels of health so as to have the energy levels needed to work all the damn time because they _______, and people who want to live forever because they _______. 

{What's with all the blanks?}

Reasons/motivations/rationalizations vary widely. Oh, and I'm not talking about people who have to work all the damn time because life peed on them. And I think that many obsessives can't help it. And I think that the would-be immortals (unfortunately? fortunately?) haven't learned there's no shortage of things worse than death. 

But I hope, that like Forrest Gump, at some point they decide that enough is enough and stop to smell the _______.

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged on either site. Cranky don't tweet (X-claim?).  

   

 

  

   

The Buckeye State

Image by Rupert Kittinger-Sereinig from Pixabay

This is a weekly column consisting of letters to my perspicacious progeny — the Stickies — to advise 'em now, haunt them after I'm deleted.

Trigger Warning: This column is rated SSC-65: Sexy Seasoned Citizens   

About 

Glossary 

Featuring {Dana}: Persistent auditory hallucination and charming literary device 

"The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it." -P.J. O'rourke 

Dear Stickies (and gentlereaders),

It occurred to me that it has been quite a while since I have written much, if anything, about my tired little town, one of many in a tired little valley that doesn't look like a valley.  

{Tired? A valley that doesn't look like one?}

As to tired, Dana, Hooterville is in the heart of the rustbelt, and despite heroic efforts to revive it and the valley in which it's located, it remains rather rusty overall.

As to the valley thing, if you found yourself passing through, particularly if you were a Yinzer (a native of Pittsburgh like me), you'd be unlikely to notice that you were technically in a valley. 

The 'Burgh is in a clearly defined, deep valley that conforms to the definition of a valley that I learned in geography class under the tutelage of Sister Mary McGillicuddy. I wonder if there's a commonly used word for a very shallow valley? 

Just a second, I'll be right back. 

Huh, according to Google/Generative AI (Generative AI is experimental. Info quality may vary.) there are a ton of names for shallow valleys including dingle, bunny, thrutch, etceterutch. My personal favorite is cwm, a Welsh word pronounced kuum. I caught a rabbit in the cwm, so we had a Welsh rabbit for dinner. 

And now that I think about it, isn't there a tiny town in West Virginia called Dingle Bunny?

{There's something really wrong with you, you know that, right?}

Living in the Rustbelt ain't all bad. For example, recently our three-burner stove--which I bought new down at the BestBuy 16 years ago, the one near damall?--which originally had four burners transformed, literally overnight, into a two-burner, both of which were clearly not long for this world. 

Not good, particularly given the current cash flow crunch here at Casa de Chaos. However, in short order, we secured a surprisingly decent one from the next tired town over for $100, and the old one vanished the next day.

{A hundred bucks! Vanished?}

 

As to the price... it's better not to ask any questions. Pay the money, load up the stove, say thanks, and get out of Dodge. As to vanished, we have a very dedicated and discrete group of voluntary recyclers in the area who are happy to deal with anything made of metal left out on the curb.

We once shoved a very large, very dead air conditioner out of a first-floor window and into the yard, intending to drag it to the curb the next day. In about an hour, a very polite, if somewhat disheveled gentleman knocked on the front door to inquire if we had made funeral arrangements yet for the dead appliance in question. 

He recycled it quickly and efficiently with our blessing and our thanks.

There's an off-year election coming up, (11/7),  in which the good citizens of the Buckeye State will decide if, going forward, weed, with the requisite sin tax and no shortage of silly Rules&Regs, will be recreationally legal, not just medically legal as it is now.

{Silly?}

Well, after all, it is a weed, and I'm led to believe it's not difficult to grow, particularly since instructions, advice, and equipment are easily acquired. My favorite caveat? You can legally grow your own, as long as you don't have more than six plants, 12 if there are at least two adults in the household that are 21 or older. 

After all, like tobacco, you're not allowed to use it till you're 21. However, it's still legal to join the military or star in a porno if you're at least 18.  

Also, possessing more than 2.5 ounces is illegal, but that's not silly. That's just Ohio trying to make sure that sin and state and local sales taxes are being collected, and that the shady-looking dude that hangs out in front of the 7-Eleven and his colleagues aren't dodging both sales and income taxes and underselling their legal competitors. 

This might seem odd given that the Republicrats, the party of small government, currently have an iron grip on most of our carefully gerrymandered state, but maintaining a full-time, two-house legislature, 24x7 x365 ain't cheap. Neither is maintaining numerous tired, tiny towns that all have their own government employees, school systems, police departments, zoning boards, etc. 

Having friends in low places, I could have weed delivered to my front door, with no delivery charge, by making a phone call. I haven't been a regular user in decades but I'm voting yes so that those who do choose to indulge can do so knowing the source of the product and know that nothing dangerous/crazy has been added to tweak its potency. 

There's another issue to vote on this year, a proposed constitutional amendment no less, that guarantees abortion rights to the women of Ohio. This, as you might imagine, has generated endless Sturm und Drang... all of it unnecessary. 

Long story short:

Roe v. Wade is overturned by the Supremes but Ohio already has a law in place restricting abortion (21 weeks and 6 days), a law the majority of its citizens support.

The masters of morality in control of the Ohio Legislature pass a law that limits abortions to the first six weeks of pregnancy, with no exceptions for rape or incest, that is promptly, and currently, blocked by an injunction. 

A ballot initiative, a broadly worded amendment (thus guaranteeing endless litigation if it passes) to amend the Ohio Constitution to include abortion rights is added to the ballot. 

Money is pouring in from outside Ohio by people and organizations on both sides of the issue to fund information/disinformation campaigns. 

Our 76-year-old, five-foot-tall governor (whose son is an Ohio Supreme Court justice) and his wife have released their own ad. They both look right into the camera and lie their bums off, stating that if the amendment passes partial-birth abortion will be legal in Ohio. 

They neglect to mention that there's a federal law in place that bans that barbaric procedure nationwide.   

{Ain't it cool that the German phrase Sturm und Drang sounds like what it means in English? Is Mike Dewine really five feet tall?}

Nah, I lied. Go Buckeyes!

Poppa loves you,

Have an OK day

Scroll down to leave a comment, share my work, or access my golden oldies.   

I post links to my columns on both Facebook and the social media site formerly known as Twitter so you can love me, hate me, or lobby to have me canceled or publically flogged on either site. Cranky don't tweet (X-claim?).