Been a while.

This year's been... stressful. I guess one could say we're seeing the results of all sorts of bad things coming to a head, in every possible way. I feel like I should write something long, eloquent, and convincing backed by evidence and statistics, etc. But the simple reality is I'm tired. I'm exhausted, and I'm not even someone who's life is particularly effected by all this mess. 99% of people on the street will see me and assume I'm a straight white cishet neurotypical male, so 99% of the time I get to cruise along on easy mode in modern America. I can't imagine how much worse this year has been to people who face so many more completely unwarranted challenges.

If you've been paying attention, if you've been listening to literally anyone other than the privately funded mouthpiece of billionaire's that don't give a shit about your lives and give foxes a bad name, you've seen what's gone on in the last few weeks and months in this country. Police, former police, etc. violating the rights and terminating the lives of marginalized people. Visiting terror, grievous injury, and death upon people accused of minor crimes, people jogging through the wrong neighborhood, or even upon people innocently sitting at home after a long day at work. And when people rightfully raise their voices in outrage and protest at this atrocious and inexcusable behavior, we've seen so many, too many, of those officers and their brethren become unhinged and indiscriminate in abusing their authority, catering to the whims of a petty self styled tyrant whose been egging them on for the better part of 4 years. The inexcusable abuse and cruelty has been utterly horrifying, in too many cases rivaling and even surpassing the kind of behavior too many of us had thought was relegated to an older, uglier time.

Against this, we've seen the reverse. Some of the most privileged people in the land, asked simply to stay at home and isolate, in the face of one of the deadliest pandemics seen in over a century, rose up armed to the teeth and stormed their capitals. And those police, who have sought to so brutally suppress other people, did almost nothing. Police who've shot people to death without remorse for the crime of having a cell phone in their hand, or a hand in their pocket, stood by as white men and women put their hands on holstered guns and their fingers on triggers. Police who've brutally beaten people for simply holding their ground at a protest, police who've arrested people and ruined their lives for the crime of disrespecting their vanity and imagined importance stood stoically and quietly as men and women hurled abuse at them and threatened the lives of legislators and government workers.

If you can't look at the stark and horrifying difference there and see something wrong, I don't know what to tell you. If you can watch what happened to George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, or read about Breonna Taylor, or read the news about the LITANY of other names of victims of unjustifiable uses of force. If you can watch the seemingly endless string of violent incitement and flagrant cruelty visited upon protestors in the last week, alongside everything else we've seen and not come to the conclusion that there are deep, long running, and horrific injustices in our society that MUST be changed NOW, then I don't know that there's anything I have left to say to you.

Black Lives Matter.
Police brutality is wrong.
We must address the horrific injustices in our communities that disadvantage, discriminate against, and abuse the most vulnerable and marginalized among us, and we must do it now.

One final note, on something within our own community.

It's one thing to be an idiot when you're young, stupid, and first discover that there are folks on the internet that won't stop you, or that will even cheer you on when you're being an absolute piece of human filth, degrading and tearing down the most vulnerable in our society.

It's far different matter that it happened last week, or yesterday, when you are in theory a fully functioning adult. It's a different matter when you only change your opinion when you get caught, and try to mask it as a joke, debate, or perhaps one of the world's shittiest ways to cope with stress.

If you do this, you are not welcome in this community. Unfollow me. Get out. Don't come back.

As for forgiveness. I grew up catholic. I left the church long ago, but I still believe in the power of forgiveness to heal and uplift. Redemption, however, is earned through changing who you are and how you behave. It is earned through penance, paid not just to demonstrate your heartfelt remorse, but also to address the things that you did wrong and show that you are taking an active and enthusiastic hand in making them [i]right[/].

Asking for forgiveness, seeking redemption, these things take time. But doing so is not a shield from the consequences of your actions. Saying you are seeking therapy, telling people that you are praying, dressing yourself up in the costume and pageantry of self improvement does not mean that people cannot justifiably take you to task for the horrific things that you said or did. Nor do these things, nor anything else that you choose to do require those you've wronged and those sickened and hurt by your actions to forgive you.