None Of This Is Normal
There is a fine line between highlighting, trying to pass on information and analysis without having the chance to step back, taking a deep breath and assessing everything you see, feel for a second and evaluating it against your own moral compass. I’ll go a step further in saying that being able to have that time is not only damn near impossible but also not wanted. I can only speak for myself and despite having done the utmost at great personal and material cost to remove myself from the cogs of this life, I struggle to find the peace and time to look at what I am seeing, talking, writing about, let alone feel and go, yeah fuck all this. I dare not imagine the unmountable pressure of trying to hold down a “normal” job, a family - which ever way you define that - in this system of debt, servitude and total lack of self-determination whilst all the while dealing with this nagging feeling that “none of this is normal”.
I’ll say it plain and clear, none of what we are experiencing is normal. Granted, we could and should debate what normal can consensually mean to us as a society, but I would wager that humanity can inertly agree on some relative truths and necessities without much talk, and they don’t exist. Rather than debating the obvious I would like to pass on a little, powerful revelation I have had of late that despite it all gives me great strength, the power of saying: No More!
Say it. Feel it. Internalize it and bold forces will come to your aid. Mentally, physically in forms of old and new friends and take it from there. Whatever the forces of capital have decided for us, it is not “normal” let alone healthy. This needs changing. Change starts with not only being over the bullshit you witness, but also looking in the mirror and saying, “I am done with your bullshit, friend”. More than happy to talk about this one if anyone is interested.
This lawsuit basically slipped under my radar and the more I looked into this over the last 48 hours - a good 8 hours of research by now - it’s becoming increasingly concerning how little I have been able to find out about this. Long story short, in the case Conditi v. Instagram it is being claimed that Facebook Inc. is using the front facing cameras on our smartphones to record and collect biometric data from us when using Instagram. Now, I wrote about Palantir and to a larger extend the Amazon Cloud Services and this claim essentially ties into that. To say this simply confirms suspicions we all have had about the genuine evils of Big Tech is what it is, and yes, if a product is free you and I are the product, but this goes beyond that simple but truthful premise. I am not going to waste your time with my own dystopian takes of control but feel free to dig into this one. It’s 5 past midnight in regards to breaking up and forcing big tech under public control and oversight. None of this should exist for profit and none of this is normal.
As to the rest if today’s fuckening, I’ll stick to some more general vibes. Germany belatedly kicked off a full blown lockdown as of today, everything is closed and I am still trying to figure out if we can actually go outside for walks or not. This second wave of the virus is deadly as fuck, with well over 500 people dying a day here and the mental cracks are even starting the show here. Be kind, be slow, wear a fucking mask if you have to go outside, and again, be kind and patient with yourself and others.