Perturbation and Disgust in Book Seven: Reconstruction 2020

I suppose this shouldn’t come as any kind of surprise to me, really. But Day 1 back at the office is pissing me off for every reason you can imagine.

Sit down at my desk and National Government and Political Coverage starts streaming in. And may I just say, HOLY FUCK WHAT IS WRONG WITH HUMANS?! Kentucky has a lynching demonstration because “fuck trying to keep us safe from a pandemic!” ?!? People are getting murdered for stating “You can’t enter this business without a mask?” ?!? SERIOUSLY WHAT THE FUCK HUMANS!? You wouldn’t be allowed to enter the store without footwear or a shirt… but they ask you to wear a mask and you kill them?!?! What… how… what in the name of everything sacred to all faiths is FUCKING WRONG WITH YOU ASSHOLES?!

Further… and this is going to get me some vicious clap backs but bring it (meaning, say what you will, I’ll likely not respond and simply fume with my confusion and rage)… I support the diversity of faiths. I am 100% in favor of believing in whatever magic, spirit, or deity you wish. PROVIDED you also deal in the real world. And as I have mentioned to SO MANY of my Christian Science friends… if you believe in prayer but refuse to believe in modern medicine… you don’t understand anything. You live in a world with history and other people. Therefore, YOUR prayer about a certain issue may not be the first of its kind. And consider that. Let us say that you are worried about disease. And you pray that God or Gaia or Tree Spirit or Magical Sisterhood remove disease from our world. And then refuse to see a doctor or take any kind of medicine or listen to anyone in the CDC. You really don’t see your arrogance and irony? People have been praying for relief from diseases since prayer began. Literally… even before humans knew what disease was… that hope that Ug-Thak would get better instead of dying from “sweaty pain time of coughing”… that was a kind of prayer. And are you so arrogant that you can tell your spiritual center what to do?? Seriously. It is like… my house flooded and I prayed for rescue but I refused to board a boat that miraculously found me because it isn’t the rescue I was hoping for?! Instead of rubbing crystals over your body and breathing in essential oils while claiming that people wearing masks are “sheep living in fear” you fucking educate yourself!

Seriously… seriously… seriously thinking that Jesus bringing forgiveness may have been too generous. Our species, apparently, needs a Book of Genesis kind of God to say, “You keep fucking everything up, I’m wiping all of you out and starting over!”

Then we get the local items in my Work and Personal E-Mail.

While it was my boss’ desire that we return to the office en masse today… it seems he’ll need to take a half day so he can be home for when repair guys come. I suppose it can’t be helped but… I’m personally irked by it anyway. But what’s more is how everything else works. Our governor has been saying, essentially, “We should open back up. There’s no need for concern as long as we social distance. Etc.” And I appreciate that we now have more testing whereas before… there was almost no testing, so we’re going to see a lot more cases. But, and I can’t believe I live in a country where I have to say this NOT TESTING DOES NOT MEAN NO DISEASE. The fact that we are testing now does not mean we have cases that we wouldn’t otherwise it just means that we are now finally learning about how many cases there are. That being said… March/April Iowa COVID confirmations… 7,000. MAY ALONE 10,00 cases and rising. But sure… open everything back up. Fuck it, why not? Except our courts are trying not to be insane. They’ve once again pushed open back 2 months. Which… I understand my boss is upset with. TRUST ME, I GET IT. ESPECIALLY considering our judicial vacancy to start the year. That effectively means we couldn’t have jury trials… and with these delays… that will be 9 months AT LEAST without jury trials. That impacts our case load, impacts a community’s perception of justice, impacts the very notion of “speedy trial.” This is a big problem. AT THE SAME TIME… do you know how a jury trial works? Do you really think we’re in a position right now to require UNDER THREAT OF ARREST 60 people to join together in a small room? Because that is Day 1, Hour 1 of a jury trial. Requiring the Jury Pool to attend court under threat of arrest. And remember.... we are not a county that HAS “Test Iowa” accommodations or a sufficient hospital to care for a surge of COVID cases. So… yeah. Better for community safety to push Re-Open back a little more. Now if only politicians listened to Medical Experts the way Judges do.

But then you have our police force… men who have specifically told me “If Trump isn’t re-elected I’m taking all of my money out of the stock market.” So guess what their opinions have been lately?? “If I can’t put people in jail, why should I do my job?” Honestly. We had a harassment call last night. DAA victim has been getting stalked by her ex. Text messages, threatening letters, pictures proving he’s been following her. Our officers took her statement, wrote 4 lines down on a police report, and sent it to our office. They didn’t… get copies of the text message… they didn’t photograph any evidence… they didn’t get her written statement… they didn’t interview the defendant… they didn’t arrest or CITE the defendant. Just… wrote down a few lines of their report and sent it to us to see what we thought. GUYS… your job as law enforcement is more than “put people in jail.” We don’t even have a private jail facility here to blame “profit and greed” on this behavior. It is laziness and apathy. Frustrating.

Speaking of frustrating from DAA folks, though? Last week… over the phone hearing… DAA victim demanding that words were said and she felt threatened but he has never physically struck her and she doesn’t believe he will. Judge basically says, “NCO lifted by request of Victim and Defendant.” Ugh. But happens. This weekend? Well… apparently, she was upset that he was continuing to threaten her… and her son was threatening her… and our officers didn’t arrest all of/both of the men in her house and haul them to jail. I know this makes me seem calloused and like an asshole but… in a case like this… can we have this woman checked by a mental health specialist? Can we order a review? Because you shouldn’t be in a home where people threaten you. But if everyone in your home starts threatening you… either YOU need to get yourself out of that situation OR ask why they are threatening you… could it be that you are a danger to yourself and others and so they are threatening that they may have to restrain you? Are they threatening to take you to a facility? Is that the threats that you’re telling us to press charges on?

Then I check my personal e-mail. I live in Iowa, in Iowa’s 4th District. That means my National Government Representatives are Chuck Grasley, Joni Ernst, and Steve King. I am politically active; both personally and professionally. Therefore, I get e-mails constantly from Re-Election Campaigns and Party Associates. And my in-box is flooding with all sorts of vitriolic, asinine, drive me crazy bullshit. Joni Ernst, Donald Trump Jr., Steve King, Newt Gingrich, Karl Rove, Mitch McConnell, and associates thereof e-mail me several times a day. Shit… Martha McSally e-mails me every day and I’ve never lived in Arizona in my life!! And do you know what ALL of their e-mails do and say? Every single one? They have a formula, as one would expect.
(1) Inform the reader that the world will essentially end if Republicans don’t fight to preserve this country from the god-less liberal hoard
(2) State that the Democrats are “willing to do anything to get rid of Trump, despite his popular support with honest Americans”
(3) Point out that Iowa is being poisoned by Schumer and Pelosi’s “rabid agenda” of getting “out of state money” to influence Iowa politics
(4) Appeal strictly to emotional, jingoistic, state pride based arguments that “California and New York shouldn’t tell Iowa what to do!”
(5) Tells the reader that Iowa is for Iowans and the GOP needs your help and support.

That’s the formula… on the e-mails… I get several times a day. Except… Hrm. Steve King? Where does a lot of his money and influence come? Isn’t he uniquely connected to Devin Nunes who… wait a minute… is a Californian politician? Joni Ernst… who are some of her biggest donors? Dark Money, Massive non-Iowa corporations, and the NRA. Not to mention… if these people are trying to demonize the “national nature” of politics and/or “out of Iowa money”? Maaaaybe don’t have Trump, his family, and other out of state GOP people as part of your e-mail campaign?? It just really bothers me… and bothers me more because it WORKS. Neighbors and my father are always bitching about how California and New York are trying to make Iowa “more like them” by funding “these damned liberal candidates that don’t care about Iowa.” REALLY?! Have you done any homework on where your preferred candidate gets their money? Have you done any homework at all?? Miserable fucking propaganda relying bullshit.

TO ALL AMERICANS… YOU HAVE A RIGHT TO YOUR OPINION AND YOUR VOTE… THAT RIGHT COMES WITH THE RESPONSIBILITY TO EDUCATE YOURSELF. This idea that “mah facebook feed matters more than your political research” is fucking disastrous.

And let’s end on Facebook just because… as I said before… I’m perturbed and disgusted. This particular meme has been making the rounds:

I appreciate the sentiment but (as always) feel a need to point out how short sighted, and frankly wrong, this is for trying to play the “Some jobs matter more than other jobs” card. Let’s start with where this got things right.

Teachers. If you have children and you don’t respect what Teachers do after this COVID restriction Learn At Home stuff, you’re a monster. And if you don’t have children but are watching people say “Wearing a mask gives you hypoxia” despite the fact that our medical professionals (who we VERY MUCH do not want hypoxic ) wear these masks all the time in their job.... then you should also appreciate why we need teachers that care and can actually TEACH. So yeah… Teachers matter and we shouldn’t refuse to pay them while simultaneously demanding that they provide their own materials!

Doctors. DUH, for the most part. We do need doctors and they are massively important to pandemic response. I say duh for the most part because there are people in our world today who DON’T know/think/believe that Doctors are important to COVID response (because humans are stupid). AND duh, for the most part because never underestimate charlatans… looking at you, Mehmet Öz.

Nurses. Trust me on this. I’ve been in and out of hospitals more than most my age. I’ve dealt with nurses that straight up ignored me while I was having an allergic reaction to intravenous medication! And even I say Nurses are fucking saints for the most part!!

Shop Workers/Delivery Drivers… I’ll put umbrella term for Fast Food Employees and all Grocers. The very people too many assholes say “Don’t deserve a living wage because the jobs aren’t ‘hard enough”. Can we finally try to fucking break that ridiculous narrative?!? If everyone working at your Grocery Store or Fast Food Restaurant had said, “Fuck all of you, we’re all staying home.” What would have happened?? Sure, Wal Mart would have gone on a mass hiring spree and hired a whole lot of people… that had no training. Your ability to get food would have been SIGNIFICANTLY harmed(!!!) however. So maybe we stop treating these people like “indentured labor” and give them healthcare, benefits, and pay that reflect our actual need for them!

So yeah. THOSE FOLKS should absolutely be getting the mad props… and they should be getting them even when we’re NOT in a pandemic.

But the ones listed as unimportant? Let’s review that a little more, too.

“We were not desperate for lawyers”… if lawyers don’t matter, or if they don’t matter in a pandemic… why was I still working 40 hour weeks?? If lawyers don’t matter… why was there a giant TEAM of lawyers at the statehouse every day of this pandemic arguing for things like “Eviction Suspension” and “Citizen Protections”? If lawyers were unimportant, why did we see such a spike in Iowa Legal Aid requests for things like unemployment, wills and estate management, and other areas of law?? I suppose that what you MEANT to say was that we didn’t need giant corporate lawyers trying to make a buck while picking on the little guy?? MAybe? But even there… lawyers were needed all over the world to try to work between Drug Companies and Governments in an effort to get funding and permissions to start doing clinical trials and other necessary processes that will lead to a vaccine. I get it. It is always fun to bag on lawyers because fuck the attorney that screwed you out of money at some point in your life but… if you have government of any kind; lawyers are a necessary part of how that government functions IF that government is going to give a shit about the rights of their citizens.

Actors/Athletes/Reality TV Stars I’ll put in the same category even though… I wish we didn’t live in a world with Reality TV Stars but they are important in their own role. DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY PEOPLE I HAVE HEARD non-stop BITCH THAT THERE ARE NO SPORTS?! Do you know how many people have called their Disney Plus, Hulu, Netflix, or “Streaming Service TBD” subscriptions an absolute GOD SEND!? Can you imagine being in quarantine and having ZERO distractions? Again… fuck reality tv… hate it hate it hate it hate it… hate everything about it… but for a lot of people… watching Love is Blind or whatever reality TV show thing came out during quarantine (1) sufficiently distracted them for a time being from misery, panic, or fear; (2) gave them some sense (even if small) of community in that they had something to discuss and a cultural “entrance point” that didn’t obsess over COVID. Seriously, “What are you binging?” became an acceptable conversation topic. True… actors/athletes/reality tv peeps shouldn’t be the multi-millionaires that we’ve made them. True… I would be FAR happier to see The Academy Awards of Teachers get red carpet, gift bag, autograph, ‘who are you wearing’ treatment. True… I would absolutely LOVE to see some “Major League of Teaching” trading cards where you collect statistics and compare which teacher had the best Student Emotional Growth stats versus Student Curiosity Growth stats.

But… as is repeatedly becoming clear the more we see and hear these kinds of things… as a culture we need to stop propping up ONE kind of thing by devaluing something else. It isn’t right to say, “We don’t need janitors, we need nurses!” It isn’t right to say, “A real woman has curves!” I just… I don’t get why, even when we’re trying to be uplifting about something, humans do it in such negative terms. “Thankful for nurses” is a better statement. “I love my curves” is a better statement.