Arrested, Silence, Destruction

I am loathe toward artificiality, but one must be careful not to look too deeply because he will find quickly, artificiality lies at the core of existence. Is it these times? Is it our phosphorescent world, artificially lit, artificially climate controlled, and artificially protective?

Could one kick back too strongly against the artificial, till we are all naked in the elements of the world once again, inching toward an artificial fire for warmth till our nether regions are cooked, and our backsides scorched, while the rest of our extremities, covered with frost fail to work properly when commanded?

Or when the brutal reality of a harsh knock on the door and the jackboots of Solzhenitsyn heavily thud on wooden floors to the laying on of rough hands, while we blink stupidly as rabbits in the cocoon of our artificial secure domiciles.

Aleksandr’s words from page one leap out at me, “Me? What for?!”.

The Black Swan event that we all should have seen coming for us, while like dumb sheep we witness our neighbors in the throws of cancel culture with accusations of hate, as an artificial replacement for disagreement. Smugly an artificial media entrenched in an artificially pregnant 24-hour news cycle grins from ear to ear while an artificial Gulag slowly becomes more and more real.

We watch the de-platforming of strong voices on social media, and in the back-wash of a nearly-drained Diet Coke, we flood social media not with the potential exchange of ideas, but of plates of food, the benign trips to the ocean, and homecoming games. Fearful of those jack-boots worn by artificial fact-checkers we highlight the mundane in fear of Facebook jail or the potential of losing our beloved Twitter blue check-mark. Artificially silenced from posting what we believe in.

It is the silence that’s most terrifying. History spelling out the march of the Organs of the village soviet as they lead their rabbits to Lubyanka. No one resists, and no one cries out. We have already aligned ourselves with the robbery of the freedom of speech for fear it will be artificially labeled as hate. As one particularly angry social justice warrior put it succinctly, the time for dialog is OVER!.

I had different thoughts about this article, but this is the one that came out. I would rather be light-hearted and talk about productive walks with my dog and the rapid onset of the holidays where we all drink a little too much, and eat beyond what our bodies can possibly metabolize in a twenty-four-hour period, but the Gulag cries out to me, and Aleksandr’s words ring in my ears; Arrest, Silence, Destruction.

I could be taking this too seriously, after all it’s artificial social media, and artificial arrest, and artificial silence in an artificial reality of bits and bytes. However, behind this artificial world sit real people, with real ideas, and real beliefs and the only thing real this artificiality has robbed from us is the decency that comes from knowing each other, and has allowed our tongues to wag indiscriminately hurling the artificial insults of racism, fascism, and sexism to somehow defend an artificial understanding of democracy.

I hesitate to click ‘publish’. Fear that it will cost me something that I have not yet taken into account. Fear that I too will be put on the list and that artificial jack-boots will soon thud on the wooden floor of my media accounts. The village soviet may be creeping in the shadows if I offer disagreement about COVID, elections, or globalism. I think of my personal Patron Saint Taleb in his last book, Antifragile, where his voice is remarkably bolder than in his previous works. But I am not Nassim. I am not accredited, popular, or read. Perhaps my anonymity can give me the courage to publish, just before I leave my home to begin shopping and food prep for the upcoming holiday.

I’m thinking duck, pheasant, and turkey. Maybe rillettes and homemade hearth bread. Garlicky potatoes with gravy and a side of French-styled green beans with almonds. It would definitely be safer to write about that. As I enter the ‘Whole Foods’, I’ll definitely be quiet knowing the village soviet will be all around me. I hope my selection of pheasant and prosciutto won’t alert them, and my name isn’t called out to board a train car.