“This constant lying is not aimed at making the people believe a lie, but at ensuring that no one believes anything anymore. A people that can no longer distinguish between truth and lies cannot distinguish between right and wrong. And such a people, deprived of the power to think and judge, is, without knowing and willing it, completely subjected to the rule of lies. With such a people, you can do whatever you want.”
Hannah Arendt, 1906-1975.
These days most events that happen in the world of geopolitics look staged to me. None of the big stuff seems to make sense anymore, and I’m wondering if it ever did. I just look at it all and I wonder whether it’s the world or me that’s crazy. Probably both, I guess.
The Trump shooting thing is just the latest. An event so polarizing for already fractious US society that you have to marvel at the way it fits the times. The story is such a ready-made formula, like an off-the-rack garment from Walmart, with a box of ammo thrown in free. We have the obligatory lone wolf shooter who amazingly gets access to a handy rooftop and pops off some shots from his dad’s rifle. Add the equally obligatory plot point of the multiple security lapses, neatly capped by astoundingly ludicrous excuses from those said to have been in charge. The roof was too steep for security guys, one said. It’s as if she didn’t even want to be believed. We get the miraculous escape – the hand of God – with just the exact right level of minor injury and blood. We get the defiant gesture and the magnificent instantly iconic photo with the flag.
I’m not saying it was staged. All I’m saying is that it couldn’t have been more perfect, as an example of its type. It’s all so fabulous. So ideal for getting the factions fired up and the skeptics fuming. It’s like everything else these days: it looks so in-your-face wrong that you find yourself completely lost for words and shaking your head while the mad narrative rolls towards some unknown but clearly dreadful conclusion, like Game of Thrones after the writers lost the plot. The visuals are there, but the substance is entirely bereft of sense.
The world seems clearly to be lurching towards a major war, which some people evidently want. The old narratives of good versus evil have become so threadbare that more and more people are losing interest in the story and are glancing back to see the emperor, tottering naked down an avenue of tanks and missiles like a remote-controlled dummy, spouting gibberish. No clothes but two heads, one of them senile and the other just stark raving mad.
Meanwhile genocide is being simultaneously live-cast and censored. Suddenly collective punishment on a massive scale is perfectly OK. In fact, it’s practically criminal to argue against it. It’s as if an IRA terror attack in London was followed by the relentless razing of some Irish cities. Or perhaps it’s as if an attack on a squatter’s homestead by a disgruntled group of displaced indigenous people was followed by the merciless slaughter of all that group’s friends, relatives and countrymen. Oh, wait . . .
Speaking of genocide, I imagine Israeli shonk-in-chief Benjamin Netanyahu could only be delighted at the inevitable surge in Trump’s electoral prospects brought about by the shooting incident. Just as things were getting difficult between Bibi and the Biden administration over the Gaza massacre, Biden got hammered on an unmediated, un-fact-checked commercial television debate that resulted in the US media commentariat suddenly noticing that poor old Joe is certifiably demented. Just like he has been for his entire presidency. And to put the matter beyond all doubt, Trump’s miracle escape from the lone wolf assassin (now dead) will likely ensure a massive turnout by his voters on polling day. Biden, it would seem, is officially finished. As for the genocide, Trump has made it clear that he is willing to back it all the way, so things have worked out well for Bibi, at least.
Everything is a mess these days. Fewer people trust anything anymore, and no wonder. It’s as if that was the desired effect. Nothing gets explained. In this day and age buildings can collapse into their own footprint in plain sight without even an aircraft strike to offer a reason. Airliners can disappear without trace. Countries can get invaded and destroyed over weapons of mass destruction that don’t exist. Somebody can blow up a vital energy pipeline and nobody wants to know who did it. The US has a one-China policy except it hasn’t. NATO is expanding and arming for wars on at least two fronts. Drones go zooming around assassinating people without trial, leaving trails of collateral dead and wounded. Secret prisons overflow with torture victims. You can get yourself jailed indefinitely for saying too much, no matter where you live. Billionaires bob about on super-yachts while millions go hungry. Think tanks publish papers on how to start wars and when those wars start exactly on cue everybody looks amazed. In so-called “democracies” leeches vote for salt, sheep vote for wolves and trees vote for the axe. Zombie economies are running on funny money and time is running out. Fanatics demand Armageddon or the rapture. The end, they say, is nigh.
And who am I to argue?
