Dragon
We really have reached an utterly hopeless state of affairs, haven't we?
I've spent ages wondering whether it's the result of a conspiracy by government officials, the machinations of some secret society, or simply good old-fashioned human folly and misfortune, but it ultimately doesn't matter. The reality facing us is the same in any case, and so too is the most important question:
What will we do about it?
Yes, it falls on you and me to act, as there are no heroes coming to save us: All of the heroes, thinkers, and power brokers of renown in our time, real or fictional, strive only for their own benefit or for the preservation of the status quo, wretched thing that it is.
Do you think our plutocratic statesmen have the desire, conviction, or fortitude to come together and do what's best for the country and her people, when to do so would be to bite the hands that feed them?
Do you think our corporate overlords will bring about any kind of social change that isn't coldly calculated to maximize their short-term profits, regardless of how much misery and ruin it'll spread?
Do you think our public education system, starved of both teachers and funding, as dangerous for children as warzones are for soldiers, is capable of producing the great thinkers, great artists, and great citizens we need for a better future?*
Not to mention how most of the public is effectively being mind-controlled. They're manipulated around the clock, painstakingly divided against each other and whipped up into a frenzy, driven to fight rabidly in the name of one party of controlled opposition or another—when not left despondent from doomscrolling or exhausted from overworking, that is.
What will we do about it?
The problem is too big and runs too deep to be solved by direct action. The actors involved are too powerful, too well-connected, too entrenched; even if you managed to vote out or assassinate some of their cronies, identical new ones would pop up to take their place.
For that matter, if you or I took a stand directly and somehow managed to pose any real threat to the powers that be, we'd just end up with a bullet in the head for our trouble, and that'd be the end of it.
No, I intend to take a different approach:
- I want to educate people in the ways that parents and states and education systems are failing to do, and on subjects they refuse to touch or are incompetent to discuss.
- I want to keep the art of the essay and others like it alive, even as schools bespoil and neglect them and generative "AI" systems threaten many of them with extinction.
- I want to revive the culture that followed the invention of the printing press, when small informational pamphlets discussing anything and everything circulated freely.
The free flow and discussion of information, thought, ideas, and human expression is our heritage, the very bedrock on which our Western tradition and way of life are built. As these things have been restricted, obfuscated, and discouraged bit by bit, so too has Western culture suffered, degenerated, and been reduced to its current squalor.
What will we do about it?
I'm going to write. I'm going to write and draw and compose as fervently as I can, sharing what I know and what I've learned, distributing it all as widely and freely as possible. I'm going to fight tooth and nail against this loathsome state of affairs, in defense of our heritage and birthright, in the way I'm best equipped to do it. Perhaps it'll be as useless as shouting into the wind, or perhaps the pen will prove mightier than the sword.
What will YOU do about it?
*As of 2023, over 20% of adults in the U.S. are functionally illiterate, and over 50% of adults read below a 6th grade level. To put that in perspective, that's roughly 54 million and 139 million people, respectively, who struggle with or lack altogether this basic but incredibly important skill. Our education system and our society alike have completely failed them.