by Amaka Pierson, Gonzo Today contributor
Artwork by: Scott Kingsnorth
OK, folks. BS aside, this mission is not for everyone. I know the chances of survival are slim to none. But if the seat of the US government can be successfully invaded by a shaman who lives with his mom and only eats organic, fuck me if we shouldn’t raise our ambitions a little.
Let me be totally clear before you dismiss this as the late-night ravings of a radical atheist. I’m not saying god doesn’t exist. I’m saying I think we can take the mother fucker. I’m also saying that we have no choice… if we want to save America from the half of the country that thought four more years of alternate universe oligarchic fascism was a good idea.
Hear me out.
Saving America… Was there ever an activity of more sweet and certain virtue? We see it over and over again in the movies and the people who do it seem to have a good time pulling it off. A few of them even got laid in the process, or they used to. These days, saving the world might get you a Nobel Prize and a stiff plutonic handshake or elbow bump. (Thanks Progress. Way to kill my victory fuck)
But maybe saving America ain’t what it used to be. If the Redhats win the long game, imagine seeing their America in,for example, the ending of the movie Independence Day. Act 3: The earth has had its ass kicked, the last vestiges of humanity have sheltered in Area 51 as our leader gives an inspirational speech to rally us for one last daring strike against overwhelming odds.
In this instance, inside the bunker are The Trumps, Ted Cruz, Linsey Graham, a bunch of Blood and Soil bros, Fox News, some QAnons, the My Pillow Guy and some drug company CEOs. (No Will Smith because… well… do I gotta say it?)But for argument’s sake let’s say the supreme leader gives the speech, the crowd go wild and we launch the fighters.
I don’t know about you, but as I watch the F16 squadron take to the sky and ponder the Confederate Flags drunk Jeff Goldblum has painted on the tail fins…
Honestly. I’m kinda rooting for the aliens at that point.Humanity had a good run.
But Saving America, people… Surely we can agree on that… Everyone wants that! with a few notable exceptions, namely – North Korea, Putin, Diabetes… and oh yeah… GOD!
It might have escaped your notice, but this asshole has been flat-out trying to kill us and his methods become more nakedly obvious with every passing year. He literally sent a Plague. Time was the only place you could find a plague was in hermetically sealed Aztec sarcophagi, certain Coney Island Hotdogs and in religious texts.
If we were serious about getting to the bottom of this, one would think that the FBI might look back at some old cases and see a pattern. What do we know about the previous plagues? Who’s calling card is this? Who has the form? Heard some shit went down in Egypt a few years back, some asshole did ten of these… a fucking spree… but they caught the guy. Said he’d reformed…
I get it. God is like a mob boss out here. His ties run deep. He makes his henchmen rich and happy. He owns a lot of real estate, has his hand in a bunch of industries. He’s infiltrated the police, the military, The Grammys… Every public official has to swear fealty to him to get elected. He’s on the fucking money for Christ sake and you know that no one gets on a plane without him or a shit ton of bourbon.
So sure, this wise guy has tentacles expanding in every direction. Even a reasonable D.A. would say that he is just “Too big to fail. Going after him would take down the entire system, Mak. You want the devil to move into the power vacuum?”
So here’s why this matters. It matters, because in the meta-physical realm, shit flows down-hill. In other words, if America is willing to entertain the notion that:1. God exists2. He gives any sort of fuck about us at all3. He doesn’t actively hate us, especially minorities. (This Covid is some cold fucking beans and don’t even start me on Kobe.)
If this fucked up society is going to insist on placing this cloud-dwelling, sandal-wearing mafiosi freak right in the intersection of every fucking thing we try to do, how then can we call out the crazy when the ‘I’m with Stupid’ crew starts writing their own fan fiction?
If we perpetuate this stuff at the top, encourage people to trust their beliefs beyond mundane and frankly dull things like logic and reason, we can’t then turn round to the pizza paedo acolytes and say, “That shit be crazy, motherfucker, but see you in church, Sunday.”
If I’m gonna get pissed at the Russian troll farms pumping conspiracy click-bait into the digital universe, should I not also have ‘Real Talk’ with my Grandma, who shares memesthat god is asserting truth through a sneeze, or that Jesus wants her to buy that lottery ticket and has preselected half the numbers. If Jesus really wanted her to be rich, he probably wouldn’t have had her be born in a tin shack on a Nigerian floodplain.
Let me put this another way. I don’t want the opinions of the guy who thinks Pokemon are real to be treated the same as a scientist or, dare I say it, that most endangered of species, an actual journalist, even if the Pokemon happens to share my views on bringing back hanging or lowering Corporation Tax. Neither one of those things is worth more to me than maintaining the spatial integrity of the boundary between reality and fiction. That boundary is our Wall, people, and the rag-tag assembly of people who believe in a sense of shared fact are the Night Watch. We have to hold firm against the White Walkers, giants and dragons and the rest of the fictional manifestations that want to invade the corporeal realm. We have to stab them in the face with our pens until they die.
If the price of holding that line is that we have to internalise our own deeply held yet ultimately made-up shit, so be it. Assuming that any of the hype from the various religious texts is to be believed, god in his infinite wisdom, would be prepared to take one for the team.
And if not, we mortals are headed for the pearly gates, with a keg, some cable ties and no invitation.
You have been warned.
Amaka Pierson: Love-child of an alcoholic foreign correspondent and a Nigerian prostitute. Intent on saving America from its own stupidity and/or marauding drone swarms. Whichever appears more urgent