RMiddleton

I definitely do not condone murder & also these are my thoughts as I read about the slain health insurance CEO

The New York Times [1], citing a police [1] source, reported that Thompson had “recently received several threats.” The paper added that executives at “health care companies often receive threats because the nature of their work.”

Gee, I wonder why that would be.

“It appears as though this was a targeted murder,” Mayor Eric Adams [1] said.

How is that guy still mayor?!

In Midtown, meanwhile, Adams insisted that New Yorkers and tourists should continue to go about their day as usual. He said the scheduled lighting of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller [1] Center—mere blocks away—will still go on as planned Wednesday night.

The assailant poses no threat to daily life. [2]

“This is a horrifying and shocking act of violence,” said Sen. Amy Klobuchar. [3] “My thoughts are with Brian Thompson’s family and loved ones and all those working at United Healthcare in Minnesota.”

Quotes from The Daily Beast [4], https://www.thedailybeast.com/slain-unitedhealthcare-ceo-brian-thompsons-wife-says-he-had-been-receiving-threats-over-insurance-woes/

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[1] corrupt

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[2] unlike the for-profit healthcare system that does pose a threat to the daily life of millions

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[3] likely corrupt I would vote for Amy Klobuchar if I lived in her state but the fact that the "left" in the US Senate is not fighting every day for free public health care is a tragedy, a tragedy much bigger even than the death of one person. The inability to achieve equity via electoral politics will necessarily lead to some who resort to violence. I hate all violence and I recognize fair democracy as a safeguard against it. We have nothing close to free and fair democracy in the USA.

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[4] likely corrupt For-profit news is a threat to the public good.

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By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

With all due respect and a sincere apology to the Van Vlecks

Who are the Van Vlecks? I have no idea. Their names sit in many places of honor at the museum that's closest to home. I am aggressively anti-capitalist, a true believer that the love of money is the root of all evil (the love of acquisition for its sake). I despise all manipulative marketing. The charity industrial complex is an impediment to progress. So yeah, those are my beliefs. So yeah, by the time I saw the name Van Vleck on the umpteenth inscribed surface umpteen times each, I began to think: Fuck the Van Vlecks! What would I have to pay for them to engrave that message on a brick?

Thus Fuck the Van Vlecks became an expression I use whenever I think about the astronomical benefit to humanity it would be if we would all STOP FELLATING THE WEALTHY.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

why/how

As part of my mental management in recent years I pay careful attention to what goes in my brain. I do not permit careless blatherers to have access to my brain. This prohibition excludes most news organizations, commercial speech, hype for clicks, pointless arguers, Republicans, etc. Many good folks use social media for emotional venting. I certainly do. I'm rearranging what shows in my feeds so that I get what I want to see. For me, I don't have time to read and learn what improves my soul if I'm breathlessly following every bad thing done by the people I already know are very bad.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

As I see it learned helplessness is a major problem among the not fully terrible people Learned helplessness in response to cognitive dissonance Cognitive dissonance in response to a culture of lies

The abused become perpetrators Without extraordinary effort And to improve is to ostracize oneself

The culture is whiteness The lies are that whiteness exists, that white existence is superior to all other human existence, that America is exceptional (in a good way), that America has ever been more good than bad, that America believes in liberty and justice for all. There are so many lies. The cognitive dissonance is so intense that it causes widespread dysfunction. The cognitive dissonance must either be reckoned with or avoided with great effort. The cognitive dissonance is so strong that avoiding it requires epidemics of drugs, drunkenness, overeating, overspending, waste, violence, sleeplessness, conspiracies and other nonsensical beliefs, and so much more. America is by far the worst nation on a range of issues, and it's much much worse when taking our wealth into account. The current most widespread avoidance technique is never thinking at all. None of these coping strategies result in peace of mind but they do enable the state of cognitive dissonance to continue rather than it being faced and overcome. The cognitive dissonance causes learned helplessness because brains do not work well under the above conditions. Being able to make decisions, knowing what one wants, clear perceptions — all are impaired.

This is the standard status of a majority of my fellow white Americans, in my opinion. I do not speak to the rest of the population because I am not sufficiently familiar with nonwhiteness. Based on voting alone I'm gonna say that other groups are doing their best and the problem is with my fellow white folk. These feelings that I have as an insider raised in affluent white Christian America are why I have no hope for humanity.

Prove me wrong. Please.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

Good morning loving message random thoughts for today

white goodness is to be in eternal conflict throw it off do good, be good, feel good where does that lead my heart? i know this: I must love what I do not like I must love my existence despite it coming out of what I hate paradox compossibility

paradox is more emphasis on conflict; compossibility = 2 things coexist those 2 things? i love my family of origin / they are bad i thought i was going to write a list but doesn't everything flow from that?

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

For a long time I've tried to get by by expecting nothing. I see a flaw in that now. I must expect less than nothing. Ok so I'm recalibrating.

As bleak and alone as I've felt, somewhere deep inside I've believed myself to be a “leading indicator”:

I have insights that others will come to see as true.

Perhaps that's artist talk. I don't want to tally the number of times someone has said something to me about how much more popular my art might be after I'm dead. I think that's idiotic nonsense by the way. If you have said this to anyone ever, stop.

The good news is that I do not now believe that I am a lagging indicator. I do not expect to finally come around and see that conventional opinions are right. No. What I think now is Fuck That! I will embrace myself as a freak outlier and enjoy it. I love my beliefs and outlook on life. How they relate to my society is barely my business. Sadly there is the matter of survival. And as much as I hate admitting it, I don't want to live cut off from all others.

The current challenge for me is to love being completely different from everyone I've ever known and also not in a fight with any of them. I like this challenge!

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

My boyfriend tried to call while I was on the beach cutting off my bushy beard. I found a remote spot and took my time using full size scissors. The hairs blew away hoping to become part of a nest some day. When I got back to the car I saw many texts and a missed call from him. He wanted to treat ourselves to a greasy fast food meal. He wanted chick fillet.*

Today of all days I thought. I hesitated. “Uhhh their owners are really awful, really Trumpy.”

“Oh.”

I honestly think he didn't know. He suggested others. I thought as I've thought many times, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. “It's alright, baby. Nearly everything is owned by horrible people. We could drive ourselves crazy thinking about it. I used to. Why should we suffer because they're awful people?” I think straight allies should all have to boycott chick fillet so gays who want it can go.

Now here's where the story gets weird. Before we turn out of the apartment complex I ask which way and he doesn't know. We look on the map and there are two about equidistant. I choose the one that I think is in the less crowded area. As we get closer to the destination we grow confused.

“Oh my god, it's inside a mall!”

So I went in a mall for the first time in years. It was weird. We got our food quickly. I just know the other location would've had a spirally long line of cars. The fries were B- quality.

Now the story gets super cute. Later in the day, after working we went to the pool. As he was drying off my bf had a fun idea that would require us to act fast if we were gonna make it in time. We went back to the food court for churros from a place we saw two stalls down! They were yummy, inexpensive, and we ate them from a crackly paper bag while we walked the mall. True love! Churros aren't sold many places here and had been on his mind for days for some reason. When I saw a whole storefront in the food court dedicated to them I was shocked. I'm pretty sure the place is named Churros World Go. Can this be real life?

In case you're wondering we had classic churros with no dipping sauce needed, not chocolate, not Nutella. This place has an insane number of ways to get churros, as you'd expect from a U.S. chain making churros its thing. Grateful to be dating someone who didn't want a hat on a hat. No sweet sauces needed on our cinnamon sugar churros — despite my Spanish textbook having been named Churros y Chocolate.

*I may give them money but I sure af won't fight my iPhone to misspell their name correctly.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

The most important thing is tea I'm sure of it.

For me. Your most important thing is yours to decide.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

The thing I find about poetry is that there is a right amount. Right is as always the not right sounding word. There is no universally right word. Love in English is also applied liberally yet I have come to feel that there may be a universal love. My affection for chocolate and melody and hugging and orange-green-pink-brown may very well be the same love as every other love. I resisted it a long time but I see it now. How can I compare that to right? I have such trouble with the word right. I hate it so often. I think it is hateful. Cruel. Abusive. Wrong. Yeah, right is wrong. Yet here I am saying, above, that there can be a right dose of poetry. In that sense I mean fitting versus moral. But is there a difference between fitting and moral? Meditating on this point might be important. The right thing to do, when the time is right.

Reading, and stopping, are valuable decisions. The words go on. How to decide to stop? Paragraph page chapter book library language exist outside me and are thus not calibrated to my required dosage. They're external markers that help me remember where to pick up reading again. Time too is not quite attuned to my own rhythm. The internal syncopation is the real one, like how I know to stop now.

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon

I have reached the end of the Internet that I can visit this morning. Alphaguess and word hurdle and now this, my own island of blog. Everything else is connected. I do crosswords sometimes but they come from the la times. Earlier there was a bright red news alert on the crosswords page where there never was news before. I avoided reading it but the shape of it looked disturbing. Here's the thing, I'm in bed. I have made a promise to treat myself with love. I do not ask the same of my tired brain as when I am awake. I respect my emotions. I live in a culture of zero respect for human beingness. I reject that culture. I make my own culture. My culture reserves my bed time for love, for poetry, for stories, for music, for sex, for rest. I do not do world politics in my bed. The hugs from my lover and that brief red band warning of news have said a lot. But not the whole story. I can have plausible deniability as long as I choose. I choose it a bit longer. During this time that past me, cruel me, Momerica me would label denial, I have read and written and hugged and made positive plans. This time is more important than being tuned into a careless broadcast. I'm narrowcasting. I narrowcast for me. It's effective if I let it be. Oh, I also left the bed briefly to grab a banana and cookie. 🍪
kisses, y'all kisses you kisses me 💗

By Rob Middleton who can be reached @[email protected] on Mastodon