It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr@beige.party I think that's totally valid, and Ive been feeling a lot of the same. For my part I'm trying to do my best to extend the gratitude and support I have to the people still fighting the good fight. Feel like they need it now more than ever.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr You're much more generous than I am. Fuck this place and fuck the celebrations. The US was built on blood. We continue to murder and destroy everything that isn't "right". I ain't celebrating shit
I know folks are fighting for the better. I am too, we have to keep fighting. I'm tired and refuse to waste my energy celebrating terror and genocideAnd I really hate fireworks. Any loud noise like that set my nerves on edge. (Not just the 4th any celebration with booms)
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@RickiTarr
I'm not celebrating for similar reasons. Why celebrate a country which wants so many people I care about to die?I did put up a new flag, but that's just because I didn't have the money when the old one wore out and it's a great way to keep Jehovah's Witnesses away.
But no, I'm definitely not happy or excited. In the last decade, American citizens have had so many rights stolen from them. The damage won't be corrected until long after I am dead.
Worked my whole life for a better future, and that's not remotely what any of us got.
I do wonder how many Americans fully understand how deeply their government (and the vast majority of its military) is mistrusted and unreliable it appears to be?
There has been more than one instance of MAGA loving tourists being told these realities and being shocked at their poor receptiion.
🥺
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr I empathize to a certain extent. I haven't been the slightest bit interested in celebrating this country for decades now, but I remember when I thought there was a kernel of good in the idea of "country," in general, the "US" specifically.
Maybe a different kind of celebration is called for? Do you have folks close to you who feel the way you do? There can be an exquisite kind of fierce joy in relinquishing those hopes you once had – it can actually be cathartic, especially if you have others to share it with. At the same time, reading & listening further into the stories of those who have never had the experience of America being a "land of the free," those for whom the very concept of "America" is a genocidal apocalypse, instead of being morbid and depressing, can often heighten that joy of the shifting paradigm. A kind of big, exhaled "fuck this forever!"
Idk, your mileage may vary, of course, but sometimes the best way to struggle through that kind of sadness of a loss of something you once had faith in, is to lean into the feeling and let go. I hope you find some solace, though, no matter how it turns out for you.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr Lately I’ve been making a point to visit the various art museums in my area. I find solace looking at the art and artifacts created hundreds or even thousands of years ago. Aside from learning something new, I leave happier. No matter what is going on, people were, and still are, creating and making extraordinary things. While that’s not a celebration of the country’s 250 th, it’s what gives me hope.
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@RickiTarr Democracy is a flawed political system, just the best we’ve come up with so far. Sadly, as we’ve seen since Hair Führer was installed, it can be suborned **really easily** by evil. Having lived through Ronny Raygun, Bush the Lesser, Dumbya, et al., it does seem like things are progressively more repressive with each Republican administration… but there is still hope for change!
Self-care is important. When the world is going to hell in a hand basket, it’s okay (good, even) to step off the bicycle, click your heels three times, and check out for a while.
@Sevardin You’re an optimist.
Some people decided to get out of Germany in 1939 when they could.
That regime came to an end after the allies and the USSR invaded on both sides and liberated a nation.
So who will invade the US and come to our rescue? -
@RickiTarr
I'm not celebrating for similar reasons. Why celebrate a country which wants so many people I care about to die?I did put up a new flag, but that's just because I didn't have the money when the old one wore out and it's a great way to keep Jehovah's Witnesses away.
But no, I'm definitely not happy or excited. In the last decade, American citizens have had so many rights stolen from them. The damage won't be corrected until long after I am dead.
Worked my whole life for a better future, and that's not remotely what any of us got.
I fear that both the US and UK will soon disintegrate into their constituent countries/states.
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@KrajciTom Thank you
Happy 4th of July!
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr It's a demoralizing time for those of us who care about the promise of the founding of the US. It was a very imperfect country from the start, but the lofty words of the Declaration of Independence have inspired millions of us to do better. There have been many times in history where we have betrayed our founding principles. We are living through one of those times.
As an older person have seen a lot of shit go down. I still have hope, and I will continue to take action to validate that hope. Without hope we are lost.
Will spend a quiet 4th with friends and neighbors.
Despite the ugly and deeply disappointing present, I can still celebrate the spirit of the US, of the US I want my grandchildren and their grandchildren to see. -
@RickiTarr I think so much of all my American friends these days and how horrible it is that you have to celebrate the quadricentennial under such an awful president! It saddens me no end to think of what could have been. Now, we just have this tacky, gilded, narrow-minded charade.
I feel with you, I really do!
(But you know what? We will celebrate that much more when this nightmare is over!
🥳)@tanyakaroli @RickiTarr
Thank you, Danish friend.
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@RickiTarr
I think our country has always been a bizarre mutation. There have always been awful things going on here, and also wonderful things.This is to say that celebrating the 4th has always been somewhat fraught for me, but I can’t deny that I’ve also always really loved some of what it is to be American.
Right now we have a kind of cancer, and I’m doing what I can to see that we survive that. And I see the others doing the same (that you mentioned), and I’ll always be grateful for people here trying to make things better.
And any point on a journey is just one of many steps. So the big numbers are curious to note, but not of great importance to me, either.
I guess my big point is: I hope you have a good weekend!
@hopeward @RickiTarr Well said, David.We will survive this cancer.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
*sends hugs, if that's okay*
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@RickiTarr and guess what? Our main parties here, #UKLabour and the #Tories, are funded by the exact same class and very often the exact same individuals. The only difference for Scotland is that our #SNP is not yet funded by the #Kleptocrat class — but is nevertheless sucking up to them in the hopes that it will soon be.
When the rich can buy politicians, #democracy is broken, and voting is more or less useless.
@simon_brooke And who else but the rich can buy politicians?
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr I can spend an hour today writing postcards for Jarrett Keohokalole, who's running for US House against a deeply corrupt Dem. Good way to celebrate the 4th of July.
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@Sevardin You’re an optimist.
Some people decided to get out of Germany in 1939 when they could.
That regime came to an end after the allies and the USSR invaded on both sides and liberated a nation.
So who will invade the US and come to our rescue?@bouriquet My fear is we are already too far gone to survive (as a nation and as a species), but if I don’t hold out any hope for a better future, there isn’t much point in the present.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr I'm going to watch the giant MAGA fireworks show (on TV) in Washington D.C. on the 4th. Taxes will pay for it, one way or the other. Not to rage watch, but for watching another trigger for a tidal wave backlash against the Regime. A record setting fireworks show added to gilded horses arses, etc.
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@RickiTarr I'm going to watch the giant MAGA fireworks show (on TV) in Washington D.C. on the 4th. Taxes will pay for it, one way or the other. Not to rage watch, but for watching another trigger for a tidal wave backlash against the Regime. A record setting fireworks show added to gilded horses arses, etc.
@timo21 Smacks too much of a peak, just before a devastating fall.
If I had children, I'd get them out of the US ASAP.
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It feels really hard to celebrate my country right now. How do I celebrate a country with detention camps? I know there are great people here, who are working toward a better tomorrow, but it feels nuts to want to shoot off fireworks right now. Add on this massive heat wave that most of the United States is going through, and I'm just feeling trapped. Of course, then I feel ungrateful, I have a place to live, I'm not in a camp, I have food, and friends. My mental health feels less than stellar right now. Anyway, sorry for the brain dump, I just wanted to be honest, it feels so complicated right now, what do we do, how do we help? I love you all. I hope you're safe, cool, and have a good weekend. Feel free to share your thoughts and feelings too, if you want.
@RickiTarr Seems that you shouldn't celebrate it, it's just a country and you're not who the country is nor does it always need celebrating. You have enough and you are enough.
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@RickiTarr and what's worse is, I hear people constantly say "but the midterms!" And like, the midterms what? They stop the bleeding *a little*?
They're not gonna reverse the court cases. They're not gonna replace the judges. They're not gonna shore up the red states that queer people are fleeing from. They're not gonna reduce the violence or the rhetoric. They won't remove the president.
All the midterms do is make sure the laws don't get worse and take us a step forward for the next election, and the next, and the next.
This doesn't go away in 6 months, or 2 years. The damage in this country will take *decades* to fix.
And this isn't me being a doomer. That's probably optimistic, honestly.
I may never actually see trans people treated as equals again *in my lifetime.*
Especially with the silence I'm seeing/hearing from liberals right now. I should hear screaming. But I could hear a pin drop instead.
As if Democrats aren't also enthusiastic about killing trans people.
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As if Democrats aren't also enthusiastic about killing trans people.
Stop. This kind of rhetoric isn't helpful right now. You already follow me. You can see the letter I received from Gillibrand today. It's not empty placation. It was an unprompted, heartfelt, and empathetic outreach to queer people.
"Democrats" are a wide range of people. They're not all perfect. They're not all allies. They're not all good.
But Democrats are also a hell of a lot more likely to be allies and on our side than Republicans are. And those allies do exist. Both in positions of power and outside of them.
I'm tired of Democrat bashing. It's boring and tired.
I live in a blue state and I am extremely protected from the things happening right now in this country *because of* Democrats, with no sign of that changing without extreme changes at the federal level.
I'm not going to play into Democrat bashing when they're currently saving many of our lives.
