Sometimes the world just goes crazy

Photo by Nishaan ahmed on Unsplash

Sometimes the world just goes crazy all around you and everyone gets real mean. Read or live enough history and that’s what you learn. Sometimes, the world, your small world, the whole big world, it just goes fucking crazy and everyone is mean for awhile. The thing I know from my own history is it helps if you can find someone to make eye contact with across the room. Someone who, when your eyes ask, “This is fucked up, right?” agrees that yes, this is fucked up. When you can’t find that someone, goddamn it’s lonely. Makes you wonder if you’re the one who’s lost your goddamn mind.

We’re not watching it in the same room this time, this being one of those times that we’ve lost our goddamn minds and we’re mean. Or maybe we’re always this mean, and sometimes we find an excuse to air it out. Either way, we’ve committed to it this time. Most of us are watching it play out on our screens and we look to our screens to find someone else who witnessed the thing, to agree, “This is fucked up. Right?”

I keep looking for that someone. It’s not an intentional act. I open instagram because it should be safe by now, surely the algorithm’s found something else to push. But the first thing I see is a meme—that bitch, that psycho, that whore, that woman who now represents everything you hate—here’s a picture of her crying. Here’s a picture of her, seated next to another woman, one face crossed out. The caption, “one down. you’re next.”

Someone I used to know posts a picture of gun and says the problem is we don’t hit kids anymore. Her next picture is a graduation picture, her kids, who didn’t get shot at school. Someone else I used to know wants to know why reasonable people can’t agree that drag queens aren’t child appropriate. I want to ask her if she still sends her kids to youth group. But I don’t.

I open twitter. Haven’t tweeted about the trial for days. My mentions should be safe by now. But someone calls me a bitch, someone calls Heard a bitch, someone says she ruined a man’s life. I wonder if they’ve been on the internet lately. Someone else tells me the woman I defended won’t fuck me. Why else would anyone defend a woman but in the hopes of getting laid. What other purpose is there really, for a woman.

I open facebook. The local news says Nazis stormed a gay bar in Dallas. Someone I used to know says monkey pox is a chemical weapon. Someone I must’ve known but can’t remember how or why says he’s had guns all his life. Mass shootings didn’t happen when he was in high school. We need god in schools. Someone I used to work for says the bitch had it coming. Someone I used to work with says he watched the whole thing. She’s a liar.

I’m losing hope for that eye contact. So I open a page for people who know what it feels like when you say what happened and they call you liar, people who know how crazy it makes you, people who know the looks you get, when you’re telling the truth but your face is all wrong, people who should damn well know that sometimes, the world around you just goes crazy, should know more anyone maybe, how easy it is to convince the world of a lie, people who know how hard even your friends will throw the stones, if it keeps anyone from looking their way, people who know what happens when those with power choose a target, an example, a witch to burn. People who know what people can do when they say you’re no longer people. The evil is in you. You’re the evil. Nothing feels better than rooting out evil. They’ve seen the bloodlust. They’ve felt it themselves. Now they’re all grown up. And there they are, throwing sticks on another pyre.

Maybe they remember those as the good old days. A lot of people do. It’s a party after all, cheering for the screams, screaming for more blood. The party could use a few more bodies to kick. Root out the sympathizers. They’re weak. They’re bewitched. A woman will do that to you. Everyone knows. Let it be a warning. Don’t step out of line. Bring your kids, like your daddy brought you. Make sure you pass on the lesson. It’s good wholesome fun. Man it feels good when good overcomes evil. Don’t step out of line.