Tag: Things that make you say hmmm?

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And Here it is Folks!

New York has rolled out a vaccine passport. The Article is here.

Yes, at this point it’s only New York. But the plan is to roll this kind of dystopian nightmare out across our country and across the whole planet.

I’ve got just a few questions…

How the heck does anybody think this is a good thing?

At a time when a law requiring a citizen to produce ID to vote is “racist“, and has been described as akin to Jim Crowe. It’s apparently it’s A-Okay to require someone to produce proof that they’ve been vaccinated so that they can enter a venue, or shopping center?

At a time when the stratification of our society is by far, worse than it’s even been in my memory (figure 50 + years), we’re fine with saying some people are not able to enter some buildings, shops, etc?

What happened to equality? Not everyone will get the vaccine for various reasons.

Some people literally can’t take the stuff. They’re to be excluded from participating fully in society? Shopping, Travel, Sporting events, concert halls, you name it, all due to a quirk in their biology?

One could easily describe higher or lower quantities of melanin in the skin as a biological quirk.

Will we see “Vaccinated” and “Un-Vaccinated” Water Fountains?

Will we be okay with “Vaccinated” and “Un-Vaccinated” Subway trains, or Buses?

Will we be more okay with marginalizing a segment of our society for supposed “Bio-Hazard” reasons instead of racial reasons? What does that look like?

People in tattered clothing with a pink Bio-Hazard label on their lapels?

Homeless, destitute, hungry, but otherwise completely healthy people, excluded from society? Will we force these people into the bowels of our cities to work in filth (regardless of their intellectual ability,) becaus they’re presumed to be; diseased, carriers… expendable?

Or will we just opt for leper colonies that look more like Hitler’s concentration camps?

Trouble is, no matter how much you want these assumed “pariahs” to die, they probably won’t.

They’re likely to become stronger, healthier, and because they won’t have the benefits of an easy life where their feelings aren’t being hurt, they’ll be tougher mentally too. Quite likely, they’ll be much more clever at survival.

See, I have a lot of faith in biology and the adaptability of the species. Apparently a lot more faith than what passes for “Science” these days.

I reiterate, COVID-19 has a survival rate of 97% or higher.

The next question is;

Might we be over-reacting a bit?

We’re still learning a lot about this virus. New discoveries are being made, peer reviewed, and published papers, show up in reputable medical journals almost daily.

A lot of those discoveries are actually pretty good news. The human race may have dodged a bullet this time around.

Would it not be better to consider this a dry run? Learn from this experience what works, and what doesn’t, then lay down the groundwork necessary to mitigate the next, likely more deadly pandemic?

Say something like an airborne Ebola, or the Black Plague, that kills in 6 hours? (Come on… You know some insane government or military somewhere on the planet has thought about it.)

I’m simply not ready to go to a GATTACA, The Walking Dead, Omega Man, or other dystopian nightmare scenario just yet.

I don’t think it’s right or reasonable to demand vaccination records to transact business.

Politicians have been attempting to spin shame for those people who choose not to wear a mask.

What’s the saying, “You’re not wearing a mask for your protection. You’re wearing a mask for the protection of others.” Implicitly stating that you’re a selfish bastard for not wearing a mask.

The spin machines have been trying to conflate wearing a mask as an act of patriotism, when in reality it’s probably more likely government mandated virtue signaling. A way of reenforcing that “We’re all in this together…“

If the shaming, spin and conflation continue to their logical conclusion. Things will be a lot worse than someone at a dog park being maced.

Picture the poor schmuck standing in line at a grocery store who discovers too late, that they don’t have the “Correct” vaccine de jour.

Crowds who believe they’re right, and just, get very ugly, very quickly.

I could see someone being beaten to death because their vaccine scan failed. (Sadly, they’d be counted as another COVID-xx death.)

Being the cynical and dark fuck that I am, the following scenario occurs to me.

Because the vaccine is essentially free, and the vaccine passport is also free I could see a scenario where the next 3 – 5 years is a period of adjustment.

A “New Normal” where everyone scans their vaccine passport to enter everywhere. Once people aren’t thinking about it anymore big pharma starts charging for the booster shots.

Picture the level of non political control a government or company could exercise on an entire population. “Oh, we’re sorry, you can’t cross the state line, or enter this city, or corporate office, without a booster shot. It costs $2200 for nonessential people, and we can give it to you right now if you can afford it…”

If you were one of the people in control, you could create an immediate two caste system, and easily control who was elite and who wasn’t simply by controlling the price of a vaccine or booster shot. All you need to do is keep fear alive.

No bullets, no war no political systems or parties… just simple absolute control.

If that doesn’t scare the hell out of you, it should. History has shown us repeatedly that control is the goal

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We’ve reached the end of the week.

Annnnnnnddd… Nothing is new!

Had a job offer rescinded. Disappointing but in truth I had some reservations about the job. The pay was good, but the Job itself was in Florida.

Florida wouldn’t be bad for me personally, but it would mean leaving Jesse, my home, and probably any reasonable chance of returning to California would be gone too, except to sell the house eventually.

I thought about it and had come to peace about all that I’d be leaving and all that I’d have to clean up eventually.

The reservations about the job in addition to those stated, also had to do with the relationship of the person I’d be working for and my family’s involvement. What happened to the job if things went sour between my boss and the family? Those questions were apparently answered when the offer was rescinded. I know from the family’s perspective that something happened.

I’m trying to convince myself that it was for the best and have mustered at least some strength of will to continue this fruitless search.

I’ve been considering just entering warehouse work. There’s a nice symmetry in that. One of the first jobs I had, involved warehouse work, and I sorta liked it.

No politics, simple labor, In motion all day long, and not trapped behind a desk. Do your job, do it right, and go home at night.

There’s also a pot grower nearby that is looking for help with the growing. The pay isn’t as high as the warehousing positions, but I like making things grow. I’d also be a good candidate because I don’t particularly like pot. The employer wouldn’t have to worry about me taking merchandise or being stoned out of my mind on the job.

The longer this unemployment goes on, the more I’m leaning toward abandoning technology as a career and doing something that’s actually constructive.

I’ve been thinking maybe it’s time to let software continue it’s slide toward horrific inadequacy without my interference.

After all we’ve all seen the debacles across the software industry in recent years. From simple things like, Typos salted through menus and help texts, to data breaches exposing a corporations entire customer database to the world.

Remember… the software “Passed” testing…

I wonder how happy I’d be returning to an office environment where any bug I discovered could be called “Racist” based on the color of a programmer’s skin or their national origin. Software either works correctly or it doesn’t. As a QA person my job is to find the problems and report them. I don’t care who or what the programmer is, a bug is a bug.

The problem is, that if you’re assigned to test a particular part of functionality it’s often a particular programmer’s code. Programmers hate QA finding bugs in their code I could see it devolving into a “He’s just a racist and going through my code with a fine tooth comb because he hates: X, Y, Z colored people.“

No matter how you play that scenario out, as a white man these days you lose. Even if you’re treating all the code you test in exactly the same way.

Then I ask myself do I really want to deal with being afraid of using the wrong word or pronoun.

Years ago I was called on the carpet during a class that I was teaching for using the term “dikes”. It was a common term that described diagonal cutters (as in for wire).

I don’t know how the term came into common usage, as that happened decades before I was an itch in my Daddy’s pants. But there I was, facing a pissed off lesbian who’d taken offense.

First of all, I didn’t know or care that she was a lesbian. Second of all, I used a term that the other 30 people in the class knew, and my use of that term caused them to all pick up the indicated tool to perform the indicated action.

I asked her what term I should use, her reply was, “diagonal cutters”. “Fine,” I said, “I’ll use that term for the rest of the class.”

While she was yelling in my face about how hurtful the term “dikes” was, I could see the other 30 people in the class rolling their eyes in annoyance.

I told her in front of the class that I happened to be gay and that I wasn’t offended by the term “Fag.” In fact I expected to hear that term frequently when I was in London.

I then asked if we could get on with the class. She’d have none of it. She demanded satisfaction in the form of an immediate written apology for using an offensive term.

Her boss spared me wasting time on an endeavor to satisfy 0.03030303 % of the class by removing her from the classroom.

Several other women were present and two of them said they too were lesbians, and didn’t mind my use of the term in this context. One of them quipped, “I hope Sheila NEVER visits Holland!“

The class burst into laughter and we got on with business.

I’ve been thinking a lot about that incident over the past year. I honestly can’t say if I’d be happy in an office full of people just waiting to pounce on the wrong word, action, or pronoun, just to be offended and cause drama.

Perhaps I’ve had enough of the corporate grind.

I know I’ve had enough of the HR bullshit where a corporation states their policy then promptly discards the policy based on skin color.

Yeah, the last place I worked had a few incidents like that. I’m rule based. Give me a rule & I’ll follow it until you aren’t following the rules. At that point, don’t try making me selectively follow your rules, especially not based on the color of my skin versus someone else’s.

The last place I worked, was just starting to see the perpetually aggrieved. I have to wonder how much worse that’s gotten over the past year.

I just want to go to work, do my job, be paid for my effort, and go home. I don’t want to be terrorized all day into silence or be expected to show up at some event to show corporate support for a cause that I don’t believe in.

Sadly, that too seems to be required by some companies.

Time will tell…

I wonder if it’s too late in my life to move to Norway. A nice simple one room cottage perched on green hills overlooking a fjord. Maybe some sheep, a cow, and a windmill or solar panels to charge the electronics, (At least much of the year…)

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Ugh! The News and politics is already back to the Obama era.

I was reminded this morning why I’d lost interest in politics and the news during Obama. It wasn’t that I was actually disinterested, it was that no matter what, there was almost zero serious discussion about anything Obama or his minions did. Anything and everything was amazing and just wonderful. That makes me suspicious. No president, administration, politician, or government is wonderful and amazing all the time.

Just as it is untrue that anything and everything Trump did for the past four years according to the media, was; wrong, evil, bad, racist, or whatever negative descriptive you can think of.

Then I remembered the movie Protocol with Goldie Hawn. I’ll be digging it out of the library later today.

Just thinking about it made me smile, and I could use a laugh or two.

I honestly don’t give a runny crap about who is in power. But I absolutely care about fair play, and politicians that actually work for the people.

I don’t believe that we have either now and doubt seriously that we’re getting fair and accurate news reporting about the goings on in Washington DC.

It’s the imbalance in reporting that makes me question. Now that we don’t have a President that the media can target, the Media and many of the politicians have switched to targeting anyone who disagrees with the prevailing narrative, or who supported the former President.

This is not a hallmark of a democratic republic. It’s a hallmark of a totalitarian state.

I’d stopped watching the goings on in Washington during the last four years of Obama. Every time I sat down to watch the Obama press conferences or state of the union I found myself having far more questions than were answered. I found that I fundamentally disagreed with the direction then President Obama was taking the country.

Apparently so did many in congress which led to nothing but wasted time and money because nothing was getting done. I was very displeased with Obama’s use of executive orders because it felt very much like he was a King, not an American President.

To be fair Trump also used executive orders, but not the the extent that Obama and now Biden have.

I think we’re in for yet another four years of congressional deadlock and infighting rather than congress doing the job they exist to do. How long can a country survive doing nothing for the people? 12 years? 16 Years? 20 years?

About 1/2 this country no longer believes in voting. Not because Biden won, but because no-one in the courts would even hear the voices of the people upraised in protest.

Last week there was an article in Time magazine that essentially says there was something going on designed to make sure Biden won. Whether this collusion behind the scenes is illegal or not we will probably never know, because the courts will refuse to hear any cases about it.

The article is here. The article could be read to imply that votes don’t actually matter in this country anymore. But that politicians and corporate oligarchs are deciding our fate.

I’ll grant you that American politics is, and always has been a dirty business. That doesn’t mitigate the fact that a very large number of people were demanding answers as is their right and were dismissed like spoiled children from the dinner table.

That was insult enough. But those in power are compounding the insult with what appear to be blatant misuses of their power by continuing to silence all opposition, engaging in what looks a lot like settling vendettas against their enemies.

It hasn’t gone un-noticed that the nation is suddenly calmer, that protests and riots are no longer front page news. Many predicted this would be the case. It’s also worthy to note the SPLC has designated, (and the party in power agrees,) quite a few right leaning groups (note I said leaning, not right wing) as terrorist organizations, but that the groups responsible for billions of dollars in damage in cities nationwide have not earned a similar designation.

It is also interesting that states which had been locked down for COVID are opening up. One could say that is a result of the vaccine, but the timing is somewhat coincidental especially in light of the limited availability of the vaccine itself. Many also predicted this would happen.

I find myself once again wanting to turn a blind eye. But I’ve tried that, hoping that the problem would go away.

It didn’t work

I hoped that the politicians would correct the problem because it’s their job.

They didn’t.

I hoped that my vote still counted.

It didn’t.

I believed that the rule of law still held sway in my country.

It doesn’t

I thought that justice was blind.

It isn’t.

I’m a relatively moderate conservative leaning person. If I’m thinking things like this, I have to wonder what other more disenfranchised people are thinking. I wonder if Germans in pre-Hitler Germany were asking the same questions.

If they were, then along comes Hitler who promises them their place in the world. He promises to restore their national pride, and tells them he will make it happen, and has a plan…

We all know, or should know how that turned out.

Logically I have to ask, “What happens if a gifted orator comes along and manages to speak to the masses of disenfranchised Americans who are asking these same questions?”

Despite what the media pundits said about Trump being Hitler. We can all agree he wasn’t a gifted orator. Neither is Biden or Harris…

But what happens when a really gifted orator comes along?

Somehow I can’t get past the feeling that we’re all sitting on a powder keg and someone is playing with matches.

I can have that opinion, it’s been demonstrated time and again over the past four years that what we feel is true… Actual Facts be damned!

So I’m going to watch Protocol, and perhaps The American President both are sweet comedies and make me smile.