August 8th, 2025
This afternoon, I was doing my routine paid eavesdropping (you have no idea how much we know about you from the tea you spill freely and sloppily at your favorite establishments, but I will tell you right now, it’s more than you think). I generally hear clips and phrases out of context, like a real life internet, but I heard a powerful line that struck me and needed no additional notes:
“…every morning at school I was forced to say ‘for liberty and justice for all’ and now they call me crazy and ‘woke’ for wanting liberty and justice for all.”
I think this is why so many of us feel insane today.
I’ve been talking about bias a lot lately but I do want to clarify: not everything we are taught, culturally or at a young age, is bad. In fact, a strong moral framework is one of the most important things a human being can construct and utilize.
When I was a kid, I thought American values were universal values: personal autonomy, freedom of speech, kindness, respect, dignity, education, innovation, community, nature, joy, peace, love, hope.
All that corny shit.
But this isn’t what America represents anymore. Not to its own citizens; not to the rest of the world. Maybe it never did, but now we’re not even pretending. We defunded Big Bird, you guys.
The environment we live in has become inhospitable to compassion and reason. It hurts to care, and the pain feels worse because so many of the adults who taught us the right things are guilty now of doing the most wrong.
If you feel crazy too, just know you’re not the only one. Like I’ve said before, it is a good and noble thing to give fucks. But this isn’t even about setting unrealistic standards; this is about living in a land where there are no standards left at all.
A land where liberty and justice exist solely for a few.
The Den 