13,026. RUDIMENTS. 1,034

RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,034

(j'accuse!)

Somehow I never knew the

exact reason me or any of my

kid friends ever managed to

stay alive  -  if  there were any,

and I'm not so sure there were.

As it is, not everyone made it

out anyhow. If it wasn't a car

wreck, it was, eventually,

Vietnam. But way before

that, the things we got thrown

at us were ridiculous. The

myths and the BS were pretty

monumental. I know that there

have been, and are, writers and

comics who trade on all this.

Instead of reflecting the due

scorn, they make light of it

all and get a freaking comedy

routine from it, one that keeps

them in cars and money. I wonder

what comics did for Covid? 'Uh,

I'm out of work, can you please

send me some dough?' And then

they get the 600 bucks, etc, but

if they remain funny about

things aren't they still working?

Just another scam, I guess.

Porn stars too  -  man, does

the Government actually send

money to the sex industry? Can

they still be producing. Mickey

Marvel, the masked man, does

Melaney Moaner, the masked

woman? Hello? I want to file?

-

Somehow, back when they gave

us out the usual drivel about

Davy Crockett and Daniel

Boone, and the Lone Ranger

and Tonto too, no one ever let

on that it could maybe some

day come to all this, like now.

I know I wouldn't have believed

them. The lines, back then, if

they had been drawn in the

sky, would never had reached

this far. I ask you, what was

up? I know I was scarred for

life, by this and 50 other things.

Parental abuse, back then was

mostly just mental abuse and

there weren't yet any charges for

that. It was all supposed to be

solved by the time we reached

18. I guess. What amounted to

a concealed fight, for me, like

I said, was Vietnam. Not so

much now, but back then, right

about  the 1970's and '80's you'd

get all these guys railing on about

their service time and how little

appreciated it all was. Listen,

fellas, life's a tough-jam; I

didn't tell you to go. I had jungle

time too, but it was in the complete

opposite direction; the streets

of NYC, hard-hat assholes,

Nixon types, draft agents 
chasing me down on the street,
and all the rest of the raw drivel.

None of that was easy either,

and no one ever came up to me

and said 'Thanks.' Fortunately,

I was never the needy type like

that. Anything any one of those

guys claimed to have fought for

anyway is, right now, all down

the toilet. The ruins are atrocious

and the ashes and embers from the

old fires still smolder, while new

ones burn. You can figure that out.

-

The only reason we were fed that

stuff was to get our heads in order

 to be out of order. Plain and simple.

-

No horseman of the Apocalypse

every had  clearer view of the

looming battles ahead  - I can see

that now, though I never saw it then.

We were given training, all through

school and home, church and community,

to be servile and passive; everything

needed would be given to us. The

country we were maybe learning

about  -  that which was presented

in film-strips, glorification movies,

and the rest  -  had led to equally

weird things. Like the 'Pilgrim Fathers,'

and then the 'Founding Fathers.' It

took 200-some years until, as adults,

when absolutely nothing any longer

made any sense, the only glorification

left to us was the militaristic homily-drivel

of things like 'The Greatest Generation.'

Who gave us that? Why, of course, a

media-mouth with a committee-written

book to advance the screed past the

point of nothing being left; probably

one of the last, pre-household computer,

riffs on propagandistic re-entry into a

world defenseless.

-

Now, anyone can say whatever they

wish about this material  -  and I am

certainly doing it myself  -  but I here

accuse a million people before me of

lies. If you examine the false premise

of The Greatest Generation I feel

confident that you will find it to be

a manufactured sentimentality over

imagined lost world now far gone and

away. Pocahontas and John Smith

together could not have manufactured

a better story. It is the stuff of myth,

and it has led us only deeper into the

American death-folly we face today.

-

 The set-up was plain; and it was plain

from the moment it was first introduced

to me. I don't think any school-board

or school staff  -  teachers, principles,

tutors or whatever  - had any knowledge

of the psychic damage they were

inflicting on their students, their young

and so impressionable wards. Captive

wards. The entire structure was built,

firstly, upon the ruination of any 'true'

American values that had once been

the underpinnings of the nation, and

which 'they' then purported to bolster.

-

How did they bolster it? In the

worst way possible  -  with sentiment

and false facts produced only to support

their argument. It was the easiest way

around, and ended up being as

meaningless as snot : Look at

the world, now, it has brought us.

It's not my aim here to destroy the

dreams of others, but it is my aim

to declaim that we've been lied

to and mis-led, and that's the

greatest generational flaw ever.

True 'America' lasted about 40

years, at most, and my 1820 it was

already in shreds. Every diversion

possible, past that point, was

given out in order to distort the

truths of what was going on

and distract the growing mass of

people from the factors that were

transforming their lives. In the

balance now, people say it was, 

overall, good. That prosperity,

material richness, charity, and

steady growth were the end

results. I challenge that as well.

-

When I got to 11th street, I was

immediately within the shambled

and remnant richness of a world

of the tenements and old buildings

which for a hundred years had

already sheltered layers of

immigrants; they were all gone

by then : German communities,

Jewish communities, Italians, later,

and before them Irish and all

other parts of old Europe. That was

already a world long gone, and what

remained were the transplanted

shards of the broken. Every

ethnic ghetto has its own story,

but this one was layered and

folded over upon itself, and there

was little truth to anything, BUT

in order the advance that world

along, two word wars had already

been fought over the feuding

stupidities of lines and borders

of the old. Like someone really
angry once said to me : 'I fought
foy my Freedom, and now I
want it.'