These are pictures of Afghanistan.

[as reported by Mohammad Qayoumi on Foreign Policy.com]

You'd think from absorbing the intel from our own media, Afghanistan was always some bleak, desolate, hopelessly backwards, Stone Age shithole, but here we have some actual examples the country was making some headway towards becoming Westernized before America and Russia decided to have one last proxy pissing contest. Un-shrouded women being educated, people buying records and going to the movies. Two things destroyed this budding modernization—war and religion. The USA funded and elevated the religious nuts because they were crazy enough to take on the Soviets. WE gave power, weapons, and legitimacy to the assholes who would become the Taliban. Funny, you'd never know that from paying attention to the "news" networks which have become the bearers of propaganda, misinformation, misdirection, distraction and lies. But that's another rant for another time.

My point in bringing these photos to the fore is to show that in less than fifty years, a society can degenerate into something unimaginable, and it could happen here. We're already seeing aspects of America deteriorating. Education, health, civil liberties, infrastructure and even our communication systems are second tier compared to other First World nations. The promise that existed in Afghanistan was, as I said, ruined by war and religion, and that's pretty much all we've got as a country. We sell arms to other countries and prop up the worst kind of government leaders so we can declare them an enemy in the future and stage a profit-driven war. Religious creeps all over the place are being taken seriously and making advances for their "cause" at every turn. It doesn't matter that they're outright con-men and charlatans like the fat fuck from the Saddlebrook "ministry" or "sweeter" types like that Joel Orsteen (or whatever his name is). The Mormon and Catholic hierarchies are blatantly defying the  tax-exempt agreement by busying themselves in political shenanigans, and any attempt to rein them in will only give them ammo in their "war on religion" bullshit. The churches are flexing their power, and as we all know when the economy sours, desperate people turn to the gods for hope.

Look at these Afghanistan photos and consider that none of these folks ever dreamed that their homeland would slide back to a state like the Middle Ages during their lifetime. And now, think of the possibility of America doing something similar. Generating more poor people, more homeless people, more people driven into debt, more people railroaded into the privatized prison system, and more people "medicated" into zombies while the wealthy isolate themselves in gated communities and hoard their money.

I don't have a solution. I'm not even saying that it is absolutely inevitable. I'm just saying that our freedom and our quality of life is at risk and it is something we should all be very aware of. I'm worried that the queer community especially might take it for granted that the legal and social achievements we've made in recent years are part of an irreversible trend—nothing is safe, nothing is secure. When things turn chaotic the religious institutions will scapegoat and demonize us with even greater fury than they currently wield. We have already seen the attempt to force women back into "traditional" roles with their campaign against abortion and contraception. There are strange things afoot and strange days ahead. All I'm saying is: don't become socially complacent; don't settle for the popular version of "what's going on;" and keep your eyes open. Might also be a good idea to keep your passports current. War and religion. They are both bad. But as a combination, they are a danger to our civilization as we understand it. And those two destructive forces are the fumes that the American engine is running on right now.

Later.