exasperating political criticism
i’m becoming really frustrated with so many of my friends and coworkers who are predominating the airspace and webspace around me with anti-government sentiments. perhaps part of the problem is that i have been delving deeper into personal webspace lately (e.g.., reading more online journals), but there is a decidedly more proliferate quantity of popular political sarcasm making its way into the conversations, status messages, and bumper stickers around me this season.
first, some examples. ever since messenger started allowing custom clickable status messages (evidently, a feature that is currently undocumented on Yahoo! Help) people have been using this for all sorts of quick and witty satire, particularly the struggling LA Lakers team and, of course, the US government and its failures. today, one of my coworkers decided to display the phrase “SpaceShipOne. GovernementZero.” with a link to an article about today’s completion of the first privitized manned space flight. at first i took it as a knock on all the recent shuttle failures and disappointing results for the International Space Station, but then I imagined you could take it several different ways (“zero funding”, etc.), so i asked him about it and sure enough, my intuition was correct. why so down on NASA? those mars rovers were pretty cool. true, it is a shame that we are still trying to putz around in those dated shuttles but if it wasn’t for our committment to the ISS we’d have little need to keep sending orbiters up and we could concentrate on more ambitious goals like reaching Mars or just building our own next-generation spacecraft. don’t get me wrong, i’m completely estatic about today’s accomplishment but i don’t understand why we need to use it to springboard ridicule on the well established fact that government space programs all over the world are suffering. if we are going to be manipulative, why don’t we phrase it “Microsoft Billionaires One. NASA Space Flight Division Zero.”
so maybe that response seems a little extreme – you’re thinking, “Skylar, why get so bent out of shape about jab at the national space program? Besides, you can’t seriously have any respect for your friends that work for NASA or fly supersonic aircraft for a living?” 
i must admit, that specific case was the tipping point for this entry. let’s move to more proliferate examples.
reagan. wow. the most beloved president of my lifetime dies and every liberal has it out for this guy. of course he wasn’t perfect but i’m completely depressed by the opportunity taken by folks to elaborate on his faults and use him as subject of tasteless humor. i really wish someone could explain this to me. a great man (and even if you don’t see him as great, a man dearly loved by his family, millions of americans, and a respectable international audience) dies, yet because of his political background (and its obvious yet somewhat removed relation to the current executive administration) jealousy and bitterness overcome compassionate intuitions so that humiliation and shame can be brought to bear lest any political gain be reflected on any surviving institutions? when did courtesy and reverence become so unfashionable? perhaps when we started making heros out of wreakless artists instead of truly honorable men and women characterized by selflessness, love, service, and grace.
i could continue with examples but if you live in the Bay Area, you should have a pretty good idea of what I’m talking about. be it SUVs, foreign policy, or formal patriotic oaths it seems there aren’t enough opportunities in the day for folks to vent their frustrations with our imperfect society and governmental leadership. perhaps that is the rub? are we incapable of being comfortable with imperfection? it seems so many folks here are driven with a self-assuming intellectual pride that anyone who thinks conservatively is ignorant and, in most cases, laughable. do we criticize the world in hopes of righting its wrongs or because this helps us justify living under failable leaders and corrupt institutions while we quietly and peacefully reap the benefits in the world’s wealthiest and most privilaged metropolis?
it wouldn’t be so exhausting if it weren’t all so predictable (as are most things which are political) and trendy. it is like the kids in high school that decide to dress “differently” or “self-expressively” in an attempt to garner attention and to conform to the Avril-type mantra “it’s cool to be uncool.” all i really want is to see more positive spirit and encouragement of others in the world. we spend way too much time tearing people down – especially people we don’t even know – rather than serving the people we do know, or encouraging and helping the people that live in our communities.
if you are reading this and do find yourself somehow targeted or perhaps offended by this entry, i think that’s healthy. many folks are offended and challenged by the things you say every day and I’m encouraged if this can do the same for you. feel free to comment, but rather than rant, I encourage you to try being positive in your social and political reflections this week. discuss and humor the good being done, not the evils. clearly, i’m challenging myself now to do the same.