Religion is one of the few remaining barriers to humanity’s advancement at this time. Perhaps it had a purpose once, when we were all closer to apes in mental development, but we’re not anymore. We are living the Reign of Man. We’re effectively Gods here now.
Relying on mysticism to define our world is dangerous at best. It blinds us from the reality at hand—that there is nothing to save us from ourselves but ourselves. We are all individually responsible for our world and everyone and everything on it. Where in the past the world was large, and to survive people banded together, today our world is so very small. And we have the power to destroy it.
Structured belief systems divide us instead of unite us. Religions preach commonality only with their followers. They promote the differences to set theirs apart from the myriad of others. We can no longer maintain divided clusters running around thinking their way is the only truth, or the only way. We are a global world now. Integrating. Blended. We must not only understand, but act on the fact that we are intricately connected with each other and everything else here.
Cultural assimilation isn’t a bad thing. Interracial marriage is an absolute necessity for our survival, and doesn’t have to rob us of our traditions. Ethnicity— a rich representation of our history—can and should be passed on, just without the divisive labels of the past. You can celebrate Christmas without calling yourself Christian. You don’t have to be Jewish to eat bagels and lox. Derisive ideologies must be eliminated. Not all Catholics are against abortion. Jews don’t have a corner on being neurotic, nor Muslims on being fanatics.
At this time in humanity’s development, it is imperative we become thinkers, innovators, not continue to be followers of a mythological narrative most adopted from their parents without much consideration or independent spiritual investigation. Indoctrinating our young with religion leaves them little chance to think outside the box we’ve guided them to join us in. While we all must acknowledge we stand on the shoulders of giants, and never lose site of history, assimilation is integral for our evolution. Without coming together as one race, and very soon at that, we will most likely divide and conquer each other. War with a bang, or disease with a whisper, if we don’t work together to face the issues of this planet, the human race will not survive the fallout of our factioning.
Promoting or proselytizing religion at this point in our history hinders our development, and just may hasten our imminent demise. Sending your kids to religious school, or raising them with a religious identity may seem innocuous, even righteous, but propagating ideological foundations that fundamentally promotes division must be discarded if we hope to continue humanity’s evolution forward.
I’m lying on the nurse’s exam table, legs spread in stirrups while she takes a vaginal sample for a pap smear. I’m there for an annual checkup, new to the area, and her practice. As I describe some minor chest pains, she asks me if I’ve gotten the Covid vaccine.
I say, yes, of course, five months back, soon after it was available for my age range. I’d unmasked in her small office when entering because she was not wearing one, nor her two assistants, and I’d just assumed anyone working in a women’s health clinic, especially a medical facility servicing an upscale suburb of Seattle, was vaccinated.
I’m naked and unmasked on her table while she tells me with certainty that my chest pains are likely caused by the vaccine. She then goes on a rant, telling me I would not believe what she sees daily—how her vaccinated patients are getting sick, women are becoming sterile, or losing their babies, and that the vaccine is killing more people than it’s helping.
I don’t believe that, I say. What possible reason would the govt have for killing its citizens?
She has no answer for this. She just keeps on about how hard it is to report side-effects to the CDC, how the paperwork is “this thick,” the distance between her thumb and forefinger as wide as she can spread them, indicating how difficult it seemingly is for medical professionals to report complications from the vaccine.
My skin is crawling as she rants. She tells me that she had Covid two weeks ago, and not only were the symptoms “not bad, like a minor cold,” but she is, “chock-full of antibodies now.” She assures me that there has not been enough research on the Covid vaccines, and regardless of any mandates, she will not get it.
She now has her fingers inside of me, checking for lumps or abnormalities, so I don’t feel in any position to argue with her. I ask her how she thinks we can shut down Covid without vaccinations. She says, “We can’t. People will die. The strong will survive, and that’s the way it is.”
She finally finishes her exam and moves back so I can get up. The room is maybe 10 x 12 ft, so we are face-to-face, unmasked, but she continues. She tells me that the vaccine misinformation is like the “fake election results.” There is no stopping Covid, which is why her clinic is “vaccine-free,” and she laughs, in my face, at this announcement. She just had Covid and is not vaccinated. Nor is the young assistant who took my blood sample. Nor is the front desk woman who checked me in. And the Moderna vaccine I had in March is losing effectiveness. The Delta variant is rampant. And ‘break-through’ Covid cases among vaccinated adults is becoming more common.
I put my mask on before we leave the small exam room. I can’t wait to get out of there.
It has been over a month since this encounter. I’ve been debating whether to share my story about this event with my neighbors through the app NextDoor, but I do not want to start a flame war online, or hurt this nurse’s practice. Besides the rant, she was professional and did her job efficiently. I am also afraid of some conservative nut job coming to my home and hurting my family because we believe in getting the Covid vaccine—for ourselves, our kids, our community, and our world. We’ve done the research and the data shows us with enough people vaccinated, humanity can shut this virus down, and stop it from prematurely killing more people.
Vaccination hesitancy is valid, real, and needs to be constantly addressed with scientific proof to thwart the fake news pushed out by conservatives groups looking to get Trump reelected in 2024. In fact, we do not know a lot about the long-term effects of the vaccine we’ve created, however, we are watching our family, friends and neighbors die, suffocate to death in droves every day for the last year and a half. This is also science fact, and we must shut this reality down now.
We’ve been administering vaccines since the mid 1960s. I remember getting the sugar cube with the polio vaccine. The only long term side effect of that vaccine was to eliminate polio globally. Measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccines were introduced in the early to mid 1960s, and my mom got us vaccinated immediately after the pediatrician’s recommendation. There were no “anti-vaccination” people back then. We were all just so grateful for the opportunity to wipe out horribly debilitating, and often deadly diseases.
The anti-vaccination ‘movement’ began with a discredited study from one arrogant, [proven] corrupt doctor, Andrew Wakefield. He was disbarred from practicing medicine and struck off the UK medical registry after publishing his 1998 paper falsely claiming a link between the MMR vaccines and autism. Full of contempt for being fired, he moved to the U.S. where he megaphoned his [proven] false findings across media, garnering followers who then repeated the fake findings in Wakefield’s corrupt ‘study,’ collecting more advocates to proselytize his lies.
Polio to flu vaccines have proven to prevent these illnesses with no long term side effects for over 70 years. We’ve been testing RNA vaccines on animals and humans for decades. Moderna and Pfizer are mRNA vaccines. They’d both been tested on tens of thousands of people well before released to the public. Now, billions across the globe are proving the side effects of a Covid19 vaccine are minimal, mild at best for most of us, and don’t last long. Unfortunately, we are also finding the safeguards afforded the fully-vaccinated against getting Covid aren’t lasting too long either.
So, if you’re still afraid there are long term side effects from the vaccine, and since it doesn’t even last, why bother getting vaccinated?
If 70% of the U.S. Population got vaccinated as soon as it was available for them to do so, we could have shut this virus down by now. Yet, our Republican representatives have used this pandemic to increase our nation’s political divide in hopes of securing reelection. They don’t seem to care that pushing ‘No Mask’ mandates are killing people. Using Facebook, Instagram, Google and YouTube, they go after ignorant religious conservatives—devout Christians, Catholics, Muslims, Jews, because these people are prone to blind belief if the message is delivered by a preacher, or powerful speaker.
An anti-vaxxer marks the nurse at the women’s health clinic as a likely Republican. She has clearly bought into the political crap served to her mobile, her computers, her TV daily, from Recommendation algorithms that track her every move, analyze her posts, texts…etc., and pushes online content she’ll respond to. She has clearly not researched the science behind these vaccines, and without facts, she likely doesn’t realize these ads are scamming her to ignite her ire. Hitler ignited Germany’s ire, and then was elected their Chancellor. And while this nurse survived Covid, if she had it at all, its mutations, like the Delta variant, don’t care who you are or what you believe in to infect, and quite possibly kill you, or someone you love.*
United and vaccinated we beat this virus. Divided we spread Covid19, and die.
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*Over 630,000 deaths from Covid19 are documented in the U.S. as of 8/24/21. The real figure of Covid deaths in the U.S. is estimated to be closer to a million or more—deaths that went unreported as Covid19 related.
This is the SCIENCE, the FACTS about how and why the TARGETED mRNA vaccines work to kill Covid without hurting any other part of your body:
MICRO-TRUTH: Human reaction to trouble: Fight, Flight, or Freeze. Any one of these, you’re Fu**ed, you’re Fu**ed, you’re Fu**ed. MUCH better to THINK, then ACT with forethought, NOT malice!
Had an interview for a Copywriting contract that required a ‘test.’
Here’s the ‘test:’
Create five (5) YouTube Channels that can “go viral,” which, according to this ‘digital marketing agency’ was “20 million views in one week,” with these prompts:
Create a “Seek and Find” YouTube channel.
Create a “Mouse Maze” YouTube channel.
Create a [tween] YouTube channel: “Imagine you are 13 and develop a superpower…”.
I stopped reading the “Test Deliverables” after that because this agency asked for a total of 5 unique YouTube channel ideas, their only instruction to create channels to “go viral, with 20M views weekly.” I hope the absurdity of this request is not lost on you, since about .03% of all YouTube Channels get 1M+ views on any given video.
And remember, this is a Copywriting ‘test,’ not a product development gig, which, seemingly, this marketing agency does not know a BRANDED YouTube channel actually is a product offering, and should be developed and marketed accordingly.
Five, free, viable YouTube channel ideas requiring little copy—this agency did stress an ‘attention-grabbing’ visual—including thumbnail layouts and storyboard drawings. Oh, and they required I sign an NDA saying that whatever I came up with on their ‘test’ was theirs to keep. Five (5). Free Channel ideas. Per applicant.
Their ‘test’ gave no OBJECTIVE for creating these channels—no sales goals for any company, or the channel itself to realize profitability. No reason for asking applicants to create these brain dead types of channels, other than the unmentionable of making the user the PRODUCT by selling their data, then slamming those same users with pay-per-click ads on every webpage visited forward.
The prompts in their ‘test’ were pulled from the latest trending crap on YouTube. The agency asked applicants to pile on more intellectually void baseline garbage to these senseless trending channels, following the Fire, Aim, Ready marketing method of business failure. Clearly this ‘marketing’ agency doesn’t really understand, well, marketing, assuming they were really looking for a copywriter, and not just garnering free content ideas. There are three business MARKETING reasons (not personal, ego-building social sharing) for a YouTube Channel:
As a marketing/branding channel for a business.
As a data collection tool for tightly targeting future marketing campaigns.
Selling collected data to Affliate Marketing brokers.
Applicants for this copywriting gig were not asked to market an offering of value, nor to build a marketing campaign (or YouTube channel) for any specific targets, nor did they instruct applicants to actually create and MARKET (i.e. BRAND) a YouTube channel for any specific business. They are under the delusion if they just get “views,” they’ll get sales, which data shows is a lie (https://freakonomics.com/podcast/advertising-part-2/), promoted by these very ‘digital marketing’ agencies to get clients. (https://www.ippglobal.org/post/truth-about-data-science)
Of course, after reading their ‘test,’ I turned down the prospect of consulting for them. I felt angry though, that they were not only asking for free, unique IP, but also the IP they were asking for was truly thoughtless, flat out bad marketing, sure to put more ‘digital’ garbage on the ever mounting pile of crap already on YouTube. To quell my anger, with my rejection of consulting for their agency, I included an answer to their first prompt:
Create a “Hide & Seek” YouTube Channel:
A Year of Free Beer for Finding NAME OF FAMOUS IPA BEER.
AR (augmented reality) game to find the bottle of famous IPA BEER (or any other idiotic thing that’s trending). Everyone 21 or older with mobile can play. AR has NAME OF FAMOUS IPA BEER bottles in places around each major cities, but also standard beer bottles, and area sports team logos, (even cross-sell with image placements) that ‘lead’ you to the ‘right IPA.’ First to find NAME OF FAMOUS IPA BEER (in any given round, which may be a week or more per round) to collect all that global data, (which then can be sold to screw us all further), wins the free beer for a year, every month getting new IPA flavors.
The TARGET USERS of this YouTube Channel will be:
Lowest hanging target is the sudo-intellectual, over-educated ivy-league crowd, mostly White men; Christians, Jews, Agnostics—higher education levels; MMORPG, FPS, and MOD gamer; Software, Marketing, Admin, Finance; STEAM; democrats; mid – upper income; 21 – 60.
Lazy, generally fat, FPS gamers, beer and sports-loving men. White mostly. Conservatives. Apatheist, Christians; low – mid income; blue-collar job; pensions; 18 – 65.
I keep putting marketing projects in front of me to avoid fine writing.
Writing fiction is HARD.
It’s the second hardest thing I’ve ever done beyond raising my kids, and husband.
Marketing, helping companies, especially startups grow is engaging. Working with entrepreneurs, especially engineers, to find their targets, and create campaigns that sell their stuff is empowering.
But it ain’t like writing fiction.
My muse comes out and plays with me when I write fiction. She and I intertwine, not just intersect like with marketing. We make love. We fuck. She drives me harder and harder…to THINK, imagine, create. One idea follows another, in rapid succession at first, then quicker, breathtakingly fast the story strings itself together, not like beads or pearls, but a continual stream of light energy. I’m riding it as it illuminates each character in their own dynamic colors, some blending harmonically, others clashing grotesquely.
I’m never bored, or lonely making it with my muse.
So, WHY do I keep taking on marketing projects when I passionately LOVE writing fiction?
It’s not a money thing. Not anymore. I spent 6 yrs writing fiction, produced four full length novels and a short story series, and haven’t made enough to pay for a family vacation to [pick your favorite vacation spot]. Marketing has always paid the bills. At this rate, at my age, money isn’t the driver preventing me from writing fiction like it was when I gave up fine writing to focus on my ‘real career,’ over 6 yrs ago now.
If it ain’t money, then I’m thinking it must be my ego preventing me from writing fiction. Beyond paying bills, making money is very validating! So is helping moms looking to become CEOs, or coders developing their latest SaaS—it’s fun turning entrepreneurs onto the knowledge they need to make their marketing work to grow their business.
But it ain’t the challenge of writing fiction.
Fiction requires my full attention. Total immersion into another space, another place, not the real one I’m in. So the real world needs to be VERY QUIET, so it doesn’t pull me out of the world I’m creating. And as I write this I’m watching a truck back up on the street, BEEPING and BEEPING as it backs into our driveway to deliver drywall to the studio we’re building out behind our home. The dog is BARKING and BARKING cuz there are installers outside, crossing back and forth through her yard. Then there is our neighbor across the street cutting down huge cedars that take over properties here in the Great Northwest. And the tree cutters tossing branches into the crusher RUMBLING and GRINDING the limbs to mulch. And our next door neighbor installing a new fireplace, after drilling out the old one all last week.
Real hard to travel to virtual places when the real world is so invasive!
Yeah, I’ve tried noise-canceling headphones, and those squishy orange ear-plugs, but they both irritate, and are distracting.
Three months ago, we moved from the overcrowding and noise of East Bay, S.F. to Woodinville WA. The name perfectly describes this place. Densely wooded. Being far from towns and freeways, with acres between homes, I’m hoping once the studio is finished I’ll have a quiet place to write fiction. But I feel scared, anxious about committing to fine writing again. I’m afraid I won’t have the focus, the stamina I’ll need to create cohesive, complex story, and characters that will linger, stay with the reader long after the read. Quiet or not, writing fiction is HARD.
I’ve committed to January 2021 to begin fine writing again.
But between commitment to some future reality and actual reality is the Grand Canyon…
I’m a guy’s girl, meaning I’ve spent most of my life hanging out with men instead of women. Like the freight train comin at ya, I prefer men’s straightforward nature, their directness, their unwavering, solution-oriented trajectory. Men are simpler than women. Not less intelligent, just not round-about, underneath, from behind.
Women, by contrast, are the poison in your food. Eons of subjugation have forced us to become puppet-masters to get what we want. Not a judgment call, simply a fact that until very recently might was right, and men assumed they controlled the household with superior strength—at first to kill the mastodon and be the provider of food, and in the modern world, until recently, be the supplier of money. Back as late as the 1990s, women were still, and believe it or not still are, the primary homemakers, caring for the kids, shopping for and preparing the meals…etc. In fact, 99% of all household product commercials still show the women cleaning up, even when the men create the mess.
Notice I said, “men assumedthey controlled the household.” Well, you know what happens when you ass (of) u (and) me…; -}
Seriously though, probably pretty early on, like cavemen times, women figured out how to get men to do what we want using our wiles—wits. Genetic transfer of memory over thousands of generations of women passing on how to be manipulative eventually became woven into our DNA and imprinted on our XX chromosomes.
Regardless of why women became…complex, the fact that we are scares me about us. Women don’t only manipulate men. Quite often our children, sometimes even our friends. I’d much rather face a freight train because if I’m paying attention I can get off the tracks before getting slammed. This also plays to why I’m a guy’s girl, why most of my friends have been men.
I knew I wanted kids for as long as I can remember. Two boys, I’d told any possible stakeholders, because boys are easier to raise. I now have two kids—a boy, 19, and a 16 year old girl, both of whom I’m madly in love with. Beyond proud, I’m humbled to know them. True to their ‘nature,’ my son is very direct with his feelings, practically the instant he feels something. He rarely lies, probably because he sucks at it, his facial expressions to the pause in his delivery clear indicators he’s not telling the truth or copping to. He’s a consummate whiner, but he respects the family rules and parental restrictions. My son is trustable, for which I’m eternally grateful.
My daughter, on the other hand, listens carefully, expresses just the right amount of contrition and understanding with every lecture, then does whatever she wants, whenever she wants, if she can get away with it. Went to kiss her goodnight a few nights ago and she was underneath her blanket watching Manga videos on her cellphone. She’d been viewing nightly since we took away her Kindle two weeks ago for watching videos on it instead of reading. Reading is all she’s allowed to do on the tablet, per our agreement when she got it for her birthday. (Is it too much to expect a 16½ year old to honor such an agreement when she gets plenty of electronics time on the weekends?)
While my son barely notices his reflection, my daughter spends hours in front of the mirror, preening. For eons a huge part of a woman’s value was/is defined by our physicality, so it’s natural, part of our nature now that our looks are important to us, or at the very least, more important to us than most men. My son likes violent movies. My daughter does not. She is deeply affected when families split up, or a parent or child dies in films, and even in books. Maternal instincts—reproducing and then caring for our offspring—is genetically encoded in our DNA. In fact, her reaction is not uncommon for most women.
Violent movies and video games are targeted at men because they are by far the predominant audience to engage with them.
Times truly are changing, though. Want part of a mastodon, a small ice-age relic? Buy one on Amazon. Most educated women who pursue a career path can pay their own way through life now, even if we still typically make less than men. Most of us don’t need a man’s support to survive, or even thrive. Technology, from the Pill to the personal computer has made it possible for women to control our own destinies, and function equally along side men in today’s business environments.
Sociological shifts in behavior are glacial, and true sexual equality is probably still a few generations in coming. Perhaps our great-grandchildren will share equal incomes, and split the household tasks of rearing the children to doing the dishes equitably as well.
From the dawn of man to present day the divide in humanity is not our race, religious orientation, education or income level. Our greatest division has been between men and women. I’m humbled to bear witness to a quantum shift in our evolution, that, for first time in our history, technology is providing us the ability to become an egalitarian race, and close this great divide.
jcafesin.com 