I am trying to think and participate again. I took some time as I have often done, to recover from health issues that I never really recover from. I write privately and that allows me to process over time. Blogging is more of a think- a- bit, ponder some more, then participate, if I think I might have a thought worth offering. There’s a saying: Use it or lose it.
So, I am considering, based on my last post, what is the difference between Nixon’s, Reagan’s and Trump’s era? A few things come to mind.
The use of the internet,
QAnon and conspiracy theories.
Religious &/or spiritual belief doctrines of good vs. evil/ the end-times.
A global pandemic.
I think perhaps these and likely others, contributed to the nightmare of Trump and how one man was able to come down an escalator and take over. Not just once. Again though, it wasn’t just one man.
From The Gaslight Report substack article by Frank George PhD re: Trump, his narcissism, dementia and the people around him. I am not sure how to link a substack article, so if interested please do a search. (I think I have successfully figured out how to link to it.) A frequent comment about those around Trump and about those who still support him is “Why?” How does this happen? I’ve witnessed narcissism in my own family as well as dementia. The article hits home.
“[…]
Collective Narcissism: How One Man Becomes A System
Here’s the part that keeps people stuck: they still think this is just about Trump.
It isn’t.
[…}
On the other hand, Trump is surrounded by people who, in any other system, wouldn’t be given crayons, let alone given power. This includes Vance, Rubio, Noem , Hegseth, RFK Jr., Miller, Vought, and more!
[…]
They watch what works.
They see that escalation wins attention.
They learn that humiliation gets applause.
They discover that cruelty can be fun and powerful.
So they copy it.
What begins as one man’s narcissism becomes collective narcissism.”
A collection of some of my comments on Nan and Ark’s blogs in light of the recent death of Renee Nicole Good.
Has anyone thought about this from a gender point of view? I think of femicide. How dare this woman ignore my orders or direction? Who does she think she is? Do what you’re told or else? Hey lady, I’m a big shot now and you must obey me and do what you’re told.
Nan, I can’t watch the video. It’s a trauma thing for me, but I was able to read, and I have certainly listened in on some podcasts. But you know, there was just something about this that reminded me of male on female domestic abuse. Especially as we consider the declining status of women in the U.S. right now as to their rights. I mean the topic of discussion is huge but I just wondered if anyone for a moment thought about this angle.
Thank you Scottie for chiming in. I am still trying to gather my thoughts. Remember when Trump called the woman journalist Piggy? “Quiet Piggy” he said. He pointed his finger in her direction/face. I was sick to my stomach when he leaned into that finger. To myself I said: Ugh. It’s going to get worse from here. Not that he hasn’t always been hateful towards women, but this seemed far more hateful and purposeful. ‘Shut up woman.’ How many of us were raised in religious and/or cultural patriarchy? We witnessed it with our own lives and were gaslit our whole lives to not speak, to doubt our senses. We lived/live in fear. It is true that our past highlights our present. Regarding consequences. Trump has yet to face them, these people (his followers his ICE agents and others) are emboldened. Consequences? There are no consequences.
… Zoe ~rautakyyrautakyy: “I would not be surpriced if misogyny played, if not a conscious role, a subconscious behavioral model anyway. “Zoe: I returned to say this. The “subconscious” part. Thanks for adding that into the discussion. 🙂1
… Zoe ~rautakyyKnowing now, that he referred to her as a ***king *itch, after he shot her, one wonders, had he shot a man, would he have bid them farewell in the same manner?
3 days ago
Malignant narcissist = I am “God.”
I suppose he could be both. I believe it likely he is a malignant narcissist, with declining brain matter and the fear part is narcissistic collapse on top of his life-long grandiosity (a narcissistic personality trait.)
Are people suggesting that Good took off after being shot in the head at point blank range, 3 times, that she was still with it and purposely said, oh shit I need to get the hell out of here and hit the gas?
I would suggest people look up the term “decerebrate posturing” if they think Good had anything to do with accelerating with holes in her brain.
(I would like to add to that last line: “willfully/consciously/intentionally” accelerating.)
Conversation/opinions remind me of the women who are silenced or blamed for their abuser’s crime against them.
You should have been quiet.
If you had just behaved in a proper manner. Do what you are told.
There are proper things you could have done to save yourself, said to every dead woman, after the fact.
Was it a mistake for her to volunteer as a legal observer?
Should we all stay in our homes and watch humans dragged away because Trump, Noem, Vance and the associated party become judge and jury?
Trust me the man with the mask says. Get out of your car. I have no jurisdiction over you but damn it women get out of the ******* car now.
She smiles at him. Abusers often rage when they think a woman is mocking them. Their rage can escalate. By this time their pre-frontal cortex goes off-line and no longer informs their actions. That woman emasculated me and there will be a knee-jerk reaction that I am entitled to.
There is a part of me that wonders if she knew she was dead and forgave him with her last words. Knowing that in those moments, his life on earth would be hell for him. In other words, one way or another, he will face his own accountability, whether justice prevails or not. Her kind words will haunt him.
Oh, for Pete’s sake, Zoe, with all due respect 🙏, go argue with the lamp-post. I’ve got no time for this. This is nothing but silly. I am not judging you. You have no need to judge me, either. I’ve a VERY busy week or so ahead of me, with very important family time. My mother just died. I haven’t got time.
I found later that Terri commented and apologized.
It’s always interesting that people appear to want to engage and when you do they get upset.
You know, I found the lamp-post quite illuminating.
They will tear it all down. If they can tear it down before you leave them, they will. They will win at all costs. Without self-reflection, the narcissist will continue with destruction and blame it on everyone but themselves. Taking a wrecking ball to history, they erase their guilt and shame (that they usually are not aware of) and build a new fantasy. A new reality based on a story only they and their enablers can control. In this way, they become eternal. They grin with cruelty and revenge knowing even after they are gone, they have left a permanent scar on what was.
Do a search for Jared Rand. I really don’t want to put a direct link.
This is the stuff that mom is in to.
There is not a time during my visits with her that she doesn’t bring up these med beds. We can already cure cancer. These beds are in the basements of hospitals just waiting to be used. Isn’t it terrible that they use mustard gas on cancer patients. Imagine that. Mustard gas. The poison they used in the war.
This isn’t anything new really. Way back when mom got into Sylvia Brown stuff. Read all of her books. Believed in her 100%. When I would discuss with her that others had been harmed by her failed work she would tell me that those people are just evil.
Jump ahead some more years and as I’ve mentioned here before and perhaps have moved into my password-protected or private mode, The Golden Age of Gaia became her sure foundational belief. As she talked about it with me and her sisters, I remarked that much of what she was saying reminded me of my days in the church. That didn’t go over well.
Along the way, I picked up various phrases she would say that led me to believe she believed she was not going to die. Ever. There was always this edge to her that she was not leaving. She wouldn’t have to. The cures are there AND the alien benevolent light-bearers would over-ride the evil when humanity finally got their shit together. Much like the Christian rapture predictors, the new agers have their end-times stuff too. Or perhaps an easier way to look at it is to say, finally the new-times will arrive but, everything must be in order first. So they too have their dates when the aliens are arriving or the new cures will be known or the universe will align. Just like the rapture folk, when it doesn’t come to be they simply blame evil and wait until the next enlightened soul gets back from Neptune or Mars with a new date channeled from yet another archangel. You get my point I’m sure.
As mom now watches those around her die, she’s still here and to her that means she’s one of the chosen. Like the Christians who will be raptured. Chosen. She won’t have to die. She won’t be caught up in the clouds like the Christians. She’ll just be here in time to hop into a med bed pod and be regenerated.
During my recent visit with her she again just threw-out there that “it will happen.” That’s why I’m still hanging around she’ll say.
She’s waiting.
I listen to her. I don’t fight with her. I don’t agree with her. When she says I know you’ll laugh at me, I don’t laugh. I smile. Not because of her beliefs but because she says this a lot which tells me maybe along the way she’s wondered too if none of this makes sense. But mom is desperate for hope and healing and she hasn’t reached it on her own or in connection with any in the family or with professionals. She only looks at the future and cannot land in the present other than to mock that which is the present.
I tend to think my mission is to love her where she’s at. I know what it is to be desperate and need hope and healing. I know what it is like to have the structure all around you that was suppose to be your sure foundation, crack and crumble. I know what it is like to scramble around in vulnerability hearing messages from other humans that tell you they’ve got the answer. I know what it is like to feel crazy. I know what trauma can do to you.
It’s difficult though not to try to lovingly counter her. Any countering is seen by her as rejecting her. Of course that’s a lot like Christianity too isn’t it. Leave the faith and friends and family take it personally. They reject Christ then they reject you. Mom is like that. She once said, “Why don’t my children believe me?”
I’d like to ask her what age she’ll chose to be when she hops back into the med bed pod. I wonder, has she thought this through. Would she pick 30 and have some more babies? Would she pick 20 and chose not to ever have babies? What if she could regenerate but we her children decided to just go ahead and finish out our days and die a natural death? Would she be able to handle that? What might happen if she reaches the age of 90 and just as she thinks she’s next in line for the pod, the powers that be decided there are too many others ahead of her desperate for regeneration and healing. Children with cancers. Wouldn’t they maybe take precedent over her? What if there’s just too many people in line and she doesn’t get to be healed. I shake my head a bit like I’m trying to wake up from delving into this mess. I am curious. But does curiosity out-weigh just letting her be and let her think she’s right.
I’ve been by the bedsides of so many people who have died. I’ve helped so many people on their journey at the end. I’ve listened. I’ve chatted. I’ve honoured wishes and advocated for people with their doctors, nurses and other hospital staff. I never challenge their beliefs in any way.
A family member who knows I refer to myself as an atheist, marvels at how I do that? How can someone who doesn’t believe in God help them die? I tell her it’s not my responsibility to tell them what to believe or judge their beliefs. I’m there to honour their journey as a fellow human on this planet.
Zero to eighty happens in a cosmic second. I can’t change anything in between. The in between is over. It’s gone. I can’t vouch for the future or the after-life or what might be. I can muse about it but my character and integrity hold me to a standard of simplicity. If I’m with you when you die I will honour you as a human being who is here and soon won’t be.
Originally wrote this in August 2018 and it is in private mode along with the comments that I am not posting here. It’s amazing to reflect. Pre-covid, pre-the return of Trump and my foresight that maybe stuff we write online could get us into trouble at the border. I wasn’t paranoid after all.
Trump?
Every single day I think to myself, “Donald Trump? . . . really?” Many mornings I ask Biker Dude, is he still President? We’re suppose to go to Florida this winter and I don’t even want to go because of Trump. I want to go because of beaches and warmth and sunsets but even the beaches in southwest Florida are teaming with dead aquatic life poisoned by the red tide. I have breathing issues so if the tide is bad I won’t even get to the shoreline. Even crossing into the states via Michigan gives me anxiety. (Will they check to see my online comments about him and turn me away?) Thinking about how he’s reversing almost everything Obama put in place including environmental protections and I think, “Really Americans? Really, you’re going to keep this guy in the white house even longer?” (Yes I know. Not all Americans.)
I know I’ve said this to Biker Dude before. All this reminds me of church. I listened today about how Evangelicals are giving Trump a pass when it comes to his immorality, especially Evangelicals like the current vice-president who was all up in everyone’s face about President Clinton and his immorality. So it’s confusing people. Why aren’t they all in a tizzy about Trump’s immorality and ethics? I’m looking at the t.v. and saying to myself, “because they themselves are up to their zippers in immorality.” Not only are they protecting their president, they are laying their own ground work to protect their own hides when the #metoo shit hits their genitals.
Gaslighting. OMG, off the charts in the church and well, off the charts in politics too. You do not see what you see, you do not smell what you smell, you do not feel what you feel, you do not hear what you hear, that’s not what I said, well it might be what I said but it’s not what I meant.
Fatigue. I remember the exhaustion that accompanied my church life. The constant neuro-negotiating I had to do every moment of every day and night, trying to sort out all the Biblical stuff, the church stuff, the ministry stuff, the interpersonal relationship stuff and the list goes on and on. After years of it, it’s like one becomes robotic, unfeeling and literally zombified. <- (Yikes, that’s an actual word? Spellcheck didn’t object.) There’s such a danger of falling prey to the hypnotic exhaustion that before one realizes it, the frog is cooked never having noticed at all that the water was getting hotter. And yes, well a frog is cold-blooded Zoe. We’ll notice before it’s too late. I reply, ‘Will we?’
Lying. Daniel Dale is a Washington correspondent for the Toronto Star. He’s keeping track of the lies that Trump tells. I’m not sure anyone cares. I know people do but the recording of those lies doesn’t reach the Trumpet’s at all. They don’t give a shit what a left-leaning crazy liberal (Canadian) thinks at all (I have no idea of Daniel’s actual political leanings). But isn’t that what everyone is who isn’t a Trumpet? The lying in church. My goodness it was rampant AND it was okay. It was okay if in the end Christ was exalted and the people swam into the minnow trap. All for Jesus. A former best friend bemoaned my chastising of her having an affair with a pastor, a married man, she herself a married woman. She moaned and groaned that she didn’t want him revealed because he did such wonderful work for the Lord. One of the last conversations I had with her I told her that they had already ruined their work for the Lord. Don’t even get me started on her.
Enemies. Stand up to them and they slice and dice you and feed you to the crocs and I don’t mean the rubber sandal. Trump turns on you even if you were a friend at first. Church. Turned off the filming and recording of the service (back then it was televised) and we were skewered. This is immediately after we handed in our resignations of our youth ministry positions. Confront your former best-friend for the last time and she leaves you in a pile of sawdust on the floor that only your carpenter husband could somehow put back together.
Threats. Hell-fire all around. Do what I say or I’ll blow you to smithereens like never before in history. You’re in danger of losing your salvation says the once saved always saved preacher. You’re an abomination to God says the former best friend.
Is this getting long? Quick look. Yup. Long.
I have zero expectation that anything I ever say will end someone’s belief in their God. Not my goal or purpose. That alone belongs to the individual. ~ Zoe
Secular Wings 