Let's Talk About Mental Health, But Let's Not Say Anything Meaningful About It

End the stigma. End the persecution. End the long decades of rotting lives at the bottom being forgotten and ignored. But whatever you do, don't point out how mental health has been adversely affected by the modern world, because that's where we make our profits. Let's not stigmatize the status-obsessesed, the oversharers, the internet addicts, sociopaths, borderline sociopaths, the narcissists, the identity fetishists... in short let's just change the perception by stating that it's not the ill person's fault they're ill, and give them a modicum of respect, and continue on our deranged way. Some day we'll all be mentally ill, if we aren't already.

So let's have a mental health awareness month, a couple corporate-backed mental health awareness movements every year, some nice infographics, some nice ads, some good progressive and compassionate copy. Let's take some real steps, let's end the crisis before it gets worse, or at least make a pretty big deal about acknowledging it. Just let's not pry into where it's coming from, or why more people than ever are getting ill. Keep condemning the suicides and the silence. Don't look over there at the causes: that way lies madness.

Poverty, mental illness, illiteracy, substance addiction, lifestyle addiction, non-normative sexuality (itself a freaky frontier that's easy to support especially if you want nothing to do with it but want to appear a progressive and compassionate person), and  megatons of other stuff. It's no longer anybody's fault. Those who declare it a function of individual responsibility, as well as those who declare it a function of societal responsibility, are entrenched in ideology. The truth is far simpler than anyone wants to acknowledge: they're all Bad Things. Mental illness is just a Bad Thing, that needs Attention, and requires Awareness. The problem is that mental illness not photogenic. It doesn't respond well to attention. It's really, really ugly and it's got deep roots and deeper pockets.

Health in general in decline. Increased incidences of diseases of affluence, first world problems like anxiety, a weakening breed finding new ways to pity itself. Dementia rears its ugly head. Cancer from years of worry-free high-living catching up to us. The natural, polluted world with its natural conclusions. Let's keep consuming so the economy doesn't falter. Let's not ask questions. Let's never wake up from our nightmare as it gets darker and darker.

People are less mindful than ever. Overconnected to everything via the internet. Bombarded with images of opulence and excess that they will never know, for which they are programmed to have an insatiable lust. Lost in meaninglessness, with false meaningfulness leading them astray. Conditioned to worship at the altar of Mammon. Real vs. VR. Terrorism vs War. Inequality is Solved. Internet sickness. Quality of Life. 12 Steps to a Better You. Fired by Text Message. 10 Cute Cats That Will Cure Your Blues. The Babylon System is winning, the world is changing, nobody seems to give a shit. Money rules everything, people with money call the shots, and most people believe their half-truths. Meanwhile a million unchecked distractions clamor for everyone's attention, and the individual (despite the hype of optimists) has never felt so insignificant in a world of Social Networks, Big Ideas, and Batshit Maniacs. There's no fucking respect, I'll tell ya.

In my opinion it's no mystery why people are getting all fucked up and sick. They can't police their own thoughts, they can't control their government and corporate sanctioned addictions to legal substances and activities, they can't escape without losing their future. People are generally more separated by technology than they are brought together by it. A whole generation is living a shitty, loveless, poor existence wrought by their elders and blamed on them – and I'm sure they'll turn out fine and well-adjusted despite this, but they take a sickening amount of shit from a world so unfair it's parodic. Suicides everywhere... a sinking quality of life, urban hellscapes, the decline of the natural world and a bunch of insane technofucks claiming we should divorce ourselves further from our roots, as if our current divergence isn't at least partly at fault for the insane clusterfuck we've wandered into. Jargon rules the day, but it never saved one life.

And the isolation. Alone in a sea of identity, tired of the cult of identity, feeling like nobody and nothing and stumbling through a life ruled by the pleasures of others and the whims of the greedy, powerful, and detached. Faces are masks, genuine humanity is in decline and retreating to the quiet places. Hope is dying along with mental healthiness. There is nobody to talk to, but everyone wants to speak out about how it isn't shameful to be mentally ill. Of course not, but the cure isn't in reinforcing the status quo, just like how all the cures to all of what ails us as a species are not in keeping things comfortably similar to 'how it is'. We don't want to look into what's harming us, like the obstinate addicts we are. Maybe things seem worse than they are, maybe I'm a shitty blogger and an alarmist, but things're bad enough and breeding vast populations of stunted narcissistic sociopaths incapable of human emotion or connection – populations in all age groups, not just the young tech-savvy millenials who already have tons of opprobrium piled onto them coupled with an increasingly grim outlook.

The world is increasingly soulless and irreal. Appearances have replaced qualities. Abandon all hope, because nobody gives a shit anymore. The pressure to succeed can only be met by dishonesty and combativeness, the competition is severe, the world is at the edge. Don't ask any questions. Don't step out of line. Don't live - exist. Just repost the memes, make those donations happen, and keep ignoring the people you know who are sinking, the people you pass on the street who are already sunk... keep your eyes on the newsfeed. Let the internet do the good works for you. This is the least self-aware era and it needs to be ripped violently in half by a comprehensive, blood-thirsty, no-prisoners satire before we destroy everything of value and premise our future on misery, ignorance, and disgust. The time to wake up is fast approaching, and a world of comatose automatons will greet it with indifference.

What the Rich Know that You Don't

You have to be rich to 'get' rich, if you know what I'm saying, and if you don't, you're probably a poor person. Here's some tips and ideas to get you started on becoming rich, because there is definitely enough for everyone on earth to be super annoyingly wastefully wealthy, and anyone telling you otherwise is a communist or loser.

How they're different from you: They're different, in qualitative ways, from people who are not wealthy, such as the middle class. Why is this? Read the linked article and get back. I can wait... So the point is obviously that the rich are simply a different breed, not plagued by the fear and uncertainty and the mentally-sapping contretemps of poverty.

You see, the world is actually quite fair if you're rich, so you can afford to make big gambles, wake up every day feeling confident, and do things that would make lesser mortals quiver with poverty-related fear and incompetence. It's not a function of exceptionalism written by a wanker kiss-ass, the article is trying to help you understand that you're poor because you're not as good.

They're different, end of story. The naysayers are a bunch of anxious and impecunious babies who like having their hands held by oversized governments and loudmouth hippies. Some day, hopefully, private security armies will give them what-for, and they'll realize they have to work and strive to be wealthy, and not spend their money frivolously.

Join the Culture: Do your time, immerse yourself in the culture, and be prepared to fight for your profits. Before long you'll be salivating at the announcement of layoffs and mergers, certain that the money being gouged out of the wealth of your country (nationalism is an outdated concept that only the middle class poor believe in) will end up in your bank account, ready to be moved offshore as soon as Big Brother turns his back. Information is your best ally, and you want the RIGHT information.

The mentality of fear is one that belongs to the underclasses, anyway. When you've got a yacht more than 60 feet long and a helicopter, do you really think some schmuck in a Corolla is going to be able to touch you? Not unless you get your town car snared in midtown traffic, and unless a big account is at stake, you shouldn't be there to begin with.

Do Your Research: You gotta help yourself first. You gotta understand certain things that poor people just don't seem to get, even after multiple applications of crippling poverty, minimal prospects, and curative destitution. Imagining that the cards are stacked against you is a fearful response not worthy of those worthy of riches. Seriously, if people just stopped being lazy and afraid, everyone could be wealthy. It's astoundingly simple and there are lots of books about it that were not written by snake-oil salesmen.

But, hey, you'll probably just sit there on the couch feeling sorry for yourself and imagining there's a certain way the world's run where decent living conditions are magically withheld from %80+ of all of humanity. Okay there, you red marxist fuck, why don't you go post on Tumblr about the %1 being a bunch of pathological parasites. See where that gets you, while the smart get going on a fantastic journey to wealth, power, and respect.

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Advertiser's Bowl: 2013 Edition ft. Existential Ennui

I don't have anything against the Super Bowl. It's a good reason to drink and eat too much and a great excuse for feeling like shit on Monday. What always puzzles me about it is how the Super Bowl Ad has become this huge event. Over the next week there will be Superbowl Ad Top 10s, reviews, and news segments. Most media output about the Super Bowl Ads will have the self-awareness of a gnat. I haven't been paying enough attention to say anything with certainty, but I think it's not really a high mark for society if the high-priced overpowering sports event of the year gets spectators who care more about the high-priced commercials and overpowering half time show. Ravens fans get to feel good, but then again: Baltimore's still going to have its problems, as will we all.

Each year, lately, people get psyched up for the Super Bowl's pricey, overblown, ridiculous commercials. Newscasts neglect problematic, boring stories for the innocent pleasures of the advertisement adventure. Meanwhile grown men have been sacrificing their bodies for... shit tons of money and a good start at fame. The themes seem to run together. There are always some 'innovative' ads, in the loosest sense of the word, but getting excited about innovative advertisement is like getting excited about a new model of taser. It's like getting excited about being in pro sports, but realizing that you may go to shit in the process: we should be so lucky to waste ourselves for such a prize.

For all their expense, commercials are generally devoid of value, promote unhealthy ideas, reinforce stereotypes, lie, cheat, flatter (in the basest sense) and bully the populace. Innovation? Most don't even have the good grace to be entertaining. This year Dodge released a high-quality, high-concept pro-farmer commercial so exceptionalist and baldly desperate that it almost touched the heart – but then again: Dodge is only another part of the dust bowl. What do farmers even matter when the whole proceedings only preach dust bowls?

In spite of all that craziness, I think by far the worst Super Bowl memory I have isn't an advertisement or the spectacular failure of a deserving team. No, my personal darkest moment is when Undercover Boss premiered after Super Bowl XLIV. It was stunning. What a brilliant PR move, but how absolutely disgusting to see something like that and then the uncritical, even positive response. This evil show was embraced. People were and still are enthusiastic about it. Advertainment, another slick evasion of issues such as predatory zero-sum business practices, income inequality, and the Recession. The smug laughter that inevitably results.

I think it's the kind of show that is okay to hate. I don't use the term evil lightly. Evil is a shared burden and all that, but it is okay to despise this goddamn show. It's  toxic, terrible, manipulative and the lack of popular critical response is a sad fact. It showed that soft power knew no bounds: it could take criminals, crooks, bullies and turn them into angelic, benevolent, personable superiors. I have no doubt the executive class is generally not evil, but their culture is not a healthy or positive one. I'm not an idealist to the point where I will deny the fundamental importance of business or industry, but the mere plight of the average modern person unsettles me. The way the earth – life – is used has gone far beyond the point where we can be unthinking and proud about it.

I don't get how such a transparently biased, exploitative show can still be on the air two years later. It is readily apparent that nobody has learned anything in the meantime, and that executives are just as wealthy and powerful as ever, what with the labor market wheezing and slumping like a dying hobo while the screaming middle class sinks. All you have to do to mask the dark side of capitalism is: videotape your choice of 'boss' talking about or doing awkward unsatisfactory work, in a sanitized and tightly scripted environment, edit to taste, pick some compelling underprivileged or overworked employees, wrap it up with a heartwarming situation, some cash prizes, and a teachable moment or two. Because the bosses do care: and no drudge's futile trudge through wage-slavery goes unnoticed and unrewarded.

Like any commercial, Undercover Boss delivers bias and sells misinformation. It meets minimum thresholds for propaganda. It portrays one point of view faithfully, and damn the rest – like the Simpsons, and many other fictional television shows. For instance: I joked some years ago about the five thousand dollar suit. Oh, hell. This is likely show money, which the boss gets to give out in order to humanize them (via #rotecharity). Sometimes an additional prize of changed terms of employment are entered into the bargain. Then tears. Let me tell you something about pathos: dollars alone don't make it convincing. The bosses cry crocodile tears, and the employees cry about the smug charity that will hopefully better their lives by some obscure fraction. 

I tell you of such scenes, not because I follow the show religiously but because I earnestly believe that that sort of indoctrinating pablum should be reserved for what are explicitly aired as advertisements. Undercover Boss contains enough slick reality-TV features to pass as a show, but that's a mask for what is really an advertisement for the same broad attitudes which have time and time again put the majority in the corner and the minority in comfort. At the end of each episode money changes hands, and nothing significant changes. The landscape of exploitation remains the same, and objecting to it still results in a defensive reaction from the world's largest, wealthiest, most powerful guilty party.

We keep worshiping opulence, and when it inevitably fails and bankrupts us, we find that consumerism is a sweetened abyss anyway. Everyone is sick with it. The rational mind knows* it is madness to overproduce, to hoard, and to waste – nevertheless: it's a race to the bottom and nobody can afford to miss out. There is only one way down.

(*or ought to, if it is at all thoughtful)