Piling on Pyres

Piling on pyres isn't new or original or exceptional and it cannot be ignored. Not for what it is, what it effects, and what it intends.

Piling on Pyres

What's already been said doesn't need to be said again.

But you wouldn't know that by little flames everywhere.

Those little flames everywhere would have you see: no flame die. But they would be wrong. Flames do. Flames have. Flames will.

Because oxygen isn't forever.

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Each of us is powerful. As bellows and pokers. As dousers and extinguishers. For every fire everywhere, each of us is responsible:

for doing something.

Because doing nothing is doing something. It's not dousing and it's not extinguishing. It's being a bystander who inacts. It's being an observer who ignores. And:

it's being present and walking away.

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That's not to say that that isn't how we got here. Because of course an arrangement that enshrines flame wars is baiting and piling on and baiting and piling on, to the rhythm of ticket punching and dues paying. 

That's to say: and...?

That that's what is done, that that's what has been done since before our time, that that's what will be done for all time is no acquittal of responsibility. 

It's an indictment of all we burn to the ground: for what?

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As if every consequence doesn't matter:

except one.

As for every other consequence? Fate, fixed and immovable, dispossesses us of our hand in every fire that breaks us. That is to say, a will not our own, relieves us of blame.

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Consequently: here is where we are. Teacups ablaze. Bonfires roaring with torched matchsticks. Mega fires raging across swells of masses.

It's nobody's fault.

It is what it is. 

Then what? So what? Really?

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When hearing with our own ears is nothing is heard and seeing with our own eyes is nothing is seen

what's already been said is echoed and amplified without friction and little flames everywhere are lit and emboldened without resistance.

Regardless of whether obliviousness or indifference or ruthlessness or hatred are to blame, each of us is responsible for every consequence of

what baiting and piling on and baiting and piling on is, what baiting and piling on and baiting and piling on effects, and what baiting and piling on and baiting and piling on intends.

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Because

ignorance and ignoring how we got here isn't bliss; no more than how we got here is innocent. To the extent that the future is written here and now, 

what do pyres write?

Note

As for

"Piling on pyres isn't new or original or exceptional and it cannot be ignored. Not for what it is, what it effects, and what it intends."

When (i) we bewail the current state of affairs as if such state of things is new and terrifyingly so; (ii) we incite flame wars as if it is extraordinary to immolate each other; and (iii) we applaud ourselves as if the worst is exceptional; (iv)

we ignore what cannot be ignored:

(v) our agreements that enshrine flame wars; our culpability for every fire that breaks us; and what we get

 when that which we aspire to, takes our cake and eats it too.

M

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Author's Note

When what threatens "life as we know it" is a fantastical figment of imagination, what "saves" life as we know it is a fantastical figment of imagination too.

Meanwhile, what threatens real life is not a fantastical figment of imagination. It's people who follow "violence resolves conflict." It's people who follow "money is everything." It's people who follow "freedom vetoes rule." 

Whether such violence assaults or imperils; whether such conflict is cultural or political. Whether such tenet exonerates hustlers who defraud what's fair game or tax shelter schemes that dodge accounting or material and immaterial currency boosted by baiting and piling on and baiting and piling on. Whether such freedom is tacit free will or upheld "right;" whether such rule is tacit norm or upheld "law."

Such that what saves real life is not a fantastical figment of imagination. It's people who with their own ears hear and who with their own eyes see: wrongdoing isn't nothing. No more than ignoring wrongdoing through obliviousness or indifference or ruthlessness or hatred, is good.

Such that when we follow "escape is real," (i) we are not investing in real lives, (ii) we are reducing energy, resources, and bandwidth towards addressing real people, and (iii) we are gamifying ignorance and ignoring real realities.

As if no one is answerable for pledging not our problem as our guiding virtue in all matters that threaten real life here and now.

M