The Not-Mystery of the Basic B$tch

I cannot say what makes a mystery...

or doesn't...

except to say: 'formulas' are not 'mysteries'.

The Not-Mystery of the Basic B$tch

There are no mysteries. You know: unknowns. There is only (a) what's known, hidden from you, (b) by a stranger or a someone not a stranger (c) or a you, yourself.

*

So there's a woman knocking at the door. Why? Why not no one? Why is there a stranger at the door?

But I don't ask the someone at the door: why. Because I know something the stranger doesn't: she won't tell me the truth. Not because the truth is unknown. Not because the truth is a 'mystery'.

Because the someone knows. Why she is knocking at my door.

I don't ask because the truth is her secret. Withheld from me to keep me in the dark. As if darkness is hers to impose.

*

So there's a man who sits accused in a courtroom. Why? What's happened? What compels a man to be so publicly addressed?

Who's to say? The accused? I don't ask the accused: why. Because I know what everybody knows: the accused won't tell anybody the truth. Not because the truth is unknown. Not because the truth is a 'mystery'.

Because what's happened, happens: not by everybody squeezing their eyes shut; not by everybody tying their hands to their sides and fixing their feet to the ground; not by everybody zipping their lips with tossed invisible keys.

Because see-nothings and do-nothings and speak-nothings do not exist except insofar as fictions that secret the truth behind nothings.

*

So there's someone who starts 'it'. Why? Why not no one? Who, after all, starts a war?

It's unjust and terrible and of all wretched human acts, the worst. Every. Single. Time. Still: why? why? why? we ask.

Not because the truth is unknown. Not because the truth is a 'mystery'. Because life is fragile and cheap. As for sacred:

What's sacred about molecules? Their mere existence? Still: we profess 'our truths' like knives of blamelessness at each other's throats. As if grace forgives us... our dishonesties.

*

There are no mysteries. You know: unknowns. There is only (a) what's known, hidden from us, (b) by a stranger or a someone not a stranger (c) or an us, ourselves.

Addendum

I am, on the one hand,

disappointed that The Not-Mystery of the Basic B$tch is not a familiar 'story', much less a 'formula' 'mystery'. 

But I am, on the other,

not confounded.

By the time its audience appreciates the thrill of its puzzle: not only is it the case that a familiar 'story' was never a 'mystery', not really, afterwards, it will never 'again', dumbfound its audience.  

*

Such that what we enjoy

is not-mysteries after all.

*

But life, unlike a genre or procedural or category, doesn't present not-mysteries as 'formulas'. A woman. A man. A someone. A knock. A trial. A war. The telling that entertains

is make believe.

In reality, to know what's known, hidden from us, by a stranger or a someone not a stranger or an us, ourselves -

is our not-mystery to solve.

*

The not-mystery of who to trust. With ourselves. With our honesty. With being kind.

The not-mystery of who to vote for. Because lives worth living are not created by human beings who don't give a f*ck, sh!t, or d@mn.

The not-mystery of who to stand with. As if standing 'as one with our own' without a moral compass... is who we are and what we do.

Because the 'formula' for 'basic' is, in the end, unoriginal and...

unexceptional.

M 

*

Notes

(i) The title of this post is The Mystery of the Basic B$tch. However, I appreciate that such title is, in a sense, misleading. With that in mind, the published title of this post is The Not-Mystery of the Basic B$tch.

Note that my title references Lisa Jewell's None of This Is True: A Novel for reasons that are plain and self-evident. 

(ii) The not-mystery of the 'basic b$tch' or 'normative @ssholery' isn't why.

Id est: (a) ignorance, delusion, and rejection doesn't make conventional antipathy, hostility, and wrongdoing not exist; (b) blaming everything and everyone but oneself and one's own doesn't make oneself and one's own right and everything and everyone else objectionable; (c) deciding final solutions are the only way to act doesn't make such decisions the only legitimate means to acceptable ends, etc. 

Which is to say, the not-mystery of the 'basic s$gma' or 'prescriptive @ssholery' is what. we. make. so.

(iii) My 'truth to power'

to the powerful who are teeming masses is: there are truths to be told; to the powerful who are inheritors of aristocracy, who govern institutions and legacies is: there are truths to be told; to the powerful who are extremists, who employ cruelty and malice is: there are truths to be told

because power is not above truth.

My 'truth to power'

opposes the reasoning that there exists an inherent 'right' to power through (a) a so-called 'divine right' that abuses the conditions and exploits the loopholes of representative government, (b) corruption and contempt of truth, and/or (c) the 'will' of make believe, whether such make believe is a so-called 'privilege' of (i) 'ideology' or (ii) 'faith' or (iii) so-called 'right' to lie with bona fide 'impunity'.

(iv) There is no 'mystery' to a future that furthers goodness; there is plainly:

action that advances such future or action that ensures such future is dead-on-arrival or inaction that robs the future of its potential to be more than

basic.

M

The Quiet Part Aloud

Leaving [fill in the blank] on the table

does not say the quiet part aloud, but rather,

is the quiet part aloud.

The Quiet Part Aloud

What?

Which is to say,

in other words:

a) what am I talking about, b) why does it matter, and c) what in the Sam Hill does it have to do with you?

*

If you really have no idea, ask Alexa or Siri or Google: "I leave $5 billion on the table."

(attribution: Brian Cox as 'Logan Roy' in the Season 3 finale of Succession (December 2021))

That

is 'leaving money on the table'.

*

But 'leaving [fill in the blank] on the table' isn't about a pile of billions on a pile of billions. It's about fear of missing out. On steroids.

*

It's about the lengths of the hustle.

If you really have no idea, ask Siri or Alexa or Google: "This city, this whole country, is a strip club: you got people tossing the money and people doing the dance."

(attribution: Jennifer Lopez as 'Ramona Vega' with the last word of Hustlers (September 2019))

That

is as if not hustling is 'leaving money on the table'. 

*

As if only fools walk away from [fill in the blank].

*

If that 

is 'this whole country' as 'Ramona' quips - if that 

is 'winning' as 'Logan' crows -

the quiet part aloud

is the real world

where you and I live.

*

If you really have no idea, ask Google or Siri or Alexa: 'ProPublica Tracking PPP'.

(attribution: over $800 billion U.S. Small Business Administration 'forgivable loans' ('closed' June 2021) appropriated by the 116th U.S. Congress (2020) and the 117th U.S. Congress (2021))

[fill in the blank]

For some of you, an election is far from your mind.

But

for some of you, a consequential opportunity to exercise our vote is asking us: who to trust and what to believe and why this or that matters.

Where we live,

everyone knows leaving anything on the table is not an option.

*

Winning is why 'Logan' leaves nothing on the table. Everyone's a hustler is why 'Ramona' leaves nothing on the table. Me?

Do you wonder what kind of world 'Logan' lives in? Or 'Ramona'? What kind of world 

yokes everyone to self-interest, exceptional and exclusive? What kind of world

makes paying for greed, indifferent and swollen, 

the price of living?

*

That world is the real world -

but 

that world is not the whole world.

*

Here, 

we leave nothing on the table because elections matter. And

we leave everything on the table. Because

walking away from what does not matter is the difference between believing in that world and making that world -

not the whole world.

*

If you really have no idea, I ask:

bailout beggars: what kind of world,

hustlers: what kind of world,

cut throats: what kind of world,

you:

what kind of world

do you believe in? And what kind of world

are you making? Because the real world 

is made by you.

 

 

Preface to the Addendum, a Case

As for: a) what am I talking about, b) why does it matter, and c) what in the Sam Hill does it have to do with you?

A case.

Addendum, a Case

In the real world, an ova bearer is at the mercy of reproductive potential

only

insofar and when

the law forbids

advancements in reproductive knowledge

from being exercised by the will of an ova bearer.

As if

'the mercy of reproductive potential'

nullifies the agency

of an ova bearer,

because the law forbids

all potential but that of reproductive potential

be afforded 'agency'.

As if

each and every single-celled ova possesses,

in the absence of real material will, 'agency'

per a right

denied each and every multi-celled ova bearer actually possessed of free will.

*

This is the real world,

where we live.

Here,

where ova bearers are nurses and teachers, military defense technologists and national security operatives, presidents and prime ministers. Where, moreover,

each and every ova bearer

matters less than a single-celled ova,

according to deciders of opinions who would rather 'we the ova bearers' not be free of the prison of reproductive potential.

*

As if a prison is not a prison, because a prison is

'a welcome joy', 'a divine favor', 'a gift of servility',

with a coin toss, a millisecond tap or swipe on a mobile device, a game of Russian roulette, that is to say, 

'sacred'.

*

To oppose the multitude that would throw away my dignity for their 'belief', is to leave nothing on the table.

Because there is nothing 'reasonable' about the prison of reproductive potential,

here,

where the so-called 'reasonable' theft of my dignity is the 'choice' of so-called 'faithful loyalists'.

*

To wit:

Vote for nurses and teachers, military defense technologists and national security operatives, presidents and prime ministers. Vote for not holding ova bearers back from their potential. From opportunities and accomplishments. Beyond reproducing reproductions. Vote for not upholding deciding opinions that strip ova bearers of their dignity to possess agency over their organs.

Oppose a world that yokes everyone to the inevitable and unsurprising consequences of the quiet part aloud. The kind of world where bailout beggars and hustlers and cut throats, live. The real world. Where we the people pay the price. That is me. And. That is you.

M

*

Postface to the Addendum, a Case

To be unafraid of the quiet part aloud,

is not shameless crowing: 'I am the victim!'

that is audible and visible,

everywhen and everywhere.

To be unafraid of the quiet part aloud,

is seeing the naked emperor

and knowing 

The emperor is a fraud. The tailor that the emperor employs to prove the unparalleled virtue of the emperor, is a fraud. The coterie that spins trifling spectres tirelessly in service to the emperor, makes this world, 'real'. The ruled who go along with this world, make leaving nothing on the table, 'what matters', everyhere and everynow.

*

After all,

the quiet part aloud is clear and present.

Neither a lie nor a fraud, is sacred;

only the truth, is sacred. 

M

The Human Solution

There's a question of who's to blame that misses the human solution.

The Human Solution

I. For example:

Religion is broken.

Which is to say, the bodies that govern the institution of religion are rife with errors, from sexual abuse of 'the least' and invisible to financial abuse by 'the most' and visible. Because duh. Because flawed human beings are everywhere and no bodies that govern the institution of religion are immune from the so-called 'charms' of the influential and wrong.

But to say 'religion is broken' is not the same as saying: good is broken.

In other words, sweeping evidence of a broken institution of rules governing the followers of deity is not a judgment as to the realness of deity.

*

But there are those who would you believe this is undoubtedly what 'religion is broken' says aloud. And such those would you further believe 'deity is not dead' is a rallying cry worth mobilizing for.

To be an army of sanctimonious 'righteousness'.

Because it should be plainly obvious that the solution to 'religion is broken' isn't amassing a mob of axes-to-grind-ers and bones-to-pick-ers who deliver apologias as if apologists are what believers are.

*

This solution is the human solution. 

*

II. For example:

Media is broken.

Which is to say, insofar as commercial financing and liability protections conscribe the institution of news reporting, survivability looms like a proverbial elephant, from newswires to media publishers. Because duh. Because an enlightened audience is not the bottom line; measurable profitability is.

But to say 'media is broken' is not the same as saying: honesty is broken.

In other words, an excess of casual entertainment masquerading as factual revelations is not a conclusion as to the trustlessness of communication.

*

But there are those who would you believe the in-the-know know what 'media is broken' unquestionably means. And such those would you further believe 'alternative facts' are worth catechizing.

As if imagined 'realities' and contrived 'information' are not fabulations but bona fides.

Because it should be plainly obvious that the solution to 'media is broken' isn't unleashing engines of brutish counterfeit rage in defense of ceaseless minutes hate. 

*

This solution is the human solution.

*

III.  To wit:

The human solution is neither compelled nor controlled,

by external will or power.

*

The human solution is instead, the exercise of free will

not bent towards goodness,

with nothing and no one to blame but the freedom to manifest intention sans ever mind.

*

So what is responsible for, say, mistreatment on the basis of label or faith? As in the hollowing of health care according to faith or label never mind need or moral principle otherwise avowed? Or rather, who's to blame for the freedom to manifest intention is broken?

The answer is the free whose will not bent towards goodness is a will to be human. Or rather, the human solution.

Addendum

IV. For example:

Arms bearing is broken.

Which is to say, when arms bearing becomes a license in perpetuum to murder en masse, arms bearing is broken. Because duh. Because the well-being and welfare of human beings within a nation's borders isn't a matter of upholding a domestic war so much as upholding a domestic peace.

But to say 'arms bearing is broken' is not the same as saying: guns kill or people kill.

Because so long as willful insecurities and fears drive the stockpiling of sickeningly abundant and foolproof tools of human slaughter, such nation's people will be locked unwittingly within games of Russian roulette, played at incalculable loss. 

*

These are but a few examples selected for their illustrative value within a constraint of brevity that are by no means exhaustive in sum or in part.

Because duh.

With that being said, being human is not inevitable and the human solution is not surprising.

Being something more than human, that, is surprising.

In the beginning, I believed in what was not inevitable and I believed in what was surprising. In the end, I still believe. What do you still believe?

M