Rise Up

I don’t know about you, but I need a reason to smile.  With everything going on in the world around me, I’m not sure whether to put together a survival kit and start a revolution or to follow my heart to Australia and make it official.  What on earth is happening?  Where am I?  It’s like that one time I had too much Corona and woke up in the basement with a ferret.  How did this even happen and who does this ferret belong to?  And yes, we should all be doing something about it but let’s be constructive shall we?  And by constructive I mean stop yelling at Bob with emojis on your friend from high school’s Facebook wall!!  That’s not how this works!  That’s not how any of this works!

Check your info.  Journalism has slowly taken up residency in the same land as chivalry and *69.  I read everything with a bit of skepticism.  I don’t have any idea what to believe anymore.  Everyone has an objective, a bias, an ulterior motive, an alliance or a payback.  This isn’t me yelling ‘fake news’ from my podium, this is me legitimately concerned with the integrity of the media we so quickly believe to be true.  It has been proven that facebook and social media have algorithms that basically make certain articles and posts visible to you based on your likeliness to open the link.  It is custom designed for you!  Which sounds amazing until you realize how creepy and intrusive it actually is.  It would be like walking down the street and every billboard, every sign, every ad changing as you walked by and it’s like – I want to walk down the same street everyone else is walking on!  Why does her street look different than mine?  Imagine if you believed everything you read.  It’s about educating yourself and not being force fed information.

They’ve kept us divided.  They make sure of it.  When I say they, I mean the men and women behind the curtain.  The real puppeteers of this country.  The Olivia Popes.  The elite table.  We are where we are right now because of so much more than one man.  If we could only see that there is no blue or red, black or white because divided we will fall…every single time.  Did we learn nothing from Mighty Ducks?  Ducks fly together.  Did we learn nothing from the Notebook?  If you’re a bird, I’m a bird.  Stop focusing on what makes us all different and focus on what we have in common because THAT is how we will be a better and stronger America.

I know what you are thinking.  No, we aren’t going to agree on everything.  No one ever has in the history of ever.  But it makes me a little crazy that there are children in cages and all anyone can do is point fingers and argue over which administration’s and voter’s fault this is.  WHO CARES, let’s just fix it, shall we?  I was in an improv wrestling show and broke my arm on stage in front of a live audience.  I know…that sentence is a lot to digest.  Anyway, a member of the cast had to call my mom and explain the whole thing to her and let her know I was in the ER.  First thing out of Lakme’s mouth? – “What wrestling show?”  It’s like “MA!  Not the point!  Let’s deal with these broken bones and I’ll explain later!”  Oh man, I love that woman a lot.

Arguing over the past will never change it.  There’s nothing more infuriating than people discussing how we got to a problem.  It doesn’t matter.  We are here.  Let’s deal with the more urgent matter at hand.  I’m not gonna lie – I have been a giant troll on social media this week.  It’s free entertainment really but the arguing and vitriol and total lack of respect for one another is astounding and at the end of the day, you’ve accomplished NOTHING for it.  So bravo to everyone and anyone who has been wasting their time doing that…because from what I’ve gathered, no one is going on social media to be educated or learn from an adult waitress in California.

It’s legit every single movie, television show and book we have ever seen.  Enemies join forces to rise against a common enemy.  When will we stop seeing each other for the boxes we’ve been put in and start seeing one another as the accomplices we’ve been given.  The Capulets and the Montague’s ruined each other with their hatred and their preconceived notions and their carved perceptions, but imagine how powerful they would have been together.  Talk about the ultimate gang.  Romeo and Juliet fell in love when there were nothing but odds against them.  They were supposed to hate each other.  Why?  Because their mom and dad told them to?  Because the history books told them to?  It honestly never says why exactly any of them are fighting, just that there is a feud and bad blood and common feelings of hatred.  What is in a NAME?  How can you possibly think you know everything you need to know about someone because of it?  Not all priests are bad men but there are bad priests.  Not all Republicans are gun-owners but there are gun-owning Republicans.  Just take everything you think you know about a person and throw it out the window because until you actually take the time to get to know someone…you know nothing Jon Snow – who also fell in love with his enemy…and then his Aunt.  And if you don’t know, now you know.  That aired almost a year ago.

So, give me a reason to smile my fellow citizens.  I implore each of you to rise up.  To be better.  To demand the best of those around you.  To seek camaraderie where you assume derision, to search for similarities where we’ve been taught nothing but rivalry, to find the light in this mighty tunnel we find ourselves.  Here’s just a little something I found while I was hardcore trolling this week that I implore you all to think about:

The people who sheltered Jews in hidden rooms and attics and basements during the Holocaust were breaking the law.  The people who smuggled 7,000 Jews out of Denmark were breaking the law.  Schindler was breaking the law.  The   Underground Railroad broke the law.  Harriet Tubman broke then law.  MLK Broke the law.  Hell, the Boston Tea Party broke the law.

If saving friends and family and the innocent is breaking the law…break it. If standing up for truth and justice is breaking the law, break the fucking law.  When the law is unjust and the law is morally wrong. Break it.

This isn’t me trying to make same grand political statement at all.  Literal food for thought.  We are a nation of immigrants, never forget that.  I’m not saying it should be a free for all, but it shouldn’t be this.  It should never be this.  Lady Liberty must be so disappointed.  Granted she was a gift from France, she is a symbol of freedom and acceptance and open arms.  We can do better.  In the words of Cher Horowitz, “It does not say RSVP on the statue of liberty!”