I Lived Through Collapse. America Is Already There.

[Arthur Brain]

I'll take "she was mad she was left to her fate on the decoy plane while Natalie got to hide in the catering truck with Trump" for 100, Alex.

Yeah, that had to penetrate the veneer...

 

[ok doser]

I'll take "she was mad she was left to her fate on the decoy plane while Natalie got to hide in the catering truck with Trump" for 100, Alex.

When you look up "rent free" in the dictionary there's a picture of you

 

[commonsense]

Never saw that, but there has to have been a point at which every person who stood behind him and clapped dutifully or knowingly lied through their teeth to prop up dear leader - there was that point where their integrity died. Took its last breath, and they knew it, and they let it die. That's on them. History will not be kind to them.

Sigh... Trump's done tremendous damage, but only as he was enabled by those who were willing to pervert their standards of what is right and what is wrong, putting Trump before their own morals.... That's on them.

 

[ok doser]

Sigh... Trump's done tremendous damage, but only as he was enabled by those who were willing to pervert their standards of what is right and what is wrong, putting Trump before their own morals.... That's on them.

It's a collapse!
A collapse I tell you!

 

[Arthur Brain]

Sigh... Trump's done tremendous damage, but only as he was enabled by those who were willing to pervert their standards of what is right and what is wrong, putting Trump before their own morals.... That's on them.

Yep, take JD Vance for example:

“Mr. Trump is unfit for our nation’s highest office,”

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/15/jd-vance-donald-trump-comments-00168450

I guess principles just don't compare to a lucrative political career...

 

[ok doser]

Look at this ridiculous nonsense coming across Lake America from our 51st State!

 

[ok doser]

It's a collapse!

A collapse I tell you!

 

[commonsense]

It's a collapse!

A collapse I tell you!

You seem to be harbouring an unhealthy fixation with this whole collapse thing. The collapse has begun, the collapse is ongoing, and the collapse is accelerating.

Wait, did you hear that? Like the rumbling of distant thunder? That wasn't thunder my friend...That's the bond market turning it's attention to your enormous national debt. Aye yi yi. Ominous... Still, we can't have all those billionaires inconvenienced with income tax and such...

Yuck, what's that stench I smell...? No it's not a pile of putrid skunks decomposing. It's the stench of corruption, corruption that flows from the White House on down, not unlike an overflowing septic tank. PU!

I invite other contributors to add their thoughts to this list of factors weighing on the US. I would be remiss, though, if I didn't at least mention the insufferable American hubris. Pride goes before a fall, or so I've heard!

It's really just the normal course of things. A society may rise, become very powerful and then decline and decay. Just like your president! When Trump was in China, Xi warned Trump to his face of the danger of falling into a Thucydides Trap. China rising, the US the contrary. It's unknown if Trump was even aware of what was being said.

Still, some good news. I heard somewhere that the state of NY won't let you buy ammo without a background check. Hopefully an extremely thorough, bordering on invasive, background check. Too many armed nutters running around already! Does this apply to everyone in the State or did you personally somehow attract the attention of the authorities?

 

[Arthur Brain]

You seem to be harbouring an unhealthy fixation with this whole collapse thing. The collapse has begun, the collapse is ongoing, and the collapse is accelerating.

Wait, did you hear that? Like the rumbling of distant thunder? That wasn't thunder my friend...That's the bond market turning it's attention to your enormous national debt. Aye yi yi. Ominous... Still, we can't have all those billionaires inconvenienced with income tax and such...

Yuck, what's that stench I smell...? No it's not a pile of putrid skunks decomposing. It's the stench of corruption, corruption that flows from the White House on down, not unlike an overflowing septic tank. PU!

I invite other contributors to add their thoughts to this list of factors weighing on the US. I would be remiss, though, if I didn't at least mention the insufferable American hubris. Pride goes before a fall, or so I've heard!

It's really just the normal course of things. A society may rise, become very powerful and then decline and decay. Just like your president! When Trump was in China, Xi warned Trump to his face of the danger of falling into a Thucydides Trap. China rising, the US the contrary. It's unknown if Trump was even aware of what was being said.

Still, some good news. I heard somewhere that the state of NY won't let you buy ammo without a background check. Hopefully an extremely thorough, bordering on invasive, background check. Too many armed nutters running around already! Does this apply to everyone in the State or did you personally somehow attract the attention of the authorities?

Seriously, when I hear about folk moaning about background checks, it makes me wonder what on earth they've got to hide. If they've got a clean enough history then they've nothing to worry about.

 

[JudgeRightly]

You seem to be harbouring an unhealthy fixation with this whole collapse thing. The collapse has begun, the collapse is ongoing, and the collapse is accelerating.

*ahem*

I Lived Through Collapse. America Is Already There.

Indi Samarajiva
A writer living in Colombo, Sri Lanka.


I lived through the end of a civil war. Do you know what it was like for me? Quite normal. I went to work, I went out, I dated. This is what Americans don’t understand. They’re waiting to get personally punched in the face while ash falls from the sky. That’s not how it happens.

This is how it happens. Precisely what you’re feeling now. The numbing litany of bad news. The ever rising outrages. People suffering, dying, and protesting all around you, while you think about dinner.

If you’re trying to carry on while people around you die, your society is not collapsing. It’s already fallen down.

I was looking through some old photos for this article and the mix is shocking to me now. Almost offensive. There’s a burnt body in front of my office. Then I’m playing Scrabble with friends. There’s bomb smoke rising in front of the mall. Then I’m at a concert. There’s a long line for gas. Then I’m at a nightclub. This is all within two weeks.

Today I’m like, ‘did we live like this?’ But we did. I mean, I did. Was I a rich Colombo [redacted] while poorer people died? Well, yes. I wrote about it, but who cares.

The real question is, who are you? I mean, you’re reading this. You have the leisure to ponder American collapse like it’s even a question. The people really experiencing it already know.

So I’m telling you, as someone who’s been there, in similar shoes to yours; this is it. America has already collapsed. What you’re feeling is exactly how it feels. It’s Saturday and you’re thinking about food while the world is on fire. This is normal. This is life during collapse. Just read what it says on the tin:

LIFE! Now with 20% MORE DEATH!

Collapse does not mean you’re personally dying right now. It means y’allare dying right now. Death is sometimes close, sometimes far away, but always there. Usually for someone else, but someday, randomly, for you. I used to judge those herds of gazelle when the lion just eats one of them alive and everyone keeps going but, no, humans are just like that. That’s the real meaning of herd immunity. We’re fundamentally immune to giving a [redacted].

It honestly becomes mundane (for the privileged). As Colombo kids we used to go out, worry about money, fall in love — it all went on. We’d pop the trunk for a bomb check. Turn off our lights for the air raids. I’m not saying that we were untouched. My friend’s dad was killed, just gone with a land mine. RIP Uncle Nihal. I know people who were beaten, arrested, went into exile. But that’s not what my photostream looks like. It was mostly food and parties and normal stuff for a dumb 20-something.

If you’re waiting for a moment where you’re like ‘this is it’, I’m telling you, it never comes. Nobody comes on TV and says ‘things are officially bad’. There’s no launch party for decay. It’s just a pileup of outrages and atrocities in between friendships and weddings and perhaps an unusual amount of alcohol.

Perhaps you’re waiting for some moment when the adrenaline kicks in and you’re fighting the virus or fascism all the time, but it’s not like that. Life is not a movie, and if it was, you’re certainly not the star. You’re just an extra. If something good or bad happens to you it’ll be random and no one will care. If you’re unlucky you’re a statistic. If you’re lucky, no one notices you at all.

Collapse is just a series of ordinary days in between extraordinary [redacted], most of it happening to someone else. That’s all it is.

One day, I was at work when someone left a bomb at the bag check at NOLIMIT. It exploded, killing 17 people who were out shopping. I experienced this as the phone lines getting clogged for an hour. My wife experienced it as, well, a bomb, it was 500m from her house. 17 families experienced it as the end. And their grief goes on.

As you can see, this is not a uniform experience of chaos. For some people it destroys their bodies, others their hearts, but for most people it’s just a low level hum at the back of their minds.

What’s that buzzing sound you hear now?

Today I assume you went to work. Bad news was everywhere, clogging up your social media, your conversations. Maybe it struck close to you. I’m sorry. Somewhere in your country, a thousand people died. I’m sorry for each of them. A thousand families are grieving tonight. A thousand more join them every day. The pain doesn’t go away, it just becomes a furniture of bones, in a thousand thousand homes.

As a nation you don’t seem to mourn your dead, but their families do. Their communities do. Jesus, also, weeps. But for most people it’s just another day. You’ve run out of coffee. There’s a funny meme. This can’t be collapse, because nothing’s collapsing for me.

But that’s exactly how collapse feels. This is how I felt. This is how millions of people have felt, including many immigrants in your midst. We’re trying to tell you as loud as we can. You can get out of it, but you have to understand where you are to even turn around. This, I fear, is one (of many) things Americans do not understand. You tell yourself American collapse is impossible. Meanwhile, look around.

In the last three months America has lost more people than Sri Lanka lost in 30 years of civil war. If this isn’t collapse, then the word has no meaning. You probably still think of Sri Lanka as a shithole, though the war ended over a decade ago and we’re (relatively) fine. Then what does that make you?

America has fallen. You need to look up, at the people you’re used to looking down on. We’re trying to tell you something. I have lived through collapse and you’re already there. Until you understand this, you only have further to fall.

 

[annabenedetti]

You seem to be harbouring an unhealthy fixation with this whole collapse thing.

You're a master of understatement.

The collapse has begun, the collapse is ongoing, and the collapse is accelerating.

Yes. Collapse is a process, not an event.

Wait, did you hear that? Like the rumbling of distant thunder? That wasn't thunder my friend...That's the bond market turning it's attention to your enormous national debt. Aye yi yi. Ominous... Still, we can't have all those billionaires inconvenienced with income tax and such...

But... but... but... Trump's making us great again!

Yuck, what's that stench I smell...? No it's not a pile of putrid skunks decomposing. It's the stench of corruption, corruption that flows from the White House on down, not unlike an overflowing septic tank. PU!

I invite other contributors to add their thoughts to this list of factors weighing on the US. I would be remiss, though, if I didn't at least mention the insufferable American hubris. Pride goes before a fall, or so I've heard!

I'll add this latest corruption:

The White House Intervened to Get a $620 Million Deal for a Company Tied to Donald Trump Jr.
About three months before the Pentagon announced plans to lend money to Vulcan Elements, Trump Jr.’s venture capital firm took an undisclosed stake in the company.

But that's just today.

My apologies for the insufferable American hubris, especially that aimed at Canada.

It's really just the normal course of things. A society may rise, become very powerful and then decline and decay. Just like your president! When Trump was in China, Xi warned Trump to his face of the danger of falling into a Thucydides Trap. China rising, the US the contrary. It's unknown if Trump was even aware of what was being said.

China knows. They play the long game. Trump plays with Sharpies.

Still, some good news. I heard somewhere that the state of NY won't let you buy ammo without a background check. Hopefully an extremely thorough, bordering on invasive, background check. Too many armed nutters running around already! Does this apply to everyone in the State or did you personally somehow attract the attention of the authorities?