"Look at what they make you give ..."

I was in a class recently, a class mandated by the state of California because  I got a DUI. Without even touching on the fact that the millions of drivers who operate their vehicles each day while legally intoxicated, yet they never endanger another soul and make it to their destination safely have NOT really committed a crime. Let's just ignore that and focus on what really annoys me about these classes. What the curriculum mandates is that we talk about the perils of living in a family with an addict. A diseased human being who has fallen prey the perils of alcoholism or drug addiction. What really annoys me is that the one question that is NEVER asked is; "What is the reason this person felt the overwhelming need to medicate their pain away to the point of becoming a social pariah?" That question doesn't get asked because the answer is assumed. The answer is that anyone who suffers from addiction is clearly a fuck-up. An irresponsible person who can't stand up and take care of him or herself, much less his or her family. I mean, why else would a person fall prey to the weakness of addiction? They must just be a loser and irresponsible. Right?

As a society we have resolved that there is no excuse for drug or alcohol abuse and therefore ... any addict is really nothing more than a parasite who is preying upon the rest of us and trying to make us accept their "madness" as a condition of loving them.

I actually sat down with one of the instructors and explained my frustration. She sadly shook her head and told me I was right, no one is allowed to wonder what is making so many people so sick. There are half a billion people on psyche meds worldwide, with tens of millions more self medicating with their cocktail of choice. But we should never ask why so many people are so ill.

We shouldn't consider the fact that we humans have created a world where we are all competing with one another for these little green pieces of paper that there never seem to be enough of. Nah, that makes no difference.Something is making us sick and I think it's money. Plain and simple. The lack of it kills 38,000 children every day. The lack of it causes theft, extortion, fraud, blackmail, bribery, and the list goes on and on. Our moral compass is cloudy because so many of us are constantly challenged with choices that pit our attempts at a noble morality against the needs of our families and loved ones. All because of money. Just these little pieces of paper that man invented and have come to rely upon literally to live or to die.

Will future generations look back on us some day and wonder how we could have been so unforgivably stupid? I think so. In fact, I fucking hope so because if they don't that means they have still not solved the problem and who knows what the world would like then.

Stand back and look at what we give, look at what we give to worship the god of little green bits of paper.