Welcome to Issue No. 17 of Listicles, the feature that presents the Top 10, Top 5, Top 3, Top 100 or Top 1,000,000 of whatever it is you want to know about. Email your Listicle suggestions to johnagliata@gmail.com.
President Joe Biden’s State of the Union Address on Tuesday night featured the go-to line for a politician looking to pass the buck. Oh, but before you get yourself all worked up for an anti-Democrat lashing, you Trumpeteer you, this is a common refrain of politicians on both sides of the aisle … and Americans in general.
In talking about the Tyre Nichols beating death at the hands of Memphis police, President Biden called for action: “Do something!” he implored.
Of course, he was very vague on what that something should be, which is the hallmark of poor leadership. Anyone can say “Do something!” Anyone can recognize that there’s a something that needs to be done. What exactly that something should be? Well, that’s what we freaking elect presidents and congresspeople for!!!!!
The truth is, “Do Something” is the modern fallback position for situations in which America is too far gone for help. Some would like to say that this nation is, at worst, a beautiful, shiny, healthy, tasty apple with a few rotten spots that need to be carved out. I’d put forward that America is that rotten banana left out too long on the kitchen counter, all brown and nasty and worthy only of being thrown in the garbage or the freezer to then be blended and repurposed as something actually good — like a smoothie.
So what is America’s problem? Well, I’ve got five problems that America refuses to confront that are leading it to go bad.
No. 1: Race
America was founded on the ideals of a bunch of white guys who talked about all people being created equal before going home to their wives, children … and cadre of slaves. We then claimed God wanted us to spread our supposedly superior values and way of living and doing business across the continent and systemically dehumanized those who were here first by treating the very successful way they’d gone about living life for centuries as “savage.”
We then fought to keep a chunk of states into this glorious union only to turn a blind eye for decades to the fact that the very systems we fought against still existed, just in a different and perhaps more insidious form. When a movement grew to actually, ya know, treat people as their equally created selves, we picked the guy who advocated non-violence and basically fitting into the dominant white culture. That certainly was more palatable than that guy with an initial for a last name.
Then, when we got bigger guns, we regularly used them to subject people around the globe, most of whom with far darker skin than those in the halls of our government, to our particular brand of goodness by wiping out their cultures and installing military bases on their territory.
And here we are in 2023 looking at issues of systemic racism that continues to dehumanize those with darker skin. Ahhh, America.
But yes, by all means, do something!
No. 2: Guns
America has a gun problem. America refuses to address that gun problem. Period.
That the problem has been cloaked in the supposed intentions of the Founding Fathers with the Second Amendment showcases just how dumb the average American is. The Second Amendment in no way and in no rational universe meant that the average citizen should be able to stockpile as many high-powered, high-capacity weapons as possible. That right-wingers hold to this as being necessary for the citizenry to stand strong against a theoretically tyrannical government is patently absurd and ignores the fact that even the largest private stockpile(s) would be no match for any government-led mission supported by the military, which has tanks and nuclear bombs and stuff.
We subject ourselves and our children to increased threats of being mowed down by a whacko with a high-powered rifle because we refuse to look at globally available data that shows us that countries with stronger gun laws and less common access to guns have fewer incidents of gun-related violence and mass murders.
Is this gun problem solvable? Sure it is, but not while the culture is as firmly entrenched on the poles like it is.
So yeah, by all means … do something!
No. 3: Food
The growth of everything from obesity to depression, suicide and poorer educational performance can be tied to the influx of really shitty food into our culture. As with everything else on this list, the influence of money at the highest levels of government plays a huge role. That we value convenience over what’s actually good fuel for our bodies and that that convenience is filled with purposefully addictive legal drugs is astounding.
We have no appetite, pardon the pun, for fixing this. When we tried to introduce healthier lunches into our government-funded school system, there was outrage that we should ask our children to eat food so bland and unappetizing. No one stopped to think about why that food seemed so bland and unappetizing to our children. It’s because of all the other sugar-infused crap on which they regularly subsist.
America has no desire to clean up its eating and actually deal with the problems caused by what we consume.
But yes, by all means, do something!
No. 4: Policing/Criminal Justice
America’s police forces aren’t what they were intended to be. They are increasingly militarized, increasingly abusive institutions that disproportionately target minorities and that throw people without the financial means into a criminal justice system in which money matters more than truth and in which power and perception are more important than justice.
And then we’re surprised, shocked and outraged when situations occur like those that befell George Floyd and Tyre Nichols? Really?
America’s war on drugs was disingenuous from the start and proved to be a catastrophic failure. It has bloated our for-profit prison system with people whose criminality only increases by the time they are spit out the other side. Then those militarized, abusive police forces do the same thing all over again, most often to those with darker skin (See No. 1, above)
If our nation truly is so great, why do we have, by far, the largest percentage of our population incarcerated of any supposedly advanced country in the world? Why are we the only supposedly advanced country in the world that regularly sentences its citizens to death, even though that system is acknowledged to have — oopsie — ended the lives of innocent people? And why do we have the largest unconvicted incarcerated population of any supposedly advanced country in the world?
But yes, by all means, do something!
No. 5: Mental Health
Proof that America has a mental health crisis can be found in so many areas, but let’s take one often not talked about: Health insurance. Your average health insurance policy covers almost every organ in the body. If your heart hurts, your health insurance covers it. If your liver hurts, your health insurance covers it. If your appendix ruptures, well, your health insurance deals with that non-essential piece of you as well.
But if your brain starts sending incorrect regulation signals to your body? Well, that’s a whole different type of coverage that warrants special copays and different levels of reimbursement or care.
Why?
Well, the sad fact is, the most brilliant among us have yet to understand the brain as well as we do all those other organs. Hell, we don’t even understand the brain of the common roundworm. Thus, those who suffer from brain illnesses are shuffled off to a bloated, underfunded, bureaucratic system that, frankly, sucks.
Couple that with the crappy food we eat that either causes or exacerbates brain illnesses, our overly militarized police forces and our gun problem and you have the root cause of a whole lot of societal ills.
Are solutions available? Sure they are. But do we want to treat illnesses that don’t show up on the most advanced scans we have as similar to those that do? Absolutely not. It’s why the stigma and discrimination around brain illnesses exist.
So instead of having equally empowered mental health advocates with every police unit and instead of treating things like addiction as brain health issues instead of criminal justice issues, we marginalize those who are unfortunate enough to have an affliction of the most misunderstood organ in the human body.
But yes, by all means, do something!
I’m sure there are other issues out there, but these are my Top 5. What are yours? Email me!
John Agliata is a marketing professional with more than 30 years of communications experience. Reach him at johnagliata@gmail.com or (352) 226-5852.
Five Dumb Things About The American Workplace
Welcome to Issue No. 16 of Listicles, the feature that presents the Top 10, Top 5, Top 3, Top 100 or Top 1,000,000 of whatever it is you want to know about. Email your Listicle suggestions to johnagliata@gmail.com. Very few of us would actually continue at our jobs were we financially able to not. That…
What Type of Bosses Do Employees Leave?
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