Those Demons Are Us

[Daveparts still]

Those Demons Are Us
By David Glenn Cox

I was writing a witty and amusing post about the alleged New York terrorist supposedly trained by the Pakistani Taliban who didn’t know the difference between ammonium nitrate fertilizer and organic fertilizer. The short version is that one is shit and the other is shinola, and then, well, I lost it. Don’t know where it went; maybe I’ll find it again while it is still relevant.

Then I came across an editorial quite by accident and it made me incredibly angry at the slack-jawed, paternalistic mongoloids with their dead-eyed indifference to other Americans and to their fellow man. This is the way it works in the real world: societies problems are created by ignorance, greed or indifference. They don’t just fall from the sky or wash up on the beach. But these self-righteous, sanctimonious, virtuous barbarians cause the problems and then lament the moral weakness of those caught in the traps.

The author begins like this; “In ancient Greece a daemon was good or malevolent 'supernatural beings between mortals and gods, such as inferior divinities and ghosts of dead heroes.'

"In Hawaii, they seem to be our Homeless and Addicted and Mentally ill.

"I was driving to work-out the other day and saw in my peripheral vision a man dressed all in black, walking across some grass. He appeared to be one of the many, many methamphetamine addicts we have here in Hawaii. Nobody really looked at him and he looked at nobody; it was like watching someone from another dimension accidentally cross my own.”

So, out in your car during your leisure time you can diagnose the homeless without even slowing down. You label them "Daemons" because you yourself could never, ever find yourself in such a position. Because you are, of course, superior to the “Daemons.” You see them, diagnose them and pass judgment upon them, all from the front seat of your car. They are all defectives, these “Daemons.” There is something wrong with them but not with you, or with us, but just with them, these “Daemons.”

“There are a lot of homeless people here in Hawaii for a variety of reasons. Hawaii is one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S. We have a ferocious Meth problem here. <"Don't even try it once!" warn the constant ads. But somehow, they all did.> The weather is always nice so people can live outside 365 days a year, unlike say, Chicago. We have three brand new homeless shelters that remain empty because they have rules that nobody wants to follow: No drugs. No alcohol. Nobody sleeps in them.”

I see, it is all their fault because they took drugs and you did not. Well, that’s because you are so much smarter than they are, dear. Maybe, just maybe, they began to take drugs as an escape from not being able to afford a decent place to live. Maybe they didn’t drive to workout classes but took the bus six days a week to two or three part-time jobs that didn’t add up to the rent. Maybe they lament their own situation as much as you enjoy yours. Here’s something they don’t teach at workout class, sweetness: freedom and dignity are intertwined.

Maybe when you’re down to an old cardboard box or suitcase of belongings and the rules say you can’t bring them inside, you, too, will decide to keep your belongings and your dignity over having a bed. I understand your point: they’re “Daemons” that need to be told when they can take shower or when it’s time to go to bed and when it’s time to get up in the morning. If they were smart, gifted and wealthy like you they wouldn’t need to be, but since they’re “Daemons,” they do.

When you offer that, “Nobody sleeps in them” (homeless shelters), you’ve done head counts? Or is that just what all the girls at Curves or the country club say? No need to answer, your tone speaks volumes. “Brand new shelters” huh? I bet they were all paid for by your tax dollars, right?

"What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this (chuckle) – this is working very well for them." (Barbara Bush)

Sound familiar, dear? You are just so good and kind to these “Daemons.” They really like existing in poverty and squalor in your privileged world because you’re just so good to them.

“So they live and sleep and shoot up and drink in an almost separate space than those of us working, driving kids to events, going to a movie. I have several homeless people I give money to. I don't care what they do with it. When my inner voice prods me to give, I give. Those particular people don't live in my periphery and seem to be living in the same place as I do. But to others they are invisible, I can see it in the faces in the cars around me.”

Here’s a clue, sweetness, they are in a separate place than you, an indescribable, hellish place where people with intellect ask do they drink and do drugs to cope with their daily existence? Why is it that these people did not exist in such large numbers in the American economy when jobs with incomes were common? But you’ve already answered that one, haven’t you, sweetness? They are defectives, they’re “Daemons” who aren’t as good as you or as wise as you and you know all this to be true because you judge all that is right and wrong in the universe by the paragon of virtue that is yourself!

But you give them money; it’s worth a few dollars to make yourself feel so good about yourself. Especially when you are helping the lesser beings, doing God’s work helping the "Daemons." God will bless you, I’m sure.

“They become active ghosts, a lot of them. We don't make eye contact because they might ask for money or swear at us or rage at us. We protect our children from them. They are so bored or mentally ill or high they talk constantly to invisible people who I guess live on a level not visible to the rest of us, though quite visible to the 21st century daemons. So there are layers around us at all times and sometimes we see those who pass by and sometimes we don't. It's a bit like Dante's Hell. With palm trees.”

Your powers of deduction are truly amazing, dear. You presume to know what they might do. But do you have any idea why they might want to swear at you or rage at you? Could it be that you call them ghosts and drunks and lazy and crazy daemons and presume them a threat to your children? As lowly as you see them, you see yourself as this wonderful creature who lowers herself to give alms to the poor. You think that they don’t see that look a hundred times a day? You think they can’t see the sanctimonious, self-righteous blankness in your eyes as you avoid theirs?

Maybe they talk to invisible people, sunshine, because they don’t have any visible ones to talk to. They are ostracized and marginalized; they are, after all, “Daemons.” They’re talking to lost husbands and wives and lost children, or maybe they’re talking to God and asking, “Why have you forsaken me?” They need love and understanding and what they get from the likes of you, sunshine, is smug pity.

They infect your world and ruin your palm tree postcard views, but you’re wrong, sunshine. You blind yourself and bind yourself in your motor cars and wealth because you really know nothing about this world at all. You are as naked as a newborn babe. You see, I am one of those "Daemons" and ghosts who haunt your world. I’ve seen the look on your face and heard the locks go down on your car door when I walk by.

I don’t drink, I don’t do meth and I’m not mentally ill, but sometimes it’s hard to understand why not. I once drove fast convertibles and lived on a private lake in a four-bedroom home. I lost my new truck when it was repoed but managed to get it back by maxing out a credit card. Then I lost my home and my wife; that’s a rough week, sunshine. The kind of week that will make you talk to yourself and look around for answers. But I won’t bother wasting them upon you as the old adage “pearls before swine” would be correct. Only this, next time you want to see a really worthless “Daemon” from your driver’s seat, try looking in the vanity mirror.


http://open.salon.com/blog/deborah_young/2010/05/08/the_daemons_amongst_us

[jotsy]

1. Promised myself I wouldn't bother you so soon, but...

:applause: :applause: :applause: :applause:

[grasswire]

2. the author is the CEO of an LLC named "Existential Angst"

Gag. Just gag.

[Bluenorthwest]

3. I think you write better than you read, and that you would be

very unhappy with a person who gave you the treatment you are giving this woman. I ask you how you can write this:
"You label them "Daemons" because you yourself could never, ever find yourself in such a position."

When the woman herself wrote this:
"It is not out of the question that someday that could be me. There are no guarantees, only surprises."

Really. If you can not read the actual lines, reading between them might be a poor choice.

[Daveparts still]

4. Perhaps

it is because I read this as a homeless person myself and have experienced the condescension that this women is doling out. Her opinions are no different than Barbra Bush

[Bluenorthwest]

6. Then why are her own words no sufficient to convict her?

You did not address the obvious difference between what she is saying and what you are inferring. Her opinions are very different from Barbara Bush, if one reads what she actually says, not what you claim she says. You did not address the fact that you say she says one thing, but she actually says the other.
You say you used to be waterfront well off, huge house, wife with full marriage rights, which some of us are denied. At that time, did you know a thing about homelessness, did you count heads at the shelters? When you were Mr Better Than Everybody, did you serve, did you notice? Did you care?
Those are the important questions, Dave. Here is a writer lesson: we are almost always talking about ourselves. You were Mr Lakefront. Not me. So when you were 4 bedrooms on water, what did you do for those with less, with nothing? Were you so different from how you claim this woman is, although she says otherwise, she's attempting to understand. Did you?
I think you are the woman in the car, unsure of how to help, trying to see the world outside. You do not understand how you lived that way.

Well, what did you do from Lakefront Manor? Tell us all. Private Lake, no less. That is what is important about this piece, like it or not. When you were Lord and Lady Lakefront, with rights and holdings I have never had, what did you do then? What was your connection to these issues then? Were you not, in fact, easily more blind to other's peril than the author you rip to bits? Did you ever write on the subject when you were not living the subject? Were you in fact, ever a person of empathy when you were a person driving fast convertibles? That is the whole heart of things in this piece, kid. As a reader, I have to assume that you are speaking of yourself in your previous Lakefront Lord incarnation. She says one thing, Lakefront Lord hears another, and then calls her 'sweetness' over and over again. To do that, one has to be the top dog in one's own head. Lake Front Fast Car Guy calling women 'sweetness' and telling them he understands what they really mean, no matter what they say. Because the Lake Lord is a man and he just knows. When the Lake Lord drove spendy cars to the mansion, the Lake Lord probably called women 'sweetness' in that way as well, that is my guess.
Do you talk to people like this in real life? The woman you are criticizing is far more empathetic than you are, and again, when you were in better shoes than her, or me, tell us all how you lived the righteous life, what you did when you were Lake Lord. When you were her, who were you?
And take the time to really read up on the word 'Daemon'. It is not the same word as 'demon'. Not at all. Daemons are beings who are above humans, and below the gods, you see. Above and beyond us. The word closest to it in our use is 'angel'.
Those angels, they are us. What a horrible thing to say!

[Daveparts still]

7. Her Words Do Convict Her

"I was driving to work-out the other day and saw in my peripheral vision a man dressed all in black, walking across some grass. He appeared to be one of the many, many methamphetamine addicts we have here in Hawaii. Nobody really looked at him and he looked at nobody; it was like watching someone from another dimension accidentally cross my own."

Or in other words, a man was walking across the grass minding his own business while she knows all about him at a glance.

"These ghosts took over the beaches. They took over the parks"

These,they, those,

"They become active ghosts, a lot of them. We don't make eye contact because they might ask for money or swear at us or rage at us. We protect our children from them. They are so bored or mentally ill or high they talk constantly to invisible people who I guess live on a level not visible to the rest of us, though quite visible to the 21st century daemons. So there are layers around us at all times and sometimes we see those who pass by and sometimes we don't. It's a bit like Dante's Hell. With palm trees."

That is a gross generalization that reeks of bigotry and then smacks of her belief of her superiority that she sees it while others do not. She confuses her own bigotry for wisdom.

Addressing your comments, while I was prosperous I never wrote posts that labeled poor people as bored, drunk or high. Your comments seem more directed at defending Ms. Young and taking me to task for critisizing her.
Your arguments are thin at best.

[Bluenorthwest]

8. What did you do when you were her?

I'm not making arguments, thin or otherwise, I'm asking questions which you are not answering.

[Daveparts still]

10. lets look at this another way

If she said she was in Arizona and was talking about Hispanics in the same terms would your opinion would be the same?

[awoke_in_2003]

11. welcome to my

friends list :hi:

[proudohioan]

9. Wow! That's some pretty hateful stuff aimed directly at the poster....

You know, it's one thing to read an article and have differing opinions on the interpretation. By all means, intelligently debate those ideas. But it's quite another thing to go on a rant while viciously attacking the poster.

Personally, I look forward to this posters journals. Do I agree with everything that he writes? No, of course not. But I do look to those journals as a new point of view to take into consideration. More importantly, he is intelligently and eloquently portraying a slice of life from his little corner of the world.

Calling out this poster in some angry, bitter rant makes you appear just that, and nothing more.

[Mac1949]

5. Tim Minchin says it better than I can

Not work safe - expletives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGas0D9_zgI

[fasttense]

12. Funny, when I read her story, or started to, it annoyed me too.

I found it condescending. She provided very little facts to back up her assertions. It was all about how she felt, how she was affected. But at the time, when I read it, or started to, I couldn't quite explain or understand what was so offensive. So, I just stopped reading it.

Thanks for putting into words what I couldn't.