Am I In A Time Warp!

I think of that opening line you see in Science Fiction books. The one that goes something like — “I woke up one day and the world had changed.”

I feel as if I am in a country that is locked in a situation that will take a while to be resolved. It has gone to a mash of the 1918 pandemic, the 50’s and 60’s civil rights movement, 1920’s hangings and World War II — the axis.

Although the news on Covid — 19 has often taken a back seat to other national news, it is still out there and in many states, the numbers are rising again. There is a certain portion of the population who want everything to return to normal so they go out, hang with friends, go to games, movies, etc, ignoring the threat and pretending it isn’t real.

We have Trump who is beginning to hold events because he isn’t doing well in the polls. His latest step is to have a gathering in Tulsa which expects close to 60,000 people. His people are having people sign forms agreeing to hold them free of liability should the attendee get the coronavirus. The organizers will provide hand sanitizer, masks, and take temperatures but they won’t enforce the masks.

We have others who believe that wearing a mask is stupid and won’t do anything to protect them because the whole coronavirus epidemic is a hoax. They feel that way until they end up in the hospital, on a ventilator when it all becomes real.

Then we have a movement spreading across the country protesting police brutality of people after the death of George Floyd. Many of these protests are reminiscent of those held in the 50’s and 60’s in this country. Protests where the police or national guard go in and break up peaceful protesters so the President can have a photo opportunity. Other protests are broken up when the police and national guards fire into crowds with some sort of “tear gas” and rubber bullets but the rubber bullets can still kill and injure people, just like real bullets did years ago.

If you watch the news, you’ll see that there have been several African American’s found hanging from trees, just like in the 1920’s and 30’s in many parts of the south. The first reports said these men died due to suicide but it doesn’t make sense. Fortunately, the FBI and others are looking deeper into these deaths. They are just too close to the earlier events that are coming back to haunt society.

Although several groups have just scored victories when the Supreme court decided that those who fall under the LGBTQ flag cannot be discriminated against due to the sexuality and they threw out Trump’s request to eliminate the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, so immigrant children can remain, Trump is not happy. He twittered a question asking why the Supreme court is against him. The Supreme court is not against him, they are for the rights of people.

Finally, is the latest from Trump’s reelection campaign who are posting red triangles that resemble those used by the Nazi’s to classify prisoners in their concentration camps. The red triangle designated political prisoners and prisoners wore them so they were inverted with the vertex pointing down.

With so many different things happening right now, I feel as if we are in a vortex where several points of time are intersecting to create all these events. Where all these different events are swirling into the now and we are experiencing it. I am waiting for the police to bring out the dogs to break up protests. I expect looters to continue taking advantage of the unrest just as they did in the 1960’s.

I don’t know where this country is heading but I do know that it has received a wakeup call to make changes so all citizens are treated equally and respectfully. Let me know what you think, I’d love to hear.