The question haunts many Trump voters now, why are we seen as so stupid by liberals?
An anguished question from a Trump supporter:
“Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?“
The ListBegins with the One Created by Adam-Troy Castro but with Pictures & Even More Citations! Then It Continues, Including 4 Powerful Messages from God, Himself!!!
Here’s what the majority of anti-Trump voters honestly feel about Trump supporters en masse:
— Answers by ADAM-TROY CASTRO
#1.That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.“
#4.That when Trump made up stories about seeing Muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, “Not an issue.”
#6. That when you heard him relating a story of an elderly guest of his country club, an 80-year old man, who fell off a stage and hit his head, to Trump replied: “‘Oh my God, that’s disgusting,’ and I turned away. I couldn’t—you know, he was right in front of me, and I turned away. I didn’t want to touch him. He was bleeding all over the place. And I felt terrible, because it was a beautiful white marble floor, and now it had changed color. Became very red.” You said, “That’s cool!
Donald Trump once turned away from an unconscious 80-year-old man who had hit his head “Get that blood cleaned up, it’s disgusting” — PUBLISHED: 03 OCTOBER 2017 — Harpers Bazaar [as well as GQ,CNN, and other sources]
#7. That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw.
#9. That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, “That makes sense.”
#12. That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, “Thumbs up!”
#13. That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, “That’s the way I want my President to be.”
What has President Trump said about your country? | BBC | 23 July 2018 — This list includes Afghanistan, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Botswana, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Cuba, Denmark, Egypt, El Salvador, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, …. oh go look at this report for yourself… Trump basically says: “Fuck you to the entire world!”
#14. That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they’re supposed to be regulating and you have said, “What a genius!”
Lost Safeguards: Popular Public Protections Repealed in the Trump Era
If You Voted for Trump, Do You Think You Are Stupid Now?
“No… you say?”
Well… The List Goes On
— More answers by ADAM-TROY CASTRO
#15. That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, “That’s smart!” [Yes, so smart… that’s your tax dollars at work for the orange man]
The Secret Service spent nearly $2 million at Trump properties
#16. That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was in the middle of water and you have said, “That makes sense.”
The Late Show [as well as reported by CNN, NBC, many other sources]
#17. That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, “falling in love” with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, “That’s statesmanship!”
#18. That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages, managed to lose track of 1500 kids, has opened a tent city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas – he explains that they’re just “animals” – and you say, “Well, OK then.”
Trump migrant separation policy: Children ‘in cages’ in Texas
#19. That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise.
Trump is anti-worker. Here are 10 of his most shocking anti-worker statements
What you don’t get, Trump supporters, is that our succumbing to frustration and shaking our heads, thinking of you as stupid, may very well be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also…hear me…charitable.
Because if you’re NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are less flattering.
– Adam-Troy Castro
(To all who agree with its content, I ask that you PLEASE SHARE IT on your own post, and ENCOURAGE OTHERS to do the same.)
Few More Items to the List for Prosperity
— More Answers Found Working on This Blog
#20. Trump plans to take away civil rights, civil liberties, and freedoms, and you say: “Way to go… your my man!”
DEFEND THE RIGHTS OF ALL PEOPLE NATIONWIDE. | ACLU | 2024 Abortion care, trans people’s right to live freely, people’s right to vote – our freedoms are at stake and we need you with us. Donate today and fuel our fight in courts, statehouses, and nationwide
#21. Upon seeing a list of Horrible or Deplorable things Trump has said or done, and you shout: “Hip, Hip, Hooray!”
Okay… Trump supporters…. you win this one… he was hilariously funny with this whooper. But innocent immigrants, who are here legally, suffered horribly because of his lie… and you laughed anyways. So when your turn comes to be a victim from one of his whooper lies of promises made and promises broken, I am going to be the first to laugh at you!
Never Forget Jan 6, 2021
From January 2022 blog — Remembering Jan 6From January 2022 blog — Remembering Jan 6January 2022 blog — Remembering Jan 6January 2022 blog — Remembering Jan 6
OH YEAH! God Said Your Stupid on New Year’s Eve 2024
Four lightening stikes on American icon’s of democracy and capitalism. If this isn’t a warning about the impending doom America faces with Trump supporters voting the most ignorant man back into the highest seat of power in the world, well, might as well go play the Squid Games then… you are probably one of the idiots who thinks you are going to survive out of everyone playing!
I started watching Season 2 of the Squid Games on the eve of New Year’s Eve. This season takes more time to develop the complexities and motivations of each main character and the parts they will be playing in the up coming games. But, don’t worry… it takes viewers to the games almost as quickly as Season 1. And now you know the motivations and conflicts of several key players in more depth that adds greater stakes and suspense to the games!
Spoiler Alert
Spoiler Alert, if you have not watched Season 2 yet, the games introduce even more democracy into the games. In season 1, players got to vote after the massacre of Red Light, Green Light game. In season 2, players get to vote after every game is played. The only catch is that they have to divide the money accumulated after the deaths of previous players with all the surviving players.
So, this pits desperate players who are willing to risk their lives to pay off their huge debts with equally desperate players who would rather live than risk dying playing one more game just so they can have a little bit more money. This is exactly where Americans (and also South Koreans) find themselves today due to huge failures of their modern day democracies…finely tuned to only make money for the super wealthy.
Don’t worry, the other side of communist countries are doing the exact same thing but under the guise of sharing for the good of all! In reality, both modern day systems are simply the oldest collective governance in the world: Totalitarian societies.
Both kinds of modern human civilization have been absolutely corrupted by money. And in our modern day, lots of money comes with unconstrained power and control that hollows out the human soul.
Sapience Could Help… If People Wanted Help
If you want to find out how we,the little guys and gals, who are all trapped inside these repressive, brutal systems carefully designed to entertain the super rich with our suffering and deaths, read my book: Sapience: The Moment Is Now.
My book currently is languishing on one of our modern day oligarch’s web system of commerce, Amazon, where is sits mostly unnoticed and unread, unable to find its readers.
This is because I self-published and I don’t have thousands and thousands of dollars to feed Jeff Bezos by buy ineffective ads on his website. Also, since I published through Amazon and I was stupid enough to use their ISBN, I am trapped inside Amazon vast ocean of commerce that does not play fair with bookstores or libraries.
This is because Amazon charges full retail price and does not take back books that don’t sell (like Publishing Companies do). Thus, bookstores and libraries cannot buy my book for a fair price that allows them to make some money (or at least not lose money). Therefore, they don’t. Because of this, I cannot get my book to places where readers are looking for something new to read. And believe me, readers coming to Amazon to find something new to read only see book whose authors (or authors via publishers) can afford to pay the most for advertising!
If you feel rebellious after reading this blog, please help me beat an oligarch and read or buy my book on Amazon. Also, please leave a rating… and better yet, leave a review! I would be so deeply grateful to you.
Squid Games — A Provocative Modern Metaphor
Modern democracies mirror the high stakes of deadly Squid Games
You are probably pondering, if you have made it this far in the blog: How Are the Squid Games and Modern Democracies the Same?
Here are seven parallels between modern democracies and the Squid Game Season 2.
#1.Economic Desperation
Be it bored rich people who are watching people die for entertainment or modern day democracies or communistic societies, both the fictional game and modern systems of governance exploit financial vulnerability. In Squid Game, players are willing to risk death for a chance to escape crushing debt. Similarly, in America, many people take dangerous jobs, endure exploitative working conditions, or gamble on high-risk investments to achieve financial security.
Deeper Dive into Economic Desperation
Here is how wealth inequality and the lack of safety nets trap people in cycles of desperation:
Wealth inequality and the lack of safety nets create self-perpetuating cycles of desperation by forcing individuals to make increasingly precarious choices just to survive. Here’s how these factors interact to trap people:
A. Unequal Distribution of Resources
Limited Access to Basics: Wealth inequality means fewer resources for the majority, making essentials like housing, education, and healthcare harder to afford. This forces people to prioritize immediate survival over long-term stability, such as skipping preventive healthcare or higher education.
Concentrated Wealth Power: Wealth is hoarded by a small elite, giving them disproportionate control over policies and opportunities. This exacerbates inequality, as the system prioritizes their interests over those of the majority.
B. Debt as a Trap
Predatory Lending: High-interest loans, payday lenders, and credit card debt target those who lack savings, creating a cycle of borrowing and repayment that often spirals out of control.
Student Debt: The cost of education locks people into decades of debt, with no guarantee of upward mobility. This limits financial freedom and delays wealth-building, such as homeownership.
C. Insecure and Low-Paying Jobs
Lack of Living Wages: Many jobs, particularly in service sectors, don’t pay enough to cover basic needs. Even full-time workers can require multiple jobs or government assistance to make ends meet.
Gig Economy: The rise of gig and contract work removes job security and benefits, leaving workers vulnerable to fluctuations in demand.
D. Lack of Safety Nets
Insufficient Healthcare: Without affordable or universal healthcare, medical emergencies can lead to catastrophic debt. Chronic conditions become untreated, reducing productivity and creating a cycle of poor health and poverty.
Weak Social Welfare: Limited unemployment benefits, housing assistance, and food programs leave people with few options when crises arise. In many cases, these programs are also stigmatized, discouraging people from seeking help.
E. Generational Impact
Intergenerational Poverty: Families without wealth cannot pass down financial resources, leaving each generation to start over. Meanwhile, wealthy families leverage inherited assets to grow their wealth further.
Educational Inequities: Underfunded schools in poorer areas result in lower educational outcomes, reducing opportunities for future generations.
F. Psychological Toll and Reduced Agency
Scarcity Mindset: Constantly scrambling for resources affects decision-making, often leading to short-term thinking that perpetuates the cycle.
Stress and Burnout: Chronic financial strain undermines mental and physical health, reducing productivity and further entrenching desperation.
G. Structural Barriers to Escape
Expensive Mobility: Moving to areas with better opportunities often requires upfront costs (relocation, housing deposits, etc.) that are out of reach for those trapped in poverty.
Systemic Racism and Discrimination: Marginalized groups face additional barriers, such as wage gaps, hiring biases, and redlining, further limiting opportunities.
The Self-Reinforcing Cycle
These factors interact to create a feedback loop: lack of resources leads to poor outcomes, which further reduces access to opportunities and resources. Without systemic change—such as stronger safety nets, equitable policies, and wealth redistribution—the cycle continues, trapping individuals and communities in perpetual desperation.
#2.Democratic Facade
In both the games and modern systems of governance, there is the illusion of choice. While Squid Game allows players to vote, their choices are framed by desperation. In America, the idea of “freedom” can sometimes mask systemic coercion, such as choosing between healthcare or bankruptcy, or enduring unsafe working conditions due to a lack of alternatives.
Deeper Dive into Democratic Facade
Here is how the illusion of choice mirrors democratic processes where choices are constrained by systemic power imbalances:
The illusion of choice occurs when people believe they have agency and freedom to make decisions, but their options are actually constrained by systemic power imbalances. This dynamic is evident in both Squid Game and real-world democratic processes, especially in systems shaped by wealth inequality, political polarization, and entrenched power structures. Here’s how:
A. Limited Options That Favor the System
In Squid Game, players can vote to leave the game, but the alternative—returning to crushing debt and hardship—is equally dire. This creates a “choice” between two harmful outcomes, ensuring the system remains in control regardless of the decision.
In democratic systems:
Economic Constraints: Low-income voters often face barriers such as unpaid time off to vote, long wait times, or inaccessible polling locations, making “free choice” contingent on financial stability.
Political Homogeneity: A two-party system can limit choices to candidates who often prioritize corporate or elite interests, sidelining policies that directly benefit marginalized groups.
The system effectively restricts meaningful options while maintaining the facade of democratic participation.
B. Manipulation Through Fear and Incentives
The players in Squid Game are manipulated by their desperation and the promise of wealth, leading them to make irrational or harmful choices that perpetuate the game’s cycle. Similarly, democratic systems often use fear and incentives to guide decisions in ways that maintain the status quo:
Fearmongering: Politicians and media outlets exploit fears of instability, crime, or economic collapse to sway voters toward particular candidates or policies, often against their own long-term interests.
False Promises: Campaign promises of systemic reform are often diluted or abandoned once candidates are elected, leaving the underlying issues unresolved while maintaining voter engagement.
C. Divide and Conquer Tactics
In Squid Game, players are pitted against each other, making collaboration and rebellion nearly impossible. Votes that should empower them instead deepen divisions.
In democracy:
Partisan Polarization: Political parties and media amplify divisions between voters (e.g., urban vs. rural, young vs. old), preventing collective action to address systemic inequalities.
Identity Politics: While representation is important, the focus on symbolic victories (e.g., electing diverse candidates without systemic reform) can obscure larger structural issues, dividing people along superficial lines.
These tactics ensure that systemic power imbalances remain unchallenged, as voters are too divided to demand meaningful change.
D. The Role of Money in Decision-Making
In Squid Game, the wealthy spectators manipulate the game for their entertainment and profit, ensuring they remain insulated from its dangers. Similarly, in democratic systems:
Campaign Financing: Wealthy donors and corporations wield disproportionate influence, shaping policy agendas and candidate viability. [Think Elon Musk… or Mush is a much better name for the maniac oligarch. Spoiler Alert: I think Mr. Elon is player 001 in Season 2 of the Squid Game.]
Economic Gatekeeping: The cost of running for office excludes many grassroots candidates, leaving political power concentrated among the elite.
This creates a system where voters may “choose” from options that have already been pre-selected by those with money and power.
E. Psychological Impact of the Illusion
Believing they have agency while facing constrained choices leads to frustration, apathy, and disengagement:
In Squid Game: Players become disillusioned with their fellow competitors and themselves, yet they continue to play because they feel there is no other way out.
In Democracy: Voter turnout often declines as people perceive elections as futile, perpetuating the cycle of systemic control. The illusion of choice traps them in a paradox where opting out feels as ineffective as participating.
Key Consequences
Entrenchment of Power: The system remains stable, ensuring those in power stay in power.
Frustrated Populations: People become disillusioned, blaming themselves or their neighbors instead of the systemic structures that constrain their choices.
Cyclical Inequality: With no structural changes, disparities grow, further eroding the possibility of meaningful choices.
This is important so lets expand into specific examples of how voter suppression laws, campaign financing practices, and a two-party system trap modern day humans living in “democratic” societies in an endless Game of Kill the Squid.
1. Voter Suppression
Voter suppression undermines the democratic process by systematically limiting access to voting, particularly for marginalized groups. Examples include:
A. Strict Voter ID Laws
Example: In states like Georgia, Texas, and Wisconsin, voters are required to present government-issued IDs that many low-income, elderly, or minority individuals don’t possess.
Impact: Millions of eligible voters face barriers to participation. Studies show that Black and Latino voters are disproportionately affected.
B. Poll Closures and Long Lines
Example: In 2020, states like Kentucky and Texas closed hundreds of polling stations, especially in areas with large Black and Latino populations.
Impact: Voters in these communities faced hours-long lines, effectively discouraging participation, especially for those unable to miss work or arrange childcare.
C. Purging Voter Rolls
Example: Ohio’s “use-it-or-lose-it” law removes voters from registration rolls if they fail to vote in consecutive elections.
Impact: While framed as a way to “clean” voter rolls, the policy disproportionately impacts low-income individuals who may be less consistent voters due to systemic barriers.
2. The Role of Campaign Financing
The influence of money in politics ensures that wealthy individuals and corporations wield disproportionate control over democratic processes. Examples include:
A. Super PACs and Dark Money
Example: The 2010 Citizens United v. FEC Supreme Court ruling allowed unlimited corporate spending on elections through Super PACs.
Impact: Billionaires and corporations flood elections with money to support candidates aligned with their interests. For example, the Koch network spent over $400 million in the 2018 midterms.
B. Candidate Viability and Fundraising
Example: Viable presidential campaigns now require hundreds of millions of dollars in fundraising. In 2020, Joe Biden raised $1.6 billion, while Donald Trump raised $1.1 billion.
Impact: Grassroots candidates with limited access to wealthy donors or corporate funding struggle to compete, perpetuating an elite-controlled system.
C. Lobbying Influence
Example: Pharmaceutical and healthcare companies spend billions lobbying Congress to block universal healthcare policies, as seen in the defeat of the “Medicare for All” initiative.
Impact: Policy decisions favor wealthy industries, sidelining public interest.
3. The Two-Party System
The dominance of two major parties creates structural barriers that limit voter choice and perpetuate the illusion of democracy.
A. Winner-Takes-All Elections
Example: The Electoral College system in the U.S. disproportionately favors swing states, often disregarding the popular vote. In 2016, Donald Trump won the presidency despite receiving nearly 3 million fewer votes than Hillary Clinton.
Impact: Third-party candidates are seen as “spoilers,” and voters feel compelled to choose between the two dominant parties, even if neither aligns with their values.
B. Ballot Access Laws
Example: States like Texas and Georgia have stringent requirements for third-party candidates to qualify for the ballot, such as obtaining tens of thousands of petition signatures.
Impact: These barriers effectively exclude alternative voices, reinforcing the duopoly.
C. Polarization and Gridlock
Example: Partisan gridlock, such as the government shutdowns over budget disputes, highlights how the two-party system prioritizes power struggles over effective governance.
Impact: Voters are left with a system that prioritizes party loyalty over addressing systemic issues, like wealth inequality or climate change.
How These Examples Mirror Squid Game
Suppression as Forced Participation
Just as some Squid Game players are coerced into staying by systemic traps, voter suppression ensures certain groups face disproportionate barriers, effectively silencing their voices.
Financing as Rigged Odds
The wealthy spectators in Squid Game rig the game for their amusement, much like billionaires and corporations dictate political outcomes through campaign financing and lobbying.
Two-Party Entrapment as Limited Choice
Players in Squid Game believe their only choices are to play or die. Similarly, the two-party system forces voters to choose between constrained options, perpetuating systemic inequality.
#3.Winners & Losers in a Zero-Sum System
The “winner-takes-all” nature of both systems is what provides the captivating energy that traps both super rich and super poor in a perpetual, brutal game. In Squid Game, only one person can claim the prize (except Season 2 is allowing players to split the money and leave with their lives if enough players vote to do this… aka, modern day democracies pretty much around the world). The same can be said of capitalism in its most ruthless form—which is what we seem to have collectively molded into existence everywhere—where success for a few comes at the expense of many.
Deeper Dive into Winners & Losers in a Zero-Sum System
Here is how a Zero-Sum mindset fosters competition rather than collaboration in so called modern “democratic” societies, thus leading to societal fragmentation:
The winner-take-all nature of modern democracies fosters competition at every level of governance, reinforcing societal fragmentation by prioritizing individual or partisan success over collective well-being. This dynamic is evident in electoral systems, policymaking, and public discourse, creating a cycle where collaboration is undervalued and division is amplified. Here’s how:
A. Electoral Systems That Reward Competition Over Collaboration
In winner-take-all systems, such as those in the U.S. and the U.K., the candidate or party with the most votes wins outright, leaving all others without representation. This system has several divisive consequences:
1a. Marginalization of Minority Voices
Impact: Third parties and minority groups are often excluded from meaningful participation. Their interests are ignored, fostering disenfranchisement and alienation.
Example: In the U.S., third-party candidates like Ralph Nader in 2000 or Jill Stein in 2016 were labeled “spoilers,” discouraging voters from supporting alternatives to the two dominant parties.
2b. Zero-Sum Game
Impact: The all-or-nothing approach creates incentives for candidates and parties to focus on winning at all costs, rather than building consensus or addressing systemic issues collaboratively.
Example: Gerrymandering—manipulating district boundaries to ensure electoral dominance—prioritizes partisan victories over fair representation.
B. Partisan Policymaking and Gridlock
The winner-take-all mentality extends to policymaking, where parties prioritize short-term victories over long-term collaboration:
1a. Polarization and Tribalism
Impact: Partisan leaders are incentivized to portray the opposing party as enemies, making bipartisan efforts politically costly.
Example: In 2009, the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) passed without a single Republican vote, despite addressing a national healthcare crisis. This deepened partisan divides and stigmatized collaboration as weakness.
2b. Legislative Stalemates
Impact: In divided governments, the focus on “beating” the other party results in gridlock, leaving critical issues—like climate change, wealth inequality, or infrastructure—unaddressed.
Example: The frequent U.S. government shutdowns, such as the 35-day shutdown in 2018–2019 over border wall funding, illustrate how competition paralyzes governance.
C. Fragmentation in Public Discourse
1a. Media Amplification of Divisions
Impact: News outlets, driven by profit and political agendas, often sensationalize partisan conflicts, reinforcing tribal identities and fragmenting public understanding of issues.
Example: Networks like Fox News and MSNBC cater to ideologically polarized audiences, creating echo chambers where opposing viewpoints are vilified rather than understood.
2b. Social Media and Algorithmic Bias
Impact: Social media platforms, optimized for engagement, promote content that stokes outrage and division, further polarizing societies.
Example: The rise of “us vs. them” rhetoric online exacerbates divisions, turning political discourse into a battleground of personal attacks rather than constructive dialogue.
D. Societal Fragmentation as an Outcome
1a. Erosion of Trust
Impact: Constant competition erodes public trust in institutions and leaders. People perceive governments as working for partisan or elite interests rather than the common good.
Example: Trust in U.S. government institutions is near historic lows, with Pew Research reporting only 20% of Americans trust the government to do what is right “most of the time.”
2b. Inequitable Policy Outcomes
Impact: Policies often serve the interests of the winning party or their donors, ignoring marginalized groups and exacerbating inequalities.
Example: Tax cuts favoring the wealthy under Republican administrations or corporate bailouts during crises highlight the prioritization of elite interests over broader societal needs.
3c. Alienation and Disengagement
Impact: As people feel their voices are ignored, they become disengaged from the democratic process, leading to lower voter turnout and weakening the system’s legitimacy.
Example: Voter turnout in the U.S. hovers around 60% in presidential elections and is much lower in midterms, reflecting widespread disillusionment.
How Collaboration Is Undermined
Short-Term Thinking: Winner-take-all systems encourage policies aimed at immediate partisan gains rather than sustainable, long-term solutions.
Lack of Inclusive Governance: Minority voices are excluded, stifling innovation and diverse perspectives that could lead to more effective solutions.
Normalization of Hostility: The framing of politics as a zero-sum game legitimizes antagonistic behavior, undermining trust and cooperation across political divides.
Paths Forward: Moving Beyond Winner-Take-All
To counteract these dynamics and foster collaboration, systemic reforms could include:
Proportional Representation: Electoral systems that allocate seats based on vote share encourage coalition-building and fairer representation.
Ranked-Choice Voting: Allowing voters to rank candidates by preference reduces polarization and empowers third-party and independent candidates.
Campaign Finance Reform: Reducing the influence of money in politics can level the playing field and encourage more collaborative policymaking.
Deliberative Democracy: Citizen assemblies and participatory governance models can bridge divides and emphasize collective decision-making.
#4.Moral Compromise & Dehumanization
Both systems (the fictional games and modern day governments) force participants (or citizens) to compromise their ethics. In Squid Game, alliances crumble, and morality is often sacrificed for survival. Similarly, in America, systemic pressures can push individuals or corporations to exploit others for financial gain.
The psychological toll of moral and dehumanization compromises in Squid Game mirrors the experiences of individuals navigating systems of modern democracies, where systemic inequalities force people into decisions that erode their humanity and sense of self. Below, we delve into how these compromises manifest, the toll they take, and their broader implications.
Deeper Dive into Moral Compromise & Dehumanization
A. The Moral Cost of Compromises
1a. In Squid Game
Players are repeatedly forced to make life-and-death decisions, often pitting personal survival against their moral values. Examples include:
Betrayal of Alliances: The marble game forces participants to exploit or betray their closest allies to survive.
Impact: This leads to profound guilt and self-loathing, as participants struggle to reconcile their survival instincts with the harm they’ve caused.
2b. In Democracies
Citizens and policymakers often face decisions that prioritize self-interest or short-term gains over ethical considerations due to systemic pressures. Examples include:
Workers in Low-Wage Jobs: Forced to work under exploitative conditions, such as in sweatshops or unsafe environments, to feed their families.
Voters’ Lesser Evil Dilemma: Choosing between two flawed candidates in elections, leading to feelings of complicity in perpetuating harmful systems.
Impact: Such compromises can result in disillusionment, cynicism, and feelings of helplessness, as people feel trapped in a system where every choice carries moral consequences.
B. The Toll of Dehumanization
1a. In Squid Game
Dehumanization is central to the game’s structure.
Players Reduced to Numbers: Participants are stripped of their names and identities, referred to only by numbers.
Deaths as Spectacle: Their suffering becomes a form of entertainment for wealthy spectators, who view them as disposable.
Impact: The loss of identity and constant objectification lead to a sense of worthlessness and alienation, with many players internalizing their dehumanized status.
2b. In Democracies
Dehumanization occurs subtly but pervasively in systems where human value is tied to economic productivity or political utility.
Economic Systems: People in poverty are often blamed for their circumstances and portrayed as “lazy” or “undeserving,” ignoring systemic barriers like wage stagnation or lack of opportunities.
Partisan Divide: Political opponents are frequently demonized, reducing individuals to caricatures and denying their humanity.
Impact: This dehumanization fosters divisions and erodes empathy, making systemic oppression seem inevitable and even justified.
C. The Psychological Toll
1a. Cognitive Dissonance
Definition: The mental discomfort of holding contradictory beliefs or values.
In Squid Game: Players struggle to rationalize their actions—killing or betraying others—to survive in a system they know is unjust.
In Democracies: Citizens often experience dissonance when participating in systems they recognize as flawed, such as paying taxes that fund unethical policies or working for corporations that exploit workers or the environment.
Impact: Over time, this dissonance can lead to emotional numbness, burnout, or a sense of resignation.
2b. Moral Injury
Definition: The psychological distress resulting from actions—or inactions—that violate deeply held moral beliefs.
In Squid Game: Participants like Gi-hun and Sang-woo endure profound moral injury after betraying their values to survive.
In Democracies:
Policymakers may feel moral injury from enacting harmful policies under pressure.
Low-wage workers or soldiers may grapple with the ethical compromises required by their roles.
Impact: Moral injury often leads to PTSD, depression, and a loss of self-esteem.
Consider the real life recent New Year’s Eve events in the United States. Both bombers were US citizens who had served in the military. Both were decorated servicemen. Both re-entered civilizan society with significant psychological wounds. While the New Orleans bomber found salvation in ISIS, the Las Vegas bomber favored both Elon and Trump and yet blew up a Telsa truck in front of a Trump hotel.
3c. Loss of Agency
In Squid Game: The illusion of choice exacerbates the psychological toll, as players feel forced to act against their will.
In Democracies: Citizens often feel similarly powerless, perceiving their votes or actions as insignificant in systems dominated by corporate interests and elite power.
Impact: A sense of powerlessness can lead to apathy and disengagement from civic life, further entrenching systemic problems.
D. Broader Implications of These Compromises
1a. Fractured Social Bonds
In Squid Game: The competitive structure destroys trust and solidarity, leaving participants isolated and unable to form meaningful connections.
In Democracies: Economic inequality and political polarization erode community cohesion, as people are pitted against each other along class, racial, or ideological lines.
2b. Normalization of Exploitation
In Squid Game: The game normalizes the exploitation of desperate people for entertainment and profit.
In Democracies: Systems like capitalism and the gig economy normalize the exploitation of workers, perpetuating cycles of inequality.
3c. Perpetuation of Oppression
In Squid Game: The system is designed to maintain the power and privilege of the wealthy spectators.
In Democracies: Systemic barriers ensure the continued dominance of the elite, with wealth inequality and voter suppression maintaining the status quo.
Can These Cycles Be Broken?
1. Empowering Individuals: Strengthening education, unions, and community networks to help individuals resist exploitation and reclaim their agency.
2. Systemic Reforms: Implementing policies that prioritize collective well-being over profit, such as universal healthcare or living wages. And, enacting electoral reforms to ensure fair representation and reduce the influence of money in politics.
3. Fostering Solidarity: Building movements that emphasize shared humanity and collective action, countering divisive narratives that dehumanize or isolate.
#5.Spectacle & Entertainment
There are parallels between the spectators in Squid Game and those who benefit from America’s socioeconomic systems, the 1% who sit at the very top of the social pyramid. The wealthy in Squid Game treat suffering as entertainment, much like some aspects of consumer culture profit from and sensationalize hardship in most modern day democracies today.
Deeper Dive into the Spectacle of Entertainment
The spectators in Squid Game represent the detached elite, watching life-or-death struggles as entertainment. Their indifference underscores how spectacle dehumanizes suffering, reducing players to pawns in a game for profit and pleasure.
In America, this dynamic plays out in various ways such as:
Media and Distraction: Reality TV, social media, and partisan news serve as modern-day bread and circuses. They keep people entertained and distracted, preventing deeper engagement with systemic problems.
Profiting from Struggle: From coverage of protests to depictions of poverty and crime, the suffering of marginalized communities is often commodified for ratings, clicks, and profit.
Normalization of Inequality: The glamorization of extreme wealth—juxtaposed with shows like Undercover Boss or Shark Tank—frames inequality as both aspirational and inevitable, distracting from systemic critiques.
Exploitation of Hope: Much like the players in Squid Game, the masses are lured by narratives of success against the odds. These stories maintain the myth that anyone can “win,” even as the system ensures that most cannot.
This spectacle not only distracts but also desensitizes. Just as Squid Game viewers (and even the players themselves) cheer for their favorite players while ignoring the brutality, we become complicit in a system that thrives on inequality, so long as it entertains.
#6.Voting as a Weapon of Division
Voting in both systems has been corrupted to the point of enslavement rather than liberation. In Squid Game, votes divide players, trapping the minority in a deadly system. In America, voting can similarly lead to polarized outcomes where a significant portion of the population feels trapped by decisions made by others whose conscious caculations and choices defy reality, reason, and facts, suggesting stupidity, insanity or criminality at play in their choices. This invites fear and widens scarcity of money and resources for all caught inside the system, and this perpetuates the disfunctional cycle.
Deeper Dive into Voting as a Weapon of Division
In Squid Game Season 2, voting is a deceptive tool. It gives players the illusion of control while dividing them into factions. After each game, just enough players vote to stay, forcing the rest to continue against their will. This creates tension, mistrust, and resentment, ensuring the group never unites against the true oppressors: the game’s creators.
In America, voting often functions in a similar way. While it’s framed as the cornerstone of democracy, systemic inequities undermine its fairness and effectiveness:
Gerrymandering and Suppression: Redistricting, voter ID laws, and reduced access to polling stations skew outcomes, ensuring minority voices often don’t carry equal weight.
Two-Party Entrapment: The binary nature of the system leaves many feeling forced to choose “the lesser of two evils,” which perpetuates disillusionment and apathy.
Polarization: Political and media systems capitalize on division, pitting groups against one another rather than addressing systemic issues. As in Squid Game, these divisions prevent collective action.
This creates a system where voting, rather than empowering, becomes a tool to trap citizens in a cycle of frustration, disillusionment, and inaction.
#7.Narrative of Hope
Investigate the way both systems dangle hope as a motivator. Squid Game players believe they can achieve a better life despite overwhelming odds. In America, the “American Dream” plays a similar role, motivating people to persevere despite systemic obstacles.
Deeper Dive Into the Narrative of Hope
Both Squid Game and modern democracies masterfully dangle hope as a motivator to keep people engaged in systems that exploit them, despite the overwhelming odds against meaningful success. This manipulation of hope creates a powerful psychological hook, ensuring participation while obscuring the deeper systemic issues at play. Let’s explore this in depth:
A. The Nature of Hope as a Motivator
1a. In Squid Game
The Promise of Escape: The cash prize, displayed tantalizingly above the players, represents the ultimate escape from debt, poverty, and desperation.
The Illusion of Agency: Players believe that if they “play smart” or “try harder,” they can achieve victory, even though the game’s design is rigged to ensure most fail.
Impact: Hope becomes a trap, as players cling to the dream of success while ignoring the moral compromises and physical dangers they endure.
2b. In Democracies
The Dream of Upward Mobility: Citizens are sold the idea of the “American Dream” (or similar narratives globally)—that hard work and determination can lead to success, regardless of starting circumstances.
The Illusion of Political Power: Elections and voting are presented as tools for change, yet systemic barriers (e.g., gerrymandering, voter suppression, lobbying) dilute the impact of individual voices.
Impact: Hope keeps people invested in systems that perpetuate inequality, with many blaming themselves rather than the system when success eludes them.
B. How Hope Is Dangled in Each System
1a. In Squid Game
Visualizing the Prize:
The giant glass piggy bank fills with money after every death, making the reward tangible and ever-present.
Psychological Impact: The constant reminder of the prize reinforces hope, even as the number of competitors—and odds of winning—dwindles.
False Choice to Leave:
Players are given the option to leave after the first game, which creates the illusion of freedom. However, the crushing realities of their external lives (debts, poverty) compel most to return.
Psychological Impact: This reinforces the belief that staying is their “best choice,” even though the system is inherently exploitative.
Individual Stories of Success:
The backstories of participants highlight personal struggles, making the prize seem like the only viable path to redemption.
Psychological Impact: Hope becomes deeply personal, tied to notions of worth and survival, which keeps players invested.
2b. In Democracies
Upward Mobility Narratives:
Success stories of individuals who “made it” despite humble beginnings are frequently highlighted in media and political discourse.
Psychological Impact: These stories perpetuate the belief that success is attainable for anyone, masking the systemic barriers that make such stories the exception, not the rule.
Electoral Promises:
Politicians campaign on lofty ideals and promises of systemic reform, often failing to deliver due to institutional constraints or lack of political will.
Psychological Impact: Citizens invest in hope every election cycle, believing “this time will be different,” only to face repeated disappointment.
Small Victories:
Incremental progress, such as raising the minimum wage or expanding healthcare, is celebrated as evidence of systemic change.
Psychological Impact: These victories, while meaningful, often obscure the broader structural inequalities that remain unaddressed.
C. The Double-Edged Sword of Hope
1a. Positive Motivator
Hope can inspire people to persevere and strive for change, even in the face of overwhelming odds.
In Squid Game: Some players exhibit extraordinary ingenuity and resilience, fueled by hope for a better future.
In Democracies: Grassroots movements and social justice campaigns often emerge from hope for systemic change.
2b. Tool of Control
However, hope can also be weaponized to maintain control and prevent rebellion.
In Squid Game: The dangling prize keeps players focused on survival rather than questioning the fairness of the system.
In Democracies: The belief that “change is possible” keeps citizens engaged in electoral systems, even when those systems fail to address root causes of inequality or injustice.
D. The Psychological Manipulation of Hope
1a. Hope as a Distraction
In Squid Game: Players focus on winning the prize, diverting attention from the inhumanity of the games themselves.
In Democracies: Citizens are encouraged to focus on individual success or incremental reforms, distracting from the need for systemic change.
2b. Fear of Losing Hope
In Squid Game: Players fear returning to their desperate lives without even trying for the prize, making them cling to hope despite the risks.
In Democracies: Citizens fear the loss of democratic institutions, even flawed ones, keeping them invested in systems that may not serve their best interests.
E. Breaking the Cycle: Reclaiming Authentic Hope
Recognizing the Illusions:
Both systems rely on manufactured hope to maintain control. Awareness of this manipulation is the first step toward reclaiming agency.
Building Solidarity:
Hope becomes transformative when shared collectively. Movements that emphasize community empowerment, such as mutual aid networks, create authentic hope rooted in collective action rather than individual competition.
Demanding Systemic Change:
Rather than clinging to the crumbs offered by these systems, pushing for systemic reforms—such as universal basic income, proportional representation, or campaign finance reform—can turn hope into a tool for genuine liberation.
HOPE Is Also the Most Powerful Four Letter Word
Here are stories and movements where hope became a force for systemic change, showing how collective action and a shared vision can break cycles of despair and lead to meaningful transformation. These examples illuminate the power of authentic hope rooted in solidarity, persistence, and community action.
1. The Civil Rights Movement (United States)
What Happened: During the mid-20th century, African Americans and allies fought against systemic racism, segregation, and voter suppression.
Why It’s Hopeful: Despite violent resistance, the movement achieved landmark victories like the Civil Rights Act (1964) and the Voting Rights Act (1965). Leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. inspired hope by emphasizing justice and equality as attainable goals.
Key Lesson: Hope is sustained through collective struggle and the belief that systemic change is possible when people unite for a shared cause.
2. The Fall of Apartheid (South Africa)
What Happened: After decades of brutal racial segregation, the anti-apartheid movement, led by figures like Nelson Mandela, dismantled the apartheid regime through activism, international solidarity, and negotiations.
Why It’s Hopeful: Mandela’s vision of reconciliation over revenge turned what could have been a destructive transition into a hopeful one. His message that “It always seems impossible until it is done” galvanized millions.
Key Lesson: Hope can bridge divides, and even entrenched systems of oppression can fall when people refuse to accept the status quo.
3. The Women’s Suffrage Movement (Global)
What Happened: Across the globe, women fought for the right to vote, facing ridicule, imprisonment, and violence. In the U.S., this culminated in the 19th Amendment (1920), granting women the right to vote.
Why It’s Hopeful: This decades-long struggle, led by figures like Susan B. Anthony and Emmeline Pankhurst, showed how persistence and organizing could achieve systemic change.
Key Lesson: Hope fuels long-term battles for justice, proving that systemic barriers can be overcome through intergenerational activism.
4. The Indian Independence Movement
What Happened: India’s nonviolent struggle, led by Mahatma Gandhi, freed the nation from British colonial rule in 1947.
Why It’s Hopeful: The movement showed the power of peaceful resistance, with hope as a central theme in Gandhi’s philosophy of satyagraha (truth-force).
Key Lesson: Hope doesn’t require violence; it thrives on truth, resilience, and collective moral courage.
5. LGBTQ+ Rights & Marriage Equality
What Happened: Over decades, activists worked to decriminalize homosexuality, fight discrimination, and achieve marriage equality in many countries. Landmark victories include the U.S. Supreme Court’s Obergefell v. Hodges decision (2015).
Why It’s Hopeful: These achievements, driven by grassroots efforts and brave individuals, transformed societal attitudes and legal frameworks.
Key Lesson: Hope empowers marginalized communities to push for systemic change, even against entrenched prejudice.
6. Climate Action Movements (Global)
What Happened: Movements like Fridays for Future, led by Greta Thunberg, and Indigenous environmental activism have raised global awareness about the climate crisis and driven policy changes.
Why It’s Hopeful: Grassroots activism has forced governments and corporations to confront their environmental impact. The recent surge in renewable energy and sustainability efforts shows progress is possible.
Key Lesson: Hope motivates action, especially when urgency and community commitment converge.
7. Labor Movements & the Rise of Workers’ Rights
What Happened: The labor movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries won rights like the 8-hour workday, workplace safety laws, and union protections.
Why It’s Hopeful: These victories arose from ordinary people organizing strikes, protests, and boycotts, demonstrating the power of collective action.
Key Lesson: Hope grows when individuals realize their collective strength can challenge even the most powerful systems.
8. Universal Healthcare Movements (Global)
What Happened: Countries like Canada, the UK, and many in Europe adopted universal healthcare systems after years of advocacy.
Why It’s Hopeful: These systems reduce inequality by ensuring that health is a right, not a privilege. Activists in the U.S. and other nations continue to push for similar reforms.
Key Lesson: Hope is sustained by the belief that essential human needs can be met through equitable systems.
9. Mutual Aid Networks
What Happened: In times of crisis—such as the COVID-19 pandemic or natural disasters—communities have organized mutual aid efforts, providing food, shelter, and care to those in need.
Why It’s Hopeful: These grassroots initiatives bypass broken systems to meet immediate needs, showing the power of solidarity and shared humanity.
Key Lesson: Hope thrives in local action, proving that communities can build resilience even when larger systems fail.
10. The Fight Against Authoritarianism
What Happened: Movements like those in Poland (Solidarity), Chile (against Pinochet), and more recently in Ukraine and Iran demonstrate resistance to authoritarian regimes.
Why It’s Hopeful: These struggles often succeed despite overwhelming odds, fueled by hope for freedom and self-determination.
Key Lesson: Hope becomes unstoppable when people unite to resist oppression, even in the darkest times.
Common Threads of Hope
Shared Vision: Hope grows when people unite around a common purpose.
Persistence: Transformative change often takes years or decades, but hope sustains the fight.
Collective Action: Movements grounded in solidarity harness the power of the many to overcome systemic challenges.
Leadership and Inspiration: Charismatic leaders and powerful stories galvanize hope and action.
These stories remind us that even the most oppressive systems can be challenged and changed when hope is transformed into action.
Speaking about stories…. have you read my book?
Stories are essential for how our minds work and how we use our precious gift of consciousness. If you read my book, you will understand why.
If you absolutely refuse to read my book, then read Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Series. He is talking about the exact same thing as the Sapience Series. I did not realize this when I began my series back in 2012, but having just started Asimov’s Foundation Series about one year ago and just finished his series just before the New Year, I know what he wrote about and what I write about are the same. Most of Asimov’s books are about this… I, Robot; Naked Sun; The Stars, Like Dust (I’m reading this one now), Pebble in the Sky, The Caves of Steel, or The Robots of Dawn.
Or pick up H.G. Wells, The Time Machine; Arthur C. Clarke, Childhood’s End; Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game; Dan Simmons, Hyperion; Frank Herbert, Dune; Larry Niven, Ringworld; Arthur C. Clarke, A Space Odyssey or Childhood’s End; James S. A. Corey, Leviathan Wakes; Robert A. Heinlein, Starship Troopers; Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy; Iain Banks, Consider Phlebas.
The only way to get out of this Fucking Game that we are all being forced to play is to open our minds. This can only be done one person at a time…. and the very best way to do this is to learn… and the best way to learn is to read, travel, and talk to real people in real places and in real time, which is here and now!
Read… Read… Read!!
Also, please stop at Sapience’s shop: The Quip Collection. I am introducing compelling and chic Year of the Snake wearables as well as Zodiac and Valentines merch with much more to come. Without your time and attention, I will disappear.
It’s just 7 days until Halloween… and 12 days until the Presidential elections.
Have you stocked up on Halloween candy?
More importantly—have you voted?
If you haven’t bought your Trick or Treating candy yet, consider yourself lucky. But when it comes to voting, sitting back and letting others decide your future is a gamble you can’t afford. The country needs your voice now more than ever, or we all risk waking up in a nightmare of our own making.
Nightmare of Our Own Making
Don’t Do These Things for the Next 12 Days
Couch Surfing
Doom Scrolling
Remaining an Undecided Voter
Diving into “Deep state” conspiracies holes… Anti-vaccine misinformation holes… QAnon holes… Trump won the 2020 hole…
Fixating on Conspiracies Theories Niches
Zombie Dancing with an Online “Cult” Community
Going to MAGA rallies… or maybe you really need to go to one NOW!
Engaging in Misinformation Manic Madness
Grim Reality
It’s not Breaking News but more like a grim reality that for many Trump supporters, they will not wake up and see the truth of who they are voting for until it’s too late. History has shown us that when power-hungry factions run unchecked, it’s often the very supporters who fall victim to their own foolish belief in “their guy” that leads to a tragic fall into a very deep pit of complacency. Just look at the aftermath of the Russian Revolution or the rise of the Nazi party in Germany. In both cases, extremist elements seized power, leaving a trail of chaos, death, and destruction in their wake.
This is what happens when Sinister Sycophants stir up a mob mentality that prevails in wiping out a functional democracy. Sycophants don’t care. And they don’t discriminate who to blame next for all the terrible things they bring into being once all the previous scapegoats are gone. The people supporting Trump & Dark MAGA today can easily become tomorrow’s victims.
If we don’t stand up now for human rights and dignity, even for Trump cult followers blinded by blind faith in their Sick Sycophantic Fanatic leaders and talking heads, then we all might just find ourselves living in a dark chapter that we never saw coming. So, as you prepare for Halloween, remember: the treats can wait, but your vote is crucial. Don’t let the spirit of apathy haunt you this season.
He set up a secret police force that was loyal to the Bolsheviks.
He decreed that the government could seize private and church property.
He began to negotiate Russia’s withdrawal from the war.
The secret police loyal to the Bolsheviks hunted down and killed or imprisoned leaders and members of the other forms of communism in Russia in 1917 such as Menshevism, which was a more moderate socialist ideology within the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party, advocating for gradual change rather than the Bolsheviks’ revolutionary approach; other factions included the Socialist Revolutionary Party (SRs), with some factions leaning towards more radical forms of socialism and even anarchism.
This resulted in The Red Terror beginning on September 2, 1918 that resulted in the deaths of 50,000 to 600,000 people who held differing opinions and ideas about communism… all were label Anti-Bolsheviks. Other groups targeted included the clergy, rival socialists, counter-revolutionaries, peasant, and dissidents. The Red Terror is followed by the Great Purge where another 220,000 members are purged from Stalin’s ideas of communism. And Stalin is just getting started with these purges.
Or if you prefer to consider Germany in 1920, which is when the Nazi party emerges. It begins as a fringe party until personalities like Hitler rise within its ranks. Hitler was an early adopter of Nazism, joining the party in 1919 when it was still known as the German Worker’s Party.
In 1933, Hindenburg appoints Hitler as chancellor, hoping that the powerful Nazi leader could be brought to heel as a member of the president’s cabinet. Hindenburg sorely underestimated Hitler’s thirst for power and willingness to do anything to get it, including setting the Reichstag building on fire [this would be like Trump setting the Capitol on fire or calling an angry mob to swarm the capitol building on Jan. 6].
Just as Trump called into question the legitimacy of the 2020 election, which he used to sig his crazed crowd on the Capitol, Hitler used the burning of the Reichstag to call for a general election.
However, Hindenburg underestimated Hitler’s political audacity, and one of the new chancellor’s first acts was to use the burning of the Reichstag building as a pretext for calling general elections. The police, under Nazi Hermann Goering, suppressed much of the party’s opposition before the election. The Nazi Party joined forces with the German National People's Party (DNVP), to gain a bare working majority in the Reichstag. Shortly after, Hitler took on absolute power through the Enabling Acts. In 1934, Hindenburg died, and the last remnants of Germany’s democratic government were dismantled, leaving Hitler the sole master of a nation intent on war and genocide. - History: Hitler purges member of his own Nazi part in Night of Long Knives
Before the Holocaust and Hitler’s invasion of Czechoslovakia and Poland, Hitler purged his own part in the Night of Long Knives.
At least 85 people died during the purge, although the final death toll may have been in the hundreds, with high estimates running from 700 to 1,000. More than 1,000 perceived opponents were arrested. The purge strengthened and consolidated the support of the military for Hitler. It also provided a legal grounding for the Nazis, as the German courts and cabinet quickly swept aside centuries of legal prohibition against extrajudicial killings to demonstrate their loyalty to the regime. The Night of the Long Knives was a turning point for the German government.[3] It established Hitler as the supreme administrator of justice of the German people, as he put it in his 13 July speech to the Reichstag. - Wiki
VOTE… Because Democracies Have Fallen Many Times Before… & Trump Has A Plan
It seems impossible that America sits tittering on the edge of fascism in 2024. Yet, here we are, sitting on the titter totter of doom waiting for a few undecided voters to make up their minds.
The Titter Totter of Doom
And… Then, There’s No Place to Run
If “We the People” fail to understand that this is not an election for who has the best policies and which party is going to take America in a better direction. If we fail to grasp that the clear and present danger to America isTrump and MAGA. If we fail to comprehend that we could lose the very democracy we claim to be voting for on Nov. 5, 2024. And if we fail to vote Kamala Harris and Tim Walz into the White House with an overwhelming majority of votes, then Trump & MAGA have a plan.
This isn’t a new plan or twist of fate. Throughout history, sadistic figures like Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Putin, and even Trump—though he stands out as the least intellectually formidable—have emerged from the shadows of civilization.
This unsettling theme is at the heart of my book, Sapience: The Moment Is Now. Many friends have told me they find it too depressing to continue reading, often stopping around pages 35 or 50. And by doing so, they miss the chance to truly grasp where the story is heading and why it’s an important story for our present moment in time.
Yes, discussing sadists and psychopaths is uncomfortable. But so is the reality of suffering at their hands. We can’t effectively protect ourselves from looming threats if we bury our heads in comforting illusions and ignore the existence of these dangerous creatures living among us disguised as human beings.
Sapience is a cautionary tale about dangerous figures who have disrupted and destroyed one civilization after another for thousands of years. If we want to survive as a species on our beautiful planet, we need to learn the lessons of our forebears or prepare to perish.
Ben from the MeidasTouch Network articulates a similar sentiment in a recent video, emphasizing that now is not the time to shy away from confronting those who act like monsters.
Trump AWFUL PAST Resurfaces after BURIAL SCAM Exposed — Reporting Only Found at the MeidasTouch
While you are at it, watch this segment about the final two weeks before the biggest election of America’s
Trump Gets DECIMATED by Most SAVAGE ATTACK AD of Election == WATCH to the END It’s Too Important to Make Excuses
Dysfunctional Decals
Now, let’s delve into these stickers that evoke ancient names for the type of creature that Trump embodies and the contagion he has unleashed among ordinary Americans, driving a wedge between us to undermine democracy and pave the way for his hellish victory!
Don’t be fooled by Trump’s worn out, tired, overused ploy tyrants have been using against peace-loving societies for over 5,000 years!
Meet The Eccentric Menagerie
Here are 9 Kiss-Cut Vinyl Decals that encapsulate the Divisive & Dangerous Case of Donald J. Trump. This essential collection features the Betrayer-in-Chief, Airhead Narc, Sinister Sycophant, Half-Witted Hedonist, Obtuse Weirdo, Dim-Witted Psycho, Licentious Sycophant, and the Sore Loser decals.
Betrayer-in-Chief is a striking and thought-provoking design featuring a green-faced depiction of Trump, emblazoned with the bold title “Betrayer-in-Chief.” This decal captures the essence of betrayal in leadership, highlighting the disillusionment many feel toward those in power who prioritize personal gain over the welfare of their constituents.
Airhead Narc is a bold and provocative piece featuring a green-faced depiction of Trump, complete with the striking labels “Airhead” on top and “NARC” at the bottom. This decal humorously captures the essence of narcissism, illustrating how those with narcissistic tendencies often divide the world into simplistic categories of good and bad.
Sinister Sycophant unleashes your inner critic with this striking decal featuring a green-faced depiction of Trump, exuding an aura of malevolence. The bold lettering at the top reads “Sinister,” while the bottom proclaims “Sycophant,” capturing the essence of self-serving flattery and manipulation.
Half-Witted Hedonist features a striking red theme capturing the essence of indulgence and folly. This decal humorously portrays the age-old tendency to prioritize pleasure over wisdom, reflecting how deception can often masquerade as enjoyment. The term “Half-Witted Hedonist” highlights the folly of those who chase fleeting pleasures without consideration for consequences or deeper understanding. It serves as a playful reminder that the pursuit of hedonism, when devoid of wisdom, can lead to misguided choices and a superficial existence.
Obtuse Weirdo is a vibrant, orange-themed design capturing the eccentricity of those who boldly embrace their uniqueness. The term “obtuse” hints at a lack of understanding or sharpness, while “weirdo” affectionately embraces the quirks that make people truly interesting. While being different is something to celebrate, not hide away, this is not the case when the obtuse weirdo is malignant narcissist who will say or do anything to grab power or hang onto power. Then, such a fool becomes dangerous.
Dim-Witted Psycho boldly captures the essence of eccentricity and madness. It playfully explores the juxtaposition of folly and chaos, inviting viewers to ponder the thin line between humor and absurdity. This decal serves as a tongue-in-cheek reminder of the quirks and eccentricities that make life interesting, even when they verge on the outrageous. However, when such an oddity gets a hold of power and can entertain their hypnotized followers into a berserker frenzy, then there is a dangerous problem going on that deserves your time and attention.
The Sore Loser decal boldly showcases the colors of red, white, and blue while playfully confronting the theme of defeat. Featuring the phrase “Sore Loser,” it humorously critiques the reluctance to accept loss, embodying the frustration and stubbornness that can accompany disappointment.The term “sore loser” evokes the image of someone who struggles to gracefully concede, capturing a sentiment that resonates in both personal and political arenas. This decal serves as a lighthearted reminder that losing is a part of the game and embracing it with dignity is far more admirable than clinging to resentment.
Overall, these decals serve as visual critiques of the manipulative tactics employed by wannabe dictators like Trump who exploit their positions for self-serving agendas. Once they get into power, they betray the very people they fooled to gain power.
You can find them at The Quip Collection on this site.
Every Voice, Every Vote
Ending with an upbeat message, this is a short, happy video to the uplifting beat of Sandra Dee Collier called: Every Voice, Every Vote!
This dress builds on the message I introduced earlier with theUndecided T-shirt. It is part of the Always Forward, Never Back Collection. It delves even deeper into where our decisions, beliefs, and ideas about reality come from. Here, we start to venture deeper into the realm of soul. Here, the importance of making time for Soulful Moments is revealed. It is not only a nice experience. It is an essential one. Here, we learn how to recognize Soulful Wisdom. It is the mental process of sorting good ideas from bad. It involves choosing good action over harmful action.
Hard choices, tough decisions, and near states of constant indecision have become normal ways of being in modern societies. Perhaps at no time in human history have individuals faced sorting through so many endless streams of information. They are bombarded like a circular firing squad of information overload. Competition for an individual’s human attention has never been higher. Today, everybody wants a piece of your time and mind.
We have monetized our time and attention into fractured, rigid categories. These have been segregated by levels depending on how much a person makes. It’s completely arbitrary humanity’s modern systems of economy and commerce. A person gets paid X dollars for doing X activities for X hours. But some people get paid a whole lot more than others. Some times the justification for this is well founded. It includes extensive training. It also includes years of education to become an expert in a field. But there are many cases where one guy or gal makes way too much. This happens regardless of what they are actually doing for X activity.
From this construction of reality, all sorts of complexities, hidden dangers, huge discrepancies and inequalities emerge. The reality most people must survive is one where there is not a fair system of exchange. It has never been fair. After more than 5,000 years of living this way, we think it is the only way to exist. It is not.
This is where the Soulful Wisdom Collection comes into play. The designs and stories of the products in this collection are meant to inspire spirit through color. They also inspire soulful moments through vivid patterns and archetypal images. I draw the ideas for many of my stories and imagery from the work of Carl Jung. He was a psychologist at the turn of the 20th Century. Through his work at the Burghölzli psychiatric hospital, in Zurich, Jung established himself as an influential mind. He developed a friendship with Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis. They conducted a lengthy correspondence paramount to their joint vision of human psychology (Wikipedia).
Jung came to understand the human mind shares a symbolic reservoir of knowledge. This reservoir spans across all times, places, and cultures. He called these living symbolic representations of common experiences all people share archetypes. These living symbols is what all humans use to be conscious and self-aware. Without conscious self-awareness, people would not know that they know something. Action would be purely instinctual… and the consequences of such action would be experienced as an immutable and unforgiving fate.
How a person learns to recognize their inner, mental world and navigate it often determines the quality of their life. Navigating this inner world is crucial. This inner world is nothing less than a living reservoir of archetypes. All choice and actions have consequences. Eastern thought calls this Karma. It is nothing more than the timeless law of cause and effect. For an individual to make wise choices, they must cultivate the interior of their mind. This prevents choices obscured by unconscious biases or implicit prejudices, attitudes, and mindsets. A person must exercise their mind just as one must take care of and exercise the body.
As I create more products for this collection and others, we will explore more of our hidden inner world. This is where magic happens all the time. It’s just learning how to see inside and recognize it. This way you can act wisely on who and what you really are.
If you have not already done so, take a moment to check out the Sapience Shop: The Quip Collection. And for a deeper dive into all of this stuff, consider reading my book. It is presented as an adventure story. Sapience: The Moment Is Now.
Thank you for your time and attention! And have a great day!
Discover the captivating Women’s Skater Dress featuring a striking, colorful design of a powerful dark female spirit guide and a grumpy old grey man. With one path leading to a vibrant rainbow world and the other to a dark, spooky forest, this unique dress blends mystical artistry with fashion. Perfect for making a statement … Continue reading “The Choice Skater Dress: Embrace Colorful Contrast in Style; Spirit Guide skater dress, Colorful pattern dress, Spirit fashion, Soulful wear, Bohemian style”
On this day six years ago, my father had a heart attack. First responders revived him after 15 minutes of CPR, and then he was flown by helicopter to the Mayo Clinic. There he was put into an induced coma and body cooled to help preserve as much brain function as possible. Nobody knew if he would wake up and if he did, how much of him would wake up. But after days of touch and go, dad came back all of him except swallowing and he had developed pneumonia due to CPR, and this was expected and Mayo began aggressive treatment of it because it turns out if you aren’t breaking ribs while doing CPR, you aren’t pumping enough blood to revive the individual.
Remembering Dad
I wrote all about this in the first anniversary of dad’s death, as well as the reasons why he did not make it.
How Narcissistic Abuse Severely Thwarted my Healing Journey
In addition to dad’s death, the CEO of a small nonprofit I was working for fired me for being by dad’s side. Most probably this CEO suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder and she would be fired soon enough for this and a number of other things she did or failed to do during her tenure.
Adding insult to injury, my mother-in-law who is most definitely contorted and warped by Narcissistic Personality Disorder was about to launch one of her most hideous and disgusting campaigns to make herself appear as the victim so she could harvest attention and pity from her flying monkeys. This is what narcissists enablers are called by professionals who try to help family members and people abused by Narcissists heal. The fuel for her campaign of Narcissistic madness was her own children and grandchildren.
It would take me 6 years to understand what my mother-in-law was doing and why. But back in 2018 and 2019 I simply found myself in HELL.
I should not be here today. The only thing that helped me hold on during this time of pain and abandonment was the story I had started writing in 2012. I was reading dad the latest parts of the story when he died with me by his side on August 4, 2018.
Even though dad had slipped into a delirium due to the stress of life-saving procedures such as suctioning the mucous from his airways and reinserting a feeding tube he had worked out with the back of his tongue four times the previous day, he told the nurses caring for him that he was so proud of me for writing this book and that my whole life has been preparing me for it.
So in the dark days of the summer of 2019, with the help of a friend, I returned to my story and began editing the beginning to bring it up to the level of writing I had evolved into after six years of writing. My friend was then editing my edited version of book 1.
Then, Something New Began Coming Through
Not too long into this process, something new started coming through. I argued with myself… it was right around this time in 2019… for I knew writing something new would take more time.
The something new won took 6 more years to write! I finally published the book my father believed in so much on April 24, 2024.
Here is an excerpt of some of the something new that was coming through me after father died. This is from Sapience: The Moment Is Now — What Rain knows.
From the Book
"You cannot sell wisdom, nor can you buy it. You must earn it by living fully, living unself-consciously but not unconsciously. Wisdom is a group activity. Wisdom is kind. Wisdom shares its last morsel of food simply because that is what wisdom does. Wisdom knows that everything is connected, and what you do to someone else, you have done to yourself first. Wisdom is a baby crawling and giggling with its newfound mastery of getting around. Wisdom is an old man falling and laughing at his misfortunate mishap, knowing perfectly well everyone falls sometimes and it doesn’t mean a darn thing.
Wisdom knows sometimes you are going to win. Wisdom knows sometimes you are going to lose. Wisdom knows winning and losing doesn’t mean a darn thing because that is part of being alive. Wisdom knows navigating the ups and downs, the wins and losses, are much easier and mean so much more when you share it with the people who care about you and who you care about… this is love... caring and sharing, celebrating and mourning, feasting and fasting together as ever as one.
Wisdom is the joy of sharing life with the ones you love. Wisdom is the bliss of partaking equitably in the ups and downs of life. Wisdom is tolerating in another the things that annoy you most. Tolerance is a blessing, and wisdom knows this. Tolerance and wisdom are essential because life is complicated, too complicated for one insignificant human being to know everything it must to make a good decision.
A wise person knows this. A wise person knows a single individual can never consciously gather enough information to make a wise decision: so, stop trying to fool yourself and others that you can. A wise person understands action must be taken without foreknowledge of the results, but if the action is grounded in mutuality, respect, compassion, dignity, love, and a huge heaping of tolerance… mostly the results will reap good outcomes. And when they don’t, a wise person knows it is important to try again. Failure is simply the process of success.
Tolerance is an anti-gravity force to fear. Tolerance requires a person to broaden their bandwidth of consciousness rather than narrow and restrict it as fear does. Tolerance allows an individual to sit in discomfort, to sit in not knowing, to sit in the darkness of what is not clear yet and to wait for understanding of what is right action.
Timing is everything when it comes to action. Right action done too soon quickly turns into wrong action. Right action done too late will also not produce desired results. Action done outside of its proper time or beyond what is necessary to complete a task is easily twisted and corrupted by thinking that tries to justify it. Such action grows fat with inaccurate, incorrect, false, untrue, and mistaken attributions ladled onto it to get people to act. This sort of propped up action becomes more and more improper and unsuitable for the circumstances.
Such artificial action awakens the most wicked and sinful parts of a person, because acting outside and beyond the bounds of right action requires an angry mind, a brash, conservative, intolerant, mean, merciless, unfriendly, unsympathetic, biased, disapproving, narrow-minded, and prejudiced mind. People acting in this manner are cruel, brutal, savage, bloodthirsty, vicious people driven by narrower and narrower justifications loaded with fantastical and fraudulent fancies.
Wisdom knows this and knows tolerance is the only way to slow down enough to sense and see what is really going on inside and outside of one’s own mind and body. Only by sensing and seeing more of what is actually going on in the present moment can a person produce right action at the right time.
Right action does not inflict harm unto oneself or another without a really good reason why violence is required. Isaac Asimov got it right when his character, Salvor Hardin, says: “Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.” This is true because it is so easy to lose wisdom when one is racing inside their mind, thought after thought conceived by lies, half-truths, or half-baked ideas and silly beliefs.
A person acting in such a way utilizes the narrowest bandwidth of consciousness possible yet still able to remain conscious. Any narrower, and the person would fall into a dumb, zombie-like stupor. Wisdom knows this. Wisdom knows thinking is a result of the constriction of consciousness due to fear. Wisdom knows thinking trumped up with false facts and fantastical beliefs is going to make a lot of mistakes due to its failure to grasp reality. So, like any good toddler, a person who thinks all the time and falls out of phase with right action will make more and more mistakes and will act in more and more rageful ways trying to cover up and hide all their blunders, miscalculations, gaffes, and ignorance." -- Pages 128-128
Note: the link to Sapience is supposed to be a universal link that will open to the book in whatever browser and language from which you operate; however, it has not seemed to be working, so you can also search by the ASIN: B0D2LM5B6K.
The oracle is an ancient role that a wise woman or wise man played in society. Ancient man understood balance is essential, but finding the right balance can be tricky, especially when confronted with lots of divergent opinions, ideas, gossip, agitprop, spin, hype, propaganda, indoctrination, misinformation and disinformation on top of more spin.
In today’s modern world, life is even more chaotic and nerve wracking. This is why finding peace and quiet to dream is more important than ever before, and thus the inspiration for this plush, comfy comforter and its simple words of inspiration to invite delight into the night.
“I am an Oracle. Didn’t you hear? My wisdom’s like magic… … mystic and clear. I’ll lead you to places… … free from pain, fear, and hate. So, ask me your questions… And dream into being your destiny tonight!”
— by Deborah
Oracle Collection
The oracle collection is a reminder wisdom lies inside of all of us. And it is closer than we think. Wisdom’s light is soft, gentle like the moonlight that makes night a magical time. To hear our inner oracle, we must find outer calm and tranquility, even during the worst of times or the hardest trails life throws to us. This is not easy to do when one is feeling pain, fear, or hate. The oracle helps to soothes away the blocking feelings and traumas, so we can all find our way to our inner pool of peace and tranquility where our wisdom waits to rise like a full prescient moon.
The oracle is part of my book: Sapience: The Moment Is Now. It is an archetype, which is an idea developed by Carl Jung around the turn of the 20th Century to talk about how people use consciousness. Being self-aware and thinking are things we do every day, but rarely do we think about how we do it. Jung proposed there are body parts for the mind just as there are body parts for our bodies. Archetypes are the body parts of the mind. To visualized this, the colorful women-harps. If you look closely, the woman and harp are one entity.
Rainbow Women
I created these lovely rainbow women and harps for a blog I wrote about consciousness and arches of consciousness. I used Genolve via Midjourney to create rainbow arches of consciousness that the AI displayed to me as women and musical instruments playing the chords of consciousness inside of us. This is what the AI imagined, and I really liked it. One of the cues I gave to the AI was arches of consciousness, which is short for archetypes or an idea.
If you are interested in consciousness and archetypes, they are thoroughly explored in my book as well—Sapience: The Moment Is Now (on Amazon).
Merch& Book
These are just a few of the Oracle Collection items available now on Etsy at The Quip Collection
If you are a writer intending to publish independently and seeking help with some of the final details of the publishing process… BEWARE… the sea of the Google is ripe with sharks and cockroaches seeking to take your money and steal you blind. Time to wake up… if you want to keep your hard earned cash in your bank account.
Report A Scam
First things first, scammers are like spam… you find them everywhere and they have a long, long, long shelf life. This is because once the Federal Trade Commission, law enforcement, FBI, or even anti-scammer superheroes like Scammer Payback, Midnight, and Neon shut them down in one place or operating under one name, they pop back up somewhere else using a different name, different spoofed phone numbers, different IPs addresses.
But, just because they are everywhere like cockroaches does not mean we swallow their shitty deeds and take it. We report it. We publicize it. We help each other learn their tactics, their scam operations, their maneuver and we learn how to recognize, evade, and report their scum bag lifestyles. And protect those who are more vulnerable from them.
Here are some places you can report a scam:
Federal Trade Commission (FTC): Visit ReportFraud.ftc.gov to provide information that can help the FTC investigate the scam.
FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3): File a complaint if you've been a victim of spoofing or phishing.
Internal Revenue Service (IRS): Report unsolicited emails that appear to be from the IRS to phishing@irs.gov. If you've lost money due to an IRS-related incident, you can also report it to the Treasury Inspector General Administration (TIGTA).
Local police department: File a police report with the fraud division of your local police department.
Also, check out these places:
fbi.gov -- Spoofing and Phishing -- FBIHow to Report. To report spoofing or phishing attempts—or to report that you've been a victim—file a complaint with the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3).consumer.ftc.gov What To Do if You Were Scammed | Consumer AdviceThat's a scam. Report it at ReportFraud.ftc.gov. Scammers can be very convincing. They call, email, and send us text messages trying to get our money or sensitive personal information — like our Social Security or account numbers. And they're good at what they do. Here's what to do if you paid someone you think is a scammer or gave them your personal information or access to your computer or phone. If you paid a scammer, your money might be gone already. No matter how you paid, it's always worth asking the company you used to send the money if there's a way to get it back.
irs.gov -- Tax scams -- how to report them | Internal Revenue Service | Feb 6, 2024 — Phishing scams Phishing is a scam typically carried out through unsolicited email and/or websites that pose as legitimate sites and lure unsuspecting victims to provide personal and financial information. Report all unsolicited email claiming to be from the IRS or an IRS-related function to phishing@irs.gov . If you've experienced any monetary losses due to an IRS-related incident, please report it to the Treasury Inspector General Administration (TIGTA) and the Federal Trade Commission.
aura.com -- How To Track Down a Scammer (and What To Do Next) - AuraJul 24, 2023 — The Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The FTC has an online portal for reporting scams. Visit ReportFraud.ftc.gov to give them more information so that they can conduct an investigation.
thelawdictionary.org -- How To Report A Scammer To The Police - Black's Law Dictionary-- It is generally best to file a police report on a scammer, reach out to your bank, and file a complaint with the appropriate federal agency as soon as possible after you have been scammed. To file a police report for a scam, you will need make a call to or visit the fraud division of your local police department.
You can also try contacting the company you used to send money to see if there’s a way to get it back. For example, if you paid by debit card, you can try using a chargeback to get your money back. I used a credit card. Because I was hell bent on publishing my book faster than the scammers could string me along… my husband and I reported the scam to our credit card company and they reeled back the money the scammers thought they had stolen. Read below their terrible realization as they realized I wriggled off their hook!
If you’ve been scammed, it’s important to act quickly to minimize damage. You should immediately stop all contact with the scammer, including not responding to any emails, messages, or calls.
My Amazon Publishing Scam Story
On April 8, 2024, I ended up on this website while search for Amazon self-publishing instructions and website. This site appears above the real Amazon website and instructions. Having never published a book before, I did not know what I did not know. The chat bot immediately engaged with me before I could scroll down to the very bottom of the website. The chat bot introduced itself as Jennifer Grace. This was 1st contact with the fraud they were about to pull on me.
Scammer Website!
Let’s Pick This Website Apart
The URL below is the Scammer’s Website. Notice how long the URL below is… this is not normal for legit websites to be so long.
Also, look at the logo. It uses Amazon’s color and shape, but it is not the Amazon logo. They just want to get it close enough and hope you ignore the fact that it is a cheap fake as you fall into their scammer net that is pretty and shiny, baited with all the ways they are going to help you be a BEST SELLING author. They are counting on your enthusiasm and dreams to make you ignore the warning flags waving frantically at you as you take the bait and fall hook-line-and sinker into their trap. They will play on every writer’s secret dream to be the next JK Rollings! The scammers will actually use this line on me later.
Bookwriting... really?! Dudes... you are suppose to be helping writers not hurting them.
And that chat box down at the lower right hand corner… WATCH OUT… because they are watching YOU and they know you have stumbled into their web.
A “friendly” girl named Jennifer is going to pop up and start talking to me. She will quickly hand me off their Marketing Supervisor… who is the same girl but with a new name: Abigail… what a pretty name for a spider. She is going to take my money and pass me off to a Scammer Closer... who she tells me is an Amazon Global Publishing Project Managers… I fail to hear her evil laugh as she quickly pushing me off to David… the Closer!
Let’s back up because the scammers gave me a lot of information here that I am going to share with you so you can begin questioning a scam sooner than I did.
Jennifer Grace immediately handed me off to Abigail Noel who is the 2nd contact. Abigail talked fast and was very flattering (very nice and flattering people are buttering you up — this is always a warning sign!!).
She moved me swiftly from chatting over the chat bot to a phone call coming from (877-806-0660) [Beware of numbers beginning with 877… these tend to be scammer numbers!] Once on the phone, Abigail continued her flattery and fast talking. I specifically asked her if they are part of Amazon, and she told me that they are. I said that I did not know Amazon had a sub-division that assisted writers with finishing up their manuscripts. Abigail allowed me to continue in this delusion and this is the moment that the fraud began and everyone I would communicate with thereafter contributed to my mistaken identity that Amazon Global Publishing worked for Amazon. In fact, they were counting on this to hook me for the scam part of the fraud they had just pulled me into.
Believing that I was interacting with a sub-division of Amazon, Abigail gave me a quote for how much it would cost, and then offered me 40% off, creating a limited offer and a sense of needing to make a decision now or lose the benefit.
Following is part of the text they sent me after my initial contact with them, though part of our conversation has been removed, especially when I tell Abigail that I didn’t know Amazon offered publishing services to writers and she assured me that Amazon did. She did not make sure I understood this was Amazon Global Publishing, which has no affiliation with Amazon and is in fact poaching client writers from Amazon proper. I highlight two points in my initial contact with individuals at this fake Amazon where the scam is initiated, then continued.
[amazonpublicationhouse] Re: Chat with Visitor 47486888 [aka… “I just snagged a very Stupid but YUMMY Fish for Dinner boys!”]
Inbox
support@…se.zendesk.com [Very creepy Zen going on here]
Apr 8, 2024, 2:03 PM to me
Chat started: 2024-04-08 05:07 PM UTC [Coordinated Universal Time] This is another trick they employ so you don’t know where the Hell on planet Earth they are working from! And another WARNING SIGN!!!
(05:07:20 PM) *** Jennifer Grace joined the chat *** [The evil worm coming to pull in dinner for the scamming crew]
(05:07:23 PM) Jennifer Grace: Hello there 🙂
(05:07:25 PM) Jennifer Grace: How are you doing today?
**(05:07:30 PM) Jennifer Grace: Are you intending to get your book published on Amazon? [Jennifer says Amazon; not Amazon Global Publishing… the scam begins here]**
(05:08:14 PM) Jennifer Grace: Well, this is not a BOT – Feel free to ask any question 🙂
(05:09:47 PM) Visitor 47486888: Oh — I was looking for self guide to do this myself, but what is the price for a book coming in at 297 pages text, plus about 10 to 15 references. I also have my own art and cover (though do not know how to put the words on the title yet)
(05:10:18 PM) Jennifer Grace: Alright, we can certainly help you with that
(05:10:27 PM) Jennifer Grace: May I have your name please 🙂
(05:10:56 PM) Visitor 47486888: Deborah … though I plan to use a pen name for the book [Ah… I just bit the hook!!! LOL…]
(05:11:09 PM) Jennifer Grace: Nice to have you here, Deborah 🙂
(05:11:23 PM) Jennifer Grace: Let me quickly connect you to Our Senior Book Expert [LOL!!!! Senior Scammer Scum is more accurate]
(05:11:30 PM) Jennifer Grace: who’d be able to guide you properly with the process and pricing as well
(05:11:35 PM) Visitor 47486888 is now known as Deborah … aka, among the scammers all huddled together in their pathetic ugly room in India: “Stupid New Yummy Target”. [YES, scammers have elaborate systems tracking everybody who stumbles onto their paid, promoted pages! You a just a number to them… a stupid fish they are hoping to reel for dinner!]
(05:11:38 PM) Deborah: OK
(05:11:55 PM) Jennifer Grace: Meanwhile, may I have your email and phone number? in case we get disconnected
(05:12:43 PM) Deborah: Sure — email is xxxx@gmail.com phone: xxx-xxx-xxxx (cell) [Never, ever give your personal information to people you don’t know… they will keep calling and email on new spoofing lines until HELL freezes over!!!!!]
(05:12:56 PM) Jennifer Grace: Thanks for the details 🙂
(05:13:02 PM) Jennifer Grace: Connecting you right away!! [Yeah right, girrrl, you are connection to yourself!]
(05:13:15 PM) *** Abigail Noel joined the chat ***
(05:13:22 PM) Abigail Noel: Hello Deborah!
(05:13:27 PM) Abigail Noel: Nice to have you here 🙂
(05:14:03 PM) Abigail Noel: I’ll provide you with the cost details shortly.
**(05:14:08 PM) Deborah: I ended up here accidentally… [Zen Desk puts … here, but there is text missing here… I know I said that I did not know Amazon had this servie and Abigail lead me to believe that Amazon did have it, the real Amazon, not this fake one] …but let’s see what you might be able to help me do and how much** There is NOTHING ZEN about this Creepy Desk!
(05:14:21 PM) Abigail Noel: I see you have a 297 paged book
(05:14:26 PM) Deborah: yes
(05:14:31 PM) Abigail Noel: May i know whats it about as in whats the genre?
(05:15:11 PM) Deborah: I have formatted it per amazon instruction… and the genre is Science Fiction-Fantasy with some historical fiction thrown in [Yeah… I just keep feeding them information to hang myself with…]
(05:15:23 PM) Abigail Noel: Thats amazing! [Buttering up… because I am dinner!!!]
(05:15:44 PM) Deborah: 12 years in the making! It’s time!!
(05:16:09 PM) Abigail Noel: Would it be requiring professional editing? Or would basic proofreading be sufficient?
<<Something was left out here… not such a perfect recording machine this creepy Zen Desk!!>>
(05:17:50 PM) Abigail Noel: Oh wow!
(05:17:52 PM) Deborah: Proofreading is sufficient… I have edited it extensively over a long period of time… I get 100% with Word very basic grammar/spell check… but I’m sure there are still some errors… [Abigail is going to ignore what I just said and proceed to sell me shit.]
(05:18:15 PM) Abigail Noel: We’ll take care of it we have inhouse professionals who can take care of this!
(05:19:04 PM) Abigail Noel: Let’s dive into the process, Deborah, this way you’ll get to know how we work and I’ll provide you with the package as well
(05:19:20 PM) Deborah: One other thing that may not make this possible for you to do… is I really feel it needs to be published on 4/24/24… [This is so fortunate!!!!]
(05:20:05 PM) Abigail Noel: That can definitely be done [YEAH Right!!!!]
(05:20:18 PM) Deborah: Ok — great! [Bad idea girl!!!!!!!]
(05:20:31 PM) Abigail Noel: Once your order is placed, we will proceed by collecting your manuscript and other relevant details including image files. Your dedicated project manager will get in touch with you via email and calls.
(05:20:54 PM) Abigail Noel: As part of Amazon’s Mandatory Guidelines, we will run the proofreading phase on your manuscript, which includes:
[Let’s just get it clear… Amazon does have guidelines, but if you are self-publishing, you are on your own. They don’t even have a Help Desk to call, nor email. They don’t care if you, speck of creative flare that you are, sink in their vast, competitive sea of online shopping… because they don’t NEED you. Once you publish on their platform, you appear at the bottom of Amazon’s Marianas Trench of their online sellers and buyers world. Whether you can find a way to float up a little higher in the vast maze of algorithms and paid ads is totally up to you!!!]
•Ensuring consistency in your writing, word choices, style, and compositional spacing
• Eliminating jargon and repetition
• Revising inappropriate verb tenses
• Checking for subject-verb agreement
• Inserting transitional phrasing
• Evaluating the continuity/flow of your thoughts
• Ensuring support of statements
• Providing correct formatting of citations/references, and footnotes according to industry style guide formatting
• Providing critical assessment and feedback of your manuscript throughout your document’s comments section.
This step identifies any roadblocks such as plagiarism, spelling, and grammatical errors that might cause the book to be flagged by Amazon or removed from its list after publication.
[This is all complete Bullshit… they don’t do shit except think of how to scam more money out of you now!!!]
(05:22:09 PM) Abigail Noel: Your book is already formatted, however to ensure that it aligns with Amazon Standards of 2024 [Hahaha… scammers want you to feel stuck… they want you to feel dependented on them… fortunately, I had already tuned her out because I knew my book didn’t need this shit… I was focused on 4/24/24] we’ll run the formatting phase on it, after your approval, we will start the Book conversion process and set the layout and formatting of the book including marginalization, spacing, fonts, dimensions, index of authorities, etc.
Moving on, an Expert Typesetter enhances the composition of the text for a better readability experience in Digital Format and also to enable the book for Printing.
We will then put together the final publish-ready version of the book in Digital and Paperback formats and share them with you for your review and approval.
(05:22:31 PM) Abigail Noel: After you provide us with your final approval on the publish-ready version of the book in print and digital, our publisher will publish your book on Amazon and Kindle. This entails a unique ISBN and barcode registration for your book and creating unique author and book profiles on Amazon and Kindle, which we’ll ensure are optimized so we can attract your book’s relevant target audience organically.
(05:22:39 PM) Abigail Noel: With me so far, Deborah?
(05:22:41 PM) Deborah: These would be checks that are sent as suggestions, correct? I have a very specific voice and tone that needs to be maintained.
(05:23:22 PM) Abigail Noel: Rest assured, we’ll make sure to preserve the true essence of its originality
(05:24:18 PM) Abigail Noel: Once we have your approval on the final publish ready version, before its publication, we will also search engine optimize your Amazon profile in order to attract an organic audience and make your book rank higher in the recommendation list of people interested in your genre.
Meta data is information about your book (title, genre, author bio, publisher, etc.) that helps retailers and readers categorize and find your book. The stronger your metadata, the easier readers can find your book. our meta data experts will perform a spell check, basic edits, and keyword optimization to give your book its best shot at make the sale. You’ll also receive a proof of your approval.
(05:24:32 PM) Deborah: I’m nervous… but I’m also overwhelmed a bit as this is first book… so if this is affordable, I will serious consider help
(05:24:42 PM) Abigail Noel: Lastly, we set up the exclusive Print on Demand Function for you. Amazon will take care of all your printing and shipping orders.
This is our process, let me know if you have any questions.
(05:25:38 PM) Abigail Noel: I understand and we’re here to be your helping hand Deborah, it can be quiet nerve wreaking but rest assured our packages are budget friendly and we strive to help authors in the best possible way
(05:26:48 PM) Deborah: Yes — I want the digital and print on demand for sure. I also have a resource page for the end… that I am cutting down… this provides links to resources I have used to help me create the texture and background for the characters… as well as be as accurate as possible to historical dates
(05:28:34 PM) Abigail Noel: Thats wonderful! Insightful and detail-oriented, the perfect blend.
(05:29:51 PM) Abigail Noel: If you don’t have any questions, shall I get your package generated?
(05:29:58 PM) Deborah: Trying… for sure… provide contents and offer new ideas
(05:30:46 PM) Deborah: Yes — what does this cost? That could be my biggest hurtle
(05:31:26 PM) Abigail Noel: Alright, Deborah! Kindly hold with me while I get your package generated
-Basic Proofreading (According To Amazon Standards) [RED ALERT!!!!]
-Ensuring the Layout, Formatting, and Typesetting are as per International Publishing Standards
-Finalization of the publish-ready version of the book
-Global Publishing on Amazon
-Unlimited revisions until you are 100% satisfied
-100% ownership rights
– Creation of Author Profile and Book Page on Amazon
– Book Categorization in relevant categories as per the Genre
– Keyword Research and Optimization to improve the Book’s discoverability
– Search engine optimization of Author profile on the publishing platform
– Attract your targeted audience with keywords and categorization
[Total Bullshit… they give your a made up price and put it on sale because all little fishys love to bite on sales!]
(05:33:49 PM) Abigail Noel: How does that sound to you, Deborah?
(05:34:59 PM) Deborah: That sounds really amazing… can you hold on as I need to run this by husband … back in a minute [And it is soon to become a really nasty nightmare, girl… RUN!!!]
(05:35:11 PM) Abigail Noel: Certainly, I’m right here!
(05:37:15 PM) Deborah: Okay… we are on a pretty tight budget… but this is a big thing, I think the book will find her readers, eventually… I am exhausted… so he agrees, let’s do it [Abigail don’t care… she just wants to swallow as much money as you give her and leave you high and dry to die]
(05:38:51 PM) Abigail Noel: That great to hear! Let me ring you up and assist you in getting started
(05:39:40 PM) Deborah: okay — you can call cell xxx-xxx-xxxx or home xxx-xxx-xxxx [OH YEAH… they’re going to be calling both of these non-stop pretty soon once they realize you realized they are SCAMMERS!!!!!!!]
(05:39:49 PM) Abigail Noel: Ringing you right up!
What Zen Desk does not record is that Abigail got my credit card number wrong three times because she kept inputting a wrong number into her system [Stupid scammer!]. On the fourth try, using my husband’s name she finally got it right and the charge of $750 went through.
Without a moments break, she handed me off to David Luiz[Apparently this dude likes scoccer because the only David Luiz who appears in Google searches is the one who plays for Brazil, but I don’t know this yet because I want to believe they are going to help me… what a foolish girl I am!] who was supposed to be my Project Manager (but really, he was primary fraudster and scammer from here on out). David’s main concern was singing me up onto this sketchy system called Basecamp. He was more concerned with this than understanding the scope of my book, work already completed, and areas that I wanted help. [Basecamp is super scary SHIT! If someone wants you to join Basecamp…RUN!!!!!!]
The “Basecamp”!!
Signing into Basecamp didn’t work at first either, and David shunted me off to an IT specialist who finally got me into this system. Following are the Welcome Messages.
Basically, David wanted to get my cover art (which is my original work and something I have not released to anyone as of this time) and my manuscript (an endeavor that took 12 years to write).
The next day, I got a cover design back. This seemed the only thing that they may have been competent in doing; however, by April 19, when I realize this is a scam, I do not use anything they provided. In fact, they never provided a PDF that I could use to load into the Kindle self-publishing system. They only sent pretty mockups, which was decent, not great and not sent as I file that I could use.
It took David until April 11 to answer questions I had sent to him on April 9th. I thought this odd, but figured he was busy. Throughout this whole time, a timeline was never created, and I had no idea who was working on what part of my book, just a mysterious 11 unidentified people who supposedly got every message sent through Basecamp.
I finally get edits on April 12. I am shocked and dismayed that the editor has only gotten to page 40 of 297 pages. Abigail has promised me they would meet my April 24 deadline, though it is clear David is hedging on this.
I look through the edits. Most are stylistic edits (stupid edits). And what concerns me further is there are glaring errors in the edits made that if published would make me look like I didn’t know who I was talking about and lost track of my characters. I point out to the mystery editor in a nice way.
I send it back the next day.
I do not receive any thing until 4/16/24, and this is only a new mockup of my cover after I request a darker color on the back. Again, it is sent to me in a file I cannot use. Just a nice mockup of what my book might look like.
Two more days past before I received the next set of edits draft back. Again, I am shocked and dismayed that this “editor” had only accomplished editing 40 more pages since 4/12/24… this is absolutely dismal progress for a “professional” editor. In my time as an editor, I would have been fired for going this slow. Even more annoying is the editor continues to make the same serious mistakes I thought we had addressed and come to an understanding of from the first draft. But in the next 40 pages, this serious mistake (along with others) continues to be made. I am also in serious doubt that they can make my 4/24/24 deadline.
But Wait… The Scam Gets Worse!!
Then, the fraud-scam grows bigger.
On April 18, 2024, David calls me breathless and tells me that out of 5,000 authors they are working with this month, I have been pick for sponsorship of Extensive Publishing. David tells me I will get two editors, be featured globally on Amazon sites as well as 40 additional non-Amazon sites, and a bunch of other garbage that he makes sound really exiting. He tells me this all cost $12,000, but some mysterious sponsor is going to chip in 70%, so I only need to pay an additional $3,600.
I told David I was on a run and could not possibly pay until returning home.
When I returned home and called, as I promised, David was not available (probably scamming someone else), but Abigail was. David messaged me on Basecamp, but I did not get a Zen Desk readout of his call and promises. The invoice does not list any of the promises David has made to me, nor do I finally notice does it list a physical address. In fact, no communications I have received thus far lists a brick and mortar building though I know David and Abigail are working someplace with other people because when I have talked to them, I hear other people talking in the background.
‘Bout Time Girl!!!!
My suspicions begin to rise. [‘Bout TIME, girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]
On April 19, 2024, David interrupts a call with my daughter who is getting ready to fly down for personal reason that are scheduled on Monday. I hang up on my daughter to take his call. He tells me that my manuscript is done, which I immediately find utterly unbelievable considering the super slow progress up until this point.
I have been kind to the editors believing berating them for dumb mistakes will not further the process, but I am not impressed by any of the edits made up until this April 18, 2024. When I open this latest draft, I am dumbfounded. The book is not over 640 pages!!! Edits are barely worthy making and more mistakes. Also, it has been sent as a PDF and David wants me to hand write my comments!!!!!
I am not pleased, but still believe I am working with Amazon.
Then, my daughter flies in and my husband and I pick her up at National. I tell her they story of the past 24 hours, and she tells me: “Mom, you’ve been scammed.”
When we get home, I finally search for amazon global publishing scams (as I should have done on April 8), and I find this article: How Scammers Are Using Amazon and Amazon Trademarks to Rip Writers Off — POSTED BY VICTORIA-STRAUSS FOR WRITER BEWARE® ON JUL 7, 2023
I finally threw away my blinders of enthusiasm and excitement and realized that this very tiny team of “experts” were preying on me to get my money that now totals $4,150 US dollars. Money, I did not have in excess to spare, especially after 5 years (now going on 6 years) of not working after being fired from my job with a religious non-profit for whom I had put in over 86 hours of worked writing proposals for the past year, many of them funded. But, this didn’t matter to the narcissistic CEO who preferred to run the nonprofit using fear of being laid off or fired if the employees did not do what she wanted when she wanted it done. This experienced combine with the trauma of being the person who had to make the decision to remove my father from lifesaving care sent me into a major depression that sent me to a pit of suicidal depression, but that is straying from the story of the scam.
Leaving My Pride on the Floor & Dealing With Reality
Confronted with my husband’s doubt and my daughter’s absolute belief I had been scammed, and finding Victoria Strauss’ article, I admitted to myself and my family I had fallen for a scam, and we called our credit card and report the fraud on April 19, 2024. They immediately begin a charge back process for the 4/8/24 charge of $750, but the $3,500 charge has not yet posted as of 4/19/24. However, by 4/20/24, this charge posted, and we reported the fraud and charge back (refund) process on this amount too.
My family and I are incredibly fortunate that our credit card could get both charges cancelled and refunded to our credit card. However, we now must begin the process of closing this card as the scammers have it and the security codes. The intangible thing that they also have is all of my original work: the manuscript I sent to them on 4/8/24, the cover art that I drew, and all the artwork in the novel, which I also drew.
With the 0.05% chance that they could publish my work before I did and claim it as theirs, I threw all my effort into getting onto Real Amazon’s website and figuring out on my own Real Amazon’s self-publishing process, which really isn’t that hard, even for beginners who have never done this before. I worked on my paperback first and submitted it on 4/22/24. Amazon is very forthright that once you hit submit it can take 72 hours for it to go Live. I was just a tiny bit over the 72 hours and could only hope that my paperback went Live on my birthday as I have been pushing for and working for hard for the past year.
And it went Live on 4/24/24 at 11:38 a.m.! I was so happy. I managed to submit my Kindle formatted manuscript on 4/24/24 and learned that the Kindle process provides more checks that proved very helpful, so next time, I will format and submit Kindle first. My Kindle version went Live on 4/26/24, which is when I submitted my hard cover manuscript and made changes to my paperback from things I had learned doing the Kindle version. As of Monday, my hard cover is Live now too.
Throughout this whole time, my husband and I were helping our daughter get through a rough moment. And as of the moment of my awareness of being scammed, I stopped responded to calls, text, and emails coming from Fake Amazon. How they responded in the wake of realizing I cancelled payment and refused to return or answer calls, texts, or e-mails illuminates they are indeed a scamming fake corporate shell operation.
I do not respond to any posts in Basecamp, calls, or text thereafter. And there are many, which I am going to list for this in itself indicated fraud and scam practices given how many numbers they desperately are trying to contact me one.
Amazon Global Publishing Website Dissected
I never got down to the end of the very long webpage. Yes, this is all one page… you have to scroll, scroll, and scroll to get to that little, tiny disclaimer in the black at the very bottom of this site… in really tiny font. In addition, throughout all my verbal communications with this scamming team, they always just said Amazon. If they were getting serious, they might say Amazon Publishing. I see now, this was all very deliberate. And since successfully publishing my work on Real Amazon, I see how they went to great links to get their graphics to look vaguely like Real Amazon, but different enough that they might be able to get away with it. That is Real Amazon’s problem, not mine.
Scammer Panic
The most interesting part of this story is what happens after we stop the payments and I stop communicating with them. Here is how they responded.
Desperate Effort to Re-engage with Me After I Cut Off All Communication on 4/19/24:
On April 23, I blocked 877-806-0660 (the number we had been communicating through). This is the number Abigail first called me on and the number David, my alleged Project Manager, used thereafter to call me. I would soon realize that this little team of two or three or a whole country, had many other numbers they used to talk with “people” (or should I say victims).
Phone numbers associated with this group:
307-429-0934 Sheridan, WY April 24 4:21 pm (it is David)
307-429-0934 Sheridan, WY April 24 4:45 pm (it is David)
And the Creepy Text Messages:
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 25 2:23 pm (it is Abigail)
307-429-0934 Sheridan, WY April 25 4:24 pm (it is David)
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 25 5:50 pm (it is Abigail)
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 25 5:51 pm (it is Abigail)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 26 11:59 am (it is David)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 26 11:59 am (it is David)
And pathetic voicemail messages:
Leaves Voicemail:‚ÄúHi Debra, this Terry speaking your project How are you doing ? It’s been a long Reach out to you on the kidding and connect Fortunately There are a couple of things that need To discuss If you could you please ring me up whenever you are free or just so let me know so I can give you a call back Looking forward to take care, I hope Your Going with the smooth as well Whenever you available, you can just call me back and we’ll connect How I take care of goodbye‚Ķ
(I’d like to point out David forgot his fake name he was using with me and called himself Terry)
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 26 3:15 pm (it is Abigail)
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 26 3:15 pm (it is Abigail)
More Creepy Texts & Voicemails:
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 29 1:01 pm (it is Abigail)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 29 4:24 pm (it is David)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 29 4:25 pm (it is David)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 29 4:26 pm (it is David)
Leaves Voicemail: ‚ÄúHi Deborah, this is David speaking your project manager. How are you doing? I hope everything is great at you and I’ve been trying to reach out to you all. But unfortunately, getting to connected all there are a couple of things that need to be discussed so On the top of everything you payment has been actually home Refund it to To your card No Finance actually been reaching out to me to get an update but unfortunately I have nothing to say then but I’m looking forward to get connected with you so just give me a call back whenever you’re free so we can‚Ķ‚Äù
(At least, he remembers the correct FAKE name this time)
484-750-6086 Digital Service April 30 1:50 pm (it is suspicious)
410-683-5026 Cockeysville, MD April 30 5:42 pm (it is Abigail)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 30 7:34 pm (either David or new guy Ronald from finance)
877-384-2440 Unknown April 30 7:35 pm (either David or new guy Ronald from finance)
307-241-5560 Wheatland, WY April 30 9:23 pm Ronald from finance
307-241-5560 Wheatland, WY April 30 9:24 pm (it is Ronald who also called my home phone)
307-241-5560 Wheatland, WY April 30 9:23 pm (it is Ronald)
Sent Creepy text (and I bet your booty it’s really David-Terry-Rashi pretending to be Ronald):
I’d like to point out that these later calls do not correspond to the established pattern between David and Abigail that communicated strictly beginning after 12 noon EST time and about 5:00 pm EST. On my last call with David (the one where he scammed me on paying $3,400) I asked him what time zone he is working in. I think I surprised him with this question for he hesitated with a Hmmm… then, said Mountain Time, which is not where Amazon headquarters would be operating from (that would be Pacific Time). The 9 pm calls correspond nicely with someone calling from the Philippines or Indonesia, which is exactly 12 hours ahead of Eastern Standard time. So, this Ronald guy would have just arrived and started work at his International Scam Factory. He would have made calls at 9:23 am, 9:24 am, and sent a text at 9:23 am Philippine time using a Spoofing (fake number) to disguise the call as coming from Whealand, WY.
E-mails & Creepy Basecamp Messages Received After I Reported the Fraud to Credit Card:
Creepy Texts and Emails Received After Money Was Pulled Back:
Hell no Abigail… you want me to tell you how to scam someone else better! Bitch!
Copy of Above:
abigail |<abigail@amzglobalpublishing.com>
Mon, Apr 29, 1:07 PM (1 day ago)
to me
Fake, fake, fake, fake
Greetings Deborah,
I hope everything is going well with you.
I recently heard from David about the chargeback situation. I completely understand if you’re hesitant and have been avoiding our calls. However, I would really appreciate it if you could share what prompted you to change your mind. I’m not asking you to reconsider working with us again, but just understanding why you’re avoiding us would mean a lot.
David mentioned that he’s planning to reach out to you to resolve this issue, but he also mentioned today that you’ve been avoiding us. It would mean a great deal to me if you could shed some light on the situation. I recall how enthusiastic you were about working with us before, and how satisfied you seemed with David’s assistance. If you could simply let me know what’s changed, we can finally put this matter to rest.
Best Regards, Abigail Noel
Sr. Publishing & Marketing Consultant
David — April 29 & 30: [HaHa… David!!!]
April 30:
Copy of above email
Urgent: Action Required to Avoid Sponsorship Loss [HaHa… David!!!]
Dear Deborah,
I hope this email finds you well.
I’ve been trying to reach out to you through multiple channels for over a week now, but unfortunately, I haven’t received any response from your end. This concerns me greatly, especially considering the current status of your project.
It’s very unlike you to become unresponsive all of a sudden, especially given the strong bond and professional connection we’ve developed throughout our collaboration. I find this behavior both strange and unprofessional, and I hope we can address any concerns or issues together. [Laughing out loud So hard… David is trying to Shame me back into giving him my money… LOL!!!]
As you may be aware, there was a sudden chargeback raised on your payment in the middle of our project, resulting in a full refund of the amount paid. While there was sponsorship involved in your package, our policy dictates that outstanding dues must be cleared promptly to avoid any adverse consequences.
I want to emphasize the urgency of this situation. If your dues remain unpaid by the end of today, the sponsorship associated with your package will be forfeited, which could significantly impact the progress of your work. I’m sure you can understand that this is not an outcome I wish for.
I have attached the payment details below for your reference.
Click here to make the payment
I sincerely hope you can take a moment to clear the outstanding dues to avoid any disruptions to your project. Please know that I am here to assist you every step of the way, and I remain committed to ensuring the success of your project.
Looking forward to your prompt response.
Best regards, David
[Yeah, duh David, are you finally realizing I am not your tasty little fish you get to eat tonight?!]
Anti-Scammers Super Heros!
I’d like to give a shout out to individuals with skills in the US who are fighting back against these scammers. If you have not heard of them, check out their channels and consider supporting the work they are doing to keep us safe from the scumbags working in huge corporate-like operations mostly based in India, but also Pakistan and the Philipines.
Thank You Scammer Payback!!!
Thank You Midnight!!!
Thank You Neon!!!
Moral to the Story
So, the moral of this story, is if your Project Manager speaks with an Indonesian, Pilipino, Indian, Pakistani accent, which mine most certainly did… you are probably not working with a real publishing firm, not even a vanity publisher. You are working with scammers who are going to pull out all the stops to fraud you out of your money. Beware.
I was born in Brazil. My father went there as a Lutheran missionary, my mother bravely went with him barely a week after getting married. I remember riding on my father’s shoulders as we galloped through the jungle with monkeys screeching at us in the trees above. It was glorious! I remember getting stuck in red mud with sheep surrounding us as a shepherd drove them homeward, a sea of baaing, woolly beasts! I remember the steel drums; I loved them, so did my father.
We moved back to the states when I turned three. Then, we moved all over because my father was a traveler who brought kindness and compassion to people who needed it most. We lived in LA to Redway, then headed east to the vast plains of South Dakota. I missed the redwood trees terribly and hunting for Big Foot with my brothers. But mother gave me Little House on the Prairie, and I began to grow deep roots on the Great Plains with my pony Blondie who liked to buck whenever we galloped. We moved again to Minneapolis. How I missed the plains, my pony, and my freedom. I felt my life was over. Then, I grew to love Minneapolis, the lakes, biking, running, swimming, and cross-country skiing in the snow.
I kept moving… living in the Florida Keys, Colorado, Maine, then Virginia. I was going to be a Marine Biologist, but when I discovered how much proposal writing was required, I decided I would spend more time writing than under the sea. So, I moved to Colorado where I took a job at a school for Creative and Gifted Children, and a teacher was what I was going to be. But I needed to finish my degree, so Bar Harbor beckon. This is where I finished my BA in Human Ecology with a focus on education and how to be a teacher.
But I felt I lacked enough life experience to truly be a good teacher, so I set out to gain some real-life experience and moved to DC. It almost swallowed me whole… except that I happen to meet a tremendous woman who helped me swim, Viola Young Horvath. She was one of the first microbiologists in the US. She who took me under her wing and guided me through life in WDC. I never, ever wanted to work in the corporate world. But, somehow, with Viola’s help, that is exactly where I ended up writing stories for corporations and non-profits in the form of proposals, annual reports, funding reports… which is exactly what I didn’t want to do as the younger version of myself. But I was sure getting life experience, way too much at times!
I met my life partner, a volcanologist at the Smithsonian, and began our family. We have one vibrant, beautiful grown-up daughter who is a constant source of inspiration and vitality. That’s about when I started looking for this story. It took me 12 years to find it, then 12 years to write it. From its inception, the timeline of this story began in 2020. And then, reality caught up with the story. Because of this, one of the characters has been woven into current events. For this reason, book 1 of this series may not be suitable for all readers as it deals with contentious concepts and issues happening right now, in 2024.
How Would A No Labels Presidential Candidate Change the Outcome in 2024?
This blog focus on the idea that the non-profit organization called No Labels plans to put a third party candidate into the 2024 Presidential Campaign. While I agree with Ryan Clancy’s idea of creating more choice for American voters, it is an extremely, short-sighted, ill-conceived, and premature idea to try to do this year.
While 60,000 voters think a third party candidate can win, so far no third party candidate has ever come close to getting a toe hold into the White House. There are so many more MAGA voters inspired by cooky myths, lies, and the very scary Seven Mountain Mandate men, of whom Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert are examples of women leaning heavily into “Let’s Do Medieval Again!“
The Stakes
This year, more than any year in American history, the stakes are higher than most people care to believe or admit or reckon with. Having Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Cornel West already running on third party tickets is concerning. So now, we want more choice and add a No Labels ticket too?! Really, this year, when King Kong and his MAGA base is coming to rip down democracy and replace it with the Christian Alt Right Stary-Eyed, Let’s Have Kings Again, The Seven Mountains Mandate men?!
Who are The Seven Montains Mandate men and women? Think Handmaids Tale.
It is not: “Oh the guy I voted for didn’t do the one thing I really wanted him to do, so I’m not voting for him again.”
This is an ignorant, short-sighted, and extremely selfish opinion. Running a country of 331+ million people democratically is not done by waving magic wands and fixing this problem instantly, then this problem, then that problem, and so on and so forth…
Do you live in reality people who give this as a reason for not voting for Joe? MAGA voters are a whole different story. They are a battering ram. They want to destroy democracy and rebuild America as a Totalitarian Christian Nationalist Country. Do you, ordinary voters unhappy with Joe want to live in a Christian Nationalist State run by one of the stupidest men on the planet… the Orange Baby?
Bradley Onishi is a former Christian nationalist who's now a professor of religion and the author of Preparing for War, a critique of the movement and its impact on American democracy.
BRAD ONISHI: I think it has. Christian nationalism is having a moment. It's having a moment in ways that it's requiring those who adhere to its principles and ideologies to respond to it. Folks like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert and others have talked about the ways that Christian nationalism not only informs their understanding of politics, but how they identify explicitly as Christian nationalists. And so we are at a point in American politics where Christian nationalism is something that many people are discussing.
GROSS: Are there many people in Congress who are affiliated with Christian nationalism?
ONISHI: I think it's fair to say that, yes. One of the things that's true about our Congress is that it is disproportionately Christian. Now, there are many different types of Christian people in our Congress from various denominations. However, if we look at the GOP and we look at the tenets of the party's policies and its approach to the upcoming elections, we find core Christian nationalist ideals in that platform. And we find many, many, many members of Congress from the GOP who support those principles. So from outgoing Speaker Kevin McCarthy to current speaker Mike Johnson, all the way to senators and other members of the House, there are many folks who I would describe as Christian nationalists in the United States Congress.
GROSS: What are some of the fundamental principles of Christian nationalism? Like, how would you define Christian nationalism?
ONISHI: I think in very simple terms, Christian nationalism is the idea that Christian people should be privileged in the United States in some way - economically, socially, politically - and that that influence and that privilege is a result of the country being founded by and for Christians. Christian nationalism is not the idea that others can't be here - that if you're a Muslim or an atheist, that you have to leave. It's also not the idea that only Christians can be part of the government. However, for most Christian nationalists, there is a core belief that the story of the United States is one where it has been elected by God to play an exceptional role in human history, and as being chosen by God, it's the duty of Christian people to carry out his will on Earth.
So Christian nationalists take an approach to their Christianity that says it should have an undue influence on our government, on our economics, on our culture, and that it is by dint of our history, the religious faith that is meant to be privileged in our public square. With that said, there are different kinds of Christian nationalists and different ways that people manifest their understanding of the term. But when it comes down to it, if we all sit down as Americans at a table and there are people from different backgrounds, different ethnicities, different faiths, and someone who is a Christian says, just by being at this table, I should have a special place, well, to me, that's Christian nationalism because you're saying that somehow this country is yours in a way that it is not for everyone else. And to me, therein lies the problem.
Go to Fresh Air to listen or read the rest of this interview. It is really, really important!
And this is really creepy:
GROSS: An extreme group of Christian nationalists is the New Apostolic Reformation, and they advocate the Seven Mountain Mandate, which is that Christian nationalists or Christians should lead government, family, religion, business, education, media, arts and entertainment, and that they - all of these sectors should reflect the kingdom of God. And I think I mentioned all seven there. So what does that mean to reflect the kingdom of God in family, religion, business, education, media, arts and entertainment, and the government?
ONISHI: The Seven Mountains mandate is a particular form of understanding human society that says that Christian people are not called to persuade their neighbors to practice the Christian faith, to demonstrate to their fellow Americans that the Christian faith is the faith of love and truth. The Seven Mountains Mandate is, as my colleague Matthew Taylor says, a mandate to colonize the Earth for God. The seven domains as you listed them - arts and leisure and the economy and the government, the family - are seen as mountains of conquest. The goal is not dialogue with neighbors who may be Muslim or atheist or Hindu. The goal is not to simply reflect the character of Christ on earth by way of living a life that upholds his glory and his teachings. The goal is to have absolute authority and power over every facet of human society.
And so we can see here what I take to be a very dangerous approach to practicing Christianity in the public square. It is not one that recognizes democracy or dialogue, pluralism as sacred values. The goal is power. The goal is conquest. And so when one hears about a politician or a leader or anyone in influence, especially as part of our government, who adheres to the Seven Mountains Mandate, that should set alarm bells off immediately.
Democracy Is Not: “Joe’s too old, Joe’s too square, Joe’s too this or that...” This is just as stupid, impatience, ignorant reason to not vote for a known and vetted winner: Joe Biden.
There was a time in the not so distant past when age was considered a plus and must for a ruler. Wisdom takes time to ripen and mature inside of people. And it does not come to everyone who ages… look at the overly large, orange, baby King Kong with his revved up mad as hell MAGA base.
Do you think they are worried about the Orange Giant being too old… his less than 4 years younger than Biden!! Anyone giving this as a reason not to vote for Joe is suffering from ageism and is pretty ignorant about how a government governing 331+ million people really works! It takes a lot of people to make it work… good people who are appointed to their positions in a timely fashion and have the expertise and experience to do their jobs. Trump had the most vacancies in top, critical positions of any former President. Some key positions were never appointed under the Orange Giant.
Democracy Is Not: “I’m mad a Joe for aiding Israel.” Modern nation-states are messy… alliances are messy… the world is messy and hard and cruel… that is why nations make alliances, and when Israel was attacked by HAMAS in one of the bloodiest, most gruesome slaughters of innocent people of this century, of course US comforts and supports Israel. There is so much going on behind the scenes that you and I never hear about. The death of any innocent person is intolerable. And Joe and his cabinet are doing their damn best to push for resolution, ceasefire, peace. But, tell me, anyone threatening not to vote for Joe because he can’t wave his wand and make this bloodshed stop… DO YOU REALLY THINK THE ORANGE GIANT (the man to put in place the Muslim Ban days after taking office)…. DO YOU REALLY THINK he is a better option?! I was mad at Obama for not doing more to stop the slaughter of Syrians being bombed by Russia as they aided their ugly ally Bashar al-Assad.
Take A Minute, Learn Something… Maybe Something New
Do Americans really understand democracy? Do Americans really cherish it? Do American comprehend what is at stake this year?
No Labels Debate
It is a choice. Listen to this debate and listen to Fresh Air if you are truly concerned about making an informed, intelligent choice.
The centrist group No Labels is planning to host a bipartisan nominating convention in 2024. This is leading some people to speculate that they may promote a third-party candidate that better reflects the perspective of middle-of-the-line voters who don’t favor President Biden’s re-election bid or Donald Trump receiving the Republican nomination.
Those who say it will help Trump argue the group doesn’t have enough influence to make lasting tangible change and worry that promoting a third-party unity ticket will give an unpopular candidate like Trump a lower threshold for votes that would’ve gone to Biden.
Those who disagree say voters who are discontented with both major parties but particularly opposed to Trump, might turn out in support of the third-party candidate, indirectly reducing Trump's chances.
With this context, we debate the question: “How Would A No Labels Presidential Candidate Change the Outcome in 2024?"
Rahna Epting argues that the No Labels Party does not have a path to win the presidency. Ryan Clancy argues a No Labels unity presidential ticket has a viable path to win the White House in 2024. Emmy award-winning journalist John Donvan moderates.
Open to Debate:How Would a No Labels Presidential Candidate Change the Outcome in 2024?
Feature Archetypal Animation
Music: Mickey Mouse Operation | Little People — [11] Fisticuffs At Dawn 1:02
Putin is a serial murderer responsible for decades of death. In case you have not been keeping count, this is a partial list of his history of mass murder.
And others who should be added to his warrant for arrest include: Trump and his MAGA zombies (failure to past funding to Ukraine), Kim Jong Un (supplying missiles to Russia), Xi Jinping (supporting and supplying Russia with weapons of war), Iran (supplying missiles to Russia), and any Putin sympathizers.
Just Another Da with My Boys! |Music: YMCA — Villiage People
The Russian apartment bombings
These were a series of explosions that hit four apartment blocks in the Russian cities of Buynaksk, Moscow, and Volgodonsk in September 1999, killing more than 300, injuring more than 1,000, and spreading a wave of fear across the country.
About 300000 people have been killed during two wars in Chechnya over the past decade, a senior official in the province’s Moscow-backed government said.— Al Jazeera
Human rights organizations accused Russian forces of engaging in indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force whenever they encountered resistance, resulting in numerous civilian deaths. (According to Human Rights Watch, Russian artillery and rocket attacks killed at least 267 civilians during the December 1995 raid by the Chechens on the city of Gudermes.[46]) Throughout the span of the first Chechen war, Russian forces have been accused by Human Rights organizations of starting a brutal war with total disregard for humanitarian law, causing tens of thousands of unnecessary civilian casualties among the Chechen population. The main strategy in the Russian war effort had been to use heavy artillery and air strikes leading to numerous indiscriminate attacks on civilians. This has led to Western and Chechen sources calling the Russian strategy deliberate terror bombing on parts of Russia.[65] According to Human Rights Watch, the campaign was "unparalleled in the area since World War II for its scope and destructiveness, followed by months of indiscriminate and targeted fire against civilians".[66] Due to ethnic Chechens in Grozny seeking refuge among their respective teips in the surrounding villages of the countryside, a high proportion of initial civilian casualties were inflicted against ethnic Russians who were unable to find viable escape routes. The villages were also attacked from the first weeks of the conflict (Russian cluster bombs, for example, killed at least 55 civilians during the 3 January 1995 Shali cluster bomb attack).
Russian soldiers often prevented civilians from evacuating areas of imminent danger and prevented humanitarian organizations from assisting civilians in need. It was widely alleged that Russian troops, especially those belonging to the Internal Troops (MVD), committed numerous and in part systematic acts of torture and summary executions on Chechen civilians; they were often linked to zachistka ("cleansing" raids on town districts and villages suspected of harboring boyeviki – militants). Humanitarian and aid groups chronicled persistent patterns of Russian soldiers killing, raping and looting civilians at random, often in disregard of their nationality. Chechen fighters took hostages on a massive scale, kidnapped or killed Chechens considered to be collaborators and mistreated civilian captives and federal prisoners of war (especially pilots). Russian federal forces kidnapped hostages for ransom and used human shields for cover during the fighting and movement of troops (for example, a group of surrounded Russian troops took approximately 500 civilian hostages at Grozny's 9th Municipal Hospital).[67]
The violations committed by members of the Russian forces were usually tolerated by their superiors and were not punished even when investigated (the story of Vladimir Glebov serving as an example of such policy). Television and newspaper accounts widely reported largely uncensored images of the carnage to the Russian public. The Russian media coverage partially precipitated a loss of public confidence in the government and a steep decline in President Yeltsin's popularity. Chechnya was one of the heaviest burdens on Yeltsin's 1996 presidential election campaign. The protracted war in Chechnya, especially many reports of extreme violence against civilians, ignited fear and contempt of Russia among other ethnic groups in the federation. One of the most notable war crimes committed by the Russian army is the Samashki massacre, in which it is estimated that up to 300 civilians died during the attack.[68] Russian forces conducted an operation of zachistka, house-by-house searches throughout the entire village. Federal soldiers deliberately and arbitrarily attacked civilians and civilian dwellings in Samashki by shooting residents and burning houses with flame-throwers. They wantonly opened fire or threw grenades into basements where residents, mostly women, elderly persons and children, had been hiding.[69] Russian troops intentionally burned many bodies, either by throwing the bodies into burning houses or by setting them on fire.[70] A Chechen surgeon, Khassan Baiev, treated wounded in Samashki immediately after the operation and described the scene in his book:[71]
The Second Chechen War saw a new wave of war crimes and violation of international humanitarian law. Both sides have been criticised by international organizations of violating the Geneva Conventions. However, a report by Human Rights Watch states that without minimizing the abuses committed by Chechen fighters, the main reason for civilian suffering in the Second Chechen War came as a result of the abuses committed by the Russian forces on the civilian population.[94] According to Amnesty International, Chechen civilians have been purposely targeted by Russian forces, in apparent disregard of humanitarian law. The situation has been described by Amnesty International as a Russian campaign to punish an entire ethnic group, on the pretext of "fighting crime and terrorism".[95] Russian forces have throughout the campaign ignored to follow their Geneva convention obligations, and has taken little responsibility of protecting the civilian population.[94] Amnesty International stated in their 2001 report that Chechen civilians, including medical personnel, have been the target of military attacks by Russian forces, and hundreds of Chechen civilians and prisoners of war are extrajudicially executed.[96]
According to human rights activists, Russian troops systematically committed the following crimes in Chechnya: the destruction of cities and villages, not justified by military necessity; shelling and bombardment of unprotected settlements; summary extrajudicial executions and killings of civilians; torture, ill-treatment and infringement of human dignity; serious bodily harm intentionally inflicted on persons not directly participating in hostilities; deliberate strikes against the civilian population, civilian and medical vehicles; illegal detentions of the civilian population and enforced disappearances; looting and destruction of civilian and public property; extortion; taking hostages for ransom; corpse trade.[97][98][99] There were also rapes,[100][101][102] which, along with women, were committed against men.[103][104][105][106][107][108] According to the Minister of Health of Ichkeria, Umar Khanbiev, Russian forces committed organ harvesting and organ trade during the conflict.[109]
Russian forces have since the beginning of the conflict indiscriminately and disproportionately bombed and shelled civilian objects, resulting in heavy civilian casualties. In one such occasion in October 1999, ten powerful hypersonic missiles fell without warning and targeted the city's only maternity hospital, post office, mosque, and a crowded market.[110][111][112][113] Most of the casualties occurred at the central market, and the attack is estimated to have killed over 100 instantly and injuring up to 400 others. Similar incidents include the Baku–Rostov highway bombing where the Russian Air Force perpetrated repeated rocket attacks on a large convoy of refugees trying to enter Ingushetia through a supposed "safe exit".[114][115] This was repeated in December 1999 when Russian soldiers opened fire on a refugee convoy marked with white flags.[116]
The 1999–2000 siege and bombardments of Grozny caused between 5,000[117] and 8,000[118] civilians to perish. The Russian army issued an ultimatum during the Grozny-siege urging Chechens to leave the city or be destroyed without mercy.[119] Around 300 people were killed while trying to escape in October 1999 and subsequently buried in a mass grave.[120] The bombing of Grozny included banned Buratino thermobaric and fuel-air bombs, igniting the air of civilians hiding in basements.[121][122] There were also reports of the use of chemical weapons, banned according to Geneva law.[123] The Russian president Putin vowed that the military would not stop bombing Grozny until Russian troops quote 'fulfilled their task to the end.' In 2003, the United Nations called Grozny the most destroyed city on Earth.[124]
Another occasion of indiscriminate and perhaps deliberate bombardment is the bombing of Katyr-Yurt which occurred on 4–6 February 2000. The village of Katyr Yurt was far from the war's front line, and jam-packed with refugees. It was untouched on the morning of 4 February when Russian aircraft, helicopters, fuel-air bombs and Grad missiles pulverised the village. After the bombing the Russian army allowed buses in, and allowed a white-flag refugee convoy to leave after which they bombed that as well.[125] Banned Thermobaric weapons were fired on the village of Katyr-Yurt. Hundreds of civilians died as a result of the Russian bombardment and the following sweep after.[126][127] Thermobaric weapons have been used by the Russian army on several occasions according to Human Rights Watch.[128]
Syria
6,950 civilians dead
The Syrian regime was responsible for 201,055 of these deaths, with the victims including 22,981 children and 11,976 women, while Russian forces killed 6,950 civilians, including 2,048 children and 977 women.Mar 15, 2023 -- ReliefWeb
Ukraine
500,000+ killed since Putin invaded
Casualties in the Russo-Ukrainian War included six deaths during the 2014 annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, 14,200–14,400 military and civilian deaths during the war in Donbas, and up to 500,000 estimated casualties during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. -- Wiki
The second year of war dragged on through Ukraine slowly and with little mercy. The first year of the war was a story of the resilience of people amid conflict that has turned into one of perseverance as the conflict has stagnated, with no end in sight.
Bohdan Semenukha and his mother, Viktoria, walk frequently through the Lychakiv cemetery in Lviv, Ukraine, just a few blocks from the new apartment where they moved after fleeing Kharkiv, in the country’s northeast, in January 2023. | Claire Harbage/NPR
Never Again
Music: Jupiter & Jaguar — Blond:ish | Welcome to the Present & Chants of Native Earth | Shamanic Moon (Native American Drums) | From February 24, 2022 | “Never Again” the World Once Said“
Alexei Navalny
‘It’s a torture regime’: the last days of Alexei Navalny
Each morning at 5am, Alexei Navalny was roused with the words “Wake up!” as the Russian national anthem played on the prison loudspeakers. It was always dark in the polar night above the Arctic Circle, and the temperature outside could fall below -30C (-22F). The convict would have a sheepskin coat and an ushanka hat to keep warm in a prison colony better known by its nickname: the Polar Wolf.
To read whole article, go to The Guardian for full article by Andrew Roth and Pjotr Sauer
Full List of Putin Critics Who Have Died in Mysterious Circumstances
For over two decades, President Vladimir Putin has squeezed dissent in Russia. Critics, journalists, and defectors have faced dire consequences after opposing him. From poisonings to shootings, mysterious falls from windows, and even plane crashes, there is a long trail of silenced voices.
Alexei Navalny, whose death in prison is as yet unexplained, had previously fallen ill on a flight from Siberia to Moscow in 2020 after being poisoned with Novichok, a nerve agent. Alexander Litvinenko, a former Russian spy who defected and was a prominent Putin critic, was murdered with polonium-210 in London in 2016. -- Newsweek
Previous Blogs Dedicated to Ukraine & Vanquishing HATE
Feature Archetypal Animation from last year’s blog marking the first anniversary of Russia’s full scale invasion — February 24, 2023 — Ukraine | “Never Again” the World Once Said“
February 24, 2023 | “Never Again” the World Once Said““You Want It Darker? We Kill the Flame!” — Leonard Cohen | Leonard Cohen is telling us exactly what WE need to do in this moment of Ruthless Barbarity, the darkness Putin has plunged the world into once again, WE KILL THE FLAME... We (the Good People of Earth who honor life and respect freedom) WE kill the flame of EVIL Putin lit in 2014 and dramatically escalated last year! We don’t have a tomorrow to do this if we want OUR World Back. | | February 24, 2023 | “Never Again” the World Once Said““Look Mom! I’m A Monkey for Putin!” | Music: Wizard of the Hood (Collector’s Edition) | Violent J — Shiny Diamonds | Putin should be careful as Xi Jinping may very well turn Putin into his Flying Monkey! | February 24, 2023 | “Never Again” the World Once Said” | And HE is still Putin’s Pigeon… he has simply pulled the entire Republican Narc Bubble into his Pigeon Hole with him | SHAME ON YOU MAGA Republicans who are leaving Ukraine blowing in the disgusting breathe of the Putin fiend.From March 2023Feature Archetypal Animation marking Russia’s full scale invasion into Ukraine — February 24, 2022 — Ukraine Letters
Jonar Sabilano [as well as reported by BBC, CNN, The 19th News, Washington Post, Politico, and the list goes on and on]
