I hate to admit getting better is boring

Hello friends, here are six songs that are B A N G E R S. Capital letters and spaces between the letters so you KNOW it’s REAL.

(This post is too long to read in your email inbox, so you can click here to read the whole thing.)

Paramore More More

It’s so cool that Paramore putting out a record is such a huge deal. And they’re so damn good. While they along with MCR were bands I always liked, I admit they were never my top favorites, yet it feels so good to see them succeed. It feels like a win for our scene, however you want to define that, and it makes me feel happy and proud. Full disclosure: late career Paramore has vaulted toward the top of the list of Bands I Truly Love. It started with Paramore and then After Laughter really did it, and now This is Why is great too.

Featured artists: Singing Lungs | Equipment | Snow Ellet | Gold Steps | Shit Present | Paramore

Keep reading for some words about the choo choo train that went boom boom and some quality television programs, or just go listen to those songs. Let me know if you like them!

There’s No Bottom

Is everything just going to keep getting worse for the rest of our lives? We’re alive at a time where we know so much, have access to so much information and technology, but everything feels like its inching and sometimes sprinting in the wrong direction.

Rather than fixing the very real and very serious problems that exist, so many people (elected officials and otherwise) spend their time fighting the problems they’ve made up. It’s kayfabe. It’s shadowboxing.

They’re mad that trans people exist. They hate that kids are reading books. They’re outraged at M&Ms. There was that one paid shill on Twitter arguing that no, actually insane bank fees are good for us. They are not serious people and they don’t have any solutions.They are carnival barkers and they are fueled by attention.They blame “socialism” for anything they don’t like despite the fact that socialism is absolutely not a thing anywhere here, at all. Every time they say the world is too “woke” just remember that what they usually mean by that word is “empathetic.” It’s all “the world is changing and I’m scared.” It’s “that person doesn’t look like me, they don’t deserve success.”

Sometimes I wonder if being that dumb and wrong is an easier way to live.

Imagine if those people put all of that energy into finding real solutions to real problems.

The horrible train derailment in Ohio has captured so many of the pressing issues of the modern world all at once and is the main reason I’ve been thinking about this so much. The supposed “liberal” media is practically silent on the whole thing. The government isn’t doing shit. Information is scarce. Cops are beating up journalists for trying to do their job and report on it. Norfolk Southern is a company just like so many others. Humans? Animals? Quality of life? Hah. Go fuck yourself. They essentially nuked a town because they needed the railway open asap. Saving time and money mattered. Nothing could get in the way.

They’ll give the community $25,000 (roughly $5 per person, oh so generous!) and give some people $1,000 “convenience checks” but only to people who have all the right documents, and those people will surely not be able to sue them further down the line as part of signing for that check. No money for people. No money for much needed upgrades. But when it comes to lobbying there’s no bottom to the well of cash. And hey, it’s a good time to buy stock in this shitass company if profiting off death is your thing!

And TurboTax has plenty of money for a huge campaign telling us “don’t do your taxes!” because they’ve spent millions making it harder and more costly for us to do our taxes with their “help” when it should just be free.

And then there’s the fascist hate (that’s redundant) groups doing Super Bowl ads about Jesus thanks in part to their tax-free status.

And the NFL keeps using Pat Tillman as a pro-military prop (a thing his family has explicitly said not to do) when he was literally killed by his fellow troops for speaking out against the American War Machine.

And Elon Musk constantly rants about the media lying and then sits with Rupert Murdoch, the literal king of fake news, at the Super Bowl. Twitter is an important tool for live information that a rich nepo baby bought on a whim and he’s now firing people for honestly explaining that his clout just isn’t what it used to be and then holding emergency meetings because Biden’s Super Bowl tweet got more engagement than his, leading to the For You page being nothing but his tweets. Just a truly sad, pathetic man.

There’s no bottom. Everything is wrong. We can see the issues. It just keeps getting worse. No one’s coming to actually fix anything. We’re on our own. The problem starts with c and ends with apitalism. We just can’t have nice things, even fucked up but useful ones like Twitter.

As the apropos Paramore lyrics in the title of the post say, the cost of chaos sure is high. I’ll be trying my hardest to stay positive, be the best version of myself, and get better every day, in spite of the world heading in the opposite direction.

Moving Images From the Glowing Screen on the Wall (or in Our Palm) That Can Distract Us From the Horrors of the World For a Brief Moment, Right? Ha Ha Ha Oof

Poker Face (Peacock) is wonderful television. “Natasha Lyonne and Rian Johnson” should be the only five words you really need to check it out, but if you need more than that for some reason, this is my Official Recommendation. Also it just got renewed for season two, so get on board.

The Last of Us (HBO Max) is excellent, but since you’re on the internet, you already knew that. I didn’t play the game because I mostly like games that involve Pikachu or Mario or Link.

Abbott Elementary (ABC) has proven that the network sitcom is not totally dead. The cast is great, and it is very, very funny. It’s also funny to watch as a teacher when one of them is teaching and another teacher comes in to chat and they stop their lesson immediately and have a full on conversation. (I know it’s necessary for the show and I’m not complaining.)

I’m late on this, but The Bear (FX) was fantastic and had an unexpectedly beautiful, poignant ending.

I’m watching Andor (Disney+) now and it’s quite good. I’m worn out on Star Wars in general but the tone of this is just right.

-

If you’re angry at the New York Times’ editorial bias in reporting about trans issues, you can add your name to this letter. It’s sad how they keep making the same mistakes. They need to be better.