I have been thinking a great deal, about what is wrong with the world, specifically what is wrong with these United States of America. The list grows longer every single day, doesn’t it? Really, look around you and there simply aren’t enough minutes in the day to list everything that is wrong, just here, just in this nation so it is utterly impossible to look across the globe and start listing out what is wrong in the world. The strange thing is, when you start unraveling what is wrong with the world much of what unwinds ends up on a spool right here, right back in this little tiny country we call ‘USA’. Strange how that works, isn’t it?

We are rich, even in natural resources we are rich. Yet, it seems we are not rich enough we want more, we want what everyone else has too. We will murder and pillage, we will send our young to die just so we can steal what others have. Our leaders have absolutely no problem lying to us, time and again, sending us to war for the sole purpose of stealing what others have. It seems we never have enough.

We are mostly healthy, though we don’t care for our health very well. Yet, we want everyone to be less healthy than us and to pay more for their health than we do. Damn them if they pay less, we will find something wrong, we will apply the dreaded ‘Socialism’ word to their system and turn up our noses at their successful solutions. We are more than happy when we see plagues in other poor nations; this pleases us to no end. We can feel greater, pointing our fingers and sending some advice along with our condolences. We will spend millions keeping our own people sick, poor and without access to healthcare, medicine and proper nutrition. I suppose I must revise my original statement, we are truthfully a sick nation.

We are a nation of immigrants; our history is one of immigration, waves of immigration from all over the world, both voluntary and involuntary. Our entire history is steeped in bloody battles of migration, whether willing or unwilling each surge of new feet on the ground in this land brought with them culture, language, knowledge and strength. Each wave brought new blood, new worldviews, new cultural norms to merge into what was already here. Each new surge also brought a new focus of hatred, though some have stayed with us while others over time have assimilated into the ‘White’ standard of ‘like us’ and thus ‘good’.

We are a nation that prides ourselves on our decency, our democracy, our record of civil rights, our education system, our freedom and even our diversity. Now there is a list that should make you throw up in your mouth just a little bit. As a nation we have spawned more hate groups and homegrown terrorists than I can count with both hands and feet, we have government representatives working hard every day to strip from our citizens the right to vote, agencies infringing on the freedoms of citizens to live without fear and practice the faith. Our education systems are failing, from pre-K straight through our university, which only the wealthy can afford. Civil Rights, I am surprised we know what these are anymore, with our prisons full and private industries taking them over for profit and diversity is something we talk about, not something we practice.

I am glossing over the deep sickness in this nation. We have a cancer, one that is grown and is frankly malignant. The GOP presidential candidates are the embodiment of what is wrong with this nation. They are not an embarrassment; they are an indictment of us all. That we allowed any of them to survive, let alone thrive, rising to the top condemns us all.

Here is my cure, don’t be an asshole.

It is that simple and starts with each of us.

Don’t be an asshole and don’t let your friends or neighbors be assholes. Don’t turn away, don’t stay silent, start speaking up and demanding better.

When you see someone acting like an asshole in the store, say something. If you don’t, you are contributing to the problem.

When your city council plans on doing something that will destroy green spaces, go to the meeting, speak up. If you don’t you are contributing to the problem.

When your school board is going to do something that will harm the children of your community, even if you don’t have children, speak up. If you don’t you are contributing to the problem.

When you state representative says something that is insulting, racist, sexist or otherwise egregious; speak up don’t let him / her get away with it. If you don’t you are contributing to the problem.

The list goes on, whether it is local or not, don’t be an asshole. Say something. Engage in the community. The only way we change the course of the nation is we become active members of the community large and small. The only way we stop the crazy is if we demand better of ourselves and those around us.

So that is my new motto, even when it is hard to do otherwise, DON’T BE AN ASSHOLE. Even when circumstances may call for it, I am going to try hard to not be an asshole.

This does not mean you can’t meet idiocy and ignorance head-on. It doesn’t mean you can’t meet prejudice, foolishness and stupidity with intellectual force, which in some cases may appear to be assholishness. All it means, this ‘don’t be an asshole’ movement I am attempting to start, is don’t add to the terrible in the world by being one without warrant or cause.

I hope you will join me, maybe if enough of us decide to speak up when we see bad and work to do good, maybe we can turn this descent into utter chaos around.