Welcome to F.*.C.K.I.T. - the Fear, Uncertainty, and Confusion-Killer Ideas Team. This bold new initiative started as a small but gnawing feeling deep in our gut that the world is going to hell, or has gone to hell, or maybe has actually been hell all along, but whatever — somebody ought to do something about it and that’s us. Our mission is to courageously seek out fear, uncertainty, and confusion and, without a shred of remorse or second thought, kill them dead along with fatalism, acedia, hopelessness, thinning hair, anomie, worry lines, depression, forlornity, flatulence and other right-wing tendencies, doubt, obligation, guilt, dry skin, constipation, apathy, anhedonia, brittle fingernails, despair, elevated cortisol levels, and, worst of all, the compulsive urge to bang your head against a wall. You will soon Feel Better With F.*.C.K.I.T.TM
So let’s take the fubarity of our present situation, deconstruct one of the many possible fubarticles as an example, and then apply the F.*.C.K.I.T. StrategyTM relentlessly and unmercifully. And what is the F.*.C.K.I.T. StrategyTM? Glad you asked! It’s another acronym! Or actually, it’s the same acronym, only different. F.*.C.K.I.T. means:
F is for Facts. There’s so much bullshit out there it’s hard to do sometimes, but it is absolutely crucial to distinguish between fact and opinion, and even more crucial to distinguish between fact and propaganda. A shortcut way to do this is to consider the source, the volume, and who benefits. A useful general approach is: if it’s coming from a politician, a meme, a Carlson/Hannity, advertising, or a facebook, then f*ckit. If it’s loud and obnoxious, f*ckit. If it lines someone’s pockets with money, f*ckit. If the starting point is cherry-picked evidence used to prop up a pre-determined point of view (i.e., an opinion), f*ckit. If it promises a glittering cosmos filled with sweetness and light (i.e., propaganda), f*ckit.
Facts are quiet, persistent, shy, empirical, and slow to coalesce into hypotheses, with the requirement to be held up to the harsh light of verification because facts are used all the time to tell whopping lies. If you think you have a fact, or a hypothesis, you must go at it hammer and tongs to disprove it, and when you’re finished, whatever is left standing in the rubble might be provisionally useful going forward. This is known as the scientific method. And it’s provisional, because it’s the new facts (i.e., ones you haven’t noticed yet because you’re busy trying to prove something) could very well be game-changers. Opinion and propaganda (like religion) work the opposite way, starting with a foregone conclusion or belief and then working backwards, selecting only the “facts” that “prove” it (i.e., telling lies with facts). And as for opinion or propaganda disguised as alternative facts: f*ckthem too.
U is for Unknown. Rebecca Solnit wrote a book called Hope in the Dark, in which she lifts up the importance of the unknown: history has a pattern of unexpected change that could not have been predicted, changes that been the major leaps ahead in history. In evolutionary biology it’s called punctuated equilibrium. In Ilya Prigogine and Isabelle Stengers’ work in physics, it’s called order out of chaos. And that is a huge source of hope.
The point is, if we ask the question “what do we know for sure,” the answer is “precious little.” We’re mostly ignorant, there’s way more that we don’t know than we do know by several orders of magnitude, and we don’t know what we don’t know. The way through the fubaritic mess we’re in is not going to be found in what we know because what we know is exactly what has gotten us into the mess we’re in.
Havelock Ellis wrote: “The promised land always lies on the other side of a wilderness.” Edwin Friedman wrote “The only way out of a chronically painful situation is by being willing to go through a more acutely painful phase.” Helen Keller wrote “Life is either a daring adventure or it is nothing at all.” All three acknowledge the importance of what is not (yet) known. All three are expressing similar conclusions based on their empirical observations. We can now test their hypotheses in our own experience and, if we do, we will surely discover aspects of ourselves and the world around us that we did not know before. All three are expressing something that could be called truth (more on that later). But looking for guarantees? F*ckit.
C is for Courage. Being born into the world comes with a 100% mortality rate. If we only knew that ahead of time... well, never mind. The point is, without courage, not much else matters. The problem is, there’s a lot of confusion between courage and reckless, stupid behavior that endangers self and others.
The Online Etymology Dictionary (etymonline.com) has this to say about courage:
c. 1300, corage, “heart (as the seat of emotions),” hence “spirit, temperament, state or frame of mind,” from Old French corage “heart, innermost feelings; temper” (12c., Modern French courage), from Vulgar Latin coraticum (source of Italian coraggio, Spanish coraje), from Latin cor “heart”
We also have some wisdom from Carlos Castaneda:
“All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. ... Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn’t. One makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.”
A path that has heart is a courageous journey. A path that has no heart, no courage, is discard, so f*ckit to all heartless paths, doublef*ckit to all heartless sociopaths, and triplef*ckit to all reckless stupicidal paths.
K is for Karma. Again from the Online Etymology Dictionary:
1827, in Buddhism, the sum of a person’s actions in one life, which determines their form in the next; from Sanskrit karma “action, work, deed; fate.”
In other words, actions speak louder than words. The best indicator of a person’s future actions are the person’s past actions. If a person’s (partner’s, politician’s, colleague’s, your own self’s) sweet and lovely words are betrayed by mendacious and ugly actions, then f*ckit.
There’s another meaning for karma that comes from Robert Pirsig, and that is: “the pain and suffering that result from clinging to static patterns of value,” and particularly erroneous, incomplete, or deceptive patterns of value. Everything clung to must be let go if we have any chance of finding something better, truer, more beautiful. “Should” is the big clue here that we may be clinging to broken patterns of value (i.e., it’s bad karma): it should be easier, it should be fairer, etc. If it’s bad karma, f*ckit.
I is for Intuition. When something twists in your gut, pay attention. That twisting feeling is a flashing red light and blaring alarm horn also known as a “bullshit detector.” Other indicators: one of your legs is longer than the other from the constant pulling; you have an uncanny feeling you’re about to get clobbered; you have an overwhelming deja vu feeling that this impending clobbering has happened before; your first immediate and visceral reaction is to vomit or throw heavy objects at the source of the bullshit. If something seems too good or too easy to be true, then it is probably bullshit, so f*ckit.
T is for Truth. To Pontius Pilate’s burning question “What is truth?” there have historically been two answers.
One is to see truth as objective: it has empirical form in objects that can be measured and quantified. This approach has resulted in the complete commodification of everything there is: value, or worth, has no value other than monetary value, resulting in obscene concepts such as “human capital.” This path has no heart, it is bankrupt, it is discard. This approach has also resulted in the rigid, intolerant creeds and confessions of various ideologies and religions, each claiming that their truth is the correct one and everyone else is wrong. So, regarding “truth is objective” — f*ckit.
Another answer has been that truth is subjective: it resides in the personal realm of each individual’s perceptions and opinions. This approach has resulted in ludicrous expressions like “I have my truth and you have your truth” which really conflates truth and opinion, and results in a wild proliferation of opinions ranging from the ridiculous to the sublime, all claiming equal legitimacy. So, regarding “truth is subjective” — f*ckit.
One possible way forward is to understand truth as a process, a dynamic relationship, an ongoing dialog between the objective, empirical, factual world and the subjective realm of meaning and purpose, both individual and collective. It lives and breathes in the in-between spaces, in the tensions between the known and the unknown, the already and the not-yet. When that process, that relationship, is working, it results in greater peace, assurance, gratitude, generosity, wisdom, love, and compassionate service in the world. If what you get is discord, doubt and fear, selfishness, stinginess, ignorance, hate, and greedy possessiveness coming from whatever “truth” you happen to be pondering, then f*ckit is the appropriate response because it’s not truth, it’s discard.
Time for an example, to see how the F.*.C.K.I.T. StrategyTM works in action! Let’s take a recent one. What did Dr. Fauci really say?
“Omicron, with its extraordinary, unprecedented degree of efficiency of transmissibility, will ultimately find just about everybody. Those who have been vaccinated ... and boosted would get exposed. Some, maybe a lot of them, will get infected but will very likely, with some exceptions, do reasonably well in the sense of not having hospitalization and death.”
(as quoted by CNN https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/11/health/us-coronavirus-tuesday/index.html)
What did Business and Politics Review hear? Under the headline “Throwing in the towel? Fauci admits that ‘just about everybody’ will eventually get Omicron” they report:
White House Chief Medical Adviser Anthony Fauci admitted on Tuesday that “just about everybody” will eventually be infected with the Omicron variant and that it is pretty much unavoidable.
So let’s do a F.*.C.K.I.T analysis, shall we?
F is for Fact. An example of propaganda is BPR’s use of the phrase “Fauci admitted,” which implies “got caught in a lie or other wrongdoing.” Fact: Fauci did not say “I was wrong,” he said Omicron is unprecedented, meaning, there has been nothing like it before it. Fact: Fauci did not say “just about everybody will eventually be infected” by Omicron. He said just about everybody “will be exposed” to Omicron. Fact: Fauci is a medical scientist and he is using the words “exposed” and “infected” as precise medical terms. Is there a difference between exposed to and infected by? Why yes, yes there is! And are there some things we can do to mitigate exposure so it doesn’t become infection? Why yes, yes there are! Don’t read more into Fauci’s provisional statements than what is there. And as for BPR’s bullshit: f*ckit.
U is for Unknown. The SARS-CoV-2 virus put us in unknown territory, and out of cancer research came mRNA vaccines (also previously unknown, and a real breakthrough in terms of medical technology). The vaccines exceeded anyone’s expectations. The Omicron variant and its extraordinary, unprecedented ability to transmit from one organism to another has put us in more unknown territory, more wilderness, with a promised land on the other side nonetheless. Whether we wanted it or not, we’re all on a daring adventure, and part of any adventure, if it’s not just a tour, is surviving to tell about it, and tell the stories of those who did not make it. Remember, life comes with a 100% mortality guaranteed, we’re not getting out alive. So, if that’s the way it is, embrace the unknown, and do it wisely. All other guarantees are bullshit, so f*ckit.
C is for Courage. As in finding and walking the path that has heart. Omicron virus variant is extraordinary, unprecedented, and efficient. Courage does not mean stupicidal recklessness because we’re all gonna die anyway. Courage means standing up for what is right under the circumstances, courage to do the right thing in an unprecedented pandemic, courage to walk the path that has heart/compassion even when we don’t have to, courage to consider the well-being of others in our world instead of staying stuck in our own, childish, petulant demands for “back to normal” that wasn’t all that good for most people anyway. We can do better, and doing better — better for all of us — is a path with heart. There’s no courage in knowingly skating on thin ice or going out and getting infected because BPR thinks they caught Fauci in the mother of all gotchas.
K is for Karma. Omicron will find just about all of us. That is what Dr. Fauci said. Where’s Omicron gonna be looking? I suspect it will be hanging out in all the static patterns of value we’re currently clinging to: ideas of what makes a good life (more stuff), a meaningful life (still more stuff), a life worth living. Is it going shopping, going to restaurants, to music festivals, to baseball games, to parties, to bars? Continuing to work in, or support, work environments that were unsafe even before covid because we like the money or because we like the cheap prices that come with others having to work for obscenely cheap wages? Karma, unlike Omicron, absolutely finds all of us, all of the time.
I is for Intuition. Bullshit detector, right? Read Fauci, carefully, then read BPR, carefully, and then check your gut. Unfortunately, so many people have been fed such a constant diet of bullshit, pseudo-factual lies that they’re hopelessly constipated. For what it’s worth, here’s my gut reaction to the BPR spin:
“White House Chief Medical Adviser” [BWEEP BWEEP BWEEP]
Merriam-Webster says (emphasis mine):
There is no difference between adviser and advisor besides spelling, and both are acceptable for someone who gives advice. Some people, though, feel that advisor is more formal. Advisor tends to be used for people having an official position—for example, an advisor to the president.
So, spelling it adviser, with an e instead of the more official o, is pure propaganda.
“Anthony Fauci admitted on Tuesday” [BWEEP BWEEP BWEEP]
Ya, here’s the weasel-word “admitted.” More pure propaganda. Criminals admit to crimes, so using that word puts Fauci in the same box as criminals. The Group W Bench, for those in the know.
“that “just about everybody” will eventually be infected with the Omicron variant and that it is pretty much unavoidable.” [BWEEP BWEEP BWEEP]
Flat out mendacity, taking an accurately quoted Fauci fragment and gloombing it together with a blatant distortion is obscene propaganda. Fauci said nothing of what came after “just about everybody” in that BPR sentence. And what the hell is “pretty much unavoidable” anyway? How much is pretty much? Ya, f*ckit.
T is for Truth. And what is truth? That which results in greater peace, assurance, gratitude, generosity, wisdom, love, and compassionate service in the world. You have choices! How you think, and what you do, really matters! And do not try and tell me you do not know what peace, assurance, gratitude, generosity, wisdom, love, and compassionate service in the world are, I will call bullshit on that faster than you can holler Ruby Tuesday.
And now, thanks to the F.*.C.K.I.T. StrategyTM you can relentlessly and unmercifully apply extraordinary, unprecedented, and efficient measures to kill fear, uncertainty and confusion in your life once and for all!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
footnote:
the next installments are available at:
seminar one: the many levels of F.*.C.K.I.T.
seminar two: fighting foo with F.*.C.K.I.T.