To the liberals first.
You see what's happening and you're horrified. Good. So am I. But before you point that finger, answer me this:
Where were you when Obama bailed out the banks that wrecked ordinary people's lives? [link] Where was the outrage when he bombed Libya without a single vote from Congress? When he authorized ICE to remove people who didn't have the permission of the ruling class to exist on this soil?
Where were you when his drones double-tapped the first responders who showed up to pull bodies from the rubble?
Quiet. You were quiet, because he was smooth. Because he was palatable. Because he said the right things while doing the exact same things you now call evil when someone you dislike does them.
You screamed for your neighbors' businesses to be shut down. You shunned family members over a medical decision. "My body, my choice" — until the people above told you otherwise, and then you complied, and you pressured others to comply, and you called it virtue.
You hate corporations but you couldn't explain how money is actually created if your life depended on it. You don't want the ring of power to be destroyed — you just want different hands holding it. Your hands. Pointed at the people you've decided are the problem: white men, conservatives, anyone who thinks wrong.
Do you know who gave you those ideas? Did they come from you, or were they placed there by people who will never know your name!
That's not moral superiority. That's chains you polished yourself.
Now to the conservatives.
You love freedom. You say it constantly. You wear it.
Your founders didn't just talk about freedom — they shot and killed people who violated it. They drew a line over a tax far smaller than anything you pay today and said no further. That was the tradition you inherited.
And yet here you are, cheering for tariffs on your own neighbors. Waving the flag for a man who pushed the vaccine, who forced gun control, who bombed other nations on behalf of the same interests that ran the men before him. You wanted a wall to keep out people who lack the permission of the ruling class — the same ruling class you claim to despise.
You back the badge unconditionally. You back the military unconditionally. The very instruments of state power that your forebearers took up arms against, you now defend by reflex.
That's not patriotism. That's chains you polished yourself.
To both of you.
The reason we're losing — the reason things keep getting worse no matter who wins — is that you keep fighting over who controls the machine instead of asking whether the machine should exist at all.
The word government doesn't break down into "help" or "protection." The word govern traces back to gubernare — to control. Mente — the mind. You are being controlled, and you are grateful for it, and you call it safety.
The most destructive acts in human history were not committed by criminals in the street. They were committed by governments. Authorized, funded, legalized, and cheered for by people who thought that authority was legitimate.
Crime will not end when the right person holds power. It will begin to end when enough people understand what a crime actually is, agree it's wrong, and refuse to commit one — including against their neighbors, including when the state tells them to.
You have the bodies of adults. Start thinking like them.
Your safety is your responsibility. Your finances are your responsibility. Your health is your responsibility. The moment you hand those things to someone else and cheer while they use that power against your neighbor, you have become the thing you hate. You are looking in a mirror and calling it the enemy.
Slavery begins in the mind. It is built from the idea that you need permission, that you need protection, that someone above you must manage what you are too weak to manage yourself.
Defeat it there first.
Because the moment enough people do, there is no government on earth with the power to stop what comes next.