Dear you,
The hottest June on record and the hottest July follows. Everything is burning and I visit the beach carrying a little purple umbrella, shading myself from the sun like a cliché Southern Belle. Shading myself from the other nonsense that abounds is not so easy.
Where should I begin?
Should I begin with the fact that my president tells opposition politicians that they should just leave the USA if they don’t love him? Should I begin with the fact that his rally last night in North Carolina featured pissed off pasty people, some shouting “send her back”? (This, as you know, referring to Rep. Omar, who is, by the way, a citizen.) Or should I begin with the fact that yet another green space on 30A here in Seagrove Beach is being bulldozed?
The above posited questions/topics are too intense for me at this moment, so I will keep it light and consider the latest weird action by Kellyann Conway, Donald Trump’s advocate and fact-shifter. During a recent encounter with the press, she seriously asked a reporter what his ethnicity was. Oh yes, she did. The question was so blatantly dumb-ass and horrifying at the same time I had to giggle it away. But this did make me consider the obsession of many “white” folks I know, their pursuit of ancestral knowledge. There’s a dot.com for that and no doubt an ap too.
I could care less what my ancestry is. I am something from Europe, something from the Middle East, and something from the Mother Continent, Africa. (This is everyone’s home, no matter what nonsense they might be teaching kids in Oklahoma.) My last name is Fleming and I think my people were run out of Ireland. And Dad said something about how during the Civil War his great-great-something or somethings was/were part of Quantrill’s Raiders, Confederate guerilla fighters. Oh hell no.
If Quantrill is my ancestor, I want no part of that shit.
I make myself new every day. So, Kellyann, what is my ethnicity?
Again, I don’t care. I do know my species, however, is devolving. According to a piece in scientificamerican.com “Another point of view is that genetic evolution continues to occur even today, but in reverse. Certain characteristics of modern life may drive evolutionary change that does not make us fitter for survival—or that even makes us less fit. Innumerable college students have noticed one potential way that such “inadaptive” evolution could happen: they put off reproduction while many of their high school classmates who did not make the grade started having babies right away. If less intelligent parents have more kids, then intelligence is a Darwinian liability in today's world, and average intelligence might evolve downward.” Considering that depressing factoid, ethnicity-niche is irrelevant.
Ciao for now! I have to go handout birth control information pamphlets to our “guests” on the beach.
XO,
Joyce
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