America Is Now The Death Cult From ‘Midsommar’
Conservatives have a plan to fight the pandemic: human sacrifice
The high-priests of conservative politics have spent the past few weeks struggling to respond to the growing coronavirus pandemic that has swept across the globe. At first, radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh compared the uncommon virus to the common flu, which is not true.
Next, the President of the United States spent weeks trying to dismiss the seriousness of the coronavirus. He had some help on Fox News, too, especially Trish Regan who suggested the virus was, in fact, a liberal conspiracy. But, so far, history has refused to allow conservatives to bullshit the illness away: hospitals are filling up, tens of millions of Americans are in self-quarantine, and the stock market is collapsing. This is an undeniable public health crisis.
The economy, of course, is the only thing that matters to conservatives. The president’s primary reelection argument up until this crisis was that his mix of tax and regulation cuts made America richer. But that’s old news. The once white-hot stock market is cold pizza. To the president, a recession is worse than a deadly respiratory illness. He wants America to return to business as usual by Easter, despite experts warning against making such announcements. You can’t wear a new spring dress if you’re on life support.
Instead of grimly accepting responsibility for their previous cowardice and leading the nation with newfound seriousness, conservatives have decided the only way to save the economy (and their political fortunes) is to convince people to go outside, browse a bookstore, eat at a buffet, and catch a respiratory illness that sends at least 20% of its victims to emergency rooms.
At least Republicans aren’t lying anymore. They are being honest about what’s important to them. First, Wall Street must be protected at all costs. Second, social distancing must end. It doesn’t matter how dangerous the virus is, Americans need to return to their little lives of empty consumption.
Their new idea is human sacrifice. Shop till you drop, literally.
On Fox News, Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick told Tucker Carlson that America’s senior citizens should risk contracting coronavirus in order to save the economy. “Those of us who are 70-plus, we’ll take care of ourselves,” he said. It is the esteemed opinion of Lt. Governor Patrick that vulnerable people should go bargain hunt, eat frozen yogurt, and play BINGO. And if their lungs fill with fluid while this is happening? They were doing their patriotic duty.
Meanwhile, conservative blabbermouth Glenn Beck heroically announced that he’d “rather have my children stay home and all of us who are over 50 go in and keep this economy going.” Beck didn’t stop there: “Even if we all get sick, I would rather die than kill the country. Because it’s not the economy that’s dying, it’s the country.”
I don’t know if you remember when Beck once suggested the Affordable Care Act would create ‘death panels’ of faceless bureaucrats that would make life and death choices for the elderly. This was, of course, a horrible little partisan lie. But time heals all wounds, I suppose.
The greatest generation made stunning sacrifices to fight fascism in Europe. Modern conservatives want other people, old and middle-class mostly, to sacrifice their life so White House Economic Advisor Larry Kudlow doesn’t have to give up a vacation home.
America is a few thousand very wealthy white people asking millions of less wealthy people to offer their lives to appease an angry money god.
All of this, of course, reminds me of last year’s tremendous horror movie Midsommar. The 148-minute long fever dream written and directed by Ari Aster follows a group of Americans who visit a small Swedish village celebrating an ancient midsummer festival. The village is populated by friendly white people who welcome their new guests with open arms. I don’t want to give too much of the movie away but everything goes horribly wrong because the white people are insane religious fanatics. Imagine watching HGTV while losing your mind on LSD and then God shows up. That was the experience for me. The ending is thrilling and terrifying, especially the final nanosecond before all of reality is obliterated.
I don’t know if I enjoyed watching Midsommar but it’s a movie that lives inside me now and I can never forget it. Even better, I’m now living it. America is a death cult run by crazy white people.
So there’s a scene near the middle of the movie I want to mention. It’s a couple of moments when both the innocent Americans and the audience suddenly realize shit is fucked up in the Land That Gave Us IKEA. The village gathers to stare up at an ättestupa, which is a Swedish word for a precipice or cliff. Everyone is high on mushroom tea, by the way. Suddenly, a pair of elderly villagers appear — a man and woman — and they both jump off the ättestupa. Their bodies crash on the rocks below. The woman dies but the old man barely survives and he has his head crushed by a large ceremonial mallet. It is explained to the horrified Americans that this is just how it is when you turn 72.
I thought that the scene was delightfully horrifying and now I get to live in a reality where one of America’s two political parties is basically suggesting 70somethings should jump off cliffs for the sake of the village. Later in the movie, the young are burned alive.
