I know I have a tendency to speak out loudly and vociferously where the political arena is concerned. I have a big mouth in that respect. It's always caused me trouble, sometimes more than I could handle. I never wanted to be "that guy" but I can't help it, because I think this stuff is genuinely important.

Every day it seems, I see, hear, or read something that makes me wonder where on earth we are heading as a (supposedly) free society. I'm genuinely afraid for the future. I don't want to be, but honestly I really am. I wish I could believe in some optimistic vision of our collective future, but some days I really don't.

I'm afraid... Sincerely and deeply afraid.

Afraid that not enough voices are speaking out to really make a difference and that there is an agenda in action that the majority of us barely seem to notice, let alone understand. Afraid that repressive policies and practices are being rammed through our societies at such a pace, that not only do we struggle to comprehend them, but they leave us all reeling in their wake.

Sometimes I'm afraid to even speak out, for fear of being ridiculed or marginalised. I hear people expressing opinions that seem to me to be based on very little active research. Instead those opinions sound like they have been inculcated and carefully crafted by others. Most people seem to think that history and society evolve by accident rather than design, I believe the research and facts show otherwise.
 
I  wonder if ordinary people have the strength, courage, or conviction, to oppose (or even understand) the actions of their governments. Even when those actions are deeply immoral and generally understood as such, it seems people feel powerless to resist them.

Thus it is that an American President can assume absolute power by fraudulent means, or that our nation can be dragged into a terrible despairing conflict by dishonest methods, fabricated evidence and blatant deceit, yet there appears to be little we the people can do about it.

My own study of history, tells me that so much of what occurs is deliberate not accidental. That there are powers we rarely see, controlling the movement and development of our societies, but which always manage to remain carefully hidden and shielded from casual scrutiny.

Watching endless successful attacks on our basic freedoms, leads me to question my own place in a culture so unwilling to defend the weak, the marginal or the victims. For if we will not defend our weaker brothers and sisters when the attack dogs are unleashed upon them, how can we expect to be defended when our own time comes to face the bully?

Do we value difference, tolerance, justice? Do we truly? Do we defend the rights of others as we would wish our own to be so defended? Indeed do we even value freedom anymore? Or is it only a freedom that we don't have to do anything to defend that we care about? The freedom to consume what we want when we want it, or to ignore the cries of agony from those that we allow to be victimized in our name, for a cause we supposedly espouse, yet do not truly support or believe in.

Are we willing to give our lives for anything these days? We willingly give ourselves to a million empty distractions. Yet it seems to me, that more and more, there is little we are willing to do to defend anything substantial. Little we are willing to sacrifice and the more unwilling we become to risk anything of ourselves, or to defend the principles we say we believe in, the more frightened I become that those very freedoms will be sacrificed on the altar of our apathy, indolence and ignorance.