No Minds To Make Up

This post on Pickled Politics is making me really mad. I can't blog when I'm this mad, and I have a lot of work to do already, so I'm posting this (somewhat) in response. I suppose it expresses my viewpoint on a lot of other things too. Although I have mellowed since I wrote this (3 years ago)!

(When I see such things, I feel like going 'Oh, oh, OK, can I just pop over there and shoot and bury you, since it's part of MY 'Bastards will not be tolerated' tradition?').

Calm down, calm down self!


No Minds To Make Up
The stereotypes are everywhere,
there’s lack of imagination and
fear and knee-jerk reactions
and all that I hate –

I need a magnifying glass
to look into these hideous
sub-cultures without wincing;
ah, the narrow-mindedness hurts –

Hard to believe that people
will fight tooth-and-nail
to avoid reality wherever possible,
to stop it encroaching on their trails –

On their tails, it follows
ready to poach the misconceptions
that keep them feeling
so safe and protected –

Ignorance is fucking bliss,
when the intelligent refuse
to claim responsibility for their
brains and the poor struggle –

To be noticed, or disdain
their intelligence, or recycle clichés
for their fellows; a challenge
is only fun if you take it –

We frame ourselves in contexts
and place God and Science
just outside of the box
for “intellectuals” to debate on –

Miserable, pessimistic pricks who
can’t handle their thoughts – well,
let them destroy you and
give us a break at last –

We need a predator to
snap us free of these lazy
cocoons of deluded
self-belief; we’ve put change

Too far back on the
agenda for far too long;
let the truth come and
claim its victims from among us –

Your minds and eyes and
minds’ eyes tightly closed; now
even music is a breeding-ground
for dull conformity and suffocation

Of shared opinion, unless there’s no
substance behind it; you need some
personality to have your own minds,
but you don’t have minds to make up.