The Alt-community struggles with some psychological issues common to many of its members–and we have some products that can help./Image: Licensed Adobe stock, kieferpix.
May the Almighty Dollar be with you, Red-state readers! Since we last wrote this column here at Spread Your Right Wings (SYRW), so much has happened in politics, particularly that which involves the right wing: more Mueller probe indictments, gun rights/gun control battles, Trump tweet storms. It’s enough to make your head spin! We found some articles about the underlying psychological motivations that energize our conservative viewpoints, and as connoisseurs of self-help books, they got us thinking about products that might aid us all on the right wing of the political spectrum. We did some digging, and here’s what we found.
Related: See how these three Trump team stars said they would decorate your abode!
Who Can It Be Now?
So sang 1980s band, Men at Work, and some of the staff here at SYRW have always found that little ditty spoke to us in its musical manifestation of the constant hypervigilance and worry we felt. And yes, despite being on the conservative end of the political spectrum, we were pretty surprised that a study, whose methodology and findings are detailed in this Scientific American article, conservatives score higher than liberals in tests to determine their general levels of disquietude. We always thought liberals were the overweening worry warts! But no, conservatives do their share of finger gnashing, too–in fact, more than liberals overall. Two of the topics that cause us a lot of concern are safety (personal and national) and debt (personal and national).
The first thing we found for you, our faithful readers, are Anxiety Accounts. They’re like bank account ledgers (does anyone use those anymore besides oldies, like us). You should feel free to customize them to fit your Alt-anxiety needs. But the way we’ve been using them is to put “Anxiety” at the top of one column, then in each cell below put something you’re anxious about–attacks by MS-13, for example–with a rating from one through ten next to it. At the top of the adjacent ledger column, write “Comfort,” and in the cell on the same line as “MS-13 attacks” put “law and order,” for example. It’s a great visual way to make sense of the nebulous insecurities that eat away at you and even affect your political behavior.
Privilegeds, 1 Non-privilegeds, 0
If you’re really committed to making sure “marginalized” groups like women, the LGBT, the differently-abled, Jews, blacks, etc. stay at the bottom of the heap, at least in some form, for cryin’ out loud, you need to get yourself a Societal Scorecard.
You can then fill in the name of your tribal group alongside the names of those you feel are taking way too much of the cultural pie from you, who’ve always had it–why should things change now?
An article on the World Economic Forum’s website by Mark Vlasic and Helga Turku discusses the ways physical manifestations of cultures–statues, walls, monuments, etc.–can be destroyed as a symbol of the destroyers culture’s dominance over the destroyee’s culture. But there are innumerable other ways one societal group gets rewarded when another gets shafted, aren’t there? Isn’t that a wonderfully not-childlike , generous way to look at life?
Each time your team–let’s hope–wins one, you can make a little tick mark in your column on your Societal Scorecard. Say, when affirmative action is struck down at another university–SCORE! Or, let’s pray to god not, another honest, hardworking, lecherous piece of scumsucking trash loses his job after 75 women come forward to tell of how the poor guy violently raped them, well, then you’ll have to put a tick mark in the “feminists” column. *eye roll* *groan* *scowl* A golf scorebook is a great DIY way to keep a Societal Scorecard;
This is, in case you couldn’t tell by our fantabulous description, an excellent way to keep very close track of the ups and downs of this cultural war we’re in. It’ll help keep it in the forefront of your mind, like a Politics of Hate and Scarcity Day Planner. That is, until we win altogether, and then you can make a big show of ripping these up and–well, burning them, just to increase your carbon footprint a little and stick it to the treehuggers.
And: Our advice columnist tells a kid what to do about his fears that he won’t achieve his dreams.
Boxed Into a Corner
“But otherwise, there is not a lot in the last three decades to give conservatives bragging rights, and with almost every fiasco, they blame someone else, wrote Kurt Eichenwald in an article in Vanity Fair.
There’s a very good reason for that, Mr. Eichenwald: nothing is ever, ever our fault. We can guarantee you–guarantee you–that when Trump is exposed for the Russia-colluding, bank-frauding, justice-obstructing lout he is, we’ll find someone else to blame. Many someone elses, maybe even.
Similarly, no matter what bad thing happens, even when The Donald’s dementia gets to the point at which he actually does shoot someone in the middle of Fifth Avenue, we’ll say it was Obama dressed like him, Hillary’s emails made him do it, Nancy Pelosi put a trance on him, etc. For each laying of blame, you can write it on a piece of paper, and then insert it into this beautifully crafted Blame Box.
Take it from us, it’s a fun way to store away secret or not-so-secret resentments, and then when you’re talking to Fox News on the TV one day, you can scowl and say, “Oh, yeah? Oh, yeah, Chuck Schumer….” then run to your Blame Box, open it and start frantically going through your inventory of others’ accountability and let loose. Sounds healthy and like a great use of time to us! And everyone knows SYRW is the place to go for top-notch advice and ways to while away the hours while also making a positive difference in this crazy, mixed-up world.
Also: You’ve got to hear how Team Trump unwinds during their precious downtime at the White House?
Helping You Handle Things
Well, dear readers, we hope that these products can aid you in coping with and managing some of the emotional issues that inform our conservative outlook on life. We’ve found them to be of great help. And, it gave us a chance to boost the economy and deplete environment resources, so that’s always good!
Until next week, then, SYRW readers: Cha-CHING!
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© 2018 Akbar Khan
