Dear George,
We are a nation of such delicious irony. We live by myths even as we deny their existence. We slather a thin layer of rationality over the irrationality that is our life and believe ourselves enlightened when, in fact, our superstitions are as pervasive as those that govern the savage in the wild. We simply replace incantations with buzzwords, spells with policies, and augury with statistics. Like the savage, we mistake our myths for reality.
Our most pervasive myth is our belief that the fetters that bind us liberate us. Freedoms have a short shelf life, anyway, because they crush us beneath their burden. Christ liberated; the church enslaved. No freedom escapes this fate. Every flight of freedom hardens into a system.
In our decline, freedom of speech becomes the trivialization of discourse, electronic journalism, and political attack ads. Freedom of religion becomes the dogmatic totalitarianism that would move us into the nineteenth century as it stands guard over a woman’s vagina to monitor what goes in and what come out. Freedom of assembly is free to the prescreened wearing approved t-shirts. The science that freed us from ignorance gives us the new ignorance of a reductional quantification that pathologizes any deviations from the norm.
The sages tell us, “In an unjust state of life, the impotence and pliability of the masses grow with the quantative increase in commodities allowed them.” So, keep flooding them with shinny new toys, George, and they will continue to love their fetters.
Your admirer,
Belacqua Jones
9:02:01 PM 
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