Dante doesn't work here

“And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Genesis 6:5)

The world we live in is almost infinitely more violent and horrible than it would be if it were not for the need of most normal people to insist that no such thing is possible, and to punish the messengers who remind them that it is. The world is not made less evil by those who refuse to speak of it, and it is not made more evil by those who insist on doing so. More oppressive than any slaughter is the endless cocktail party of people who pretend that the world is innocent so that they can feel that they are, and go to sleep every night when the party ends, untroubled.

People might stop the slaughters if they were spoken of readily. That is why. People might react usefully to the idea of suffering when they know it corresponds to something fearful and real. Opposite to that condition is avoiding mention of it. That does not lessen its occurrence, only efforts to limit it. The world is good and God is happy, they will say. Good news: The Holocaust did not happen here; on us, the sun only shines.

Many people believe that you get whatever you deserve by seeing realized in your life whatever you imagined. What this reflects is the true fact that most people will want to punish the messenger for his message. If you lived next to an ax murderer and you said this to some guardian of health and normality, she or he would assume that you are a murderer busy sharpening your own ax.

(This is especially if you are male. Females are supposed to be timid and emotional, and be protected, while male persons, at least in this society, are supposed to be strong enough to deal with anything that might happen to them. This is especially the case in a society as violent as the United States. How could our government not blame people who are its victims for this?)

For every act of barbaric hatred or cruelty, there is a small crowd of cowardly people whose lives are circumscribed by small talk at cocktail parties or around the office cooler. They are everywhere, and today you find them on Facebook, along with their seeming opposites, the harassing trolls, who are just a mirror image of the same thing. "Evil doesn't happen here, but only over there; may I provoke you into saying something we can use against you? If you let me, we can all laugh at you, you disgusting weakling." It's only weak people who commit crimes; the strong are presumed good, because it's happier to win and not lose. Whatever you do, don't ever say anything unpleasant about anyone or anything your interlocutor might chance to deal with, unless you are just denying it by ascribing it to others whom you would provoke. (How would you like to be accused of some kind of prejudice? If the person who wronged you is a member of a social group with an identity as such, then anything you say about them will be held against you on that account. For what is a crime compared to a prejudice? Everyone is entitled to your respect, no matter what they do.). Few people will forgive you for reminding them that people regularly die, suffer, are tortured or violated, and often avoidably. Get this through your head, if you want to live long: Nothing bad happens that shouldn't. These are spiritual truths; haven't you read the gurus who teach them?

"Everything is for the best, in the best of all possible worlds." Of course this is not true, but if you act and speak as if it is, you will be more popular with the most of people who loath inconvenience even in thought. It's a well kept secret that evil and horror are more interesting than innocent good. So keep the secret, you'll go further. Confidence in yourself will not only make you popular, but rightly help you claim the ladder of success in your profession.

Since it was true, I mentioned to the social worker that my roommate had threatened me. That was my mistake. Anyone who is troubled by anything must be punished for it. How could that be tolerated? It doesn't matter whose fault it is, they must save you from pain. They can do this at great expense to you, which they don't mind, because what they do has "spiritual" meaning and thus infinite monetary value and sparing you no inconvenience, especially if you are paying. Then the doctor stopped me on the floor of the unit and said, out of the blue, This is a good country. Oh, so that's what they had against me. That was not an opinion but an order. Be happy, and don't worry about anything, or else.

For every charnel house, there is a parade of people celebrating their shared innocence and the joyful reassurance that they are together fully committed to the collective happiness whose realization is so well represented by the parade that one might suspect that it merely is that parade. If you think the thought and with the right determination of will, it will be true, no?