Squishy3000's Songbook

I have a family friend who worked at our local Salvation Army headquarters as a a secretary. This particular office took all the Christmas donations for children in need, put them in a warehouse, and on a designated day the staff and their friends picked through them all, taking whatever they wanted. She saw people hauling away bikes donated for specific families. Some local children had hundreds of dollars of gifts donated in their name, and on Christmas they received three cheap things, items likely not even from the person who sponsored them.

My friend quit, and I’ve not given them a dime of my money since then.

I’m a wildfire and disaster logistics specialist.

I deal with a lot of agencies who provide disaster relief.

I used to say the Salvation Army’s disaster services were the one (literally the ONE) good thing they did.

They would come in, set up a canteen trailer, make and pass out hot coffee and donated food in a disaster, usually being one of the first agencies to get there and the last to leave.

Then I found out.

Every time they did this, regardless of if they were actually invited or deployed by the agency in charge (usually FEMA, sometimes others) they would SELF-DEPLOY. Meanjng they would just show up. Ok. That’s not TOO bad, sometimes agencies have to take initiative and get there before the red tape is sorted out. BUT. They, after they left at the end of the incident, they would send FEMA or the host agency a BILL. They used one or two paid employees (usually the driver of the truck and a supervisor); and many VOLUNTEERS, but they would bill for EVERYONE’s Labor at standard federal rates. They would bill for the food they distributed even though it was all donated by another agency or private parties. They would bill for the coffee they made and the supplies. Except they would use electricity from the shelter location, water from donations or from the shelter, and in many cases, they would get the coffee and industrial filters DONATED, but bill for them at retail prices.

Furthermore there are a LOT of ex military personell that are homeless and trying to deal with PTSD. This can result in mental health issues or behaviours, and the Salvation Army will kick them out in the middle of the night if they have any sort of nervous tick or nightmare.

police officers jeer at and insult the citizens who are on the streets mourning for the death of a 22-year-old student, calling them cockroaches 

the death of said 22-year-old student being called an ‘accident’ when the kid literally fell off the third floor of a carpark…for no apparent reason, with riot police surrounding the area; no investigation into his death at all

the pro-Beijing legislative members won’t even stand silently for 5 minutes during the start of the meeting to mourn for the death of a HK citizen 

a 15-year-old kid being charged and found guilty for being in possession of dangerous weapons, said weapons being an umbrella, a hiking pole, and a laser pen

Over the past 5 months, our energy and motivation during these protests has turned from encouragement, to resistance, to vengeance. 

We will not back down.

SOLIDARITY.

We get it. Really, we do.

But have y'all considered why this struck a chord, especially as quickly as it did? Because this is one of the fastest inception-to-mainstream velocities I've ever seen from a meme.

Think for even a second about the literal decade of the older generation blaming Millennials for literally every single problem. We couldn't go a week with us being accused of killing an industry or being whiny snowflakes. Of being told we can't afford healthcare because we're too lazy to earn it and houses because we eat too much avocado toast. That we're entitled because we want try to prevent the world from metaphorically catching on fire. That we're too sensitive and can't take a joke because we don't like when comedians shout racial slurs.

It got so bad websites were making listicles of all the industries and societal norms we supposedly killed. From Applebee's to diamonds, dinner dates to marriage. They would've blamed us for tornadoes if they could.

Do you think boomers were having these long discussions and Twitter threads about "well the entitled millennials are just the rich, spoiled ones and most of them aren't in that group something something class warfare"? I'm sure a few did, but very, very few.

We've withstood this shit for years, YEARS, and the one time we punch back in a large scale way, we get this? Like, let people even the slightest amount of cathartic fun.

We've been the go to punching bag since I wasn't even out of highschool, and I'm in my late 20's.

Yes, it's reductive. Yes, it's not a replacement for class analysis. Yes, ageism is a real thing and a large number of 55+ year olds (typically poc and/or working class) are treated poorly and are subject to the same shitty class system we are, too.

But also, yes, sometimes it's nice to it's have a fun joke that finally turns the tables and see how terribly they react to the ridicule we've put up with since we were preteens.

So maybe just save the thinkpieces for just a little bit. Or, in summary:

Sorry, Dad. I couldn't think of a nice way to say "America Stinks!"