Friday, June 28, 2024

Daily Jam - Pets

This column was originally published in 2018.

“My friend says we’re like the dinosaurs, only we are doing ourselves in much faster than they ever did.”

I don’t know if I ever would have believed that a 30-year old lyric from Perry Farrell would ultimately wind up being as prescient as it seems to have become, but here we are. From the self-titled debut of Farrell’s post-Jane’s Addiction project Porno For Pyros, “Pets” is a wistful lament on the state of humanity and its inevitable, self-attributed demise. And if you’re like me, and you’ve been paying attention to climate scientists, or just reading the recent articles from the New York Times or The Guardian, then that demise appears to be just over the horizon.

It angers me. It scares me. It depresses me.

And my mind keeps going to my sons, and the whole thing just angers, scares, and depresses me even more. We are on the precipice of a mass extinction event, and all for the sake of a few more dollars in the pockets of a bunch of rich old white men. And there’s a whole horde of us who are just too stupid, stubborn, or corrupt to ever care.

So while Farrell was 100% correct about us and the dinosaurs, he was way off in believing that we’d “make great pets.” We’d be awful pets. We’d just end up shitting all over the rug again and again and again. Horrible.

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It’s difficult not to despair. I know I need to fight and scream, but it’s hard to do so without feeling like it will all end up being pointless in the end. But fuck that. I love my kids. I love your kids (even the shitty ones). And I’m going to have to do everything I can to remain steadfast in my duty to provide a future for them.

Please join me.

Here are some sites with information on how to donate your money, time, rage, and anxiety to help. It is quite literally the least we can do.



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