A Den Of Thieves

Sometimes, we cannot ignore the brutal, crass indecency of the society we live in.
It horrifies us and we're stunned to see the kind of atrocity we're capable of subjecting on other living beings.

And because we've been taught that it's good to be compassionate, we feel for the victim, fleetingly.
We're angered because we imagine what would happen if we were the victims, especially since that seems like such a plausible situation.
We see ourselves as helpless and alone.
Then we're angered. Only then.

When this anger and disgust fills us, we're full of rage.
We want something done.
So we talk about it passionately, we write and we tweet and we post and we protest on the streets.
We ask for justice.

We ask for a justice we're too scared to discuss.
When the discussion comes up of the repercussions of these crimes, we come up with suggestions that are more horrifying than the crime itself.
We're ready to assault another human being in unmentionable ways, we're ready to project on them all our suppressed anger.

How do we not stop to notice that our imaginations are even worse than that of the rapist in question.

These rapists are a part of us. They're part of our collective consciousness. They were born because we didn't try any better.
We didn't teach them any better and we weren't taught any better.

So we go through our busy lives, participating in every protest convenient for us to join. We sign petitions and attend awareness shows for about 45 minutes.
We do enough to feel satisfied. To quieten our anger. We masturbate.

The disease grows.
The disease grows because we're too ashamed to diagnose it.
We're too afraid to treat it.
We're lazy.

"We're living in a den of thieves, rummaging for answers in the pages.
We're living in a den of thieves, and it's contagious." ~ Regina Spektor