At Least They're Committed

The word vacillate is lovely, isn’t it? I mean, you can visualize the word in soft focus — swaying back and forth as an impartial-ized pendulum, never wanting to slow for fear of landing on one side or the other.

Dictionary.com states it as such: To waver in mind or opinion; be indecisive or irresolute.

Tripping Raul’s definition? A weak, pathetic sell-out.

Why yes, I am a Libra and as such (even if there were no mystical merit to the zodiac) I am diplomatic and I weigh things thoroughly and cautiously. If I fall any direction too quickly, it’s to the positive. Benefit of the doubt and all that. I have often been wrong! But I never regret thinking the best of people only to have them fuck me over in the end. That’s on the fuck-over-ers, not on me.

Really, though, the kind of vacillation that I find the most amusing is the kind of soul-bartering. Sure, we’re seeing it on a national level as people who claim to have ethics and be followers of Christ forfeit their beliefs to pander to — or even gain a role among — the current administration.

Yeah, yeah, they’re quest is to bring change from the inside . . . right. Yet, upon their appointment every last shred themselves will be seduced by power and the self-justification and glorification of their darkest motives and desires.

Let’s face it. That’s nothing new even when the powers-that-be are not inherently evil. It’s the process to arrive at that point that is rather a curiosity to me.

One can start as a good person: Maybe someone who is slightly insecure and is confusing ambition with power.

They might truly be well-meaning at the outset and making decisions based on their ethics, their upbringing, their sense of justice.

But, then they have to bend a little. You know, to get that extra pay or catch the big boss’s eye. Maybe they distort one tiny part of their beliefs or priorities. Just once, they tell themselves.

“Damn! That worked well, didn’t it!” They were recognized, patted on the back, complimented for their willingness to bend. And they take the next step — just one more tiny ethical lapse, twist of the justice system to edify the powerful they so desire to emulate.

The next thing they know, they’re in a position of authority, dictating the ways and means to their underlings. They are basking in power, but convincing themselves they are gracious and caring. They are telling themselves that they are special, they are chosen, they are doing what they should be doing . . . they have overcome those simple ways. Those simple beliefs.

That must be hard, somewhere in there where they realize they’ve become a tool, a laughable extension of the corporate elite who are figuratively and sometimes literally kissing the big man’s ass.

Vacillating, yes, between one set of power ethics to another, always accommodating, never stopping to see the injustice and frivolity of their ways, changing direction any way the pendulum swings to preserve their perceived position.

Back and forth, back and forth, never standing up for anything they once valued or should value. A court jester and a joke of themselves, not daring to stop to be accountable to the punchline.