It’s a nice sentiment, it really is. Many people have said it over the years. A couple of people who said it that come to my mind are:

Adolf Hitler.

Josef Stalin.

Pol Pot.

And pretty much every tyrannical dictator who has come to power has said it. It’s all for the greater good.

The “greater good” is just another ideal. It’s another container word filled with nothing except what you put into it. I promise you, Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot had a different idea of what the “greater good” was, than what you think it is.

In the screen shot I posted above, I was having a conversation with the individual in question. Here’s the entire conversation between the two of us:

I don’t think either Hitler or Stalin could have said it better. Change up the country, glory, and God container words and you have a winner. Country is nothing more than the place you reside in. Most of you were born where you live. Glory? What is glory? Being glorified for taking a bullet for someone else? Glory for giving up your time, energy, finances, and ultimately your life so that someone else may benefit from it?

What am I going to receive for signing up for your ideals? What am I going to receive for joining your cause? Spare me the bullshit about the afterlife, I’m not interested in it. There’s been no empirical evidence to suggest that God or the afterlife exist, so I’m not taking any chances there. I want my benefits and rewards in the here and now, and they had better be tangible. I had better be able to see them, touch them, taste them, use them, or at least put them in my pocket and take them home with me.

Screw your 72 virgins in the afterlife, I want them now before I blow myself into oblivion. And who said that I was going to martyr myself for your cause?

What. Is. In. It. For. Me.

Plenty of causes and ideals out there, plenty of ways to waste your time and your life on your own dime, for somebody who isn’t you or yours. Do you really want to sacrifice yourself, your time, your money, your energy, or even your life for…. Words?

Freedom and Liberty. Two more words that mean nothing by themselves. Two more container words. Like I said in my earlier post: I promise you, my idea of freedom and liberty are going to be different from yours.

I don’t know who this anonymous individual is, nor do I care so much either. What I do gather is that he is either really young and naive, perhaps under the age of 35. I get it. I too, was once young and naive. I too, used to be an idealist. I too, used to live for container words. But then I grew up and opened my eyes. It became time to put away childish things and get to the business of living and enjoying my life instead of playing word games. I hope that this individual is indeed young, because if he’s older than 35:

He’s an idiot. A useful idiot to be sure, but an idiot nonetheless. Every cause and every ideal needs useful idiots. They are the blood and sweat of the engine. They are the ones who actually believe in the container words and carry out the deeds. They are the ones who are the cannon fodder when the bullets rain down. They are also the ones who end up against the wall when it’s time for the purge, and every movement with a cause, an ideal, has a purge.

I have no patience or time for idiots, useful or otherwise. I got shit to do.

You know what’s for the greater good of me? Corned beef hash, eggs, bacon, and sourdough toast. For dinner. You know what else is for the greater good of me? Beer. And the final and most important greater good for me is…

If you guessed poontang, you would be correct.

Fuck your container words, I’m not interested in your ideals or your cause unless there is something tangible in it for me that I can receive sooner rather than later. If not, go pound sand.