42 REASONS WHY I DON’T LIKE THIS COUNTRY
1_Because This Country smells. Like rot and neglect. Like its own people who no longer notice the stench. Everything here flakes, crumbles, grows over with moss, then sinks. Nature and chaos always win out over effort and intention. Only the landscapes are beautiful — the mountains in the West, the towns in the East, the ocean. At least, from far away.
2_ Because many here bow to ‘tolerance’. When combined with national-level apathy, it breeds one thing: low-quality selfishness. Everywhere else, selfishness builds skyscrapers. Here it builds excuses.
3_ Because this place invented and perfected the opposite of cosmopolitanism: neighborhoodism. This Country behaves like it’s the only dot on the planet, and its inner life gurgles mostly from hunger for any inner life at all.
4_ Because here, they insist neighborhoodism has no alternative.
5_ Because the Eternal New Corporatedom is real, and it regularly gang-rapes the national resource, the land’s potential, and the people’s spirit.
6_ Because that same Corporatedom doesn’t just exploit — it squanders the talents, desires, and ideas of anyone with half a spark. And in its service, ‘tolerance’ becomes a cult, neighborhoodism becomes law, and nobody understands their tax form.
7_ Because the so-called intelligentsia exists, barely.
8 _And because the pseudo-intelligentsia thrives.
9_ Because public and private discourse speak different languages. One mumbles clichés. The other screams in silence.
10_ Because there are no rules. Not written. Not unwritten. And if they exist, they’re thumbtacked to a toilet stall behind the barn. Need rules? Sorry — someone else used them before you. You’re stuck with theirs.
11_ Because the country has amnesia. The sign for ‘yesterday’ is just as blurry as the one for ‘tomorrow’. No one’s from here. Everyone’s just passing through.
12_ Because old heroes are replaced by those who can’t, won’t or aren’t.
13_ Because the road ahead has become impassable. Literally and figuratively.
14_ Because of Un-Knowing. As Terry Pratchett said: ‘I suspect nobody on this planet truly knows how a VCR works.’ Same here. Nobody knows how This Country functions. Or if it even functions. Or if it’s just rolling downhill, gathering dust and bad vibes.
15_ Because we live in a Permanent Experiment. Especially if you’re younger than a Boomer.
16_ Because the American Dream was only a dream. It’s the difference between a hot girl and a hot stove. Between planet and paid-for. Between banal and anal.
17_ Because there are only two types of people here: Addicts and Rent-Seekers. The former die of whatever they can get their hands on. The latter die of cholesterol, boredom, or hooker-grade cocaine. That’s the whole cast of our national drama.
18_ Because this country never had the Renaissance.
19_ And if we did, they’d say: ‘Cool, but can you put it on a T-shirt?’
20_ Public transportation. Or as we call it: mythical infrastructure.
21_ Because no plutocrat has ever been beheaded by an angry crowd. And the Refund has become the only national form of protest.
22_ Because This Country needs a human being brave enough to start it over from scratch.
23_ The Church of the Recliner. American theology holds that all things end in a La-Z-Boy. It is the sacred object of retirement, television worship, and slow, greasy ascension into death. Motion-powered. Faux leather. Often beige.
24_ Because of the F-150. It contains the universe: horsepower, pride, repressed emotions, and at least one loose dog, usually a pit. It is vehicle, weapon, and mobile identity crisis. With a flag.
25_ The Self Help aisle. You are already a god — you just haven’t monetized it yet. Every guru is a prophet, and every prophet has a book deal.
26_ The undying love of spray cheese. It’s not nourishment. It is gesture, a rebellion against Europe. It is liquefied irony in a can. Its meaning lies not in flavor but in its denial of the concept of food.
27_ Throne public toilets. Proof that the human soul was always a surrealist.
28_ Time is money. Coffee is time. Therefore, coffee is money. And you must carry your TO GO CUP while walking, driving, texting, and manifesting your brand. Stillness is failure.
29_ Because the normal world openly despises us.
30_ Because I still wonder: do we deserve this contempt, or are they just cold, awful people who refuse to understand our precious tortured soul?
31_ The uniquely American metaphysics of bacon, where all meaning, joy, and identity can be traced back to salted pork. It is not just food — it is foundational. To reject bacon is to reject liberty, brunch, and masculinity all at once.
32_ Because the people in the streets are sad, overweight, unshaven, uncombed, poorly dressed, and pissed off. They’re the ideal breeding ground for misanthropy and conspiracy theories. And most can’t spell the first.
33_ The last outpost of American comfort: microwaved nostalgia at Chili’s in Terminal C. Here you reflect on the nothingness of travel, the illusion of choice, and why your burger costs $24. Time has no meaning. Only boarding zones do.
34_ The verb ‘I would have’. It’s the most common tense in This Country. Not because it’s loved, but because it always contains the ghost of a future that might’ve happened — if only it hadn’t been shut down halfway.
35_ Because no one here actually knows history, global or American, or the Constitution but love to endlessly talk about all.
36_ The Sacrament of the Unlimited Refill. Forgiveness is found in high-fructose generosity. Dignity is optional. One does not ask if more soda is necessary. One simply receives it, endlessly, like divine grace in liquid corn form.
37_ Here, the soul is assumed to be under constant siege. Safety is achieved not through peace, but through the threat of louder violence. Faith is placed in tools of finality. Love is expressed with a monogrammed holster. The gun is not an object — it’s an argument in metal form.
38_ Bad music: R&B. Country-rap-pop. Beyoncé.
39_ Identity is a cap. Fatherhood is a cap. Political allegiance? Also a cap. Selfhood is determined by what’s embroidered above your eyes. To remove it is to reveal vulnerability. To turn it backwards is to threaten civilization.
40_ JFK once said: ‘Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.’ Well, we did. We gave it our best. We tried. We tried everything. But we weren’t cut out to be gangsters. Too chicken to be rent-seekers. So now we’re just going trad. No. It’s not too late.
41_ Because of my friends. My family. The ones who capitulated to bullshit. The ones who just go with the flow of worse. It’s actually not that I dislike This Country. I just violently, viscerally can’t comprehend it.
42_ The futility of writing all this. Writing 42 reasons. Getting drunk. Getting high. Jerking off. Puking. Watching TV. Then writing more. And wondering — somewhere else, in another language, would any of this mean something?
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