Throughout the course of my life, I've held various views of the political topics.

At Christmas, a couple years before WTC 7 mysteriously fell into the ground, my godfather and his son (a Pulitzer Prize nominee) had a loud discussion about whether or not Black people were well suited for swimming. I left the house to sat outside in the cold where I could get some relief from the conversation... I think it was that point when I realized how to identify racist views that I held, and between psychedelics and self-analysis, I worked to navigate those feelings and grew into a different kind of automated response to noticing ethnicity and race.

During 2020 it was the style at the time to be very antigovernment, and it made sense to be that way, but I still campaigned amongst my "anarchist" friends to not go break shit in town (they didn't listen, and weren't my friends afterwards). But in 2008 I helped to campaign for Barack Obama. In middle school, as I began to cut my teeth on the Internet & used BBS's servers in my local community, I learned about Kevin Mitnik & I held very harsh views about people from Mexico and Central in South America, but in 2010 I worked on a Democratic Senate campaign against an incumbent Republican.

I was graduated after 10 years of wandering through undergrad, with a BS in Political Science. I quit my job, and was ready to try something new. I moved to China enthusiastic to learn about Chinese communism. In order to get my visa I traveled halfway across the North American continent to the Chinese Consulate in Washington DC. I got a job the first day I was there... in Beijing, at a successful game company that was topping the charts on the App Store.

The government required blood samples, and I had to get a physical at a doctor once a year in order to legally stay in China. I have a collection of extra copies of official photos that I had to get a couple times each a year for various stages of the work-permission process. I thought it was funny that my photos got more and more angry the longer I stayed in China, under such a totalitarian thumb.

While I was there, I watched the nomination stolen from Ron Paul. I read Road to Serfdom. I read Dread Pirate Roberts & watched the news as Ross was sentenced. I learned about PRISM and saw Julian chased into hiding. I saw there, on the ground that it was "Capitalism with Chinese characteristics" in the streets... you could tell food vendors were unlicensed but delicious. You could pay for food from licensed businesses that advertised the cleanliness of their facilities. You could get Gucci bags and Rolexes from the corporate stores or the knockoff stores. You could see the quality of building construction was poor, but there was sooo much of it.

I write all this to share that I've been around a bit, geographically and philosophically. What I've learned is that the more exposure I get to the things, the less I feel certain about the right answer. The more exposure I get to people, the more I learn we're brothers and sisters with very different outlooks. I'm not sure how I feel about what's going on, but I have a lot of compassion for people who are trying to work and feed their families. I have a lot of compassion for people who have suffered criminal behavior by others. I have less compassion for the people making the rules, but I certainly wouldn't want to be out there enforcing them either.