The most toxic side effect of the woke agenda is that it dehumanizes the individual and forces him or her into an over-complicated caricature.  There is no such thing as a non-binary superhero or a man who can menstruate; there is very much such a thing as a broken, bleeding heart.  The rise of the superpeople franchise screensaver posing as film is the byproduct of a culture that has been atomized into non-existent, inhuman special-interest groups.  It is overwrought, synthetic entertainment for people who've been installed with under-developed, manufactured souls.

But there is a way out.

I failed to take my own ghostly, canine advice the other night, and was deeply aggravated by the computer-generated attitude on display in the viewfinder of our culture.  This CG attitude infected me as well, and I reacted to it like someone whose spirit has been hacked by artificial demons, making myself into just as much a part of the postmodern CG dystopia as the people I'm cutting down to size, whether they are asking to be cut down or not.

This was a mistake, and it kept me up way too late, and the entire next day was exhausting as a result.  Thank God for pre-Fentanyl, OTC caffeine pills from Walmart, is all I'm going to say.  You don't want to trust the pharmacies down here with even pre-packaged sleeping and/or wake-up pills.  The world's not quite ready for coffee shops that serve Double NARCAN Espressos, To Go, but we're getting there.  So I save my old-school chemical knock-out and stimulation agents for emergencies only.

Yesterday qualified.

Fortunately, I stumbled across The Station Agent tonight, the style of which is the cure for the synthesized caricature war taking place in the souls of all the social-engineering projects who overcomplicate the world with their fantastical demands.  It's almost impossible to maintain full Ghost Dog composure at all times, and when we lose that battle on occasion, it's necessary to return to minimalism, so that we may rediscover the simplicity of who we are.

"Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted,
and become as little children, ye shall not
enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 18:3

Of course, people are not exactly simple.  But also, we are.  The caricatures make everything complicated.  That's why everyone is so confused.  We've abandoned minimalism, objective truth, and even the possibility of objective truth, and are waiting in line for a complicated identity enhancement that takes us farther and farther away from who we really are.  Why should we be forced to connect with that which connects with no one?  Not only should we not be forced, but also:

Why should we even try?

Fortunately, there is a cure.  The path away from the plague of superpeople franchise screensavers, cerebral, overserious bomb biopics, and furious transgenderism is films like The Station Agent.  I'd never even heard of it before tonight, and I have to say I loved it.  The film is indier than indie, because it isn't conscious of its indie-ness.  The characters are great, the actors are great, and there's nothing meta or self-consciously quirky about it.  Nothing much really "happens" in the film, and yet there is no shortage of compelling dialogue and drama.  It doesn't need to be "epic" to engage us.  Which is to say, it doesn't require us to be epic to appreciate it.  The over-complicated world of caricatures demands that we blow our egos all out of proportion, to meet the minimum requirements for the job.  Like a dangerous ride at an amusement park, our culture has a sign outside that reads, "Must be this tall to ride this ride."  Except the sign is a hundred feet tall.  Maybe more.  Which is why people contort and maim themselves to get on the ride.  Is this a spa, or a Medieval torture chamber?  No one knows.  But they stand in line anyway. 

They think it's what they have to do.

Minimalist, character-driven films like The Station Agent are the cure for that.  The Station Agent isn't for epic people.  No archetypes are allowed.  No legendary figures need apply.  It isn't a film for people who are all that and a bag of chips.  It's for people who may just be a bag of chips, without "all that" extra garbage piled on.  It's what we need.  The Station Agent is over 20 years old, but it's the cure for the Redundancy of Crows that plagues our world today.  I highly recommend it.

Thanks for listening.