It’s war online. We’re bombarded by fake and half-baked news, endless moaning, opinions and trolls. 

Covid-19 has exposed the fragility of the system. Highlighting that most of our leaders, with access to top expertise and bottomless funds, are winging it. 

These adults hold private conversations in closed rooms on our behalf. They also appear to be drunk on alcohol bought between Monday and Thursday, as well as hosting swinger parties with shady “entrepreneur” associates.

In space, no one can hear you scream. In a pandemic, no one can see you smile. 

As with many others, Covid-19 strangled my industry into a coma for the foreseeable future. Work projects got cancelled like they were racist statues; marketing budgets got iced. The only thing to do was sit at home and face the ghost of work past. I’d better start an Instagram account, I said to the mirror, or do I attempt to buy the stock market dip with my Sassa grant, whenever that arrives?

With current global craziness, a sense of humour is an essential service for coping. That together with Krugerrands stashed behind baked beans in your mountain bunker. 

As Patch Adams and the Joker taught us, laughter is the best medicine. That and vaccines. We’re short of vaccines, so stock up on chuckles until the World Health Organisation drops their latest mixtape.

“I don’t like laughter… how about meditation and a good book?” Who has time for that when we have all this time on our hands? No, the solution is a cackled conversation with a friend, or a wry moment shared with the smiling eyes of a masked stranger. The kind of joviality experienced when facing the gallows. 

We require more sharp, pleasant jabs to the funny bone, often best delivered in small doses such as one-liners, memes and if you really have to, short voice notes. 

“It could be worse,” as my Uncle Monty used to say, “now pull my finger.”

People also self-isolated when facing the Black Death in the 1300s. It still wiped out a third to a half of Europe. If only they’d had social media to lighten their mood and distract them with 50 shades of misinformation. 

Plague ended up strengthening state power and boosting the growth of early mega-corporations. Post-plague taxes gave governments more power to meddle in the economy. Seven hundred years later, governments are still not letting a good crisis go to waste. 

Simon says don’t smoke, don’t cross imaginary provincial boundaries, stand on one foot, don’t touch your nose, stop coughing!

It’s naïve to think that regimes care about anything but self-preservation, their banking buddies, faceless multinationals and the 1% Swingers Club. 

Are these powers master Machiavellian manipulators, or is Hanlon correct: Never attribute to malice that which is explained by stupidity? Let’s say it’s 50-50, same chance you had of dying from bubonic plague.

These new feudal overlords and parasitic parastatals set clever debt traps and use thinly-veiled money laundering techniques to drain blood from the masses. We’re in a Kafkaesque pickle. But when life gives you pickles, make pickle lemonade. 

What better way to ignore this global fuckery than to laugh into a pillow or the crook of your elbow?

We’re hamstrung by these power-thrilled dopes who control Ponzi tax schemes, but we still have the free will to decide how we react. Viktor Frankl said that the last of human freedoms is the ability to choose one’s attitude to your circumstances. So consider an attitude of mirth, maybe enjoy some silly cat memes.

They can take our freedom, but they can’t take away our freedom to laugh at them… and one another.

So until Bill Gates is crowned king of the new world order, let’s kick back with some chocolate chuckles and have a laugh. Is this denialism? Nihilism? Denihilism isn’t just a river in Egypt, sister.

Mark Twain said humour was society’s biggest blessing. He knew things.

Laughter increases blood flow, heart health, immune cells; it decreases stress hormones and boosts the immune system, leading to physical wellness – thus improving your resistance to viruses. Laughter can basically cure this damn pandemic. FYI I’m not a doctor, I just imitate one online.  

Choose your inputs. Ingesting glumness is bad nutrition for the mind. Take a bad news detox. Try a shot of vitamin D(adJoke).

Question: Is a dad bod just a father figure?

As we steamroll towards a second Great Depression, let’s fire off some mirth and upbeat gifs like a glitter cannon.

The online thought police are making citizen’s arrests by CAPSLOCK tagging their Facebook echo chambers. Don’t join them, join the LOL patrol.

“We should protest at Davos!” Not with the current exchange rate. Next year’s World Economic Forum is ominously titled The Great Reset, so if you thought 2020 was as bad… just joking, I hope. 

The event will be partially online, so if you get a Zoom invite, be sure to send some spicy comments from your basement.

The casino owners never lose, so concentrate on your realm of control. Save your energy for growing mealies and saving clothing buttons for trading tools. Utility money instead of bullshit fiat currency conjured and printed willy-nilly to game the system at our expense. Let’s barter smiles for apple cider. How much petrol can I exchange for a thumbs up online?

Frank Zappa misquotedly said that government is the entertainment division of the military-industrial complex. Citizens need to rise up and form their own entertainment divisions. It may be our only chance of survival.

It takes 62 muscles to frown, 26 to smile. So frown more to better exercise your face. No wait, smile more because it’s less effort. As Uncle Monty told us, always look on the bright side of life.

Our collective consciousness laughs at the cosmic joke, where we applaud with the sound of one hand clapping. If you can’t laugh about it, what can you do? Cry? Then make it tears of joy. 

I ended up starting that Instagram account to fill time when standing six feet apart while trying to withdraw my daily cash limit. Feel free to connect and share some good cheer. DM