There are those few who are so rabidly unwilling to believe this simple truth that they push and push and push against it in the futility that they can keep it back. They have to force themselves not to give in and be good people. Ultimately, though, they will eventually break and become the very worst kind of monster—those that can’t care. They are the worst because they feel guilty about not being able to prevent the inevitable, mistaking the truth for the wool over their eyes. This shatters their world. Not because they understand they are monsters, but because they understand they could be something else. So they atrophy inside. They would rather do this than realize that people are dark, ugly creatures who only occasionally display good qualities. This is why, I think, we laud people for possessing attributes that any good kindergarten teacher knows everybody is supposed to have. Nobody gets surprised if you tell somebody that so-and-so’s an asshole, but if you mention that so-and-so’s an honest, upstanding guy who does right by his family it’s like he won the motherfucking Nobel Prize.

But check this out—that’s not the funny part. This is the funny part: I can look around myself, at my environment and ask myself straight-faced, “what the hell happened?” as if it’s ever been any other way. As if humanity once had some sort of Golden Age when everybody was nice to each other and that was the standard. News flash—Adam and Eve couldn’t decide what their units were for until a snake showed them which way was up, and then their first kid ended up a murderer while their second woke up in martyr heaven, the first professional victim. People have been scum since chapter one of the Bible, get it, and it hasn’t gotten any better. Let’s face it, we choked ourselves right out of the cradle and the only things that have changed in four thousand years are the hairstyles and plumbing. So who’s the monster here?