Being Good At Being Angry

RECENTLY, I'VE HEARD several people describe the American people as "angry". I heard it on the radio, I think, which proves its true. Radio never lies. Also proving its true is that damned near everyone I encounter seems...angry..unfriendly...self absorbed...Case closed. Its easier than ever to get into an argument in America. We have all become intellectual corrections officers, always with something to add or subtract from someone else's narrative. Surveys of random samplings reveal broader trends. The average American has at least one fewer friend than a generation ago. Facebook "friends" don't count. Facebook, rumor has it, is going to add a "dislike" click on to balance its "like" click on. further proof. Facebook, we, is/are dropping all pretensions of contentment, and getting right to the nub of the matter. Watch out! Katie bar the door, 'cause now the cows'll leave the barn, the cats, the bag. Zuckerberg will rue the day he legalized honestly online, and forth pouring will descend all our anger, inundating us in venomous spleen. "Have a nice day", we all say, reading from cue cards. (we don't really mean it). Facebook will now sink and die in our sea of venomous spleen, as chatrooms once did. You'll see. Already the trolls are lurking, the abrasive acid dripping. Follow the money. Its all about personal finances. Unless you're a member of the privileged wealthy one percent elite, you're going nowhere financially, and you've been going nowhere for a very, very long time, ever since Reagan unleashed the hounds of unregulated free enterprise. Now, those who own anything own everything. Everyone knows someone who has diabetes, has been wounded in war, or gone through an acrimonious divorce. On the list of the happiest countries, the U.S.A. is nowhere near the top, and trails socialist, egalitarian, contented, productive Denmark by a country mile. The fruit of a society of predators and competitors. The per capita anger quotient is where America holds forth at the top, say the sociologists. At least we're good at something, even if we're good for little else.