Straight out of the Hooverville playbook.

Exhibit A. :)

Time and again, the "normal" world forces us to accommodate their deeply unhealthy and counterproductive expectations, and then they blame us when it makes everyone more miserable, including them.

American corporate culture responds pathologically to deepening social and economic problems, by requiring more and more performance and surface acting. This is part of the much larger problem with toxic positivity, as explored by many authors, including Barbara Ehrenreich and Susan Cain.

Studies have already shown that fake smiling and surface acting (pretending to be happy when you're not) produce a very short-lived dopamine boost. Long term, it's actually horrible for your mental health, even if you're not openly neurodivergent.

We already have smiling courses and smiling coaches. If stores start requiring their employees to smile, it won't be long before they make everyone take these courses.

We tried smiling more. It did not go well.

True. Maybe they changed nothing, and the new Epstein is hiding in plain sight (again). It worked well enough the first time.

The new Epstein will not be caught dead in public rubbing elbows with politicians and the super rich. They're not going to have him hanging around. They learned from that mistake. That's one of the lessons they learned.

Epstein has already been replaced. We just don't know anything about the replacement yet.

I think they just like taking our money and smacking us back down the socio-economic ladder every year.