INVERTED REALITY QUICK REFERENCE GUIDE

John Califano lives in New York City where he contemplates his existence and works helping at-risk parolees transition back into the workforce. He’s worked as a writer, actor, visual artist, and musician, and has performed in clubs, art galleries, feature films, and Off-Broadway productions. His work is featured in The Broadkill Review, The Willesden Herald’s New Short Stories Series (UK), Adelaide Literary Magazine, The Writing Disorder, Poetry Super Highway, Embark, Dream Noir, Spank the Carp, Across the Margin, and Literary Yard (India).

We live in a time of rapidly shifting political and cultural landscapes. Norms and beliefs of less than a decade ago are now defunct. Long gone are the trusted voices in mainstream media like Walter Cronkite. Today, people are incessantly bombarded with propaganda 24/7 and don’t know whom to trust or what to believe.

This phenomenon is particularly troubling for older generations struggling to acclimate to entirely new dystopian words and phrases along with their ever-evolving meanings. The situation has gotten so out of control, people who were taught that 2+2=4 and grew up believing that biological men and women are actually real men and women, have now begun to question their own sanity. Admittedly, I was one of them.

For me, the tipping point came when I witnessed an angry mob of about three hundred young people flood the streets of Lower Manhattan. They were mostly dressed in black, wearing dark face coverings and T-shirts identifying themselves as “Anti-Fascists.”

Having attended a number of peaceful protests over the years, my first impulse was to reserve judgment. But then I noticed something peculiar. These civic-minded citizens weren’t just exercising their First Amendment right to free speech. They were indiscriminately shattering storefronts, jumping up and down on the roofs of cars, smashing windshields, and—even more alarming—they were hurling rocks and bottles at helmeted police and counter-protesters.

I immediately thought, is it just me, or is something terribly askew here? Are these young folks really protesting against fascism or are they promoting it?

I retreated to my humble abode riddled with doubt. I thought that perhaps I had been missing something, and that, maybe, there was a new way of . . . you know, perceiving reality that I somehow wasn’t quite getting. I mean, hey, nobody wants to feel left out. I certainly don’t.

After doing a little research I discovered a godsend: the INVERTED REALITY QUICK REFERENCE GUIDE.

I must say, this handy tool has rescued me from countless moments of self-doubt, confusion, and frustration. Not to mention saving me thousands in talk therapy.

Here’s how it works: Say you’re watching CNN, MSNBC, or some other bought-and-paid-for mainstream news network, and you suddenly find yourself in a cultural and political quandary. You’re not quite sure, but you suspect what you’re being fed is the inverted opposite of what you know to be true, sane, and rational. You whip out this nifty quick-reference guide, look up the word or phrase in question, and Bam! —your sanity is affirmed. Now you can dismiss all your paranoid, politically correct fears of being caught on the wrong side of history.

One minor precaution: If you’re inclined to buy into any of this delusional, dystopian, hate-filled nonsense, it might be a good idea to ensure that you’re armed to the teeth, have prescription drug coverage, and that your kids and grandkids are attending school on another planet because—in case you haven’t noticed—this insidious weaponization of language is helping to both fuel and obfuscate the global shitstorm currently brewing on the horizon. Not a good look for future generations; not a good look for humanity.

For some, this may sound like a stale throwback to the 60’s, but what’s needed now more than ever is a megadose of genuine peace, love, and understating.