Control: A Man’s Rage

I, Dalton Lewis, feel rage occasionally: rage at rich people, rage at life, rage at my place in life. Why am I a middle-class mentally ill person? Why haven’t my novels sold millions of copies? This confuses me. Why shouldn’t I sleep with beautiful women every night? Why? This really confuses me. Life really mystifies me.

This isn’t a desire to frame or murder anyone. It’s just a feeling, an impression, that something is wrong with life — that it’s broken, that it’s empty, that no one can have the life they want except a few pretty people at the top of life. It’s looking at the world around us and knowing that most of us aren’t at the top of our fields. It’s a general malaise at the lack of integrity in the country around us.

People get framed. People get mistreated. Mentally ill people — people with schizophrenia — rarely make it in life. Many of us end up homeless or living off of family members. If only schizophrenics could do the dishes and clean our rooms and hold a steady job then our lot in life would improve drastically. Alas — I can’t do that.

Why aren’t my friends rich and famous? Terry should win big tournaments at Warhammer 40k and host a successful series of web shows about strategy gaming. Phillip should executive produce a successful television show about something ridiculous and yet perfect — an outrageously melodramatic hit.

Gilbert should be on the Supreme Court. He should be rewarded for hard work and skill and not have to work so many ridiculous hours. Finnegan should design a hit indie roleplaying game that hits conventions all across the world and revolutionizes the gaming experience. Simon should design a good video game that challenges and excites people and then spin it off into a series of novels about time travel.

Raging against life’s unfairness is a fun way to pass the time. Being angry matters. Feeling emotions helps someone to feel something and react to the world around one’s self. I should win wargaming tournaments. Why don’t I win these things?

Terry doesn’t win the biggest wargaming tournaments and has few views on his feed. Philip hasn’t gotten the money from his grant to make a web series. Gilbert works ridiculous hours for the grossly rich elite. Simon works at a museum while trying to find a job making video games. Finnegan works as a middle manager trying to invent prescription drugs to help people. Everyone is okay — but should be great.

People need this emotion. People need to feel upset and angry and dejected. A desire to rebel against the status quo is healthy and necessary to move society in the direction of a fairer and better world. Rage is fine, good even. Rage is needed to look at things and say, this is wrong. This is broken. This needs to be fixed. Without emotion we fail to improve a society that holds us down.

Thanks, and take care, friends.