As I get older, I find myself increasingly out of touch with the world. Or rather, more specifically, I feel out of touch with society.
I despair at the structure of government, the ludicrous concessions we make to celebrity, the obsession with physical beauty over achievement or decency of character, the sheer lack of empathy towards our fellow man.
I despise the power structure of our world, how those with money, with fame, with beauty, with ability, or a job title with "manager" in it, are considered to be worth more than the rest of us. I cannot express my rage regarding wars fought over territory, or for corporate gain. I hate how powerless I feel to change anything, beneath a barrage of political lies that the vast majority of us lap up because we're so scared and angry all the time..
I hate how the bigger you are, the more influence you wield. How - in a country of 320 million people - Donald Trump, a man who looks and sounds about as intelligent as a donut with sinus problems balancing a Weetabix, can be front-runner to become leader, while his opponents include a gun-loving patriot whose brother and father have already been president, and a robot woman whose sleazy human husband was also The Leader of the Free World.
And how nobody ever stops to ask whether that feels fair or balanced.
I despair at the structure of government, the ludicrous concessions we make to celebrity, the obsession with physical beauty over achievement or decency of character, the sheer lack of empathy towards our fellow man.
I despise the power structure of our world, how those with money, with fame, with beauty, with ability, or a job title with "manager" in it, are considered to be worth more than the rest of us. I cannot express my rage regarding wars fought over territory, or for corporate gain. I hate how powerless I feel to change anything, beneath a barrage of political lies that the vast majority of us lap up because we're so scared and angry all the time..
I hate how the bigger you are, the more influence you wield. How - in a country of 320 million people - Donald Trump, a man who looks and sounds about as intelligent as a donut with sinus problems balancing a Weetabix, can be front-runner to become leader, while his opponents include a gun-loving patriot whose brother and father have already been president, and a robot woman whose sleazy human husband was also The Leader of the Free World.
And how nobody ever stops to ask whether that feels fair or balanced.
I equally despair at how Paul McCartney, with his fooling-nobody dyed hair and entourage of much-younger peers, can stand at the door to a nightclub - at 73 years old - and expect to be allowed inside, because he's a "VIP".
Why would he even want to go to a nightclub at 73, anyway?! What has gone wrong there that he feels he needs to so desperately cling to youth, to relevance?
I hate how we all tune in to see the frocks at a meaningless jamboree of narcissistic self-congratulation like the Oscars or the BAFTAs. Why don't they televise the plumbing awards, or the insurance awards, or the farmer of the year show, or the Good Parenting Awards? What's so boring about the rest of us, eh?!
The left, the right, the middle ground, the tabloids, the broadsheets, the celebrity mags... it's just a cacophony of entrenched opinions, or gossip, or body-shaming, and I hate how confused I feel all the time by all of this. It has become a wall of white noise that I struggle to fight through. Knee-jerk, tabloid fearmongering, versus equally knee-jerk broadsheet campaigning.
It feels like nobody stops to ask whether what they believe in is because it's the right thing, the decent thing, or because they're puppets to their programming... or because Katie Hopkins/Richard Dawkins/David Icke has told them to. Frustration doesn't even cover it.
And - honestly - I'm about two more pangs of impotent rage away from going to live in a trailer in the middle of the Mojave Desert, with a solar shower and a couple of shotguns.
Video games feel like they're the only thing that make sense anymore.
Why would he even want to go to a nightclub at 73, anyway?! What has gone wrong there that he feels he needs to so desperately cling to youth, to relevance?
I hate how we all tune in to see the frocks at a meaningless jamboree of narcissistic self-congratulation like the Oscars or the BAFTAs. Why don't they televise the plumbing awards, or the insurance awards, or the farmer of the year show, or the Good Parenting Awards? What's so boring about the rest of us, eh?!
The left, the right, the middle ground, the tabloids, the broadsheets, the celebrity mags... it's just a cacophony of entrenched opinions, or gossip, or body-shaming, and I hate how confused I feel all the time by all of this. It has become a wall of white noise that I struggle to fight through. Knee-jerk, tabloid fearmongering, versus equally knee-jerk broadsheet campaigning.
It feels like nobody stops to ask whether what they believe in is because it's the right thing, the decent thing, or because they're puppets to their programming... or because Katie Hopkins/Richard Dawkins/David Icke has told them to. Frustration doesn't even cover it.
And - honestly - I'm about two more pangs of impotent rage away from going to live in a trailer in the middle of the Mojave Desert, with a solar shower and a couple of shotguns.
Video games feel like they're the only thing that make sense anymore.
GAMING MIGHT BE WHAT?
Gaming might be bigger than it always has been, yet it has somehow always existed on the fringes of our society.
The higher-ups often don't seem to understand it; however big a game might be, it still somehow seems apart from everything else.
We don't, as a whole, celebrate gaming in the way that we celebrate politicians or movies. It's not just the indie scene that feels like it's outside of everything else, but even the big games - those released by the Sonys or Microsofts of the world.
When the mainstream pays lip-service to gaming, it's tentative, almost fearful. Like we're a race of indigenous people and they've just landed on our shores. We look funny to them, with our strange, almost imperceptible customs and language. No wonder they're a bit scared of us.
When games are reported on in the mainstream media, it's usually because some Korean kid has suffered a heart-attack because he played games non-stop for a week, or because some new game is going to cause the moral decay of civilisation, or because The Mirror has a tie-up with Sony to give away a PlayStation 4 and Street Fighter V, or something. It's the usual fear-mongering guff, riddled with a lack of understanding.
Somehow, gaming still feels underground. It still feels like a community in and of itself (albeit one, as well we know, rife with its own political and ethical divisions, which reflect everything that's wrong with the rest of the planet, sadly).
Gaming might be bigger than it always has been, yet it has somehow always existed on the fringes of our society.
The higher-ups often don't seem to understand it; however big a game might be, it still somehow seems apart from everything else.
We don't, as a whole, celebrate gaming in the way that we celebrate politicians or movies. It's not just the indie scene that feels like it's outside of everything else, but even the big games - those released by the Sonys or Microsofts of the world.
When the mainstream pays lip-service to gaming, it's tentative, almost fearful. Like we're a race of indigenous people and they've just landed on our shores. We look funny to them, with our strange, almost imperceptible customs and language. No wonder they're a bit scared of us.
When games are reported on in the mainstream media, it's usually because some Korean kid has suffered a heart-attack because he played games non-stop for a week, or because some new game is going to cause the moral decay of civilisation, or because The Mirror has a tie-up with Sony to give away a PlayStation 4 and Street Fighter V, or something. It's the usual fear-mongering guff, riddled with a lack of understanding.
Somehow, gaming still feels underground. It still feels like a community in and of itself (albeit one, as well we know, rife with its own political and ethical divisions, which reflect everything that's wrong with the rest of the planet, sadly).
IN A WORLD...
But in a world that I feel increasingly detached from, I feel closer to gaming than ever. In the years when I wasn't writing as Mr Biffo, I knew something was missing from my life - and it was this.
It was engaging again with a community, with a world, with a society, that I feel at home in. That I don't feel confused or frustrated by. One that simply celebrates itself.
Alright, we're not perfect - far from it - but gaming is ours. They don't understand it. They don't want to be a part of it. There may be threats and divisions within gaming - as there are with any society, once it reaches a certain size - but those of us who play games are all gamers. We're the smart ones, the ones who've realised that human beings have one thing in common: we all want to play.
A society built upon the concept of that, the ideal of play, makes a damn sight more sense to me than the screwed-up mess we're forced to live in by default.
But in a world that I feel increasingly detached from, I feel closer to gaming than ever. In the years when I wasn't writing as Mr Biffo, I knew something was missing from my life - and it was this.
It was engaging again with a community, with a world, with a society, that I feel at home in. That I don't feel confused or frustrated by. One that simply celebrates itself.
Alright, we're not perfect - far from it - but gaming is ours. They don't understand it. They don't want to be a part of it. There may be threats and divisions within gaming - as there are with any society, once it reaches a certain size - but those of us who play games are all gamers. We're the smart ones, the ones who've realised that human beings have one thing in common: we all want to play.
A society built upon the concept of that, the ideal of play, makes a damn sight more sense to me than the screwed-up mess we're forced to live in by default.
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