Elmo wrote a simple tweet that revealed widespread existential dread. Now, the president has weighed in.
Elmo wrote a simple tweet that revealed widespread existential dread. Now, the president has weighed in.
"Elmo is just checking in! How is everybody doing?" the X page for the Sesame Street character posted. Many answers were brutally honest and downright cynical about the dread people are feeling.
The message from the Elmo account, the follow-up and the Sesame Street account linking mental health resources is some of the most wholesome stuff I've seen in a while.
It's easy to get in your feelings, and it would've been easy for a social media "win" to play into the doom and gloom or to add to it. Or even to ignore it! But the people responsible for those decisions definitely count as some of Mister Rogers' helpers. I'm grateful for that.
Mr Rogers could really help this world right now.
"Feelings are mentionable and manageable."
It isn't that everyone is special, like superheroes. Everyone is special because we are the only one experiencing the world how we experience it and how we react, in anger or in love can make the world a better or a worse place. He wanted the world to be a better place by letting children love and be safe, and work through the negative feelings in healthy ways.
Mr Rogers testifies in front of Congress for funding is a great video because the man in charge was completely ignorant of what Mr Rogers was doing but in minutes was able to change his mind about how the funding for public television education programs would clearly help children.
I've seen this before, and I watched every second of it again tonight. An amazing human.
A real time peak at what happens many years after selling out the health of your citizens so that insurers can generate money off of misery.
Just wait for the 23AndMe liquidation sale.
They're financially fucked and your genome is going to get sold out to advertisers and life insurance companies.
That site always sounded like a poly dating site to me. Is the domain for sale?
Life insurance? Pfft biochemical and pharma more like.
Monsanto!
Been looking at therapists for my teenage daughter, she’s been debating therapy for a couple of years and has recently fully committed.
We have good insurance and are financially secure, and holy shit it’s still going to cost an extraordinary amount. I don’t understand how anyone struggling with financial insecurity could even consider having access to therapy as an option.
What a fundamentally broken system, there is not a single type of care that exists that is accessible to the people who need it.
As someone who is indeed struggling with financial insecurity, on top of depression, anxiety, and I’m pretty sure adult ADD, it sucks a great deal. My spouse also has similar issues, and so we try to just find the joy in our kids, but I’m worried about passing our issues on to the kids. I truly don’t know what to do at this point.
Check the HR, insurance extras or employee perks whatever page or call the insurance about Behavioral Health programs. Some companies (not enough by far) have some free or lower cost providers in those programs. Not just EAP, which is also a great offering, just usually not long term. Some, it may just be "virtual in-network visits" are discounted over "in person" visits or something simple. A common obe I see is ~5-8 free w/the matched provider then it rolls into the benefit payments if you keep them going.
Its all a very dumb game and I try to pass along any "tricks" I can find to make the system remotely usable. If anyone has any, throw 'em my way!
I'm going to start seeing a sliding scale therapist at $60/hr once a week. I'm donating plasma to afford it, along with using student loans. I figure it's an investment that will pay off. There are therapists that will work pro bono, too.
Think about it this way: the payments you're making for insurance, that they aren't reciprocating in terms of service coverage (their only fucking job), is providing a very needy owner with another private island! You're making the world a happier place as one person can now have multiple islands to lounge on while their corporation does the actual work of syphoning your money for them!
Hashtag SilverLinings!
:P
And I just thought I'd reply to say thats 1 of the countless issues facing average people today.
I came to the comments to see if someone just summarized what the article is about so I can decide whether or not I want to read it.
Since no one else did, here you go:
"Elmo is just checking in! How is everybody doing?" the X page for Elmo posted. A barrage of responses – tens of thousands of them – were brutally honest and downright cynical about the dread people are feeling.
Here is Biden's (or his account's) response:
I know how hard it is some days to sweep the clouds away and get to sunnier days.
Our friend Elmo is right: We have to be there for each other, offer our help to a neighbor in need, and above all else, ask for help when we need it.
Even though it's hard, you're never alone.
Ask for help? This country is built around avoiding meaningful help for others because of “freedom”. You are free to live in a box under a bridge. Free to lack upward mobility. Free to be jailed because of homelessness, drug addiction or mental health problems. Free to lose your home because of a health problem. Help is “socialism” in this country. Can’t have that. Gotta have those freedoms instead.
Ok Mr. Biden, can you help me afford a house? I've been working my ass off for the better part of 2 decades and can't seem to manage it.
How is the guy (biden) who's in a position to actually get shit figured out responding like it's our responsibility to?
Just to be extremely clear, there is no presidential candidate worthy of the position. Trump and Biden can both wheel their crippled old asses to the nearest nursing home.
How is the guy (biden) who's in a position to actually get shit figured out responding like it's our responsibility to?
Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for the country...
I think that's one of the worst quotes from a president of a country. The government is for the people, it's supposed to be doing stuff for the people. It should be our sword and shield against the corporations and fascists, but instead it's become the shackles of the people.
Christ... Thanks Biden for your version of "thoughts and prayers."
Just as fucking worthless as the typical Republican response to our suffering.
offer our help to a neighbor in need
spoiler
Damn this senile dumbass really is just the same mouthpiece for Obama when he was vice president.
Garfield, the animated orange cat, famously hates Mondays.
Actually top-notch journalism. There's that one fucker out there who still didn't know who Garfield was.
The older Garfield is, the more people there are who don't know much about him even if they know who he is.
Someone's a 10,000
That's me! Didn't realize they ever animated Garfield. Always thought he existed in panel cartoons only.
The Garf has been in animated form since 1988.
ImSorryJohn
Elmo asked how everyone was doing, the replies were so bad president of the United States had to come in.
Who got that on their bingo card?
Imagine if it had been the previous president...
If you are really experiencing anxiety, stress, addiction and/or dread, sometimes it's important to get it out there, acknowledge your situation and don't try to hide it from yourself and pretend everything is fine. Then get yourself the support you need from others and also try to change things, but recognizing the signs is a first step.
What I need is for the people creating problems in my life to get their shit together and fucking stop. No amount of support from others will achieve that.
I would accept support coming in pretty much any form other than pointing at boilerplate "solutions" ignoring reasoning behind why they're out of reach, and washing their hands of the situation as though they did everything they could.
We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas!
"Wow! Elmo is glad he asked! Elmo learned that it is important to ask a friend how they are doing. Elmo will check in again soon, friends! Elmo loves you. #EmotionalWellBeing"
Elmo lying. Elmo sorry he asked, just wanted to sell more junk. Existential dread no good for selling junk! And slogans not further good policies!
I forgot HBO bought Season Street.
HBO/Discovery has an exclusivity deal, which expires in 2025. The show is owned by Sesame Workshop. https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/sesame-street-hbo-max-pbs-deal-1235252239/
Inb4 MAGAts claim that Sesame Street was bought out by dark Brandon to spread his propaganda.
Part of the problem, IMO, is found in the deep divisions presently found in our country. Most forward progress comes from the network in which people exist (notwithstanding the myth of "rugged individualists" as the secret to success). Our present society is riven with deep divisions along generational, ideological, political, socio-economic, and racial lines. If we want to break out of the present "us vs. them" trap we're in, we have to begin to reach across the divisions in everyway possible. (And I am not suggesting that we give up our differences, only that we reference them only when they are appropriate to the overall welfare of our network/society/culture.)
It's a lengthy quote, but it comes from one of the foremost authorities on democratic leadership, James MacGregor Burns:
"The function of leadership is to engage followers, not merely to activate them, to commingle needs and aspirations and goals in a common enterprise, and in the process to make better citizens of both leaders and followers. To move from manipulation to power-wielding is to move from the arithmetic of everyday contacts and collisions to the geometry of the structure and dynamics of interaction. It is to move from checkers to chess, for in the “game of kings” we estimate the powers of our chessmen and the intentions and calculations and indeed the motives of our adversary. But democratic leadership moves far beyond chess because, as we play the game, the chessmen come alive, the bishops and knights and pawns take part on their own terms and with their own motivations, values, and goals, and the game moves ahead with new momentum, direction, and possibilities. In real life the most practical advice for leaders is not to treat pawns like pawns, nor princes like princes, but all persons like persons." ~Burns, 'Leadership,' (1978)
Edit: typo
Jesus Christ that’s the worst website I’ve had the displeasure to visit all year :(
I learned of the below site recently to help avoid paywalls and crappy websites etc
Anyone remember when Elmo first started showing up and the horrible truth that Sesame Street was dead and would never wake up sunk in?
That was actually a great video
Psy-op more than anything, especially with Biden stepping in as if he understands what people are going through. You have no idea buddy.
I agree that this kind of stuff does little to actually help anyone but i much, much prefer a president capable of behaving in a respectful emphatic manner.
I cant even begin to imagine if trump had to respond to something like this.
Oh my god! Biden is controlling Elmo to capture the preschool vote! It's ingenious!
Well the president decided to stand by (at best) or enable (at worst) a genocide of a people. So yeah thanks, but those sunny days seem a bit bleak right now.
Troll.
If only things were this simple anymore...
Nancy Pelosi?
Oh right, it's an election year so we're not allowed to feel bad things about a generally lame president. We gotta suck down the blue flavoraid or else the red flavor aid drinking idiots might scootch closer to winning.
Forget about actually doing anything though. Let's just gaslight each other until he suddenly seems like a decent president.
Lol
Am also agreeing with the Elmo that Biden Genocide Joe is not strong candidate for president. Voting will only encourage weak peoples. A strong leader as Trump or great president Putin loves the freedom not a genocide like Bidenski.
Source: am independent woman of color working in strong factory job with many transgender friends. Am looking forward to the American football contest later for the Superb Bowls. Like and subscribe!
"1 Genocide! Ha ha! 2 Genocide! Ha ha! 3 Genocide! Ha ha! That's how many genocides, Genocide Joe will have. Great Dear Leader Trump makes me sad as I won't be able to count genocides." Count von Count
Edit: This is a sarcastic comment.