Don Kowalewski
Writer. Ad Sales and Marketing. Social Media Content Creator. Aeropress Coffee. Makes the best salsa in the world.
The Year of the Blame Sticker
Early in 2021 I swore off all news. I promised myself, other than a quick skimming of the headlines and scrolling through Twitter a couple of times a day, I wasn’t going to use any brain cells or invest any more emotional capital into what politicians were doing and saying, nor would I sit and use my valuable time watching any cable news station.
2021 was a year of peace, zen, and better use of my limited time on Earth. It’s eye-opening how I can still have a firm grasp on what’s going on in the world without sitting down and spending hours on news websites or watching TV.
So, imagine my surprise while standing at a gas pump filling my tank and seeing this Joe Biden sticker on the pump …pointing at the price of gas! At first, I didn’t even notice it was Joe Biden. I thought it was some sort of advertisement maybe inviting me inside to buy a taquito or 2 for 1 energy drinks. Then I noticed, oohhhhhh. That’s Joe Biden and this was some clever, snarky way someone wanted me to notice that Joe Biden is responsible for the high gas prices.
I was actually dumbfounded. I was fascinated. Have a missed some new trend? Are we now putting “blame stickers” on things? I smiled, in fact, thinking how preposterous this was …that someone created this sticker, someone bought this sticker, and those same someones take the time to stick blame-Biden-stickers on things.
Funny side note …that gas at this particular point in time was $2.90 a gallon and I used my reward points to get it down to $2.20 a gallon, and I was like, “thanks, Joe.”
Please know …this isn’t political. If this had been a cartoonish Trump or Obama or Reagan or Matt Gaetz or any Clinton pointing and taking implied blame for anything, I would find it equally amusing. I picture some angry lady scrolling through her social media and seeing like-minded people bragging about their flags and banners and then someone has an Etsy store where they’re selling these stickers.
“Oh,” she says, “I’m definitely getting a sheet of these because I have sooooooo many places I want to stick it and tell the world how Biden is ruining things.”
Then she gets them and starts putting them on grocery store shelves, newspapers at the gas station, and then on the gas pump, and then she posts it to social media and feel amazing about how she’s gonna rile up some snow-flake liberals and then she tells all her family and friends about what she did and how clever she is.
Again, I could Google this blame-sticker thing and see if it is a thing, but I won’t, or else the Internet will bend itself to make my Facebook, Insta, and Twitter feed full of politics, again, and after a year spent ridding my social media of negativity and letting the algorithms deliver me positivity … this clueless Blog entry is the closest I’ll get.
So I peeled off the Biden-blame-sticker and decided, I’m going to use this all throughout 2022 …for everything. Anything I do or anything I see, good or bad, I’m going to blame it on Biden (or I’ll be giving credit to Biden).
I’m highly amused by this. And I’ll continue to be highly amused by this. And I hope my Biden-blame-sticker quest will amuse others and point a light on how silly it is that any of us let cable news or politicians affect our behavior and attitudes and impact how we treat other people.
If you’re looking for a New Year’s Resolution of your own, try what I did last year …STOP watching news and reading news articles. Replace every minute you would’ve spent with politics and news (industries that trade on fear, negativity, doom, gloom and blame) …and replace it with prayer, journaling, meditation, or reading articles or listening to Podcasts that educate and inspire.
And then stick a blame-sticker on your better mental health and better outlook on life.
Don Kowalewski 