The woman in the video doesn’t scream or rant. She simply names a truth she can no longer ignore: some people enjoy the suffering of others. And that realization is gutting. But as I watched, I realized something else—something just as painful, but maybe even more important:

It’s not that everyone gave their soul away. It’s that many were misled.
Some don’t care that they were.
Some do care, and they’re just scared to admit it.
And some still have no idea anything’s been lost at all.

That’s why this post exists. Because somebody has to say something.

I didn’t start CherryCoBiz to do political commentary. I’ve always teetered in and around political conversations, curious but often hesitant. Politics felt confusing, like a foreign language no one bothered to teach me. But that’s been true of a lot in my life—I don’t like what I don’t understand. So eventually, I set out to understand.

I Didn’t Always Understand Politics—But I Set Out To

I was born in the mid-70s. Politics didn’t show up in my childhood the way it does now. What I remember are the interruptions—cartoons breaking for war footage, grown-ups changing the channel when the tanks rolled across the screen. It was surreal, and even as a kid, I wondered: Why aren’t we talking about this?

But I didn’t know how to enter that world. For a long time, I stayed back.

That started to change around 2007. I began paying closer attention—still uncertain, still learning, but finally leaning in. I wanted to express thoughtful ideas about the bigger topics, even if I didn’t always have the language for it yet.

And then the pandemic happened.

Like many of you, my life flipped inside out. My business was collapsing, we were stuck indoors, and the world felt like it had just stopped spinning. It was a moment where everything paused. A strange, painful stillness settled in—and within that stillness, I began to wake up. Not all at once. Slowly. That’s how it often works for me. I’m a smart cookie, but sometimes it takes me a minute to fully grasp the weight of something big.

I talk sometimes about going “east to west,” and while that phrase might sound literal, I mean it symbolically. It’s a reflection of discovery and transformation—my own journey to see clearly what I had once avoided. It also mirrors part of our country’s legacy. Manifest Destiny shaped more than just borders; it shaped families, including mine. My grandfather grew up on a Cherokee reservation. His father was raised by Zeke Proctor, a key figure in the Goingsnake Massacre of 1872. I didn’t grow up on the reservation myself, but I carry the stories. My mom is even writing a book about it. If you’d like to know more, you can read my post titled Currently Reading: A Journey Through Time and Heritage.

That history matters. All of it. Because the past doesn’t disappear—it evolves. It bleeds into now.

I began teaching my son the full picture, not just the sanitized textbook version. I talked to him about how the Americas came to be, and when needed, I veered outside the lesson plan to teach nuance. Because the truth matters. Say it with me: the truth matters.

We’re living in a world where too many people are caught in feedback loops—repeating talking points they barely had time to digest. Shortform content isn’t research. Clips and memes don’t make a worldview. Algorithms don’t care about your well-being.

But you should. You should care enough to dig deeper—not for my sake, but for yours. For your family. For your community.

I’m no saint. I’ve made mistakes. I’ve misunderstood things. But here’s what I need you to know:

I am no one—but I am one of you. I started asking better questions. I refused to stop digging. And when I finally saw what was really happening, I couldn’t unsee it. And I couldn’t stay silent.

MAGA & the Marination of Cruelty

If Hawk helped reflect the feeling many of us share, this next video builds the framework to understand it. Dr. Russell Razzaque gives us the psychological insight we’ve needed to understand: why so much of this feels deliberately cruel.

He walks us through the “authoritarian switch”—the idea that many people carry authoritarian tendencies, but these aren’t always activated. What flips the switch? Fear. Fear of loss, of status, of identity. And when people feel that fear, especially culturally, they often look for someone strong to lead them—someone who promises to “make things right,” even if that means making things cruel.

Trump has mastered this fear game. His rise has never been about policy. It’s been about pain—leveraging fear and resentment to win loyalty. Dr. Razzaque points to status anxiety—the underlying dread that one’s automatic place atop the social hierarchy is slipping. And for many MAGA followers, that fear isn’t economic—it’s cultural.

We’re not talking about people demanding opportunity. We’re talking about people demanding dominance. The idea of equality feels like a personal loss to them, not a collective gain. The cruelty, then, isn’t a side effect. It’s the point.

Alligator Alcatraz: We’ve Seen This Before

There’s a new detention facility in the Florida Everglades—already nicknamed “Alligator Alcatraz.” And if that alone doesn’t send a chill down your spine, it should.

Built in an alligator-infested swamp, the facility is being used to detain undocumented immigrants. And the administration isn’t shy about why they chose this site. According to officials, the surrounding wildlife—alligators, crocodiles, and pythons—act as a “natural deterrent.” This isn’t hyperbole. This was marketed. Publicized. Glorified.

They even posted AI-generated images of alligators in ICE hats with the caption “Coming soon.”
Let that sink in.

And already, reports are flooding in:

Detainees exposed to flooding within a day of arrival
Extreme heat, lack of water, mosquito swarms
Maggots in food, inhumane conditions, and zero transparency
Lawmakers denied entry

This isn’t just a poor policy decision. This is intentional cruelty—weaponized for political theater. A performance meant to delight a base that finds satisfaction in the pain of others.

This is trauma manufacturing. And it’s a national disgrace.

Say It Plain

Not all migrants are criminals.
Not all migrants are undocumented.
And all of them are human beings.

If you’re okay with people being caged in snake-filled swamps, fed rotting food, and used as props for political points, you’ve been radicalized by cruelty. And it’s time to wake up.

A Personal Note on Credibility

I spent years working in research and earned graduate-level training in psychology. That includes:

Human Subjects Research (HSR)
Good Clinical Practice (GCP)
HIPAA compliance, and more.

But let me tell you something a little more real.

I dropped out of school when I was 15. At the time, I genuinely believed I could run my life just fine without a formal education—and for a while, I did. I worked hard, fit in anywhere, and pushed through. I still work like that.

But eventually, the world reminded me that no matter how capable you are, not having that piece of paper—a high school diploma—can close doors. It didn’t matter how much experience I had or how well I performed. I didn’t check the right box, so I wasn’t considered “qualified”—not because I couldn’t do the work, but because I didn’t have the right credential.

That realization stung. But it also lit a fire in me. So I went back to school. Medicine, real estate, general studies, nursing—you name it. If someone was willing to teach, I was ready to learn. Yeah, it might look messy from the outside, but that “mess” is full of perspective most people don’t get. That’s where the wisdom lives. That’s where the nuance comes from—especially around issues like ethics, power, and how people get treated in systems that weren’t built for everyone.

I’m not here to impress you with credentials. I’m here to say I care about truth. I care about people. And I never stop learning—no matter how many times I stumble.

Because let’s be honest: to human is hard. But I’ve always done the best I could with what I had—and I’m still doing just that.

So What Now?

We’re all responsible for what happens next. No savior is coming. No one’s going to snap their fingers and make this mess go away. If we care about democracy—if we care about decency—then we must understand how it gets eroded. Slowly. With a laugh. With a lie. With a law.

This isn’t just about Trump. It’s about a cultural sickness that revels in resentment and weaponizes fear. And unless we recognize that, we’re not just vulnerable—we’re complicit.

But you reading this? You’re not the problem. You’re the possibility.

Let’s stay open.
Let’s stay honest.
And most of all—let’s stay awake.

We’ve come too far to fall asleep at the wheel now.