Author Archives: Matthew S. Hiley

Thought Free Zones

It seems as though this most recent mass shooting is having a bit more staying power than the last couple of hundred. Sure, it’s fading out, but it gives me a little bit of hope that the conversation may grow over the next couple of hundred mass shootings. We may actually do something about it […]

The Popular Anger Society

A mass shooting is driving a wedge through our political culture yet again. This is a problem other developed countries don’t seem to face on anywhere near the scale that we do in the United States. The United States… That name seems a bit ironic these days. Why is it that we are incapable of […]

Hate Thy Immigrant Neighbor

There were a couple of pictures this week that really got to me… really made me question the dark side of humanity and civilization. This was the one that got me the most, though. I have four kids. I can’t fathom the depths of the pain achieved from seeing the lifeless body of your child […]

Everyone is a Political Genius on Facebook

I really don’t want to talk about politics anymore. Especially on Facebook, where everyone is an amazing scholar that does countless hours of research before posting such educated items as ‘Obama supports the Muslim Brotherhood because he’s secretly a Muslim’, or ‘George W. Bush should be in prison because he’s a war criminal’. Right now, […]

Honey Boo Boo and the Fall of America

My deep disdain for reality television has been no secret. Hell, my second novel, The Candidates, trashed it pretty heavily. I feel very strongly that it is very representative and all-encompassing of everything that is wrong with America. The list of reasons why would fill up the seemingly endless internet. But let’s talk about a […]

I’m Not Freaking Out.

I know that there are many things out there that we should be really damn concerned about… like the environment. Sure, there are plenty of brainwashed, unqualified idiots out there that don’t think there’s such a thing as ‘climate change’… or if they think there is, then they don’t think that man plays any role […]

Relax. Everything is Normal.

As usual, the news is driving me absolutely f**king crazy again. I mourn common sense, and all that passed quietly with it. Let’s examine a few current topics that might benefit from a healthy dose of ‘no shit’ in their diets: Ebola. Ebola sucks, obviously. I have no first-hand knowledge of it, nor do I wish […]

Divided Again: The Gun Debate

We’re all beside ourselves right now. We can’t even begin to process what has happened in Connecticut. There are so many questions. I can’t imagine a more important question, however, than ‘how do we prevent this from happening again?’… We’re at such an important crossroads in American culture right now. I wish I weren’t so […]

Republicans: When Did You Stop Giving A Sh*t?

Do you remember a couple of months ago, before Mitt Romney had sealed his spot as the Republican nominee for President? Do you remember what the general consensus was amongst Republicans? I remember. The consensus was that he sucked. The consensus was that he’s a douchebag. The consensus was that he’d never win. The consensus was […]