A DILLIGAF Nation

I was first introduced to the word on the Huon highway, it was emblazoned in orange across the back of a Holden. The driver's window rolled down and a can came out. Caleb, my teenage son guffawed and provided an explanation for the acronym.
Does it Look Like I Give a Fuck.  If appeared they didn't.

It stuck with me the entire day. The strange concept that someone would spend money to advertise their lack of caring. But were they serious? Or was there some compulsion to LOOK like they didn’t care, even if they did? Bravado, making a show of their nonchalance when in fact it hid an excruciating sensitivity to the opinion of others? Perhaps a rebellious teenagers reaction, an opportunity to buck authority? 

 

Or did they really not give a flying fuck about anything? Is the acronym also a meme, a culturally accepted and acknowledged belief in one’s right not to care?

The romans grizzled about their teenagers, each generation sensing a slip into some new level of depravity not seen before.  I don’t want to fall into that trap. Especially as it seems it’s not limited to any particular group, but extends far across the age spectrum. 

There’s something much deeper going on, something rooted in the modern psyche. And I want to know what it is, and why. The imperative to make great change is upon us,  the need to reinvent  our world is here. Yet we are nations of deniers, disbelievers, and those prepared to declare in large orange letters, that they just don't care.

 

Do we admit defeat or do we delve into our social psyche and seek to understand how it is we came to be here and how it is we, as a species, we reconnect and with our 14 billion feet, and shuffle away from the precipice?