Wrath & Reverb—Volume Up / Systems Down:
The Noose by A Perfect Circle
I’ve watched every movement eat itself.
Churches. Collectives. Faculty groups. Mutual aid pods. Political orgs.
The names and slogans change. The endings don’t.
They start with hunger for truth.
They end in bloodless ritual.
They start with a vision.
They end with a purity test.
Because what people want—
more than justice, more than change—
is to be seen as good.
Not good as in kind.
Not good as in accountable.
But good like a mask.
Good like a shield.
Good like, “Don’t cancel me, I’ve memorized the catechism.”
“I’ve sacrificed nuance for the right words.”
“I’ve scrubbed myself clean in public.”
But that kind of good?
That good is a weapon.
It makes monsters out of mistakes.
Turns questions into heresy.
Turns curiosity into exile.
And so people go quiet.
Not because they’ve changed their minds.
But because they’ve learned:
Silence is safer than stepping wrong.
Absence is better than the gallows of group chat.
I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it.
And no matter the flag they fly—
no matter the scripture or the slogan—
it circles back to this:
Purity becomes currency.
And those who won’t bankrupt themselves to perform it
get vanished like a threat.
What survives the purge isn’t clarity.
It isn’t community.
It’s the mad scramble to seize the pulpit.
To seize the mic.
To seize the gun.
Power rushes in wearing whatever mask still fits—
doctrine, party, scripture, flag.
It doesn’t matter.
Because when the goal is alignment,
force becomes holy.
Silence becomes obedience.
And the old ghosts of control get new names.