The Apocalypse of Dollar General: Watching the Death of Small Town America

I don't leave my house much anymore. After getting stabbed investigating a child trafficking operation out west a few years back, I developed severe PTSD and became something of a hermit. Most of my food comes from the internet. Tech and supplies arrive in brown boxes from Amazon. But every now and then, I need something immediately and have no choice but to brave the great outdoors of what we still call civilization.

Today was one of those days. Town is a few miles from where I'm staying, so I bundled up against the freezing winter temperatures, climbed on my e-scooter, and zipped down to the local Dollar General. The fluorescent lights hit me first when I walked in. That harsh, institutional brightness that makes everything look slightly poisonous. Then the smell. Plastic and cardboard and something vaguely chemical that I could never quite place.

As I shuffled up and down the aisles, it hit me like a ton of bricks. This isn't just another small town dying. This is the systematic destruction of the heart and soul of America, being played out in real-time all across the country.

The Takeover of Main Street In town after town, the story is the same. The family-owned hardware store, the local pharmacy, the mom-and-pop grocery - all shuttered, their livelihoods snuffed out by the corporate juggernaut of Dollar General. What was once a thriving Main Street is now a lifeless husk, dominated by the institutional sterility of discount retail.

It's not just the death of small businesses, though. It's the death of community, of shared experience, of the human element that makes a town a home. When the last local shop closes its doors, something essential dies inside each resident. The loss of that sense of place, of rootedness, leaves a spiritual vacuum that corporations like Dollar General can never hope to fill.

The Prophetic Warning But this isn't just an economic story. It's a spiritual one - and one that the Bible warned us about centuries ago. In the book of Revelation, the apostle John describes a time when "no one will be able to buy or sell" without submitting to the mark of the beast. Could the rise of Dollar General and its ilk be a chilling fulfillment of that prophetic warning?

After all, these mega-chains don't just offer cheap goods. They're rapidly becoming the only option for basic necessities in countless communities. And with their surveillance-powered loyalty programs and cashless payment methods, they're building an infrastructure that could one day restrict access to essential resources. The technology exists right now. Brain chips go in your forehead. Digital currency tracks every transaction. Revelation 13 warned us 2000 years ago. Wake up.