Restart
It's been awhile. So why not restart. There are things lingering in the mind, and there is a need to get them out before I forget. And forgetfulness is becoming friendly.
I just watched the new Star Wars yesterday. And the trailers were of yet another recycled story of super hero men in metallic suits, off on a mission to save the world, with slivers of humanity and vulnerable masculinities as personal hurdles to overcome. For a split second, I wondered if Robert Downey Jr and the guy who plays Captain America ever get a little embarassed to do this again. That their craft and life's work has been reduced to this. Then I remembered that they live in another universe, where their social capital is precisely around the lore of the comics, even though it's becoming a little frayed around the edges.
Another trailer was a contemporary retelling of essentially, Famous Five stories. Instead of parallel of colonisation, where there are lost, wild worlds to be tamed as their entire playground, fighting pirates through friendship and a loyal dog, it's now a dystopian future, where they are fighting monsters with a loyal droid, or magical assistance. The same tale of the chosen one, aided through friendship, loyalty, gumption. And so white. Beautiful, young, white imagination of what youthful hardship could look like, in a fantasy world of meaning and consequence. And then my mind wanders to the young people who join Daesh, and thinking about their motivations. Remembering how I was when I was younger, full of energy and idealism, of believing in my own power and vision to create a much better world than the one that is currently fucked up. And how Daesh provides that - a divine call of solidarity, meaning, purpose - a different kind of social and spiritual capital.
Putting these various pictures against each other. One is playing, make belief, glamourised. At the heart of it, a thought experiment, and not even a very good one, in case it offends sensibility or turn the infinitely more profitable pop culture into the constraints of high art. Another is the vision carved out of the space of a small town, constrained by having very little in money, books or mirror stories. And another is the grip of a time that is so real, it seems like a moment in history. And having the ability to be part of this. The harsher the call, the more real it seems.
Maybe it's not such a leap to imagine how easy it could be to take it on. Feeling so isolated and alone, misunderstood, unseen, and seeing so much. That being given a chance to hold a weapon, being told how it fits into an entire picture, and your critical place in this network of imminent change. I heard from a researcher recently, that many young women become radicalised through peer network. That friends convince each other that this makes sense, which makes sense, because friends often help to make sense of things. It reminded me of a conversation in another chapter, of young lesbians choosing to transition because of their peer network. That friends convince each other that this makes sense. And that in both instances, they are also people who feel rejected by the current social system of value and meaning. And having that other space, where who you are matters a whole lot, not just to you, but to the actual real and material world - and every world is infinitely personal - what fullness that brings.
And this is so familiar. We have all stood at that trajectory, of not being seen, of being excluded, of sensing the texture of our own impotence at a large and unjust world. And then we make choices. And the choices we have are also already within the topography of how we are named, and the history that we carry with us from before we were born. Like the number of blades in a folded fan. And as we take one step to another, these continue to open up. Hopefully, we don't walk ourselves into a knot or a dead end.
I chose to be an activist, quite late in life. Not realising that this was actually possible until another bookmark. And now I am constrained by this choice, because what radical change can happen from within a node that exists in the system in which it tries to reconstruct? But then are there even pockets outside of this increasingly hungry machine that we have finessed like a super AI who understands layers of conscience, learning and choice?
Not sure where I am going with this. But I am just struck, but how much of one is the shallow sheen of plastic at play, and how much of another is the crusty sound of bone and flesh. Two opposite ends of the same quilt. Powered by guns and ideology and adults who are also just consuming and consuming. It can be a little depressing.
Star wars though, was very satisfying. Even as it fit neatly into its own mould.
I just watched the new Star Wars yesterday. And the trailers were of yet another recycled story of super hero men in metallic suits, off on a mission to save the world, with slivers of humanity and vulnerable masculinities as personal hurdles to overcome. For a split second, I wondered if Robert Downey Jr and the guy who plays Captain America ever get a little embarassed to do this again. That their craft and life's work has been reduced to this. Then I remembered that they live in another universe, where their social capital is precisely around the lore of the comics, even though it's becoming a little frayed around the edges.
Another trailer was a contemporary retelling of essentially, Famous Five stories. Instead of parallel of colonisation, where there are lost, wild worlds to be tamed as their entire playground, fighting pirates through friendship and a loyal dog, it's now a dystopian future, where they are fighting monsters with a loyal droid, or magical assistance. The same tale of the chosen one, aided through friendship, loyalty, gumption. And so white. Beautiful, young, white imagination of what youthful hardship could look like, in a fantasy world of meaning and consequence. And then my mind wanders to the young people who join Daesh, and thinking about their motivations. Remembering how I was when I was younger, full of energy and idealism, of believing in my own power and vision to create a much better world than the one that is currently fucked up. And how Daesh provides that - a divine call of solidarity, meaning, purpose - a different kind of social and spiritual capital.
Putting these various pictures against each other. One is playing, make belief, glamourised. At the heart of it, a thought experiment, and not even a very good one, in case it offends sensibility or turn the infinitely more profitable pop culture into the constraints of high art. Another is the vision carved out of the space of a small town, constrained by having very little in money, books or mirror stories. And another is the grip of a time that is so real, it seems like a moment in history. And having the ability to be part of this. The harsher the call, the more real it seems.
Maybe it's not such a leap to imagine how easy it could be to take it on. Feeling so isolated and alone, misunderstood, unseen, and seeing so much. That being given a chance to hold a weapon, being told how it fits into an entire picture, and your critical place in this network of imminent change. I heard from a researcher recently, that many young women become radicalised through peer network. That friends convince each other that this makes sense, which makes sense, because friends often help to make sense of things. It reminded me of a conversation in another chapter, of young lesbians choosing to transition because of their peer network. That friends convince each other that this makes sense. And that in both instances, they are also people who feel rejected by the current social system of value and meaning. And having that other space, where who you are matters a whole lot, not just to you, but to the actual real and material world - and every world is infinitely personal - what fullness that brings.
And this is so familiar. We have all stood at that trajectory, of not being seen, of being excluded, of sensing the texture of our own impotence at a large and unjust world. And then we make choices. And the choices we have are also already within the topography of how we are named, and the history that we carry with us from before we were born. Like the number of blades in a folded fan. And as we take one step to another, these continue to open up. Hopefully, we don't walk ourselves into a knot or a dead end.
I chose to be an activist, quite late in life. Not realising that this was actually possible until another bookmark. And now I am constrained by this choice, because what radical change can happen from within a node that exists in the system in which it tries to reconstruct? But then are there even pockets outside of this increasingly hungry machine that we have finessed like a super AI who understands layers of conscience, learning and choice?
Not sure where I am going with this. But I am just struck, but how much of one is the shallow sheen of plastic at play, and how much of another is the crusty sound of bone and flesh. Two opposite ends of the same quilt. Powered by guns and ideology and adults who are also just consuming and consuming. It can be a little depressing.
Star wars though, was very satisfying. Even as it fit neatly into its own mould.