Joy Is Not a Crime, Courage Is Medicine

"So what if I get plugged into the Machine if this is the way it’s going?" Where do I start...

What a great location
For a raping station!
Pre-equipped with streaming!
Never mind the screaming!

Very neatly labelled.
All AI-enabled.
Raping cells divided,
Masks and gloves provided.

Citizens are dizzy.
Marketers are busy.
What a sweet location
For a raping station!

I’d like to start with a philosophical outburst that is half analysis and half art. It is an expression of my heart’s spiritual logic wrapped in a scream of longing for something real.

There is this almost identical exchange that I’ve been having with many of my friends—repeatedly—in the context of the current situation.

When we get to the democracy- and science-defying pandemic measures, the measures that are so eerily aligned with the world’s most powerful people’s preexisting techno-totalitarian blueprints for transforming our society that I find it impossible to believe that they are truly a reaction, I go:

“But facts… and our existential responsibility… and individual aliveness… real joy… authentic inner freedom… a civilizational crossroads… all hands on deck…”

And they go:

“But inevitable trajectories… and technology… and comfort… and so what if I get plugged into the machine if this is the way it’s going… the dangers are probably exaggerated and I’ll be fine… in any case no time to think about it… and why would I think too much about anything I cannot change?”

Then my mind starts shooting up internal bits of language in a million directions, trying to find good words to describe the 360-degree picture that I have in my head so perfectly and clearly, the picture that connects all the dots and explains everything logically—but that requires the recipient’s sensory foundation to be primed for grasping intrinsic depth, and thus I really need to find the best words to even try…

So let me try.

First, you know, it’s true. If you are looking at something that you absolutely cannot change and cannot even give it a little push in the right direction in hopes of making a difference now or in the future, there is no point in murdering your soul over it. In your heart, you know what’s right for you—and if you don’t, you gotta try and listen harder.

The question is though, who changes trends? Isn’t the entire history of mankind merely a chemical reaction that starts in our hearts and minds (“desires and intentions”), and as the song of each human heart gets mixed up with all the songs that are coming from all the hearts of all other human beings, it all boils in a pot together, and we end up with various opinions and events, depending on the mix? Isn’t this how it works?

So who is to say that when one person starts singing louder, it doesn’t impact the mix in the pot? Isn’t this exactly how “super predators” win, by screaming their song in everybody’s ears so loudly that the ears bleed, the hearts shut down, and the bodies make themselves available to predation? So if you, a hero of your kind, start singing a song of love and joy a little louder, who is to say that it will have no impact on global trends, now or in the future? Who? And is that person who says that you have no impact really your friend? Only you can know the mission of your life, and what it is that you need to do in order to—when your time is up—die with inner peace and no regrets, knowing that you did your best. Only you can know your heart’s most important song, and no two people are the same. But I reassure you, no matter what your mission is, you matter.

Now, comfort. Like anything, comfort works in balance with meaning and with courage. When comfort gets in a human being’s way of aspiring for truth and growing soul, life waits and waits for action and then removes the comfort. Rich people get sick, academics lose careers, movie stars spend months in rehabs chasing joy and meaning. Comfort is amazing but it’s only good in balance with joy.

And the buzzy sound of hypnosis that blocks our hearts, steals the existential depth from human life, and turns us into confident—albeit sometimes desperate—zombies preoccupied with the narcotic of the mechanical clock? It’s there, like a never-ending strip of chewing gum, like a bad relationship that provides a plot and occupies the mind with a draining but secure familiar routine.

It’s there all the time, and it’s on us to cut through the toxic, all-preoccupying noise and be alive. Alive, alive, alive. Alive uniquely. Alive in beauty, freedom, love, and touch. Alive. The way we were intended to walk this Earth. Not sexless slaves who choose to sacrifice their will for joy to accommodate the "trends” but spiritually strong human beings whose lives are meaningful. We have a chance of being remembered by the children not as blind and tragic victims of the circumstance—but as inspiring role models, the people who didn’t accept the servitude and who maybe saved the world.

You are not fuel for the machine. You are not a robot.

Sing your song.