This is rare and unlike me, but I am going to preface this by saying it will take some resilience for you to read this weeks post. I touch on a few of uncomfortable topics so read it to your own capacity. If this rouses a reaction in you, please respond from a compassionate and kind place. Social media has taught us that all opinions are valid and that is simply not true. All opinions are solely opinions.
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War is terrible. I can guarantee that most of us know and understand this. What I wonder is why do people feel compelled to share violent images 24/7 on social media. This I can not understand. To those of you who post graphic war images, can you share your why?
I can not partake because I am too sensitive. Something I have been called all of my life. A delicate flower, who simply can not hang. Partner after partner has insulted my sensitivities to the world, and time after time I resist. Because this is my true nature, my gift. Being sensitive is a gift however, the world will cease to understand why we do not partake.
We do not partake because it is not tolerable. Because there is not enough space within ourselves to hold both our mental wellness, which can be easily tippable and the world. Humans, in my opinion were never meant to see this much media and be exposed to so much. My body can not metabolize it and I presume that there are many others out there, empaths who too can not take it.
I am at a crossroads because I have enjoyed social media returns after my usual breaks and lately it is too much. Black Lives Matter, Stop AAPI Hate, the war against Ukraine, the war against Palestine, of course, I am omitting many in between.
The truth is that it is too much, and simply having conversations about it is not enough. If people care, they need to do more, and do what they can, where they are, with what they have.
Below is a link to companies supporting the war. I am going to ensure I do not support these companies, but I don’t need to post about it on social media to feel like I am doing something. I care in more subtle ways, because I feel things deeper, see things deeper, and experience life in a much more colorful way than most. It can be immensely overwhelming at times but it just is a fact.
I close this post with a lighter song of which I love and appreciate that has helped me keep up my 日本語 all these years (although it is getting rustier by the minute).
I hope that we can all pause, drop into our breath, and take a moment to think what we can do, where we are, with what we have.
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Written under a Scorpio sun and a Virgo moon, feeling at home.
Company List (I tried keeping this to US only but it did not work out that way):
More on what to boycott and why: bdsmovement.net
On being too much: To anyone who is told they are too much, too sensitive, too caring, I have found this site to be of great use in clarifying my sensitivities: Eggshell Therapy
p.s. we are entering a political year in the US pretty soon so I may delete social media altogether and only interact via an external app such as Later. Just a heads up to those who still think I check DM’s consistently ;)
As this Substack ebbs and flows you will find it becoming more honest and unfiltered. After all, I a very opinionated Black woman who has been oppressed by the world of which I grew up in my whole life. If you are curious to know more about my experiences and others, I recommend you have a listen to my podcast. Episodes 10 and 13 (coming out 15 of Nov) dive deeply into the race complex.
I just burnt my breakfast writing this post, must be a metaphor for something, ey?
Your truth does not anger me. that is a projection on your part. I will say that I am triggered when people think that they can compartmentalize themselves from their role as American citizens in the horrors that are being done in our name overseas (and that our tax dollars are directly contributing to). I guess I will say, enjoy the privilege of being able to be "hypersensitive," because there are a lot of people who don't have that privilege. Being an adult is being able to be brave enough to confront this ugliness and it is a fantasy to think one can escape it.
This is a subject near and dear to me because I believe that America is a participatory democracy and the American public is largely ignorant about war and geopolitics and our perpetual role in it. I'm only on Instagram and typically post anything political or controversial there, but I think I can answer why people are posting these images about the current conflict (I'm thinking in particular of the activist Shaun King, who I follow). Those people are desperately trying to get people to care about war and to use their voices to help stop it. In the case of King, he specifically is trying to bring awareness to the plight of the Palestinians (who until this moment were hardly on the world's radar and who the US media largely ignore). The Palestinians in Gaza have been living in what amounts to the world's largest open air prison since 2006 (and before that, starting in 1947, have been displaced from their land and their homes so that Israeli Jews can move in). Gaza is home to around 2 million Palestinians, half of whom are children (who cannot vote and so did not vote for Hamas). They are continually food, medicine and income insecure (and 90% of the water is not potable). Israel controls everything that goes into Gaza and everything that comes out, and although there has been some primitive military resistance to this state of affairs (which they are allowed to do under International law as residents of an "occupied" land), Gazans have been carpet bombed by the Israelis on the regular for most of my lifetime. Now, due to the Hamas terrorist attack, the far-right wing Israeli government has pretext to go beyond fighting Hamas and to collectively punish and eliminate all Palestinians from Gaza (this is considered a war crime under International law).
The reason why all Americans should care about this (besides the obvious) is that our tax dollars are directly funding this horror. Israel is basically our proxy in the region, and we give them unconditional monetary and military support. The major human rights organizations consider Israel's actions a genocide and much of the rest of the world is turning against us. All UN members (except US and Israel and Ukraine) have voted for a ceasefire. Iran (who many think are funding Hamas), Russia (who we are fighting by proxy in Ukraine) and China (who would like to usurp us geopolitically) are aligning against us geopolitically, as are many South American countries (many of which we upended politically with coups during the 70s and 80s and beyond and so have many reasons to dislike and distrust us). These things do not make us safe and we are now losing our position as the world's hegemon (basically squandered, in my opinion, with greed and lust for war and power, facilitated by a distracted and ignorant population. Many think we are on the brink of WWIII (perhaps involving nuclear weapons), at which point we will all be affected, in one way or another. Who will fight that war? I doubt we have enough enlisted personnel. We most certainly will need to bring back the draft and then maybe people will care about war. At the very least, our job as Americans is to be informed about these things and let our government representatives know that we find them intolerable. There are massive protests going on right now (including blocking of weapons-carrying ships carrying at the major West coast port) and there will be political consequences to the Democrats, who are some of the warmongeringest MTFRs out there (including Joe Biden, who has never met a war he didn't love). The Republicans are no better, as they all get contributions from the weapons and reconstruction industries. Hedge funds, such as Blackrock, love to invest in war. To be clear, I don't blame Jewish people for the actions of the Israeli government (the conflation of Jews with Israel is a propaganda trick to suppress dissent on this topic). I don't personally know any Palestinians but I have had plenty of Jewish friends and coworkers (and a Jewish "godmother") who I care about deeply. Hope this clears things up.