Why do I write

Let's find out together

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about why I write. Why do I write about the things that I write about? What type of things do I want to write about? Do I want to make people laugh so they can forget that the things I write about are truly awful? 

I don’t know. So that’s why I’ve taken a break from writing the column.

I came back to writing today because I have many thoughts inside my brain that I wanted to let out. Sometimes I feel like my brain is like a blender without an off switch. If I let it, it will keep making kale smoothies until the world overflows with green stuff that a lot of people don’t like to drink. But I do! I like a kale smoothie. Don’t hate until you’ve crushed strawberries, kale, and dates together. 

Like a blender, my brain will crush all my separate thoughts and blend them together to make a “what the fuck type of world do we live in” smoothie. When that happens it’s impossible for me to communicate how I feel because everything is amalgamated together and I can’t separate them. But maybe that’s a good thing. 

After all, the world being fucked up here and the world being fucked up somewhere else is very much interconnected. 

I think about the students of Bangladesh who rose up against an autocratic government that doesn’t serve them. I almost cried when I saw them storming the palace. I love seeing people rebel against oppressors. I think that’s why I secretly looked up to the kids who didn’t do homework and skipped classes. There’s this one kid who walked out of the classroom because the teacher upset him and I’ve never been happier for someone. On the inside of course. I didn’t cheer him on as he rebelled, but I should have. 

The government of Bangladesh responded the same way as the government of Nigeria and Kenya when the people rose up to demand better. They shot at them. This is because governments aren’t here to serve the people, they are here to serve the elites who want to plunder our bodies so they can buy fancy things. I have written a variation of this sentence so many times and maybe that’s why I took a break from writing. 

It feels like I’m saying the same thing over and over again. The government is bad, the state is bad, the police are bad. Only we can save ourselves. I have to keep saying things because if I don’t, my brain will start screaming at me to do something. 

YOU HAVE TO DO SOMETHING. YOU HAVE TO DO SOMETHING. YOU CAN’T JUST LAY ON THE COUCH EATING GUSHERS WHILE THE WORLD IS BURNING. 

My brain is right. I have to say something and do something. Sometimes I wish that I was a comedian who just made dick jokes but I can’t be that kind of comedian. Not in this world. Maybe that’s why I want to live in a world without hierarchy and oppression so I can make silly comedy.

Yes, I want to make people laugh but maybe I’m not skilled enough or somethings are too terrible to make funny. It doesn’t matter. I’ll keep saying it. I’ll keep saying it because I want to know that I lived in a bad world and complained about it. I remember this kid in middle school didn’t like me because she said I whined a lot. I was ashamed of being a whiner then, but I will no longer be ashamed. No one will ever say I was oppressed and I liked it. 

So yes, the purpose of my writing is to complain about the hell we live in. To complain about white supremacy, imperialism, transphobia, and all the other features of the hell we live in. It just hit me that the reason why people say “what the hell” is because we actually do live in hell. 

I’m okay with it not always being funny if you are .

❤️

Your favorite anarchist comedian/poet/social critic,

Marcela

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