cw: i’m still talking about consent

hey y’all,

i wonder if there is a right way to talk about imperial violence. i see my colleagues on the left rightfully enraged about the attention white victims of ICE are receiving, and i see the mass action their murders are inspiring in this moment. i see people wrestling with fury over epistemic injustices with no restitution, but still showing up on the frontlines.

how do we reconcile our grief as death chases us around?

remember me talking about that research study i did about identity predictors of those who engage in victim blaming? the reason i did that study was to help build interventions that move our culture away from blaming individuals for the bad things that happen to them.

if someone is raped, the person at fault is the rapist. it doesn’t matter what the victim was wearing, what they were doing, if they were intoxicated, if they were a sex worker, if they knew the perpetrator. none of that matters. what matters is someone made a decision to rob someone else of their bodily autonomy. when i conducted that study, i was 20 years old and had a recent first hand experience with being blamed for the sexual violence i experienced.

i believed that if i could just show people the truth, things would change. i believed that people didn’t know. i had deconstructed from evangelical christianity, but some of those teachings still lingered: “forgive them, lord, for they know not what they do.” these were the naive musings of an early scholar of justice, believing that he was trying something that no one else had tried. looking back on that study, it’s a pretty rudimentary analysis of rape culture in the U.S.

the arrogance inherent in this radical self-belief notwithstanding, i am now growing disillusioned. i no longer believe that ignorance is the plague. i think people know exactly what they mean when they ask what i was wearing. i think people know exactly what they mean when they say comply, and you won’t get shot by police.

what they really mean is, let someone else get raped or shot, it doesn’t have to be you. what they really mean is, there’s nothing wrong with the system, and you are the bug for not getting with the program. we’ve all seen a the 1998 disney film a bug’s life, right?

in 2020, dystopian first-person shooter cyberpunk 2077 was released. it is a near-future tragedy where unbridled corporate greed is now the law of the land, and corporations are the government. “communist terrorist” johnny silverhand delivers an amazing monologue in cyberpunk 2077 that reinforces hopper’s lesson about suppressing revolution. but, he doesn’t just blame corpos. he blames all of us too, for allowing it to get that far.

everyone knows the game that’s being played with our lives. no one with systemic or institutional power believes it’s actually your fault if you are raped or murdered, but they cannot confront what it means about them if they admit there are no perfect victims. they cannot confront what it means to live in a world where some people get to act with impunity and some people don’t. they cannot confront what it means to be afraid.

our justice system is designed to contextualize violence around who is deserving, and the criteria for worthiness is written by those who have a vested interest in devaluing human life. our justice system does not reinforce the idea that all men are created equal in the eyes of the law. it does not reinforce that we have inalienable rights that ensure liberty and justice for all. it never did.

so it begs the question, if every life is not equal, then who deserves freedom? we all must collectively decide, as one people. it is the most self-evident fact of my life that all human beings deserve life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. it is so intrinsic to my being, and i truly believe it is intrinsic to all human beings. it is so basic, in fact, that we teach our kindergarteners to share. every religion on earth has one tenant in common: care for others and the earth.

jesus said welcome the foreigner into your land. feed the hungry. care for the sick. provide for the poor. do unto others as you would have done unto you. i am still finding my way back to animism, filipino psychology, and indigenous spirituality, but these teachings are the same.

kapwa says i am my countryman and my countryman is me. karangalan says all people have inherent dignity. utang na loob says i have both a moral obligation and a gratitude-driven desire to care for and protect others, especially those who have less than i do. for as they grow, the world grows, and none of us will lack for anything.

these are the two religions that i have the most exposure, but you can find these teachings across all faiths. even ancient philosophers, while exploring the edge of what humanity is capable of, come back to the trait they believe separates us from beasts: grace. what this tells me is that human beings intrinsically know that our destinies are intertwined with each other, and if one of us is suffering, we all suffer.

so i can no longer give a pass to my fellow humans who think if we follow the law, we will be spared. i know that you know better. my lineage was born under colonial occupation, and the echoing reign of spain and the U.S. lives on in the marcos regime to this very day. is it indigenous filipinos’ fault that they welcomed foreigners onto their soil with curiosity and kindness? is the seizing of their land, people, and resources for empire not the most degenerate violation of consent one can imagine?

i think if you still believe people are responsible for the violence committed against them, you fundamentally believe in your own right to conquest. you believe that you must get yours by any means necessary, and in fact feel you are more deserving than anyone else. and if you believe that, then you have lost your humanity. maybe the people who are the most lost don’t care, but then what else do i call you if not a human? gavin newsom keeps screaming at us to wake up, but i believe we are awake. it is not a matter of not knowing anymore.

i watch people consciously choose themselves over each other, over and over again, when mass solidarity is necessary. it cannot rest on the shoulders of the very few who are willing to put everything on the line. there should be no martyrs, because there are enough of us to disarm the machine. i know you are afraid. i am too, but the grasshoppers are right. they know we are stronger than them, and they are terrified of us. they know if you reached out a hand toward your neighbor, the empire would fall. that is why they tell you that your neighbor is your enemy. jesus said love thy neighbor. kapwa says my neighbor is me.

i am trying so hard not to be angry at everyone. i am trying so hard to believe in us, against the odds. these days i feel a lot like johnny silverhand, but only half as brave. what will it take to get free, once and for all?

xoxo,

von