what kind of world are you dreaming of?
hey y’all,
today i’m sippin’ on instant vietnamese coffee with a little southern pecan coffee mate. the metaphor writes itself, honestly, but it doesn’t roll off the tongue like sweet tea & kalamansi.
this one is for my fellow liberators. i think we need an intervention. the subject is the point, but i’m going to ask again in a different way: when was the last time you thought about what you want the world to look like instead of how fucked up it is? do you have goals? a wishlist? must-haves versus nice-to-haves? have you given this any independent thought, absent of any talking points online?
the revolution must be fueled by a belief in a better world. revolution is generative. it is imaginative, it is innovative, it is creative, it is hopeful. if you are an activist with a burn-it-down mindset, and you want to see every fascist pay, i am genuinely asking: what does the world look like to you after?
if you only want to be friends with people who are completely aligned with you, i really understand that. your closest relationships should reflect your values. you shouldn’t compromise your safety and your beliefs in order to maintain your inner circle. but here’s the thing: not everyone you interact with has to be your closest friend.
i’ve observed a pattern among activists that we expect society to emulate what we seek in our personal relationships. this is functionally impossible. we are currently living in fear of what those around us believe. if you spend 5 minutes on threads (which i recommend you don’t), it’s flooded with storytimes about people running into trump supporters at the grocery store and being horrified when they find out. they recite the encounter to their meta-fueled echochamber, patting themselves on the back for sticking it to those idiots.
i’m so put off by these threads. they are flooded with hundreds of comments shitting on trump supporters, going so far as to wish death upon them. they call them hicks, rednecks, morons. the talking point that is so prevalent that i’m starting to suspect it’s AI-generated is “i hope they get what they voted for.” these people have the socialist symbol in their instagram bios, for fuck’s sake.
in the history of the world, it has never been the case that you’ll be standing in line at the grocery store and know with absolute certainty that everyone around you shares your values. every single one of us comes from a different walk of life, with different traumas, fears, goals, histories, cultures. i humbly offer you a different goal, which is common decency. or, if you recall, hiya.
from 17 to 23, i worked at a grocery store in the south called harris teeter, and i absolutely loved it. a grocery store is a great equalizer. everyone has to buy groceries and medicine. i checked out breakfast cafe owners buying 25 cartons of eggs, lunch break executives grabbing a quick sushi and a cold brew, college students buying sweet chili doritos and mountain dew code red, single mothers buying formula with WIC. every single one of them was worthy of dignity and respect. and so was i.
maybe it’s just nostalgia and rose colored glasses, but there was a time when i didn’t hate my job. nowadays, me and all my homies hate our jobs. we’re tired of selling our labor doing things we hate just to survive. we’re tired of being afraid. we’re tired of hating everyone.
one of the reasons i came home to north carolina is that i wanted to get back into community with humans. just like all of them, any of them; some semblance of normalcy and integration. i’ve gotten so socially agoraphobic that i feel in very real danger trying to make a new friend. a lifetime of activism will show you the worst in others, especially the ones you thought you could trust the most. i’ve grown suspicious and defensive.
so, here are some things i’m doing to get back in touch with my humanity, and therefore everyone else’s:
i’m starting my pottery class tomorrow, after talking about it for 4 years
i’m grinding jedi survivor for the 5th time
i’m thrifting and DIYing new clothes from local spots to wear to pilates and said pottery class
i’m reaching out to colleagues and mentors in my professional network to see what they’re up to these days
i’m buying produce, zines, and flowers from local vendors at the durham farmers’ market
i’m buying books from indie press (especially my friend’s books)
i’m writing to all of you
there is an instinct written into our DNA as a species to prevent danger, and that instinct is collective care. in order to practice it, we must ask for it and participate. this, too, is a question of abolition. because if we want to live in a world where the only people who we deem worthy of basic human rights are those who agree with us, there is a word for that. at the end of every empire, when the dust settles, the people must remain. will we face each other and heal?
xoxo,
kuya von
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“don't you remember how we used to split a drink? it never mattered what it was. i think our hands were just that close. the sweetness never lasts, you know.”
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eat local, buy small press, support your local library, and don’t call the police <3