People are rioting in Minneapolis – people are meeting for peaceful vigils in Arizona. People protest and meet and demonstrate everywhere right now. Some of them are protesting shootings in their own city – the kind of things I hope a paper can never call a “police involved shooting” again. Maybe the people who write the words about “serious stuff” will start fucking saying murder again. Every window broken is a little regained dignity.
We all know that it will happen again. I don’t want to think about it. Some of us are having a tough time dealing with the situation, and in all of our bedrooms is an easy escape. A game console of some kind, asking us to run away as far as we can. Let our brains breathe, get away from the violence on our social media. So far away from the planet that we can’t even see the smoke anymore.
Those out in the streets in Minneapolis, or again Arizona, or wherever, seldom have that option. For them this is a moment to make a message heard. That the crying in the night can have community support and become some kind of scream. The language is in burning buildings and graffiti walls and stolen TV’s. It’s not about the value of the property – it’s about the value of the message and the price of the life. It’s always the same fucking balding jackbooted thugs that do this shit. We have a system that tells them they can bring the war home whenever they want.
Our escapism sits always ever present, ready to come to life when we need it. Often waiting to tell us that this is not how the system is designed to work. There are thousands of ways to run from confrontation. Videogames are not the problem. More of us need to start asking why the days need to be so long that they’re the only thing we can think of when we clock out. It’s very unfortunate that we just can’t run from anything. T
Saying its ruined a generation or turned us into cowards is a type of hyperbole. A real fear I have is that escapism has instead drained us of confrontation. Rather than giving us a way to experience wholly new experiences – it is a chance to experience emotion we often don’t have the time for. I can’t be out protesting tonight. My reality is that I’m balanced so precariously in life that my job will not be there tomorrow if I run off tonight. I sympathize with whoever reads this and feels that pang of white* guilt that they can’t “do more”.
We all need to ask the questions about why we don’t speak up more to make this shit valued. Those of us with the cushy jobs and the office positions and the twitter check marks. We’ll tragically comment about the death of civic life when millions of people are giving up work right now to participate civically.
When you see the protesters out in the street again, there will be an urge. After you donate money and you send links to friends and feel like you’ve done “all you can do”. After that will come your prescribed rest – maybe it will be Animal Crossing with friends. Like so many of us, maybe the way to protect against the harm of the outside world will be a softer inner one. None of us wanted to give up our passion for writing or art to exist in the world we do now.
Maybe this is the only time Deep Hell Dot Com will ask anything of anyone. Now more than ever, if your sole response to the situation is to run into the soft arms of escapism. The yearning for digital violence as a type of release. Confront why that is. We started here to ask ourselves why there were no true utopias being imagined in this digital landscape. It’s not just for reading anymore.
Other websites will all write about What To Do right now. They’ll hopefully offer their platforms up to people of color, or use their Patreon money towards donations. We can only ask one thing – confront your escapism. Find out why you need it so bad. What does it tell you?
Now will be the time to be critical. Now we might turn our eyes towards our office – our workplace, our home. Why do these things push us into the arms of escapism? What does it offer us? It may be time to let go of the things that don’t give anything back. It may be time to look at the clock when you play Minecraft and the hours vanish and go – maybe this is eating my life. It’s hurt, but the least some of us will be able to do is be critical of why we want to escape from all of this.
The answer may come that it’s the only thing we can do. What’s the harm in a little League of Legends when we constantly have to be reminded the world is burning? What’s the harm again in asking why that’s the only thing our lives leave us emotional room for.