note: this advice and rant is so deeply happening because, of all
people, i live in abstract theory land and this is my struggle
on the regular. i've noticed that my advice is generally stuff i'm
trying to believe in myself.
Skills vs. Discussions. Workshops need to be labelled clearly skillshare, discussion, lecture, or performance. Have you ever gone to a workshop expecting some skills and it turns out everyone's sitting in circles theorizing about what the word "skill" means? Point is I have learned something important about myself at the Allied Media Conference.
I have no patience for metaphor.
I have no patience for theory.
I want to learn what you tried yesterday, how it went, and what you are going to try today.
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| Display from the Maine-based Beehive Collective |
The AMC is a conference full of Radical Activists (note the capitals). A lot of these folks know the language and the grammars of this community. I swear if I hear another buzzzz word.... liberation. oppression. I don't even know what liberation means! I don't even know what oppression means! Don't just drop that as though you're saying something when in fact you're saying everything/nothing!
Mind you I drop that shit like an exhale. I'm all "feminism"-this and "liberatory community practices"-that. Cause I'll admit it - it's useful. I need these words so I don't have to talk all day just to explain the first sentence I said when I woke up in the morning. But nah, nah, nah, ENOUGH.
Being in the high-density-buzz-world of the AMC has convinced me that this language is dangerous. We can talk in circles all day about the word accountability, but if I still have no idea what tactic you tried out last time there was an assault in your community, if I have no idea what that conversation looked like and what steps were taken, then what have I learned?
I've learned that a lot of people think accountability is important.
Cool. Check.
Of course education is extremely important, but let's be conscious of our audiences and our opportunities to move into action-mode. DOING is more important than theoretically-doing-but-it's-cool-cause-I-have-a-list-of-references-I-can-google-later.
Have our brains been so academicized, so made to privilege intellect, that that is the inherent mode in which we operate? We slip unblinkingly into analysis, criticism. & yes, that is essential. But at a certain point it rings hollow. What are we talking about? Are we too afraid of making mistakes? of being remembered negatively? of speaking for others? So we stick to abstraction. Better that than allow the vulnerability of giving a single detail. Our vocabularies are so bulked up, our brains so used to filling out multiple choice surveys, that all description, all experience, all detail have fallen to the wayside. I think it also has to do with not trusting that our experiences are truly worthwhile and relevant.
This happened so much in femsex. Big ideas, suggesting at experiences, got traded around like abstract playing cards. We sat inside a flurry of hints forming clouds of people that I maybe knew something about. It took months and one much-needed conversation about masturbation to put some spine into our concept clouds. Some intimacy. Yes darling, imagine for a moment that you're truly around friends. Tell them what happened. They'll try to understand. You don't have to convince the room that your head is in the right place or that you read the right zine.
Pragmatism. I'm taking about what makes us do things.
How we spend our minute of our days is not besides the point. Are you trying to guess at how best to change the world? Or are you trying shit out on the daily to see what sticks?
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