Finding Your Voice

Some may swiftly dismiss the choice to own the label of 'fan.' Often times such a title is hocked with assumptions of obsession, fixation, lack of personal goals or even downright mental or emotional instability. I could go on for hours about how deep a miscalculation those assumptions are, but the likely reality is merely that those who claim to be passionate about nothing are probably just ashamed to own their passion openly.

I cannot convince you to take off the mask if you're terrified that I might look you in the eyes. 

Perhaps myself and my colleagues in 'fandom' adopt a risky social contract in our candor. I have, on some occasions, encountered significant oppression at the hands of those who decry being committed to an art. Others with similar admitted proclivities return my interest with validation. Rarely is the surface of the water still and uninterrupted.

Let's face it, nuts, the world is a deeply, hazardously disempowering space. From every angle we are shot with insidious messages to question our competence, to envy those who seem to have more than we, and to compete for a square foot of self-respect and privilege amongst a landscape of enforced contrition. You must shame yourself for your desires, your needs, your thoughts and feelings. You must shut your mouth lest you make folly of your self.

So we spend how many years of our lives in silence, or muffled whispers at best? We do as we are socially instructed-to stifle our need to scream out that we give a damn.

That makes me sad, I'll be honest. I grow increasingly weary of the rescission of our individuality and creativity. I have said it before, to play from the words of another beloved and long passed artist; I refuse to be created rather than creative. I will not recoil from the challenge of being genuine about those things into which I place great value. Perhaps it is an attempted act of unconditional self-love, although at times my fidelity to that self wavers.

I cannot promise to give you answers, or shield you from the slings and arrows that will be pitched at you by those who cannot or will not engage in perspective and self-examination. I often find I can barely offer myself solace. In the spirit of Voltaire I will, however, defend your right to use your voice whether or not I concur. Your mind is a vast space of unseen potential, may you never build walls around it. If you already have, I hope you'll find something that drives you to break them down to dust.

For any who may look upon our 'cause' and find it silly, useless or obsequious, I ask you this;

What is it that you are concealing in the name of shame?

c. P 2012