6 years ago i started working on a short film hashtag (shout out quincy and michelle). in the years since, i am so glad that that film does not define my body of work, my point of view, or the range of my creative capabilities however one thing is certain: the plot of the film, a time loop of police violence, was not wrong and i hate that i let ignorant and closed-minded motherfuckers tell me that it wasn't prescient at the time.
another nigga won an oscar off of my idea and i’m still tight about it, but i hope he enjoys it knowing he had to step on others to raise himself up. but that wasn't the first time i wrote about a time loop.
in college, i made a short film called 360 for a class. all i remember is that i was in a state of insomnia and desperately wanted to rest but consistently felt like i was dealing with something; if not one thing then the other and then another. at the college of wooster, i was the only person who was really out here making short films and for that project i made it all by myself with only one shot involving me. truth be told, that short film also isn’t indicative of who i am because i had nowhere near the skills or wherewithal that i did in 2016 when i was trying to make hashtag. but again, time loops.
*bang*
clearly we live in a period of time where we are consistently asking each other to learn, and learn, grow, change, decolonize, understand capitalism, dismantle capitalism, form class solidarity, learn histories of movements in a short amount of time that has been hidden from us for most our entire educational lives, and ultimately, while all that is going on, heal and survive. deja vu. and all of us are fucking exhausted. just so overwhelmingly exhausted. a lot of my peers do not have the stomach nor the cardio to do this work and i don't need to tell you what their complexion or their privileges, i bet you already know. but one thing is for sure, collectively, community after community is ravaged by the oppression of governments and over militarized forces led by power-hungry wrinkly old maniacs who simply don't care. they do the destruction and leave us to pick up the pieces.
and we're exhausted.
we are all so exhausted, even those of us who have lived under these dysfunctional systems for almost our entire lives; the finish line keeps moving, and not only that – someone could shoot you in the middle of your race and that's just considered part of the game. somebody could take control of your body from you, and that's just part of the game. somebody could trip you, stomp you out, spit on you, call you a slur and the USA on TNT team spend the next four days dissecting why it wasn’t racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and how the game used to be rougher…but isn’t the goal easier lives? not working ourselves into a grave chasing after a made-up metric of our worth? shouldn’t we want peace? safety? prosperity? shouldn’t we have-
*bang*
clearly we live in a period of time where we are consistently asking each other to learn, and learn, grow, change, decolonize, understand capitalism, dismantle capitalism, form class solidarity, learn histories of movements in a short amount of time that has been hidden from us for most our entire educational lives, and ultimately, while all that is going on, heal and survive. weird. that’s how we’re supposed to move right? we've all gone from moment of silence to moment of silence, thought to prayer, anger to apathy, unspeakable tragedy to unspeakable tragedy; it’s almost as if the trauma response keeps us in a frenzied silence, and right when we’re ready to scream – another moment of silence for anything. whether it’s sexual assault, domestic violence, racism, genocide, proxy wars, murder, mass shootings, the constant stream of trauma, grief, discourse, “debate,” wash, rinse, repeat, keep coming and they don’t stop coming (not to bite from smash mouth). we collectivize under the neoliberal guise of these being individual events that we ourselves must process in therapy, grieve with our communities, with our loved ones, but hurry the fuck up because the next trauma truck is pulling up at 12:17 and we can’t be late. I can’t keep tweeting through it, I just can’t; stormchasing traumatic event after traumatic event without, words emptier than a politician’s promise. something has to give and it can’t keep being the lives of children, the elderly, immigrants, civilians, etc.
but what connects all of this? is this what healing and surviving is? a constant stream of coping with issues that people in power continue to pretend isn’t systemic but us pulling ourselves up by our emotional bootstraps? even knowing how you’re being fucked by the system isn’t a reprieve because then you see the matrix code of all the bullshit and know you can only manipulate your subroutine, not anyone else’s. no power in individuals, no time to be human, no time to humanize, no time to collectivize, what now? the panic builds - the nervous system is in a constant state of freeze. fight, you die. flight? to where? the panic hits a crescendo: what can we do? what can anyone do? i’m going to do something, no, we’re going to do something-
*bang bang*
clearly we live in a period of time where we are consistently asking each other to learn, and learn, grow, change, decolonize, understand capitalism, dismantle capitalism, form class solidarity, learn histories of movements in a short amount of time that has been hidden from us for most our entire educational lives, and ultimately, while all that is going on, heal and survive. uhhhhh, ok…how do we pass the time until the trauma comes to us or comes back to us? infographic our way to freedom? it’s nice to have all the information about how and why i’m being fucked by everything from the cisheteropatriarchy to tau tangles in my epigenome to two wolves inside me to my libra sun shining on all my decisions but that’s not- fuck, shit, who’s that? why’s he standing like that? where’s the exi- oh, ok, never mind he works at gamestop, he’s not going to end my life. anyway…what to do while i wait for the trauma? damn there’s a lot of multiverse movies out right now. ain’t no one trying to live in this reality, huh? i get it though.
fuck…here comes the trauma…quick, a distraction - should i listen to nostalgic music to remind me of a time when i wasn’t scared all the time? oooh a murder podcast so i can escape the reality that i could be murdered at any time? nah, too real. maybe this circle jerk podcast of radical leftists who don’t ever have women on their show? pass…wait? why am i even outside? i’m in a goddamn grocery store that’s by a school and a church and a mosque? what the goddamn fuck am i thinking? i could get shot! ok…home time. i’ll put on a guided meditation…”so angry i wanna punch a police horse” very specific but nooooo, “niggas die everyday” ok headspace has it’s juneteenth programming a bit early…oh, “constant state of paralyzing terror” perfect. and pl-
*bang bang*
clearly we live in a period of time where we are consistently asking each other to learn, and learn, grow, change, decolonize, understand capitalism, dismantle capitalism, form class solidarity, learn histories of movements in a short amount of time that has been hidden from us for most our entire educational lives, and ultimately, while all that is going on, heal and survive. hmm. life seems to be a series of time loops; present, generational, historical, romantic, platonic, etc. what keeps the loop looping is a failure to learn or a failure to change. my peoples are learning and trying to change but what holds us back? clinging to outmoded political structures based on a document written in quill? capitalist and corporate interests interfering intentionally with the safety and survival of the most vulnerable in our communities? a suppression of history about marginalized people at the hands of colonial powers and communal colonial decisions? a living social parasitic organism that fights critical thinking and creation of a more peaceful and just society, commodifying every radical movement by targeting the attention of the movement, shifting it to celebrity and self empowerment™️ and away from the culprits of the constant state of trauma we’re all in? all of the above and more.
nothing is new. everything is recycled, including trauma, pain, our responses to it, and the lack of responses from the people put in power. people are getting mad again. people are getting upset again. we’re seeing the loops but that’s not enough. we’re angry about the loops, but that’s not enough. we’re posting, sharing, grieving together about the loops, but that’s not enough.
i don’t have an answer. Revolution is an option but not Revolution™️ brought to you with limited commercial interruption by Pepsi. but these days, people really still believe in the ballot which is influenced by the bills trading hands in government buildings and protected by bullets that spray when you’re black or brown but…you know the rest, you’ve been in the loop as much as me. education is being suppressed but definitely an option; the work is out there, read it before it’s too late. spirituality is a salve until you realize how colonized so many of our ancestral practices are and have been; sold back to us at 300% markup so gwendolyn can learn who her spirit guide is (hint: she’ll tell you even if you didn’t ask).
i don’t have much time, but all i know is that in time loop movies, protagonists try killing themselves at some point, normally multiple times. that’s fiction but here’s the fact, something has to die, and that something is the faith and belief in a system that all know are broken but it’s working just fine. it’s propagating suffering through our communities because we continue to go to our oppressors to ask for liberation from the pain and the deliberate for so long that by the time any smidgen of peace is even an option, 13 more once in a lifetime tragedies happen.
before it’s too late, the most common trope of a time loop is that the protagonist learns something, leaves something behind, and picks up something to hopefully break the loop. we need to learn that this country does not fuck with us, tweeting through it is not going to change it. we need to leave behind the notion that the only way to form change is “from the inside” and “through civic action” because while the sentiments are good, we all become tools of the state by upholding it. and finally, before the next loop, we need to abolish ourselves of the notion that for things to change, asking nicely and pointing fingers at the ivory tower and action. we need to pick up arms-
*bang bang bang*
clearly we live in a period of time where we are consistently asking each other to learn, and learn, grow, change, decolonize, understand capitalism, dismantle capitalism, form class solidarity, learn histories of movements in a short amount of time that has been hidden from us for most our entire educational lives, and ultimately, while all that is going on, heal and survive. hmm. hold up.
have we done this before?