Why Write?
Written by Morgan Goma.
Because we fuck.
Vulgar? True. Yet, here we are. It’s a mind fuck before anything else really. I’ll let you know what comes after, though something tells me you already know. You follow – you’re reading after all! Gazing into yourself, hearing yourself, feeling yourself, even though the words are mine. At least they were when I wrote them down. The only other time you see yourself like this— without a reflection–– is when you’re looking at another human being face-to-face. A human face, gazing back at your own, reflecting an image. Not the one in her eyes. You don’t really see that miniature facsimile. You see the image of you that lives in others’ expressions. What someone fears, desires, surmises, projects, expects, all written in the depth of their gaze, the creases of her brow, the quiver of his lips, the scrunching of my nose: the living image of you. And sometimes you do more than see what people think. You feel it too, and with luck you’ll fuck about— err— write about it later. To leave an imprint? A reminder? No. To live again— to relive! A moment. An experience. An anger. A joy.
Writing and oratory are the mental magic of sex: pure spiritual connection with another person or persons. It directly projects the ideas seen in one mind onto the minds of others. We write so that we can know ourselves, and so that others can know us too. It is the loneliest impulse of delight. Perhaps, that’s just a writer’s hype? Do we really need to write in this era of never-ending online streams? For some, Literature has reached its apotheosis. They implore us to abandon text, ringing alarms about waning publication sales and failing institutions. With every viral video clip however, there is a deluge of text. Each week comes with its own Cambrian explosion of memes and references. There are a lot of brand new fucking ideas being pulled from the ether and splattered all over the tapestry of our minds and, consequently, all over our world. All of the text, images, memes, gifs, essays, comments, reposts, video replies, entering the hearts of children, women, and men who will go on to birth new worlds of thought and form. After all…
"Everything is about sex except sex itself, sex is about power".
Sex is a direct, generative connection between two or more people. It generates ideas, feelings, and people. It is a very powerful tool. The purest inspiration. Sex as a creative act is the continuum of expression. The totality of human expression and creative output is generated from the cross-sections of our physical being (our genes and their phenotypes) and our metaphysical being (our ideas and their feelings). Writing creates without the physicality of sexual creation, making it obsolete to some, but wholly unique in its inspiring quality. Text begs to be spoken, interpreted, experienced and felt, not just written. Words want to be fucked— or at the very least want you to fuck on their behalf. They aren’t really written for the writer. The written word is always about the readers. The reason I, and any other writer, may be deluded into feeling like that’s not the case is because the writer just happens to be the first one to read. Words want to be read. They need you to break your mold and taste the consequences for yourself with your own tongues. This is why I know we must write and should continue to write. Ignore the propaganda being broadcast in an effort to get us to stop. Our oligarchs want to push us towards what they believe is the final apotheosis of Literature, past Cinema and straight into the “indistinguishable” Virtual Reality simulation. Look! They exclaim. You can’t tell the difference between this and reality, so why not pick the one that we— err— “you” can control?
Only a society of readers can look this riddle in the face and choose correctly. Through ownership of writing and the desire to read, to inspire and be inspired, to “run to the comments” and taste new thoughts and spill our own, will readers know the difference because writing would have already pushed them to go out and experience reality for themselves. When presented with the simulation they will never be entranced for long because they will see that it lacks that subtle reflection of themselves – that living image first seen in the eyes, then in the works, and then finally again, relived, in the eyes of yet other human beings.
Exploration and Sexuality
The current onslaught against writing and the top-down push for an immersive live stream only (read: surveillance-first) world can only be understood as an extension of the war between the Fascist Incels and the rest of us. Any form of graphic, symbolic representation that grabs a person’s attention can be a catalyst for action. Literature has evolved significantly from its early forms thousands of years ago. Cinema is a first apotheosis. It represents the highest form of the magic of Literature. The larger-than-life, big screen blockbusters of Hollywood regularly projected made-up ideas into the minds of billions about the world around them, making those ideas real. Now with livestreaming technology paired with generative AI, the technocratic elites of the age propose Reality 2.0: a simulation designed to assuage our economic anxieties by offering us an alternative to direct experience. Rather than read some text and think “I’ve got to see it for myself” they are attempting to bait and switch us, telling us to turn away from a cave wall only to throw us into a deeper hole. To those who have already peeped the trap, they try to dissuade us with the weight of wealth inequality. Oftentimes internal rebuttals of “could I even afford to in this economy” strike down any attempt to look away from the wall. Should you fail your class? Should your debts accrue? Should your credit go down? Should you lose your position? Imagine. No. Then keep looking at the wall…
How poetic that these tensions emerge in our republic. In Western philosophy, Plato first discusses the interplay between physical reality and eternal truths (“ideas” or “forms”) in The Republic. He presents an allegorical cave where people are shown symbols on the cave walls made with “shadows” but are largely unaware of the truth of the world outside of the cave, including the source of the
light for the shadow show they watch. In our current era this “shadow show” is social media.
Presently, creators drive the landscape of social media, engraving symbols with digital markers broadcast by the light of Silicon Valley. Before us, our older siblings broadcast their writings on the walls of Jack Dorsey’s cave. “Twitter” (and to a lesser extent other blogging web services like “Tumblr” and “Blogger”) provided space for the inspiration as millions shared their unfiltered thoughts with each other. The invitation to recreate was about more than just getting the experience to be repeated. It was about getting others to own the experience for themselves. Presented with the wider world of thought, some of us chose to remain in the cave but many others were inspired to turn away and seek the light, to live the truth of going out and being young and chasing your dreams. Darren Watkins, commonly known by the name of the channel he hosts “IShowSpeed” or “Speed”, is a primary example of this impulse in my generation.
The transition from “Twitter” to “X” marked the end of this shared inspiration, a shift away from the true culmination of Literature towards a controlled simulation. The corporate simulacra offered by our technocratic oligarchs is direct. “X” , seeks to treat humans like a variable, seeks to subsume and take us in as an input. The output? Noise. Though the text, images, etc. produced by bots and the diminutive crowds of humans give the appearance of life, it is designed to keep one looking at the wall, ignorant of the reality of the human condition and the Truth of life in the world beyond it. Other sites have evaded this corrosion, but for how long? Even on my precious TikTok, the acquisition of the company by American oligarchs and rise of bot accounts portends the inevitable. The current sexlessness of our technological age spells the end of writing. It threatens to neuter the creative power of humanity and kill us altogether. In the wake of our dead flesh, the oligarchs hope to necromance a new reality. Simulated. Transhumanist. Metropolis. We need to reach beyond. Ignore the illusions. Keep writing for fuck’s sake. It’s special. So fucking do it. Not to leave an imprint or a reminder. Write to live again and relive and die and live again. Your moment. Your experience. Your anger! Writing inspires the living.
Enjoy?
Bibliography:
Plato, and C. J. Rowe. Republic. Penguin, 2012.
Meta. "Announcing Meta". Facebook.com, Meta Platforms, Inc., 28 Oct. 2021, https://www.facebook.com/Meta/videos/139502261709080/
Guardian News. “Meta: Mark Zuckerberg announces Facebook's new name”. YouTube, 28 Oct. 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sya_ET05N7E
Zahnd, Brian. “Plato’s Cave: A Christmas Story”. BrianZahnd.com. 23 Dec. 2013, https://brianzahnd.com/2013/12/platos-cave-christmas-story/
Case, Spencer. “Plato’s Allegory of the Cave: the journey out of Ignorance”. 1000-word Philosophy: An Introductory Anthology. 26 May 2023, https://1000wordphilosophy.com/2023/05/26/allegory-of-the-cave/
“Plato’s Allegory of the cave”. Daily Historian. Instagram, 23 July 2024, https://www.instagram.com/p/C9yOcqSyjB_/
4edges. “An Illustration of The Allegory of the Cave from Plato’s Republic”. Wikimedia Commons, 24 Oct. 2018, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/An_Illustration_of_The_Allegory_of_the_Cave%2C_from_Plato%E2%80%99s_Republic.jpg
We thank Morgan for their contribution and work! Please check out Morgan’s socials below.
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Written by a human—no AI was used in the creation of this work.
