This reality is so fixed & it can\u2019t always<\/p>
be a matter of escaping to other realms, right.<\/p>
Molly says that when she can\u2019t sleep, <\/p>
she imagines each of her friends\u2019 hands. <\/p><\/blockquote>
That\u2019s<\/em> what this column is about. I think. Sort of a sibling to this column<\/a>. If it makes sense the way I want it to. <\/p> Last week, we talked about sci-fi against empire<\/a>. Week before, we were reading conversations with anarchists and a book of hard-won joy<\/a>. Now, I want to try and synthesize these into, well, not a manifesto<\/em>, per se, but just stuff I\u2019m interested in. <\/p> Antifascist literature doesn\u2019t always have to be Judas And The Black Messiah<\/em> or How To Blow Up A Pipeline<\/em>. Some quiet ways to be antifascist include: passing the Bechdel Test, having a queer romance, showing people of color enjoying their lives, and either not having cops in your stories or making the cops idiots. Maybe I\u2019m a dad<\/em>, trying to model good behavior for an impressionable child<\/em>, but I think the types of stories we tell get stuck in our brains in unexpected ways. I\u2019m not saying all art has to be good-for-you medicine\u2014I like messy art about bad people that doesn\u2019t tell you what to think. What I\u2019m talking about is the subject matter we do and do not include in stories. Here are things I like to see: <\/p> Losers and Misfits and Weirdos Having The World Happen To Them<\/strong><\/p> Do you feel powerless in contemporary society? Maybe you got laid off, despite a glowing performance review. Ever notice how layoffs are nobody\u2019s fault? Maybe you got hit by a drunk driver and you\u2019re physically not the same and the insurance bills have near-bankrupted you. Maybe you have long COVID, an affliction that maybe you wouldn\u2019t have if competent leadership had been in charge when the plague hit. Maybe you\u2019re one of the vast majority of people who didn\u2019t vote for Donald Trump<\/a> and now have to live under his reign for a second four years. <\/p> Lately, I\u2019ve been wondering how much agency characters really need to have. It doesn\u2019t seem like regular people in the real world have much agency. Oh, sure. Everyone could make different decisions. Everyone could eat less meat or opt of using Tax Prep companies or quit smoking or exclusively take public transit. But life is messy. Sometimes, you understand questionable people more than a questionable society, you know? <\/p> examples:<\/strong> Trouble Finds You<\/a><\/em>, Bone In The Throat<\/a><\/em>, Jesus\u2019 Son<\/em>, Didn\u2019t Nobody Give A Shit What Happened To Carlotta<\/a>1<\/a><\/em>, The Big Lebowski, The Trial<\/em><\/p> this, except that pitch: <\/strong>this is basically the opposite of the whole entire trend of \u201cyou\u2019re a nobody from nowhere, but secretly you\u2019re the chosen one\u201d stories. Maybe Luke Skywalker started it, but Harry Potter<\/em> and Hunger Games<\/em> and Divergent<\/em> and all those other cashgrab YA series made it unbearably omnipresent. Basically, give me a Spider-Man who only accidentally rises to the occasion. Or doesn\u2019t at all. <\/p> Working People Trying To Figure It Out On The Margins<\/strong><\/p> A long time ago, when he was at Cracked<\/em> had a thing about how Hollywood never depicts poor people. Here\u2019s the article<\/a>, and it\u2019s worth reading. TL;DR is that you and I have lived with worse kitchens than the residents of Zion in The Matrix<\/em> movies. Poverty never looks all that bad<\/em> in movies and TV unless they\u2019re trying to win an Oscar. There\u2019s never that feeling that Jos\u00e9 Olivarez is so good at capturing: swiping your debit card and not knowing if it\u2019s going to go through. <\/p> Poverty isn\u2019t the center of Mac Crane\u2019s <\/a>I Keep My Exoskeletons To Myself<\/a><\/em>, but that novel was maybe the first time I read something that rang true in the way I experienced new parenthood<\/em>. Sure, I didn\u2019t have cops with sci-fi-powered shadow branding technology installing cameras in my house. But this feeling that everything could fall apart at a moment\u2019s notice\u2014and not the Hollywood falling apart, the complete unknown, cosmic horror, too-scared-to-look-over-that-ledge falling apart\u2014that\u2019s the feeling I carried with me for a long time as a new parent. I want to make it clear that I\u2019m not calling for characters to be anxious wrecks all the time, with every other line of dialogue referencing making rent or not. But I haven\u2019t read very much that captures the very specific dread I felt from age 23-25 (and have felt since, plenty of times, to a lesser but still taxing degree).<\/p> examples:<\/strong> I Keep My Exoskeletons To Myself<\/a><\/em>, Chef<\/em>, The Bear<\/em>, Jos\u00e9 Olivarez\u2019s poetry<\/a>, Little Giants<\/em>, The Metamorphosis<\/em><\/p> this, except that pitch: <\/strong>is there a way to make a non-Oscar baity Pursuit of Happyness<\/em>? Maybe one where the main character doesn\u2019t become an investment banker. Chef<\/em> is almost like Pursuit of Happyness<\/em> in reverse, and I\u2019d watch that. Someone loses a high-paying job and things suck for a while, but then they find true happiness after an unexpected career change. <\/p> Ok, Sure, Some \u201cRich People Are Awful\u201d Stories<\/strong><\/p> It\u2019s really hard to do satire when the targets are too dense to get it. Elon doesn\u2019t understand Hitchhiker\u2019s Guide<\/em>, Thiel doesn\u2019t get Lord Of The Rings<\/em>, Fight Club <\/em>fans don\u2019t get Fight Club<\/em>, the list goes on. It\u2019s hard to know the utility of something like, say, The Colbert Report<\/em> or Tim Heidecker\u2019s <\/a>An Evening With Tim Heidecker<\/a> <\/em>when the people being skewered are reading the art as a playbook. <\/p>![](\"https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/b8093374-5e36-42c1-9434-54785cd56b93_1080x600.jpeg\"\/)
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