I’m not the same person that went into quarantine.

I guess that’s to be expected. There was a whole year of my life where my entire routine was smashed. But it was more than that too, it was the constant state of stress where I was in survival mode and the rules were constantly changing an evolving.

Don’t wear a mask.
Wash your hands a lot.
Wear a mask.
Stay three feet away.
No, six.
Here’s a horrible new thing that comes from getting covid even if you were asymptomatic.
Check out this hot new symptom in your area.

Then there was a group of people who seemed to want to do everything in their power to spread the virus as fast as possible or those who refused to take it seriously – and then died or spread it to someone else.

It was so weird watching the truth become distorted every day. There were undeniable facts, but people had to put on their tinfoil hats and constantly pick at them, saying that dead communists were to blame.

There’s always been a bit of that in American culture, we love a good conspiracy. JFK, the moon landing, Elvis, etc.

I guess it’s because we like to be the center of the known universe, we want to think we know something that no one else does, and we’re the only people “in” on it. We’re the only ones with the secret knowledge that will set us down in history as a savior and a person whose name will never be erased by time like a name on a weather headstone.

I used to just kind of laugh at these, but now every one of these conspiracy theories causes bile to rise in my throat and rage to fill my veins. They’re not funny anymore. They’re a symptom of a systematic narcissism American culture had pushed upon us where we want to be the most special person, and we value ourselves over the group. This idea is so ingrained in us, that as I write this, I’m trying to carve out caveats to why it’s okay to feel this way. But we need to realize, that most of us won’t be the person breaking the conspiracy and waking up the masses, we’re just cogs in the machine that keeps it clicking on.

It reminds me of a phrase that I used to love, but I’ve come to hate.

“I want to believe”.

I can close my eyes and still see that grainy poster on Mulder’s office wall under the tile full of pencils he lobbed at the ceiling. That fake UFO whooshing over the forest. It used to make me smile, because it seemed so silly, and now that phrase makes me grit my teeth. It sums up a lot of the human experience that makes the lives of people miserable who don’t have the luxury of living in their own fantasies about the world. It can be applied to so many things:


I want to believe in aliens.
I want to believe that the government is trying to kill me.
I want to believe that only bad people get punished.
I want to believe my story is the best in the world.
I want to believe that my child isn’t torching other kids at school.
I want to believe that beating my kid because it makes me feel better about myself will make them a better person.
I want to believe that they wanted it.
I want to believe that American doesn’t have a problem with race and that our systems have been designed from the start to put anyone in the “other” category down and make their lives as miserable as possible.
I want to believe that vaccines cause autism.
I want to believe that Covid isn’t real.
I want to believe that humans don’t cause climate change.
I want to believe it’s an individual’s fault for climate change, and not an problem caused by a hand full of companies who have done everything in their power to make sure they never suffer the consequences of their own actions.
I want to believe that we can’t do anything to stop climate change.

Some of the above are harmless, but others have caused so much suffering and death. Or they will cause suffering and death in the immediate future.

Some of it comes from nihilism, but a lot of it comes from the individualistic value you have where we don’t want to think of our group as a whole, and we only want to focus on what affects us, and only us.

It’s why I don’t trust Geoengineering, which would fix some countries, but break others who don’t have the power to stop it.

Or nuclear power, which we can’t be trusted with as a species yet. We can’t make a pipeline that won’t spill, what makes you think we could make 1000s of full proof reactors that won’t just end up hurting poor people?

We want the easy fixes, because we don’t want to admit that we need to start working together for the betterment of humankind, and that it’s someone else’s problem.

I watched the world burn last year, figuratively and literally (example: https://www.abc.net.au/cm/rimage/12.....-large.jpg?v=2 ). You did too. We all did.

Hell, this year even, we watched on live TV as the Capital of the United States was almost taken over by insurrectionists who wanted to believe that Trump won the election. That they were in the know on some great conspiracy, and not just a part of the system like the rest of us. And a week later Texas had people froze to death because some of those same people wanted to believe that the PowerGrid being isolated from other states was a good idea.

All of this changed me.

I’ve learned that sometimes there is no “next year” or “later”. Every second you’ve managed to hang onto the edge of your grave and keep from getting sucked under into the void is a blessing, and you need to fight for every breath you take like it’s your last- because it could be. I need to take more chances, see people more, do more things.

The second I was vaccinated fully, I started to try and do something every weekend, not just stay holed up at home and close myself off from the world.

I’m also trying to make more of an effort to be the organizer of these things or try and join them. I can’t keep doing what I was doing. If I want to be involved in the world, I have to make an effort to be apart of it.

I’m also not as socially anxious as I used to be. I don’t know if it’s the new meds, or after being on high alert for an entire year with Klaxons sounding every day, that it’s become easier to ignore. I think the masks help with this some too, suddenly I feel like I can be my real self, and not the meat suit I’ve been forced into.

I also don’t take the bullshit anymore. I don’t want to let people get away with stupid opinions beliefs anymore.

That blue lives matter shirt? Just a confederate uniform in another color.
Nose-dicking after a year in a pandemic? Virtue signaling that you think you’re better than everyone.
Not wearing a mask? Just wanting to die, so you can “trigger the libs”.
Blaming plastic straws on all of the world’s woes and climate change, rather than looking at the companies that make the straws in the first place, and don’t try to make a better product or a better way they can be captured? The false belief that capitalism is the most perfect system and that it can do no wrong.
Believing you need to work with people who actively want to kill a segment of the population because you don’t want to seem too progressive? Bullshit.
Wanting to blame kink for all of the fandom’s problems? You just want daddy to not think you’re “one of those queers” or you huffed too much of that purity ring dust in high school.

I used to just say block these assholes and move on, but now I think it’s important to fight* them even if you know you can’t change their mind, because someone else might see it and rethink their own shitty opinion.

Maybe you’ll get lucky. Maybe you’ll wake someone up. You never know. But if you don’t engage, they’re getting to shout the loudest and they’re the only ones that will gain followers to their shitty opinions.

But do not fall for the callout post trap. Don’t blast someone’s name across your platform by uttering their name, quote tweeting, mentioning them, by naming these people you only give them power and spread their opinions farther.

I wish I had a guidepost to really show how to change people’s hearts and minds, but I honestly don’t know what else can be done.

This all has remined me of what the original Greek origin for the word “apocalypse” was.

“Apocalypse comes from Greek apokálypsis “uncovering,” a derivative of the verb apokalýptein “to take the cover off”.
I survived the cover being taken off. I survived having my whole self shattered and exposed to the world. I survived the apocalypse.

It wasn’t zombies.
It wasn’t nukes.
It wasn’t war.

It was people wanting to believe that a pandemic wasn’t real, wanting to believe that racism isn’t real, wanting to AstroTurf over climate change and pretend there’s nothing we can do to stop it.

Well now I don’t believe any of that, I know for a fact that racism is real (I never doubted this btw), wearing a mask will protect others, and that we can do something about climate change if we MAKE people listen.

Remember: Trans women are women, trans men are men, black lives matter, all cops are bastards, no human is illegal, and party on dudes.




*I am not suggesting violent actions, it was more of a figurative statement.