Our Hero's Journey is NOW

As someone who possesses an overactive imagination and leans towards the dramatic, I have contemplated what “collapse” would look like since I began studying political science in 2005. That’s also when I came to “enjoy” dystopian fiction, it kept me both intrigued and terrified, allowing me to process the worlds I was documenting as a photojournalist.

The dystopian books that make the big screen usually involve a predictable, yet enticing, narrative arc. The leadership of a country goes full authoritarian, the society implodes upon itself, the heroine or hero is simply trying to survive yet accidentally ends up destroying the ruling forces in the most nail biting Hero’s Journey imaginable. Riveting. Terrifying. And well, inspiring.

A beautiful heroine's journey told properly leaves us inspired and motivated. We feel prepared, even if just in our own minds, that if we faced a similar situation, we’d also embrace that journey, survive the dark night of the soul and liberate our communities and our country.

Funny how fiction allows us to always see ourselves as the victorious ones. We resonate enough with the protagonist and the mission to delude ourselves into thinking we’d be able to bring down a dictator with a bow and arrow or lead a people to revolution with our art alone.

What if the truth of surviving collapse is actually the opposite of our favorite dystopian distraction. What if the Apocalypse is simply a slow roll towards a society where 8-10 shit-stain human beings hoard 98% of the globe’s wealth, 1% of the population makes enough money to never give a shit for generations, 10% of the population makes enough money to insulate themselves from the direct impacts and pretend everything is “normal”, even though they’re one layoff away from financial ruin, and the remaining 89% are simply left to “figure it out” on their own with no social safety nets and all forms of homelessness and unpaid debts criminalized?

What if society holds on to just enough normalcy that the masses, that 89% left to fend for themselves in an economic reality designed to destroy them, are not able to, or motivated to rise up against the ruling class?

What if the racism and destruction wins? What if we are all too terrified by our own precarious status in this 1%-10%-89% scenario that we simply don’t take a stand for anything? We just let the destruction slowly obliterate the things that make us human-- our creativity, our communities, our life force, our art-- because we are all bouncing between 10% and 89%, trying to keep our loved ones on our life rafts and trying not to end up in a concentration camp in Florida?

What if civilization itself is the problem and we’re all just careening towards the fall of a man-made structure that was never meant to co-exist with nature or a planet we are so hell bent on destroying?

We can clearly see that many of the powerful humans destroying our planet and our society are not, in any way, evolved humans. They lack the very fundamental elements that make us human; kindness, empathy, understanding and compassion. The oligarchs are implementing their vision of “utopia” and they’ve clearly demonstrated that such a state of being requires violence, surveillance, mass extinction and complete authoritarian rule of the masses. They literally are building the systems to enslave the masses so their “techno-feudalism” goals will be achieved in their lifetimes.

I work in tech. I know how these techbros with unchecked egos and drunk on power think. And the reality is dark. Very fucking dark. And to be clear, we are in the middle of that reality coming to fruition.

Why?

Because racism, hatred of the “other” and colonialism are still the ruling ideologies in this country. Because we allowed ourselves and our communities to fall victim to separation through rapid consumerism and weaponized algorithms. Because we look the other way as our neighbors are kidnapped and our elders are left on the streets to die. Because we are too scared and too overwhelmed to participate in a society that is, by design, a death-trap for 89% of the population.

So what’s the solution? Is there one? Is it too late?

I have no answers. I do still believe the heroine will win-- eventually. But I also believe we are still in the stage of disillusionment as a collective and change will not happen until we wake up to the reality before us.

And an awakening on that scale, to motivate 89% of the population towards resistance and direct action, will be intense and dramatic. And, I fear, we will not see it coming. The sheer volume of corruption and violence happening right now is a special type of chaos that keeps us distracted and complicit, by design.

The true catalyst will sneak up on us in the shadows and pounce when we’re all just trying to get through the next wave of bills, layoffs, closures, genocide or a distraction war.

So I guess the real key to embracing our inner heroine in what’s to come, because it is definitely coming, is to cultivate our kindness and compassion. Spend time in communities, as many as you can find resonance within. Prepare and adjust as much as possible within your means. Find joy in the simple pleasures again (for they may not always be accessible). Support your people and give them hope when you can. Mourn what we lost and compost that grief into fuel.

Fuel that allows us to burn down systems of oppression and destruction. Fuel that warms our loved ones when the dark night is long and frigid. Fuel that moves us to create the systems of regeneration that show the oligarchs they got it wrong.

Circular systems that put oligarchs to shame and show them just how disgusting and destructive their very existence is to the humanity they seek to control and wield for their systems of extraction at all costs.

We will all be called upon to embrace the path of the Hero’s Journey as our society willfully accelerates towards collapse. The question remains, will we take a stand together, before it’s too late?

Or will we simply surrender to the overlords and enact their agenda of slavery because we fear the reality of revolution?

image by me. from La Junta, CO.

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