I’ve recently put together a trilogy of essays exploring systemic cruelty and complicity—so, all light and airy stuff, then. But, this being a pop-culture blog, I’ve tackled the subject through a few different mediums—weaving together comic books, video games, and academic theory alongside lived experience. It’s a slightly different direction for the site, but let's give it a go, eh?
By bringing together all three pieces, I hope to construct a unified thesis on how modern systemic cruelty operates across every scale of society:
My essay on Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow examines macro-level community complicity through Hannah Arendt's concept of the "banality of evil".
My Papers, Please essay explores micro-level bureaucratic survival, administrative paranoia, and the personal reality of border control.
My Tacoma essay dives into the cold, corporate ledger math of late-stage capitalism, AI automation, and disposable human labour.
I wrote these essays over the summer holidays as I let my mind drift and wander across the myriad complications of the world and I found that this was the best way to work through what I was thinking and feeling. I hope they work!
LINK: The Evolving Fears of a Horror Gamer
LINK: The Power of Stories and How They Are Manipulated
LINK: The Message by Ta-Nahisi Coates - Book Review (and Some Thoughts)
LINK: The Anxious Generation: Book Review (and Some Thoughts)
LINK: Utopia for Realists- Book Review
LINK: Toxic: Women, Fame and the Noughties- Book Review (and Some Thoughts)