DARE

I.
If none will dare
To risk obliteration, to chance death for a glimpse of freedom,
Then all will die, choked by the grip of tyranny.
The timorous, of course, will die a thousand times before that end
Cutting their own lifelines by offering their abject obedience before it is asked.
From Columbia University to the Association for the Advancement of Collegiate Schools of Business
They extend their learning mission in a gift to power.
Their anticipatory self-repression teaches the algorithmic denominators what they can do
To them, to us, to me, to you.

These institutions were meant to save us, to serve us, to shield us.
Did we speak up for them when we could have?
Did we let those glib and shifty professors get promoted upstairs, where they could do less harm
Relieved that we didn’t have to see them so much
Without understanding that the furtive person who could pull off a slick presentation
In a lecture theatre for an hour might not play the game of managing millions over a decade
Quite so fluently – but who so wanted to play with other people’s money.

And these people do not act alone, they just separate themselves from scholars,
Aligning with expansive entrepreneurs, calculating clothiers, donors who extract, mathematical marketers, slick risk takers,
Indigent inventors, malicious insurers and smarmy speculators who want a desperate slice of the polity’s pie.
And we who should resist must not act alone
Because our institutions are together damned
And fall like dominoes, whether crammed Courts, besieged NGOs, bedraggled utilities
Laws and rights that we can lose with ease, Schools to be closed, universities
And hospitals to be sold off
Embattled Presidents to be told off
Papers struggling to speak with a lucid unbought voice
For innocents who suffer and then die without a choice
Unions villainised and undermined, distrusted
By the several-homed disgusted
Labelled by the cold and seedy
Extreme, shabby, coarse and greedy
Enemies within, for seeking honest clarity
And the execrable sin of solidarity.

II.
They want you never to be in two minds again
The one-party multi-party state refines again
Only faces of the ever-same, corrupt pubic zirconium
With crook, or clown, or satyr, masked by smothering encomium.

They create a state of exception to shape Exceptional bait-and-switch
Distracting confused opposition away
While hapless and helpless victims pay
For the crises of the rich.
Welcome to the torpor lounge, we thank you all for waiting,
But you’ll stay forever on the ground, it’ll be excruciating.
We have no food or heating and the toilet’s overflowing,
But just remember it’s your fault, and there’s nowhere you’ll be going.
We incentivise by terror: disassembling your protections
Whilst dissembling against rotating foes on Orwellian selection.

Look for the signs and salutations.
The stiff-arms of the aggressors and the placards of the peaceful
Are extensions of identity coming into being.
They will set norms for good or ill
And if we don’t act on what we see
What comes next will be painfully familiar, And our great grandparents’ past will be our children’s spiked future. 
Remember there are more masks than you can conceive of
They can change faster than you can think
And the glittery ones they allow you to see
Are not the ones you need to fear.
Life may be what happens when you are making other plans
But so is death.

III.
Within our threatened institutions, the lifeblood is professional integrity.
That’s why professional ethics must be undermined
And doctors, teachers, justices, scientists ridiculed, degraded and denounced.
Anyone who points to something worth believing in,
Both moral and rational, critical and aspirational
Curious, welcoming, nurturing for the collective good
Must be first silenced and second destroyed.
Alterity has no safe havens.
When those who serve civilisation are gone
All you will have are plunderers and concentration camp guards
And four-seasoned lawyers who work out of gardencentres.

It’s hard. Be scared. But still be ready to say no.
Remember Rosa Parks. Remember Ruby Bridges. Remember the phosphorated Match Girls.
Remember those who set an example for you, however small.
And those who died in Lidice, Tulle, Oradour-sur-Glane
That we might learn.
The moment that example is set, the spell of illegitimate authority is broken.
Once the path is cut, others will take the road not taken,
And more will follow it.

IV.
Don’t abandon facts, or avoid formulating simple truths, for that is to abandon freedom. 
If nothing is true, then life is spectacle not theatre. Develop a feel for truth.
Investigate. Inquire. Figure things out for yourself. Find long articles and spend more time with them. Read. Ask. Learn.Think.
Then share your thoughts with anyone and everyone you value. Learn some more. Discomfort brings better questions.
Reject easy answers. Be as simple as possible and as complex as necessary. Then try being as simple as necessary and as complex as possible. Dive into mysteries you’ll never solve and relish unknowing.
Then surface and look someone in the eye. Make small talk.
It is a way to stay in touch with your surroundings, your neighbours
And break down social barriers,
To find and celebrate humanity
And resist cultures of denunciation.
When they come for you in the morning
Whether making love or porridge you will suddenly
Understand who you should and should not have trusted
And who you should and should not have supported.
Don’t leave it too late for love to find a honeyed space.

V.
Screens are important.
They want you to live in front of them, for education to be online
And experience indexical.
Screens screen you off from reality, and substitute images
That suck out your pre-approved sentiments
And sticky longings and tell them where to go.
Don’t fall in love with a robot but don’t be fooled by ableist corporeal politics.
Get out and about and into new settings as much as you can
Bodies matter, but bodies without organs affect how matter matters.
Be vitalist not ableist. Don’t reduce me to my parts.
Accept infirmity. Life does not demand perfection.
And remember your abilities change, but your value as a friend doesn’t. Your existence matters. 
Just be there. Just do it, but fuck victory.

VI.
My mum left two messages when she died.
I found them in the dust of an attic box
Of photos and diaries that faded and fell apart in my hands.
Keep some things private and personal.
When you attract their attention they will use anything they can against you.
They want to own you, when they need to.
Otherwise, your life is cheap and they will bomb it to vapour if it suits their purpose.
Or sometimes simply because they can, and cruelty is fun.
So reciprocally, pay attention and keep your powder dry.
However little you have, give something away.
Charity begins with you and wherever it goes it nourishes you and all who touch you.

And this one, barely discernible smiling wraiths in Tunisia saying wordlessly
Travel as much as you can.
The survival of the world depends on how well we connect.
Wherever you go, don’t stay in the hotel or resort. Go out and make friends. Be a friend.
Go to festivals – music, wine, food, dance, arts and crafts, flea markets, all that brings us together and keeps us caring yet free.

VII.
In light and shadow
Watch their words. Don’t let them get away with casual racism, sexism and bigotry.
Humour’s teasing so easily becomes bullies’ barbs
That ignite the blush of humiliation and fan the florid rage of hate.
Don’t let them laugh it off. It’s not funny.

VIII.
Joni Mitchell sang her Kipling rewrite
For people with with and without penises.
She said Adonises and Venuses
Alike would be alright
If they could fill the empty “journey of a minute
With 60 seconds’ worth of wonder and delight”.
But the earth and everything that’s in it
Isn’t what we should want, for we don’t have the right
To waste our labour to control what we should share.
Forgetting racing time, just empty the moment out
Of guilt, shame, bitterness, jealousy, anger, scorn.
Let it fill itself, and you, with its own dawn
Dispelling dampening doubt
And with a loving shudder, to the day step out.
Speak. Act. Dare.

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Stephen Linstead
Picture Joan Byrne 

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