thisisramztrying

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I love drinking warm water because it reminds me of the warmth I lack from my parents. Kidding!!! It just soothes my throat!

[thisisramztrying]

Hello very much :)

I thought about making a video on this topic but I decided to just write it out in a post instead. Either way, I'd like to speak a bit more specifically about a drunk rant I made on a separate account the other day that was not as well put together as I'd like to stand as my viewpoints on the subject.

tl:dr, I just feel as though there's a lack of sincerity in the world these days. I speak from personal experience as an artist putting things out into the world, yes, but also as a human being interacting with other human beings on the regular, and I have had my sentiments echoed by many other friends of mine over the past year or so, both artists and non-artists alike. Most of this will be framed through the consumption of art, because that's my own personal passion in this life of mine, but also the way we interface with each other and process the world around us. Now, don't get me wrong, I love to laugh. I love a good joke, and I love lightheartedness as much as the next person. But I saw someone this morning put it very succinctly in response to my rant, something along the lines of "don't let the joke about it overtake the source material." It feels as though it's a common occurrence these days to take a pinch of something with a lot more weight to it, often a humorous bit, and then run with it. Everyone then gathers around the pinch to ooh and ahh and consume it as a whole. Context is immediately lost, the legacy of that body of work becomes its own caricature, and anyone discovering that body of work via said caricature may forgo a piece of art they would otherwise love because "there's nothing there". And don't think this is me griping at those making jokes at the expense of my art. I make jokes about my own art. But when the joke dies, yet continues to grow, and spread, and finds its way back to me both on the internet and off for months (or, God forbid, years) to come, I can't help but say to myself; what the fuck is happening. Artists have fled the public and all their outlets for personality and expression outside the medium because they feel ridiculed. It's not even just their art. Katya comes to mind, speaking on how she went on youtube live a few years back in literal tears talking about police brutality and the injustices marginalized communities were facing at the hands of the government. Meanwhile, the entire comment section "yass" and "mother"ed her in barrages, not paying attention to anything she had to say. I get asked about when I'm dropping Preacher's Daughter vinyl en masse in response to my Palestine fundraiser links. It's everywhere and it's inescapable. No one can be serious for even two seconds.

This may all sound obnoxious; so be it. I tie strings from this central problem to many other complaints I have heard repeated ad nauseam the past few years. For example; the death of subculture. Goth, punk, whatever, you name it. People who built an underground counterculture movement with a rich history based on a love of art, community, and otherwise misunderstood worldviews and experiences deemed foul or inappropriate. Now we see bits taken from it, the terms and the looks, without any of the meat, spread thin across society as a whole. Words mean nothing anymore. One can rest on history and say they were a part of it when in fact, they did nothing. No appreciation or understanding to be had for the love and passion that built it. No serious interaction with the culture's very real confines and boundaries, just mindless co-opting. This has just as much to do with late stage capitalism as it does with excessive humor in lieu of sincerity, but it's certainly both. Again, this may sound like a silly complaint, but I don't care. The collective ennui we're all experiencing has a very real reason, whether we're ready to acknowledge or not.

In a twisted thread, it's even tied to our lack of care to change the world around us. People cheer on the idea of communism, but who among us is ready to give up the convenience of society as it stands? Amazon prime, doordash, fresh fruit out of season as I saw someone mention in a similar post last week; the marvels of modern technology. Do we really think these things can last in a society that isn't actively destroying the planet? We talk about the idea of something all day long but have very little to do with the actuality of what we're talking about. And don't think I consider myself exempt from this problem. I couldn't even try to claim to be. It seems nearly silly to be complaining, then, about the way people consume the art around them these days as we creep towards what feels like the end of days. But as long as I still draw breath, I must complain.

I miss genuine passion. As an autistic individual, when I'm alone, sometimes I cannot contain myself with how things make me feel. The music I listen to, the video games I play, the books I read. I almost feel the need to run through the house and scream in everyone's face how I'm feeling. It feels good to love intensely. Now, I won't pretend like autistic people haven't been bullied for this since the dawn of time, but there is surely a noticeable lack of passion in everything these days. Everyone can feel it, everyone is talking about it. Everything now is "cringe", or "doing too much", or "not that serious". Actually, it is that serious. Insecurity in one's own deeper feelings may not be a new thing, but a culture that seems to promote this eschewing of them does seem to be a new evil. The tone of the internet has completely shifted. I spent most of my time here when I first discovered it a little over a decade ago on Zelda forums and other chat-based websites, talking about how much I loved whatever fandom I was in at the time and having genuine and memorable interactions with like-minded individuals who felt the same way I do. Now, you have two options; if you hate media, you rip it to shreds, and if you love it, you word-salad it to death and parrot a joke about it that someone else said. I'm not saying people don't still talk seriously in a heartfelt way about the things they love, but it does not seem to be the initial reaction anymore. Do I have a solution to this problem? Of course not. I'm a 26 year old girl posting on a tumblr blog. If I had a solution, this is not where I would be dropping it. But conversation is God to man, and I believe in the ability to change things from the inside out. We make the rules, and we can change them.

Before I go, I'd like to just clarify that I am very grateful for my career, grateful to anyone who has ever given me and my art the time of day, grateful to anyone who has ever come up to me and connected with me over my work, and grateful for a life where someone making too many jokes is the worst part of my day. I do not think I am better nor smarter than anyone on or off the internet. I am simply a girl with big feelings and I enjoy talking about them with other people with big feelings, and it makes me sad when something avoidable or unnecessary gets in the way of that.

All in all, I love to love, and I love all of you, I love my life, I love this record, and mi amore vo- i mean.... oh, whatever.

(Feel free to sound off in the comments and please be nice to each other)

[thisisramztrying]

being in my 20s is like I understand more of my mother and less than i ever have. My childhood friends are strangers to me and there’s no one i know better. i want to drink wine. i never stopped wanting to climb trees. i know more than I’ve ever known before. I don’t know anything at all. i’m seven years old and sixteen and twenty nine and seventy. I can’t tell when i'm happy. I think the only thing that will make me happy is to be little again. i want to be really old. i go to the ocean and feel like nothing matters more than that. in my bedroom everything matters so much. I go to the grocery store every day. i know how to cook a lot of things but the only thing i know how to eat is fried eggs. I can take care of myself but i want to be taken care of. i want to go home and I don't know where that is. i think it may be somewhere inside of me but i’m not sure

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In another world my mom is happier and safe

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No song has ever touched my soul the way A House in Nebraska by Ethan Cain has

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- James Baldwin talking about Love

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The horrors persist but so do I.

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Sometimes I wonder if I’m ever going to feel at home with my family or if I’m always going to feel like I don’t belong

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Just because you don’t remember it happening doesn’t mean it didn’t happen because I WAS THERE.

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I’ve written a note, and I don’t know why. I heard my family’s words and I know they didn’t mean them, but it feels like they’re tattooed on my face. I’m trying so hard to not say goodbye because I promised my friends I was doing better, and my mom didn’t raise a liar.

[thisisramztrying]

Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness

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You have to give yourself time. Time to heal, time to adjust, time to forgive

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"Impossible", Mher Arshakyan (translated by Tathev Simonyan)

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I miss my high school counsellor because she was the only person in my life that didn’t make me feel like I was going crazy. I’m spiralling in a way that she would be able to get me out of. I always talked about Taylor and that was always so helpful to figure out what I was feeling. Right now the songs I relate to are All too well, Right where you left me, and Epiphany .

I’ll always love the ending of All Too Well, where Taylor just repeats the line “I was there” over and over and over again. It reminds me that I truly was there. It truly did happen, and now I have to deal with it for the rest of my life.

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Cuz I grew up believing that fighting injustice was normal, my favourite genre has always been dystopian. But now I’m seen as crazy for STILL posting abt a literal genocide?? Like I’m sorry I’m making you uncomfortable but that is a good feeling to have when thousands of people are dying. Why on earth would you want to ever be comfortable with that?

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Crying cuz all the Palestinians killed were once children with dreams and now they’re never going to come true. And the kids that are dying…they haven’t even had a chance to live yet

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Mahmoud Darwish, Life To The Last Drop