Of compasses and quandaries - o meu manifesto anarquista

I briefly pondered. Angsty remarks are not my business nor have I any disposition towards self-checkmates.

Losing your compass generally means a sense of numbness. Which is generally held to be a personal responsability. But it is not. It is but the impression of a Leviathan breathing on our backs, sensing our loss and nurturing itself on strife, either internal or external.

We as human beings are not fit for strife. We strive for cooperation and it is in our nature to be brothers and sisters. But the oppressive social reality imposed on us, younguns, olduns, short-tempered or even-tempered, is taking its toll and the first thing it commands is that no one but the oligarchs has the right to a compass and - most importantly - to the North Pole of our contentment.

This is the quest which I set myself upon - to inquire on the nature of oppression in my life and those of my fellow people, my loved ones and whether there is any hope for us as human beings.

Perhaps the journey is but a delusion of grandeur; maybe I just need a towel to reassure my aching brain - who tells me that my heart is only its afterthought and why on earth do I ascribe it any importance whatsoever.

Well, dearest friend. It is commonly held that hearts are the engines of history. Destinies are built on the whim of a few - though not happy, at least sternly courageous - persons who want something else.

She said, Rosa said, that freedom is the freedom of dissenters. I do not wish to dissent, because I have no desire to stuff my mind with the direness of the world, only with its reality. But it happens that dissenting in our age means that reality-seekers are the most reproached dissenters. We do not strive to be moralistic beings, only ethical ones.

We also do not strive to teach cruelty, imbue others with shame or assume people are bad or good as a finishline.

Whether people are good or bad is but a detail. What matters is that we seek, we are seekers of freedom. We are not lost. How could we? We have never known where we stood before. We therefore cannot afford to make a stand. We can only reach for each other and feel the touch of brotherhood. Perhaps when we overlook rationality and the need to be cold, we will reach that stage. Not yet, but someday.

In the very least, it is a better project, albeit less revolutionary, less ambitious and overall less relevant than screaming revolutions which aim to change nothing at all. It is better because at its core we are concerned about equality as a starting point. We want to see and observe and know.

Maybe my quest leads me into the unknown. But at the very least I will have tried and quench my hunger for the Else, the Not-Here.