does writing matter?
in response to the leaps and bounds in machine and rational intelligence, I want to write about emotional and social intelligence
it’s a question many writers ask. Zadie Smith and George Saunders repeat it in their interviews, but they have harvested the fruits of illustrious writing careers. I am just planting the seeds of mine. so instead I will pose a different question — in the context of a world on fire, what will I write about?
let me start with, it’s not just my writing we are assessing, it’s the writing of a generation witnessing global wars, climate crisis, late-stage capitalism, and the resurgence of fascism. there is so much to write about, and given that American media has consolidated1 it’s promising that we have platforms like Substack, Beehiv, Moosend, Ghost, MailerLite, Revue, Buttondown, Medium Newsletters, MailChimp, and Kit that enable a new kind of media pluralism.
at the People’s Film Festival in Kolkata2, the infamous and formidable writer Arundhati Roy explains how necessary writing is in these times:
fascism is about the simplification of all sorts of complexity. with India, many people have tried to simplify the subcontinent. as writers and artists, we have to carry on… hope lies in text that can accomodate and keep alive our intricacy, our complexity, and our density against the onslaught of the terrifying, sweeping simplications of fascism. as they barrel towards us, speeding down their straight, smooth highway, we greet them with our beehive. our maze. we keep our complicated world with all its seams exposed, alive in our writing and filmmaking.
as a writer living and working amid a technological and political rennaissance3 and an in-house cultural battle4, I feel an urgent need to capture my observations in real-time. as Roy says, “it takes time to know what is happening to us and how we are to live in this new era… of AI and algorithms… he who conquers and owns technology controls the narrative”.
in response to the leaps and bounds in machine and rational intelligence, I want to write about emotional and social intelligence. I feel an urgent need to lionize the magnificence of every day people. our seventy year-old neighbor Dennis who sits on our porch, chats everyone that walks by and makes our block feel like home.
my mom, or amma, who ran our household for twenty years, attended every dance class and music lesson, and founded the Portland Indian community. my uncle5 who, for thirty years, owned a bookstore dedicated to Kannada culture and is now a forest conservationist.
I want to glorify people who add volume and give shape to human life. who operate according to a clear dharma6 of their own and stitch people and ideas together, not under the name of a brand, but in the name of culture. I want to erect a Ravana-inspired7 Mount Rushmore for all those who seek family, friends, faith, and work that serves.
so, what truths do I want to write about? big public truths about the ethics and societal impact of software technology and Silicon Valley? small, personal truths about love and family? or maybe I demonstrate the existence of the small in the context of the big? maybe I juxtapose the richness of our private lives against the moral and intellectual poverty of modern society?
I want to end with a final quote from Arundhati Roy. dear reader, these are times as serious as the grave:
the most number of journalists ever killed have been killed in Gaza8. there is a reason for this. real journalists are the most endangered species on earth. the better you are at your job, the worse the consequences for you… each one of us reacts differently [to the mounting pressure of fascism]. as the windows are shut one by one, every cell of my writing brain seems to want to force them open. does that shrink or expand writers? sharpen or blunt them?
News and Global Issues, University of Illinois Library
People’s Film Festival, YouTube
These women tried to warn us about AI, Rolling Stone
Ravana Iconography, Wikipedia
thank you for reminding me why we must write. Your words create worlds and feelings of hope through your honesty and wonder.