worlds apart

mania | maniac | maniacal

An all too accurate downward spiral blatantly exhibited by this second term of Trump in office. For him, his chosen, and the GOP - who are intent on the destruction of anything clear, good, and working in our American government today. 

survival of the best

All self-centered, insecure, petty, and unloved - they are the smallest packages of humans, so wrapped up in only themselves. It does not take much to decipher their barren psyches and broken behavior. 

There they stand in the glaring public gaze - frantically waving their freak flags in proud puerile penis envy. 

ANGER | character & context

Women are often discouraged from expressing anger and if they do, they're penalized. Writer Soraya Chemaly explains the ways women are socialized to suppress anger. 

Soraya Chemaly is a writer and director of the Women's Media Center Speech Project - an initiative dedicated to expanding women's civic and political participation.

art by Michelle Moirai

Anger is an assertion of rights and worth. It is communication, equality, and knowledge. It is intimacy, acceptance, fearlessness, embodiment, revolt, and reconciliation. Anger is memory and rage.

It is rational thought and irrational pain. Anger is freedom, independence, expansiveness, and entitlement. It is justice, passion, clarity, and motivation. Anger is instrumental, thoughtful, complicated, and resolved. In anger, whether you like it or not, there is truth.

book cover art

patriotism vs nationalism

With the recent death of a former decent president back in the Philippines and recent Fourth of July celebrations in the USA, issues regarding beliefs that drive and affect us have come up once more. 

Patriotism is love for or devotion to one's country. The feeling of pride, devotion, and attachment to a homeland, as well as a feeling of attachment to other patriotic citizens. The feelings of attachment may be further bound up in factors like race or ethnicity, culture, religious beliefs, or history.

Nationalism is loyalty and devotion to a nation. Feelings of nationalism are based on a belief that one’s country is superior to all others. It also carries a connotation of distrust or disapproval of other countries, leading to the assumption that other countries are rivals. 

They may have similarities but there's a world of difference between the two - they are not in the least synonymous. Patriotism is the love of one's identity and achievement to better the world and future generations. Nationalism is believing your identity and achievements are better than those of others.

liberty, justice, freedom

Any recipient of abuse lives with the consequence of their traumatic experience. Each individual manages their own personal experience - dealing with it through whatever means they have available and are capable of. 

Those who have not been abused live in a different world.  Touched or untouched by the abuse of another, some can relate and others cannot. But never in the exact same way the one abused is forever changed - for better or worse. 

embracing life

I have always been demanding of myself and others.

Never high maintenance but definitely difficult at times.

I do not concede defeat. Instead I question and challenge.

I like options. I love to choose. I advocate for change.