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Making Art Is Not Fiddling While the World Burns
False equivalencies do nobody any good at all.
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Unless you’ve been living under a rock – and if you’re reading this, you’re not – you know that the world has gone stark raving mad. Between people cutting corners and removing protections for equality, diversity, the environment, and other reasonable things; blatant lies passed as truths like the “dangers” of vaccinations or stolen elections; and rising acts of fascism, things are really going wacky out there.
If you have empathy, you probably really, really want to do something to help. Like whatever you can do to turn this madness around and insert some reason into the irrationality of the fear. I know that I feel as if I should be taking some sort of action to do more to help reason get some purchase.
Hence, any and all frivolities of privilege can feel indulgent. How can we still enjoy that TV show, look forward to that movie, and desire to visit that museum in the face of all this? The answer is that you can only impact your life. Choosing to live in fear or to shrink in reaction to the madness doesn’t help you or anyone. Instead, it lets the madness grow and gain more traction.
The idea of Nero fiddling while Rome burned comes to mind. But making art in these crazy times isn’t fiddling while the world burns.
The deception of false equivalencies
Often, we’re exposed to the idea that “X” leads to “Y”. Sometimes this is true. This could, however, devolve into a whole discussion of correlation and causation if I let it.
Blame is an incredible, terribly weaponized tool of disempowerment. Casting blame on this person, that organization, those practitioners, or what have you, is frequently a false equivalency fabricated to disempower.
When you focus on “them,” you become distracted. Take Trump’s deployment of the National Guard in Washington, DC, for example. He claims it’s to restore law and order, but the facts disprove him, show the false equivalency, and tell us this is a distraction from the cracks in his and his administration’s façade.
False equivalencies are used to disempower, misdirect, distract, and create counterfactual things. More often than not, it’s complete bullshit. Take this whole anti-DEI movement in conservatism. They claim that more diversity, equity, and inclusion is ruining the nature of this, that, or the other thing, and eroding the soul of the USA. Except the truth is that DEI gives voice to those who have been kept down and disempowered for decades, if not centuries, and creates more expansive options for all.
False equivalencies are damaging. When they’re applied to the arts and the supposed luxury and frivolity of them, this is utter bullshit.
Making art is empowering
Art empowers because creating art requires you to be mindful. Mindfulness puts you in touch with both the world without and the world within. Making art comes from the head, heart, and soul of the artist and touches the external six senses for both the makers and the viewers of said art.
Has a book made you cry? Did music make you feel like dancing? Has a painting stirred something you can’t explain in your heart? That’s art empowering you.
In the middle of this madness, we need anything and everything empowering that we can get. Hence, you making art is not the equivalent of fiddling, like Nero, while the world burns. On the contrary, it’s much more like deploying a fire hose to fight the fire.
Disempowerment and keeping people in fear and uncertainty is the playbook of too many of the powerful. They have a lack and scarcity mindset, and greed for both tangibles and intangibles drives them. Making art is a way to take a stand.
Empowerment cannot be given. It can be inspired, it can be shared, but it can’t be given. Yet many people are led to believe that they only get power if someone else passes it to them. The truth is that empowerment is the real source of power. And that comes from within.
When more people find their empowerment, the so-called powerful have less sway and influence. Making art is a way to positively impact that.
Making art is not selfish
The biggest, often most distressing false equivalency is applied to what makes a person selfish. Frequently, self-care of any kind, rather than acting for others, is seen as selfishness.
True selfishness involves malice of forethought. It’s taking more than your fair share while knowingly denying someone else or causing active hurt and/or harm.
Making art, even in the middle of the current madness, is not selfish. It’s empowering. When you’re empowered, you become a beacon to guide others. Since you can’t give anyone else empowerment, you can serve as an example of what being empowered can do.
Why? Because everyone is worthy and deserving of being empowered. It’s not about birthright, belief, or morality. It’s a basic human right. Anyone suggesting otherwise likely doesn’t have your best interests at heart.
Making art is a sign of genuine freedom, and it’s neither selfish nor self-indulgent. It’s a necessary tool of empowerment and abundance that’s good for everyone, everywhere.
Thanks for reading. As I share my creative journey with you every week, please consider this: How are you inspired and empowered to be your own creator, whatever form that takes?
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