from suppression to expression

i was told a long time ago, "if you stand for nothing, you'll fall for anything." and fall, i did, for my teens into my twenties.

i used to be homophobic, transphobic, racist, just outright a bigoted chud. i was a conspiracy theorist and i believed "the Illuminati" controlled the world. i had suspicions that ancient aliens influenced humanity, and i truly believed the government could actively control the weather. i was a militant atheistic Satanist, and i believed in "might is right" attitudes and social Darwinism. i was an incel.

i was, for all intents and purposes, a right-libertarian. i was hateful of feminists and i wanted to debate politics and god with everyone. if you agreed with me, i'd find something to disagree about. if we disagreed, of course we did, because i was smarter than you.

so, what changed? a few things.

for starters, it was brought to my attention through several Internet arguments that i was refusing to look at facts and just wanted to reinforce my biases. i dabbled with LSD a few times and began to recognize i was hiding my Queer aspects. i thought i was bi in high school, but i'd had a friend shut me down when i brought it up, so i was under the impression that being Queer was a bad thing. being uninhibited because of the acid, i was able to explore and identify with myself in a way i had never been "allowed" to before. i was 24 at the time and realizing, "i'm not a boy." but i didn't know what i was. i recognized that i had been suppressing a part of me that was essential to my identity and my character, even if i didn't yet fully understand how to let that part show.

Bernie Sanders enters the mainstream consciousness about this time, and he spoke in a language i understood and agreed with (at the time) about how the rich keep getting richer, the poor are crushed, and that most politicians are compromised by moneyed interests. to some extent, i knew that, but i stopped making excuses for corporations and rich people and began understanding my true place in the economic world. i voted for Bernie in the primary, and for Jill Stein (of the Green Party) in the general election. oh, and then i started a political campaign running as a Democrat in a local election. while that went nowhere, it led me toward some more progressive types of people, younger Democrats who seemed hopeful of the future. i had mentioned to one of them that i wanted to change my name, and that i was pretty sure i was Trans. we began talking about economics. i remember saying, "corporations create jobs. they hire us, and we work for them. it's a voluntary exchange." he corrected me, "workers create jobs. companies and corporations need people to complete those jobs, but the work is always there to be done. CEOs and managers are middle-men." that reshaped my worldview of economics.

so what changed my mind about conspiracies? that was a slower battle to be fought. i kept smoking weed and dropping acid and going down all sorts of crazy YouTube rabbit holes. i ended up at one video in particular that introduced me to the concept of the Anunnaki as the original "Gods" which fueled my conspiracy-and-atheism-riddled brain. i posted the video on Facebook and someone commented with a single link: (Rational Wiki)

i decided to dive in, and realized something harrowing: all of the conspiracy theories i believed in were actually Nazi propaganda. i had a reckoning and my life was changed forever.

i don't know the exact timeline of events that followed, but i abandoned my ties with Anonymous. i found myself in all sorts of left-leaning Facebook groups that were talking about labor politics, feminism, Trans issues, and more. i was completely deradicalized from the right and shifted dramatically leftward. i found myself reading Marx, Kropotkin, Bakunin. i was feeling truly politically aware. i became, as the kids say, "woke."

so what now?

well it's been a decade since i began to shift myself to the left. my ideas have shifted a lot. in many ways, i have fixed values now. sometimes i nod in one direction or another away from the current point i stand on, but i'm ultimately circling the same spot on the floor. i'm comfortable here. and i have some faith, although tempered, that others can learn how i did. it's not impossible, because i wouldn't be here if that was so. but it's very hard work. and for that i try to have patience with people who believe differently than i do. but at the same time, i'm not going to waste my time arguing with people who just want to insult or destroy me. i have standards and boundaries.

i know who i am. i love who i am. and i try to radiate that outward. i'm no longer afraid to talk about what i believe in, and i can actively stand up for it. with me, what you see is what you get.