Dystopia is not guaranteed…
… so can we please stop writing about it like it is? Keep reading to explore this topic, then leave a comment to join this dialogue. And be sure to scroll to the bottom to see today’s writing prompt.
I get it. The Doomsday Clock is ticking closer and closer to midnight. It’s been decades since we’ve been this close to an all-out nuclear war. Podcasters lamenting the end of days are becoming a dime a dozen, especially the extremely religious ones. Social media companies and traditional media entities are selling their ideals and souls to remain profitable and institutionalized. And many authors are beginning to pen more dystopic fiction again, which is more than understandable... to a certain degree.
Listen, I’m not naïve. I know things are terrible right now. Children and adult citizens are being kidnapped off the streets in broad daylight, from schools, hospitals, daycares, workplaces, and private homes, in the United States of America. World leaders are being celebrated for becoming bolder with their greed and misogyny and trigger fingers, which is only making them more emboldened to act even more childish and reckless, which is also making them, and the world, more dangerous. Racism and sexism, and all the other -isms, are on full display in public and online. People are starving to death, unable to pay for necessary medical care, and are being pushed out of their homes while being robbed blind by banks who are being treated more humanely than actual human beings. Our water and air are polluted… I could go on and on, but I want to focus on something different in this post instead, which is meant to serve as more of a welcoming reality check than that, so apologies for that depressing detour.
*Ahem*
I want to focus on how we can and should write more about the world we want to live in and the people we want to be and become. Which does not require us to put our heads in the sand or be naïve. Far from it. Instead, it requires us to be more self-aware and get better at paying attention to nuance and details and information and patterns, especially those language patterns that keep us trapped in our current dystopic world. And, most importantly, it requires us to be more creative and resourceful than we have ever been before with the words we wield and how we wield them.
It’s easy to lament and complain about everything that’s wrong in the world today, with all the doomy echo chambers open and available to us twenty-four seven. Which is why so many people do just that.
It’s a lot harder, however, to dig down deep and come up with real world language tactics that assist with and insist on survival so that we may all thrive. Especially when most of the world is trapped in those doomy language loops that work to reinforce the doom and trick people into regurgitating over and over again how futile prosperity for everyone is, while constantly reminding everyone of their individual insignificance while also making them feel unique and special— I know, the dizzying irony.
But how is accepting and internalizing the language of our doomy world, contrived by the people who created it and institutionalized it to maintain power and control, really an option? Choking it down seems a lot harder than the alternative when one looks at the bigger picture, actually.
It’s easier to write about a tyrannical leader, a sociopathic man-child CEO, corrupt government officials, pedophilic clergy, women and girls who are missing or murdered, a world where there are food and water shortages and tribal warfare and an out-of-control AI that wants to own or kill us all… because that’s what we are used to reading and writing about most of the time.
But it’s much harder to imagine and create a world via words and language that doesn’t exist quite yet. A world where humans understand how barbarism is its own form of ineffective labor and thrive in peaceful communities and —this is the most important bit— laugh or grow perplexed at things like the concept of tyranny, and all the -isms attached to it, because it doesn’t exist and seems so foolish. A world where society is organized by principles manifested by language that is actually based in genuine prosperity and beauty and the future, not juvenile intolerance and destruction. A world where dystopia is not only not guaranteed but not even an option.
I know such a world seems far off and far-fetched. But that’s only because we have yet to write it into existence on a mass scale, to ensure its inception and longevity. I’m still attempting to use my own language and vocabulary, inspired by words scribed by other authors who have come before me, to write such a world into existence myself, word by word, line by line, page by page. It’s still a work in progress, but at least it’s inching forward in a lot of ways.
I’m not sure about all the details regarding how to write a better world into existence. Yet. But I won’t stop trying to write a new world into existence because I know it’s possible. And I know I won’t give up hope (one of the hardest emotions to conjure and sustain right now), because I will forever remember how we humans once wrote dystopia and a dystopic world into existence. Didn’t we? And on such a mass scale that has lasted millennia…
So why can’t we write something else into existence instead? Something that offers practical guidelines and insight into how we can and should imagine and create a world we actually want to live in, maybe even thrive in. There is no other task as serious and important as this right now. All worlds, real and imagined, start with the words we give them, the words that breathe them into existence. And I suggest we use those words to create the world we want, not via words of perfection that attempt to construct haphazard and incomplete utopic visions, but building words that make common sense both now and in the future we create with them.
To be continued…
What are your thoughts on this topic? Leave a comment to join this dialogue, and don’t forget to share this post with others so they can join this dialogue too.
© This work is not available for artificial intelligence (AI) training. All Rights Reserved by K.E. Creighton; Creighton’s Compositions LLC.
Want to express your appreciation for this post and writing prompt?
My writing and I are fueled by loyal readers, caffeine, and kind words, so I appreciate any support you can offer that keeps me writing. Thank you so much!
Today’s Writing Prompt
Writing Prompt: Speculative Fiction
Write a piece of speculative flash fiction that includes things you actually want to exist or happen in the future.
Writing Tip
Before you begin writing, close your eyes and think about the reality of the world you want to live in and what needs to exist in order to make it attainable, but try to be as practical as possible.
