Everything in the past is a memory – a story woven from elements of objective truth, and subjective experience and interpretation. These stories echo through time for generations – even if not a single word is uttered or written about what unfolded.
Stories were created to make sense of the world and helped provide an effective framework within which the group should function in order to remain cohesive and sustainable. It is through storytelling that humans were able to thrive, and, how we are sowing the seeds of our destruction.
Stories, in their original form, were a survival mechanism – a means by which we could attempt to avoid pain, suffering and death. But, they are also used to justify the inflicting of these very same experiences on others.
While arguably stories have always been about manipulation, the scale at which this innate capacity to influence others is being leveraged has never been so great.
The internet, and the social media networks it has spawned, have been a double-edged sword in that they have both allowed the power of storytelling to be exploited to incredibly destructive effect, while also ensuring more and more people have been exposed to the consequences of this, and, more significantly, realities long concealed by prevailing narratives peddled by vested interests.
As a direct consequence of a greater awareness of histories we were once actively denied, a plurality of forces are gaining potential, and thus creating a global cultural landscape that has never before been so accessible and diverse in its ideas and practices. Each one vying to be seen and acknowledged, to remain alive and thrive, and to erode the dominance of the racist, colonialist thinking and practices that have prevailed for far too long and dominated and decimated the cultural landscape for centuries.