My strawberries are farmed by Dyson. My fish is pre-skinned for me. My bread is pre-sliced. AI can beat the average man at time management. This is dystopian, but I wake up nonetheless.
These days, I find myself questioning everything I consume. I wonder why all the money in my budget pools up in the groceries I have spent so much thought on. Each meal feels almost strategic. I am always too consciously aware that there is nothing out there that’s good for me anymore. I am simultaneously the harm and the harm-reducing agent. There are fifty different people online telling me that eating clean is much better than eating shit-but also that if ingredient A is cooked wrong, it easily becomes a carcinogenic1
In the midst of writing this article, I came across Mina Le’s video on “Erewhon hauls, ozempic and chefluencers” which helped to solidify my thoughts on these current ponderings. How we consume now has become deeply rooted in the fear of inauthenticity. Erewhon, as a B corp2, is set up with the promise of “supporting local farmers and brands and caring for its employees, partners, and communities, [being] recognized for its uncompromising quality standards and customer service” I find it increasingly concerning that in the recent years, our collective consciousness has shifted towards habits of consumption that require suspicion. I need to know exactly where, when, and how this avocado reached my kitchen table. I need to know if the things they have told me are good for me.
Still, knowledge is power. In this case, it would seem wise to consult an expert. But when you are plunged into decades’ worth of health scams and “wellness coaches” and see quacks who peddle empty pills from point-of-sales on their clinic desks as the solution, how do you even start to “take care of yourself"?
I couldn’t even explain what “self-care” means anymore—ask a girl who does pilates every other day, and she would say an Erewhon smoothie and a plain gel manicure. Ask anyone I meet nowadays, and they would say, buying yourself a little treat. I question why consumption has become the number one source of comfort and ponder how much of that act has to do with buying something for the sake of owning it.
Since the dawn of “clean beauty” in the 1960s3, great companies have twisted the back-to-nature aesthetics of those who rejected the mass production of goods, faking natural berry-shaded lipsticks laced with many synthetic ingredients. We are in the eye of the ‘quantity over quality’ storm, still blindly falling for B-grade vaseline stuffed in pink plastic tubes and rose quartz guasha that is probably just coloured glass. The problem here is we know so little about the things we buy; we have to assume they are made with measures to keep us safe.
I don’t have an answer for you, but I do have examples of how deep this inauthenticity has penetrated into our lives. Think of the prefix insta- and see how many products you can place it on. I’ll start with Insta-clean, Insta-fix, Instagram, and Insta-pot. What about instant houses- instant walls, flooring, tiles- instant manicures, instant lash lifts, and lipsticks to give you an instant pout? In an instant, there is a product for you.
In an instant, I ran out of ideas because there were already so many articles about this very thing.
Sometimes, I wonder if any kid growing up nowadays wants to be an inventor or even knows what an inventor is. I can’t imagine experiencing the world in its excess, never having to entertain myself with games of my own creation because they could never compete with a phone. My nine-year-old brain would combust if TikTok were around at that time. The opportunity for genuine creation is dwindling, and I don’t see anyone doing anything about it.
As dramatic as it sounds, the landscape of art as a whole has changed drastically post-AI art and the inclusion of AI in music. It becomes increasingly hard to make something that is entirely your own. Co-writers, Ghostwriters, AI schemes and outlines. I remember sitting at my desk as a middle schooler, learning about how to write. Now, the year sevens I know vape and submit their essays with very similar writing styles. In a way, I am worried; what will they do once they realise that they don’t have a voice beyond what chat gpt can write? Not to talk about girlhood (god knows we have enough of that), but if it inspired you to keep a journal, then maybe we still need it here.
I’m starting to understand the rage of the Ned Ludd.4 Nothing I touch feels like it was made by another person anymore. When I am out to spend, I feel a coldness in every object and every piece that feels like it has a soul I cannot afford. I understand why every handmade item is priced the way it is, but I am saddened by the state that the market has come to. When authenticity is used as a tool to mark up the perceived quality of an object, it raises the question of why that isn’t the standard in the first place.
There was a time when all you knew was one thing, and you got very good at doing that one thing, and it became your whole identity and career. Think of weavers, glassblowers, and tradesmen who came together to build great churches and create art that could sustain them. Nowadays, I can only write when I have time. I can sneak in a poem or two on the train ride or even afford an afternoon to write them all out. I don’t have enough time to create an identity for myself in the midst of mixing into the great engine of a city which runs for the greater machine of the world. Creation is a power we fail to nurture when we sacrifice our time to look at the products we can use to birth it.
So, in the spirit of creating for yourself, I am inviting you to sit down and write something, anything that feels like it is your voice on the page.
Here is a poem I wrote just to get you started:
Sphinx
I find you in glances, great lines-red and young
Blue bodies and disgust, entrancing and glossy
I have had enough- your riddles, your sly
Kiss I’ve consumed and coughed up many times
Greener than phlegm, my heart white as a sheet
Gatekeeper of things I can no longer keep,
Your language is foreign, your air composed differently
I find myself heaving to breathe what you breathe.
I am in and out, my body has been a mess-
And you still the enigma my mind cannot digest.
all those videos about leaving garlic in the refrigerator
https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/find-a-b-corp/company/erewhon/
I would highly recommend watching Mina Le’s first video on Erewhon and also her video on “Deadly Cosmetic Myths and the Lies of ‘Clean Beauty’ Marketing” for more clarity.
The Luddites were members of a 19th-century movement of English textile workers who opposed using certain types of cost-saving machinery and often destroyed the machines in clandestine raids. They protested against manufacturers who used machines in "a fraudulent and deceitful manner" to replace the skilled labour of workers and drive down wages by producing inferior goods
[Conniff, Richard (March 2011). "What the Luddites Fought Against". Smithsonian. Retrieved 19 October 2016.]
Ned Ludd was a legendary weaver whose name was used as a pseudonym in threatening letters to mill owners and government officials
[Binfield, Kevin (2004). "Foreword". Writings of the Luddites. Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. xiv. ISBN 1421416964.]
So well written! I’m getting inspired to start publishing my own writing 💕🤌
i’m obsessed with how you processed and captured the unrest into words. truly