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They are we
Each of these four elements plays out during the social discourse following a mass shooting, school shooting, and even a political assassination. The perpetrator is labeled a 'monster' to fit into a cultural story we have told for hundreds of years:
1. The monster comes from some distant place that is separate from civil or mainstream society (like the trench coat mafia, goth kids, mentally ill, loners, outcasts, and transgender).
2. The monster destroys the things a culture covets.
3. The monster must die for cultural stability to return.
4. The monster’s death cannot be my fault.
We have hundreds of years of English literature about monsters and 187 different film versions of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein. Like the original text of Frankenstein, the classic monster story is about a crisis where a monster appears and then needs to be vanquished from society. But these stories are not about fixing the root causes of what created the monster in the first place. They serve as a cartoonification of complex cultural and social issues by creating a binary, moral tale with a simple solution...the monster must die and it can’t be my fault.
But the monster story in literature is not reality because in real life, the monsters look just like us and even live right next door.
1. The monster comes from some distant place that is separate from civil or mainstream society (like the trench coat mafia, goth kids, mentally ill, loners, outcasts, and transgender).
2. The monster destroys the things a culture covets.
3. The monster must die for cultural stability to return.
4. The monster’s death cannot be my fault.
We have hundreds of years of English literature about monsters and 187 different film versions of Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein. Like the original text of Frankenstein, the classic monster story is about a crisis where a monster appears and then needs to be vanquished from society. But these stories are not about fixing the root causes of what created the monster in the first place. They serve as a cartoonification of complex cultural and social issues by creating a binary, moral tale with a simple solution...the monster must die and it can’t be my fault.
But the monster story in literature is not reality because in real life, the monsters look just like us and even live right next door.
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Anti theft fanny pack
Digusting and effective
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Marina Abramović: "Rhythm 0."
In 1974, Marina Abramović staged a performance in Naples that still resonates today: "Rhythm 0."
At the Galleria Morra, she placed 72 objects on a table – flowers, honey, wine, bread, feathers, chains, scissors, knives, whips, and even a gun with a single bullet – and told the audience:
“For six hours, you can do whatever you want to me. I will not resist.”
At first, people approached gently: offering flowers, light touches, small gestures of care.
Slowly, things changed. They tore her clothes, cut her skin with rose thorns. Someone picked up the gun, and one person even tried to load it. Others attempted to intervene, creating tension in the room.
The performance lasted from 8 PM to 2 AM. When Abramović finally moved and reclaimed her body, the audience fled – unable to meet the gaze of a living person, no longer a passive object.
This was more than art. It was a stark demonstration: when responsibility disappears, the veneer of civilization cracks.
Inside each of us coexist two possibilities – care and destruction.
The true choice is not what we CAN do, but what we DECIDE to do.
And today, in the hidden corridors of social media, the same experiment plays out every day. Behind screens, consequences vanish, and masks slip. We can mock, attack, manipulate – or we can act with care. The question remains the same: the power is there, but what we choose defines us.
At the Galleria Morra, she placed 72 objects on a table – flowers, honey, wine, bread, feathers, chains, scissors, knives, whips, and even a gun with a single bullet – and told the audience:
“For six hours, you can do whatever you want to me. I will not resist.”
At first, people approached gently: offering flowers, light touches, small gestures of care.
Slowly, things changed. They tore her clothes, cut her skin with rose thorns. Someone picked up the gun, and one person even tried to load it. Others attempted to intervene, creating tension in the room.
The performance lasted from 8 PM to 2 AM. When Abramović finally moved and reclaimed her body, the audience fled – unable to meet the gaze of a living person, no longer a passive object.
This was more than art. It was a stark demonstration: when responsibility disappears, the veneer of civilization cracks.
Inside each of us coexist two possibilities – care and destruction.
The true choice is not what we CAN do, but what we DECIDE to do.
And today, in the hidden corridors of social media, the same experiment plays out every day. Behind screens, consequences vanish, and masks slip. We can mock, attack, manipulate – or we can act with care. The question remains the same: the power is there, but what we choose defines us.
express, not stress