There is an unshakable feeling of responsibility that weighs on the shoulders of anyone bold enough to stand in true solidarity with the oppressed. A feeling so strong it moves your body and mind to become one against injustice. I realized for most of 2024 I’ve been immobilized and distanced from this type of feeling. Around August I started writing less, organizing less and running out of gap year funds. I received my political science degree then it was static from there, I was left alone to figure out how to cope with the “u” word. Cope is an abstract way to describe unemployment currently. It’s not something you get used to without the looming anxiety of the even scarier “c” word, Capitalism. The months feel longer, every day is a reminder that you will need money to feed yourself, have access to housing, or participate in your community. Have you failed yourself when you cannot get these things? The pervasiveness of money in every aspect of our lives drives us to develop a material fixation, after all, it has the power to change reality. In exchange for riches, we have to jump through arbitrary hoops for a chance to be good workers, budding capitalists. 

The job market was not the first thing on my mind before graduating. My mind was on resting, writing, and fun. I assumed sooner or later a job would fall into my lap, I’d never had a problem getting one before. I say that as a recipient and as someone scorned by privilege. When your money is stacked you feel successful, something to look forward to on Fridays. A gap year without school sounded lovely; still is lovely in hindsight, but rough and spirit-crushing. The job application process entry-level or otherwise is enough to drive anyone towards a breakdown. The silence and rejection beats the misguided advice from employed people. It’s usually empty chatter that is supposed to motivate you to sell yourself better to the system. Have you tried updating your resume? Sending follow-ups? Selling your soul for pennies on the dime? Unemployment becomes long and drawn out, sucking the air out of any happiness toward having a degree. As read in UK author, Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism

This is one way in which education,far from being in some ivory tower safely inured from the ‘real world’, is the engine room of the reproduction of social reality,directly confronting the inconsistencies of the capitalist social field. – Mark Fischer

I know it’s just as hard for someone who didn’t have the same educational opportunities as myself. It is a cruel process that preys on hope and desperation. Each day of said month I was eager to hear back except you never do, the ATS system has betrayed you.Home gets boring fast, repetitive to the point where you numb your mind with any distraction. The ‘any’ being a plan to spontaneously get rich and be free of doing labor at all.A common or perceived easy way to combat the ism is by grinding, grifting or maliciously complying. Unemployment is stigmatized as selective laziness, no job, no social status. You can’t relate to the budding capitalist in over-consumption, your lack of ‘grind’ becomes inexcusable. I’d like to think a lot of people are not driven by a desire for monetary wealth, but wealth in fulfilling their human needs. I remember having a conversation with my cousin’s older sister. She gave us financial tips as an older figure. She was approaching her “peak earning years”, which meant she’d have to work twice as hard to retire comfortably. She was aware that her work ethic would eventually decrease or the reality of disability would impact her labor. When the grind ends, how will capitalism discard us? After our usefulness to the system ends will simply being a member of society suffice? Finding a job has been described as dehumanizing for the person, but ‘business as usual’ for the system. 

Post grad it’s crossed my mind multiple times on how I could monetize Texas Girl Writes. Sure I’ll be exploiting myself in the process,turning a passion into a source of capital. On the other hand, being paid for my writing isn’t inherently evil.  Keeping it real about capitalism , “it is simply obvious that everything in society, including healthcare and education, should be run as a business.” (Pg. 17) I hope TGW stands the test of time as an educational resource, that’s my desire. I consider myself a journalist, a friend of the art itself and one of many people in its community. I have endured struggle as it is unavoidable under capitalism, moreover I am a witness. A true believer that we are all struggling in more ways than one. In all my articles I’ve talked deeply about racism,white supremacy and other barriers in American society. I make it my mission to be mindful and remind my readers that we are not immune to doing harm against others or vice versa. Our society emphasizes that money is chief and all other aspects of our life are second to the dollar. 

Money begets power, access and the will to ignore those without it. I don’t want to be a billionaire, I want journalists to be able to pursue their passion without the punishment of death. In so much of my writing death is always present, often gratuitous, violent, and sad deaths. As much as I see through the screen it’s not hard to walk down the street and see a similar form of injustice. Crying over people I have never met is madness, a case of caring too much about so-called ‘random’ people. Apathy (lack of interest, enthusiasm,or concern) is not practical, it is cowardice. I care so much because beyond the 12 point font of my screen there are real peoples, lives that have been destroyed by barbarous violence. Democracy and the free market economy are our saviors and naysayers are too “woke” for their own good. In theory I should make my money and move along, I can’t save everyone. As an individual I’m supposed to put the profit over people if I want some semblance of comfort. Recalling what I said about responsibility where one’s pen or voice has been suppressed,It’s on me and other journalists’ to breathe life into their words. Writing without struggle in mind is like painting without a canvas. Annoyingly and conveniently we can call out the rights we will be losing but won’t take 5 seconds to lend a helping hand to the communities most affected. The apathetic will find no home in the Texas Girl Writes community. As Mikki Kendall puts it, “it’s inherently self-loathing because whatever consequences other communities face will eventually land at your door too.”

The purpose of this rant against capitalism arises from one of my recent encounters in the job market. Three weeks of my life was spent applying and conversing about a job position the company had no intentions of letting me interview for. After ‘moving on’ with other candidates I was still left vulnerable to an ever ‘growing’ system. Writing while unemployed made me question if I should be writing at all when my efforts should be focused on finding a job. In between sending applications, I stored away my thoughts for months. In the event I get a job I will have earned time to write. That moment has yet to come and yet the pen is still in my hand. The most valuable tool in my arsenal is led, a resource that transcends the value of money. My words are worth more than money, though I’m not reinventing the wheel by being paid. It is a dark day when my work is selling just as much when it is not. My solidarity is not transactional. I’m struggling because of a vicious cycle that wants me to submit to it, embrace it and turn my head when it abuses someone. 

I think I write because I cannot look away, everyday I think longer and harder about the fight against these systems. Texas Girl Writes will never exist behind a paywall or grifting the truth to be rewarded by the system. I have a responsibility to speak out against whoever and whatever threatens my community. Even when it feels like I have no power to help the next person, I know my words will comfort me. Similar to those before and all after me language will be resistance against injustice. It is not lost on me that I chose one of the most cliche majors for social justice. A job in this field ranges from administrative assistant to political warlord. Speaking in budding capitalist terms, being a warlord is more admirable and lucrative.There is plenty of philosophical and academic literature that explains the various ways capitalism is bad or good depending on your class bracket. I’m willing to bet no one reading this is in the 1%, so let this be free space to express anger like I have towards this system. 

Anger can only be a matter of venting; It is aggression in a vacuum, directed at someone who is a fellow victim of the system, but with whom there is no possibility of communality. Just as the anger has no proper object, it will have no effect. In this experience of a system that is unresponsive, interpersonal, centerless, abstract, and fragmentary, you are as close as you can be to confronting the artificial stupidity of Capital in itself. – Mark Fischer

As a working class person I’m desperately awaiting the fall of capitalism. None of that happens if we do not take our experiences personal and work towards a future where we are more than our labor. To do that we have to believe; we have to remain hopeful that there is something beyond capitalism.