Moving from “Who is Going to Save Me?” to “What Can I Do?”
Finding empowerment during the empire’s downfall.
For people living in the imperial core (the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Western Europe,) life has become increasingly frightening.
The temperatures have risen along with the water table; uninsurable homes collapse into the seas while the forest fires billow a widening radius of lung-irritating smoke. A meal for one person costs at least $15, jobs are scant in the finding, and access to medical care is threatened by reactionary legislation and provider shortages. Property development and the police state have eroded our public spaces, social media is a graveyard of bots and advertisements, and nearly a half decade of COVID has made many of us feel incapable of relating to others at all.
On our TVs and in our phones, two Presidential candidates square off unseriously: one is unable to counter a single strike among the barrage of mistruths and vitriol lobbed at him; the other uses his attempted assassination to mobilize a base of seasoned white supremacists, and both remain ardent supporters of mass deportation, transgender rights restrictions, and ongoing genocide.
There is nowhere to turn to, if you’re looking for an authority you can trust. Every public institution has either failed or slowly revealed itself to be stacked up against you from the very start.
This is in sharp contrast to the rest of the world, where it is not new for life to be frightening. The sea levels have been rising for quite some time, after all, and have already taken several small islands into its depths. The atmosphere has been boiling, diseases and mass extinctions have already been spreading, and Indigenous peoples have seen centuries of ecological destruction from Aotearoa to Sápmi.
For a Palestinian who has lived under seventy-six years of violent apartheid rule, it’s no surprise that government representatives are corrupt and do not have the people’s interests at heart. If all your life you’ve been exploited by Western powers and their proxies, you’re unlikely to believe some benevolent leader will ever rush in and save you.
In this and numerous other ways, the peoples who have been colonized are far ahead of us nervous, guilty descendants of the colonizers. For a very long time they have been aware of exactly who their enemies are, and that no amount of obedience, desperate “productive” labor, or peaceful political appeals will rescue them. Their cultures have been outlawed, their homes ripped apart, their languages erased, their forests and farms torched, their bodies enslaved — and yet they persist in caring for one another, trying to weave something new and formidable from the tatters.
For colonized people, the world has already ended multiple times. But instead of giving up, their communities have joined together, again and again, to preserve the old teachings, create new traditions, shelter other displaced people, cook food, raise babies, sew clothing, make regalia, and build supports that no government would ever just “give” them.
They do these things not because they are superior to Western colonizers on some inherent level, but because they understand where their power comes from. It comes not from a weapon, their personal resolve, a police officer, or the government. It comes from the collective, built with each individual effort and kindness.
Those of us who have only just had our first glimpse of apocalypse can learn a great deal from the people who have lived an apocalypse every day. If we follow their lead then our frantic, nervous questions of “Who is going to save me?” can drift into the background, allowing “What can I do for others?” to come to the fore and direct us where we’re meant to be.
This is how it has always been — weak, weary people actively choosing to tend to other weak, weary people, the trammeled-upon rising together proudly to fight for another day.
No matter how powerless you feel right now, a new world is forming, and it needs you. With your help, it can be far better than anything you’ve ever lived through before.
Recently, activist Ashtin Berry (also known as TheCollectress) posed a question to her white American followers: what would they do if a civil war broke out, or society collapsed and they could not leave?
“Overwhelmingly, people stated that they would simply die,” Ashtin writes. In a survey of hundreds of people, choosing to lay down and accept death was easily the most popular response. Respondents often cited pacifism, an inability to make a difference, and the belief that life was not worth fighting for as their reasons for giving up.
“Most BIPOC would not be alive if their ancestors had these type of thoughts,” Ashtin reflects. By resigning themselves to certain doom, the white people she surveyed displayed what she calls “a clear lack of historical and social awareness of how their acceptance of death…condemns others who want to live.”
Ashtin’s writing lit up my social media feed. Many commenters shared that their suicide ideation got worse with every piece of upsetting political news they consumed, and so they could not imagine carrying on if matters got “worse.” Several white people suggested that because they were the descendants of enslavers and colonizers, they did not deserve to live. A few close friends reached out to me about the post in private, speaking about their ongoing search for purpose in life, or confessing that despite their best attempts they still couldn’t see any reason to keep going.
Suicide’s main draw is the escape that it offers. We long for death when we cannot find a path from our suffering, or when we believe, as Aaron Bushnell did, that we are so bound up within evil systems that the only way to cease doing harm is to cease being. Death is an answer that ends all questions — about what a better life would look like, how to make amends, or how our circumstances might ever change.
The fantasy of the apocalypse serves a similar purpose. Destruction wipes the slate clean; in the absence of memory, we owe nothing to anyone. It is better for my building to collapse on top of me than for me to learn to share my property with others. If I die in the rubble of the United States, I don’t have to contend with the fact it was built in my name. If I don’t survive to see the new world, I never have to change.
I reject the notion that suicide is ever selfish, and I would never deny a desperate person their fantasies of relief. But I do see how intense, apocalyptic helplessness protects the empire. Choosing the “lesser of two evils” in every election only lends legitimacy to a government that’s done nothing but evil over the centuries; sitting at home waiting to die makes it easier for the police to round up my friends who are in the streets.
The end of the world is an answer that stops all questions — about how we might pay reparations, how we might want to live, what we value, what from the past is worth preserving, and crucially, what we have to give. The alternative to giving up is to keep asking these questions — and to start forming our own answers.
Recently, my friend Dr. Devon M. Price (no relation!) posted some thoughts online about the importance of disabled people building community, and she faced a backlash for it that proved quite instructive.
Many disabled folks live in a state of hyper-isolation, relying upon one or two relatives or health aids for care. With a lack of safe, accessible in-person community to turn to, many disabled people find most of their social connections online. Unfortunately, online discourse surrounding disability often encourages disabled folks to isolate themselves more — by claiming that making small talk or sharing food with one’s neighbors is “ableist” for example, or by portraying anyone who has made imperfect decisions surrounding COVID as a eugenicist whose life is not worth preserving.
Devon was concerned by this, and stated that it’s important for disabled people to keep reaching out to others and contributing to their communities, even when it’s difficult, and even when they have been excluded and oppressed before.
A white disabled woman reached out to Devon, outraged at this suggestion. She said was Autistic and physically disabled, with a chronic health condition that regularly flared up; it wasn’t fair for Devon to tell her to help others when she could barely do anything herself! She was sick and weak, lonesome and depressed; she needed so much care she wasn’t getting, and there was nothing that she had to give. She was certain that she would die alone if there was ever a societal collapse.
“I’m sure you have a lot of experience and skills that are valuable,” Devon assured her. “With that many disabilities, I bet you’re an expert at navigating the healthcare system.”
The woman considered this. “Yes,” she told Devon, “I am really good at advocating with healthcare providers and making sense of the insurance system.”
“That is an important skill!” Devon told her. Lots of disabled people could benefit from her hard-won knowledge. And if the American healthcare industry collapsed, this woman’s perspective would be invaluable in constructing a system that was better thought-out and more just.
“I’ve never thought of myself as having a useful skill before,” the disabled woman told Devon. In that moment, she shifted from seeing herself as a completely powerless victim of ableism, to a potentially powerful agent of change.
“It really goes to show you just how helpless people have been conditioned to see themselves as being,” Devon told me, “And how much that prevents us from building any networks of care that could make us less reliant upon the state.”
When we think that we have nothing meaningful to give to others, we can’t imagine surviving in a changing world where old healthcare systems collapse and oppressive governments fall.
A view of ourselves as utterly powerless keeps us from appreciating that all the good in the world comes from regular people around us, too. It’s not the President or the hospital network that “gives” us the medicine and care that we need. It’s our neighbors who do that, and they will still exist and still contribute to our lives even if some terrible catastrophe were to occur.
The first time that I really realized my mistrust of other people was a threat to my political power was when I read Rebecca Solnit’s excellent book A Paradise Built in Hell. The book profiles the reactions of everyday people in the face of disaster: earthquakes, hurricanes, explosions, warehouse fires, and acts of warfare. Each story between that book’s pages has given me immense hope, and reminds me that most humans are fundamentally caring and community-minded.
Though government authorities always feel the need to arm their cities against riots and “chaos” when big disasters happen, the reality is that a majority of people are motivated by what Solnit calls a human need to be needed. Rather than fleeing or harming one another, most humans run toward the danger in order to rescue people, recover supplies, and bring comfort. The community support that rises up in the wake of disaster is so robust that many survivors look back upon their moments in “hell” as the happiest days of their lives, Solnit reports.
In the mutual support of the Palestinian people, we can also find a model of how humanity continues on in the wake of unthinkable loss.
Israel has destroyed every university in Gaza and slaughtered hundreds of journalists, yet young journalism graduates continue documenting the genocide and honoring the stories of the slain. The economy of the region is devastated by deprivation and price-gouging, but a lack of pay does not prevent surgeons and nurses from reporting to the hospitals (or from building clinics in tents when the hospitals have fallen).
One young Palestinian man that I have spoken to a few times, Seraj Aburaida, sets aside a portion of every donation he receives on GoFundMe so that he can provide mutual aid to his neighbors. Though a bottle of water can cost him nearly a hundred dollars and his family’s basic living expenses have risen to $13,000 per month, Seraj is dedicated to sharing what little help he receives with others.
We can be of aid to one another, even when we’re in the most desperate of circumstances. In fact, our hearts yearn to. When we listen to that powerful need to be needed that cries out inside us, we no longer have to dream of escape. Instead, we can imagine our own routes to freedom, and build them with the many small choices that we make each day.
The corrupt Palestinian Authority did nothing to save Seraj; neither did the United States, which drops food on Gazan people’s heads alongside its bombs, furthering the genocide’s death toll. No, Seraj has repeatedly saved himself and his family by asking for help — and in making that ask, he has provided an invaluable connection to every person that has witnessed it and been able to contribute.
My friend Sky organized an art auction to help fund Seraj and his family. Then they organized another one for Nara, a disabled Palestinian mom. Several artists that I know have volunteered their time and donated hand-made goods to these fundraisers, and I’ve gotten to know multiple people in my local community more closely thanks to a mutual connection to Seraj.
With every message that he sends or fifty shekel Ramadan gift that he gives to hungry families, Seraj has worked to build a post-colonial world — and granted us the opportunity to join him in its making.
What Can I Do?
I know so many people who are certain the world is about to end. They’ve felt this way since about 2016 or so. They are neurotic and unempowered, refreshing their Twitter feeds and making posts begging others to stay worried and go vote.
Some of them are leftists, and say they wish to see an end to capitalism, perhaps even to America — but when the possibility starts actually feeling real to them, they fear crime, and chaos, and their own helplessness. They joke uneasily that we live in “The Bad Place” but they are too afraid to get to the good one. They don’t want to see an end to their quiet street corner, their cozy condominium, their favorite television shows on streaming, their door with a lock. They admit this world is hell but they try to claim their own corner of it and keep it comfortable.
I’ve been in the exact mental spot as these people, so I don’t mean to make myself sound superior. For the longest time, all I wanted to do was find a few comforting distractions to get me through the years before my death. I went to bed with my stomach in knots, certain that one day the power grid would go dark, the water would stop flowing, and the fascists would march in the streets and no one would stop them.
Back then I didn’t fantasize that I would do anything to stop them. I picture things differently now.
I used to think that voting and calling representatives were my only avenues for political participation, but now I see that with every choice I am not merely voting for a better world, I am creating it. When I fund a friend’s jaw surgery, when I look an unhoused person in the eyes and ask them how they are doing, when I slow my walking speed, when I share my knowledge, I am making decisions about how the future will be. I am not powerless. I am small, and vulnerable, but I always have something to give.
I think that when we are feeling powerless and afraid of the collapse, it’s helpful to shift our attention toward practical, empowering questions like these:
If the government collapsed today, what would I do tomorrow?
The End of the World is a big, frightening abstraction. But if some terrible disaster (or glorious revolution) were to happen today, all I’d have to do tomorrow is make a few basic decisions. What would I eat? Where would I sleep? Who would I contact first?
At the end of the world there are still dirty clothes and rumbling bellies. Those pressing physical needs are the most immediate questions we will need to answer, not larger philosophical quandaries about what life is “for,” or what the ideal new political system should be. For those more essential questions, there will always be answers: canned food to gather, lakes to wash off in, stories to be traded across candlelight.
The future that we expect is just a fiction we tell ourselves, and it has never been guaranteed. And so, when some dramatic change comes, we can focus not on the loss of certainty, but on the practicalities: finding shelter, getting fed, and keeping the people around us as safe as we can. This is already what life is about — and we’re all more practiced in survival than we might think.
If the world as I know it ended, what would still be important to me?
Hitting my weekly wordcount goals wouldn’t matter at all anymore, I know that much. But in the wake of a terrible collapse I would still value my friends, my immediate family, my chinchilla, and the people I see every day. I wouldn’t be so fixated on never seeming ‘awkward’ or ‘creepy’; the moment disaster happened, I would just get over myself and knock on my neighbors’ doors.
If the world ended, I’d stop caring about my appearance, but I’d still long for a mode of self-expression like fashion currently provides. I wouldn’t think of my writing “career,” but I’d still want to be heard. I can imagine myself giving a small speech to my neighbors, trying to persuade them to take whatever course of action I thought best. I would be wrong often and not always persuasive, but I would still get to express myself and witness how that expression influences the world. I’d take care of more animals. I’d worry less about my apartment getting banged up and wrecked.
It’s worthwhile to contemplate the people we will become after capitalism. The rhythms of our lives will change, as will our priorities. We may harbor fears about all that may be lost, but it’s worth asking whether our possessions and favorite TV shows and Twitch streamers are really all that important. I often find myself looking forward to the person I could become in this new reality. And those thoughts often motivate me to make small changes in who I am and what I prioritize right now:
What would I feel unburdened from?
My worries about work and creative success have made me a more selfish and disconnected person. When I’m stressed about writing deadlines, I view social invitations as an intrusion, and I can’t be emotionally present with the people I love. I know and loathe this fact about me, and I know that if I want to live in a better way, I’m going to have to make a change.
If capitalism and the government were to crumble around me, I’d have an easier time letting go of such things. I’d care instead about contacting my sister and snuggling up with someone I love by the fire. I’d stop worrying about whether I was having enough sex or going out enough to not be a “loser” — all petty, consumption-obsessed ways of thinking about life that I have nonetheless absorbed.
In a less consumeristic world, I know that I’d find my purpose in quietly sharing books with other introverted types, asking my local elders for advice, and clinging to the handful of people who make me feel safe. Of course, I could be living that exact way right now. I don’t need anybody else to rescue me — I can choose immediately to become less superficial, to move at a slower pace, and to stop trying to prove that I am a worthy person by the standards of this terrible economic system.
I don’t have to have all the answers to society’s problems. I just have to go make some cookies and start knocking on my neighbors’ doors.
What important work would I keep doing?
If society as we know it were to collapse, many of us would recognize immediately that our day jobs did not matter.
If we have what anthropologist David Graeber called a bullshit job— a meaningless time-waster and meeting-holder designed to entertain middle management and bring nothing of value to the world — we would simply stop doing it, and place our focus on something more essential, like providing childcare or cleaning latrines.
As Graeber writes, most people with bullshit jobs absolutely loathe having them. Getting paid to do a bunch of meaningless nothing fills people with dread and makes them want to rage quit — perhaps because they’re suffering from a Solnitian need to be needed that has gone unfulfilled. Graeber even argues that under capitalism, certain meaningful professions (like education and the arts) are underpaid because people are so desperate to do work that matters that it makes them easy to exploit.
In a post-capitalist world, many of us would be eager to take on the jobs that need doing. The rule-abiding Autistics among us would love to check expiration dates and ensure that food is meticulously and safely prepared; those of us with a more tactile urge would plug holes and fix bathroom grout to our heart’s content. We would make more art, even if it wasn’t lucrative, and babysit kids, no longer having to worry that childcare is so underpaid. And the people whose old jobs are necessary would likely keep showing up to do their work, exactly as pharmacists, doctors, teachers, and journalists in Gaza have done.
99% of my work is a bullshit job. But the educational aspect of it is important. In a societal collapse, I would never attend a meeting with university administrators again. Instead, I would spend a whole lot more time speaking with the parents of Autistic children and explaining accessibility needs to the small communities forming around me. I would still do the “work” I am best prepared for. I’d just be sharing my knowledge more directly and intimately, and not for a profit.
And there it is again, an important realization. I could be performing this work right now. I can liberate myself from my bullshit job and make my expertise more widely accessible to the people who genuinely need it most. Once again, preparing for a future world offers me lessons about how to live better in this one. When I consider the person I could be if I stopped following the rules of capitalism, all of a sudden I’m no longer afraid.
What skills do I have that people will always need?
I’m not a terribly strong person and I’m not particularly good with my hands, but that doesn’t mean I can’t contribute in an emergency situation. I am wiry and flexible, so I could climb over fences and under gaps in windows to open up shelters and pillage loot from buildings. I could walk long distances to collect water or drop off supplies, as Seraj does in Gaza right now. I am a good listener. I can entertain.
I’m a fast reader and a quick learner, so I could study up on any topic that my small post-apocalyptic community needs to learn about. I’m also hyper-verbal, with a real talent for helping people understand one another when communication breaks down. My cooking skills are acceptable. I can run an anxious dog absolutely ragged playing fetch. I know how to sew a stitch. I know how to get blood out of clothes.
It’s easy for individualistic, capitalist society to convince us we’d be “useless” in a societal collapse. And it’s true that most of us could not make it on our own. But the whole of history teaches that will not have to — because humans have always been social beings who crave company and take care of one another. If the government falls we won’t each be hiding up in crow’s nests, armed to the teeth with guns. We’ll be out in the courtyard together, drying our laundry, bitching about the stale corn muffins we had for breakfast, and trying to find some way to pass the time.
Humans come together as a matter of course, and we all have something to contribute to that great joining. Even the act of requesting help is a gift that binds people to another — and so we remain essential to society, even in our illness, weakness, and disability:
What help would I ask for?
If we are looking to create a more interdependent world, one of the kindest things that we can do is ask other people for help.
Capitalism and colonialism thrive on the separation of individuals; behind the walls of our private residences we hoard our wealth and cry our tears, with no one around to disrupt our peace or mop our sorrow up. Without lasting networks of care, we become reliant upon paid therapists, Uber drivers, Grubhub deliverers, Amazon Prime shipments, and TikTok personalities we’ll never meet. Needing to spend so much money in order to remain “independent,” we cling to what resources we have all the more.
But to escape our oppressive loneliness, we have to tear our walls down and invite other people in. That doesn’t just mean giving freely of what we have — it means making requests, revealing our weakness, and bravely turning toward others so that their need to be needed gets fulfilled, too.
This is an aspect of community building that I grapple with a lot. Like a lot of white Midwestern people, I grew up being taught to paper over all unpleasant feelings, and to never lose face by being messy in public. I felt shame about ever crying in front of others, or failing to find the positive side to things. At home, being an entertaining pet and therapist had been my role. Years in liberal academia added an additional hang-up: I couldn’t voice my suffering, because I was so incredibly “privileged.” Both sets of norms prevented me from reaching out to others and finding common ground.
It has been a lifelong project to unlearn these norms and begin seeking help. This past weekend, I was on my back porch with my friend Madeline until three in the morning, watching the rain and talking about our lives. I was pushed in that moment really lay myself bare.
Madeline had just finished telling me about what I perceived to be “real” problems in her life: physical illness, the lingering effects of loss and trauma. At first I felt that I couldn’t complain about my biggest concern these days — the hundreds of thousands of people who have read my work, recognize me on the street, look up to me, and expect guidance from me. I’m afraid to go out in public sometimes, because I don’t want to be the public figure that “Author Devon Price” has become. But that all feels so conceited to say.
After tip-toeing around the topic for a bit, Madeline looked at me and said she worried about me sometimes. She reminded me that I didn’t have to save everyone, and that my needs did matter, too. And she shared that she wanted to be able to help me, as I’d tried to help her and many other people. I realized that in not opening up to her, I was denying her access to a core part of myself that she’d been asking to know. That was when my tears started flowing.
“Sometimes I just want this all to stop!” I cried out. “I want to delete all my accounts and just disappear. I feel pulled in so many directions. I can’t be what everyone needs me to be.”
It’s not that I wanted to stop writing, or cease caring for others. I just wanted everything that mattered to me to stop being a commodity the world fed upon. I wanted a way out of capitalism. I wanted the product “Devon Price” to stop being sold and the small, real me to be enough.
I felt so much closer to Madeline after sharing my biggest fears with her. She expressed to me that she understood how many demands were always being placed upon me, and that she’d never once resented me for not being able to give more. It was clear that she’d been wanting to be there for me on a deeper level for quite some time, and that my attempts to remain strong had only denied us both that potential connection. I was immediately grateful that we’d finally broached that gap.
As a disabled person, I have known for a long time that my productive capacity comes with a limit. It’s hard for me to absorb the pain of all the people who open their hearts up to me; it’s hard to break free from my daydreams and screw a polite look on my face. Politically, I have always believed in communal living, but the prospect of it seems asphyxiating: after having friends over, I need to spend a day in bed. I love my door, I love my locks, and I love my individualistic privacy.
It is slowly dawning on me that my needs are just as legitimate as anyone’s, and that after the downfall of capitalism, I could still tell people that I need time to be alone. I could beat my temples with both fists in frustration and it wouldn’t be some shameful losing of face. I would no longer have to be professional, no longer have to separate the meaningful work that I do from my dysfunctional personal life. The people that care for me would be the same ones that need me, and all our weaknesses would be the center around which life revolved.
The world after capitalism will not be a warzone. It will be a long, vulnerable night on the porch with your friends.
The world has already ended hundreds of times. Every empire falls eventually, and every society changes. And when an empire has wrought as much evil upon the planet as America has done, we can welcome its collapse with a sense of possibility and relief rather than scrambling to reform it, or begging its genocidal leaders to take care of us. They have never taken care of us. They have always prevented us from taking better care of each other.
We don’t need better health insurance. We need clinics anyone can enter at any time, with no documentation needed and no questions asked. We don’t need a lower interest rate; we need to stop making people pay for food. We don’t need a Black chief of the police, a better AI-operated drone, or a lesbian for President; we need no more cops, no more military, and no more Presidents.
In the empire’s absence, each one of us will step up to become the teachers, parents, mentors, caregivers, wise elders, joke-cracking friends, protectors, and companions that we’ve always needed. We will also get to be the sobbing children, jilted lovers, and chronically sick and weary bodies that we’ve had to hide from the rest of the world.
We have the answers. We get to decide what comes next. And we will continue knowing how to care for one another long after the world as we know it has gone.
If you would like to donate to Seraj’s survival and mutual aid projects, you can do so here. If you would like to find another Palestinian family to fundraise for, my friend Sky has a long list of vetted fundraising campaigns to choose from here.
I’d say this is pretty much the definitive article on anarchist collapse-optimism. It’s got Graeber. It’s got Solnit. It’s got Neurodivergence as a form of being well-adapted to the better world being born, rather than a form of being maladapted to the profoundly sick world currently dying.
I still have to read Jem Bendell’s Breaking Together, but (at least) until I do, I think you’ve nailed the most optimistic vision for collapsing gracefully that I can imagine. It’s very much what lives in my heart as well.
The apocalypse-as-war-zone is a fable told by these systems to make sure we keep upholding them, a fable that teaches us life without the systems would be worse than life with them. Because otherwise, we would never tolerate them.