I clicked on a link on twitter about a transsexual boy/girl.
That’s how he/she refers to him/herself so I’ll respect it.
But continued use of those pronouns could get unwieldy.
So I’ll use the name he/she uses instead.
Sam(antha), is seventeen years old and involved in an art project.
The idea for the art project is a photograph of a murder.
Obviously not an actual murder.
Sam(antha) will have to stage a murder and photograph it.
The idea is to lie in the street looking like someone who’s been pushed off a tall building.
Then a friend standing on top of the building, seven stories up, takes the photograph.
For the idea to work, people have to be walking by, ignoring the body.
Sam(antha) knows that no one cares about anyone else so people will just walk quickly past, and this will make a good photo.
People ignoring the body, just getting on with their own lives, no one caring about anyone else.
That’s how life is: no one cares about anyone else.
So Sam(antha) lies in the street.
The friend is on top of the building waiting to take the photo.
But what happens next ruins the project.
People keep stopping to check that Sam(antha) is okay.
They keep coming over to see if they should call an ambulance.
They don’t do what they’re supposed to do, which is walk by and ignore the dead or injured Sam(antha).
They keep coming across to see what they can do to help.
In fact, they won’t leave Sam(antha) alone on the floor.
And this has a strange effect.
On the one hand Sam(antha) is irritated, it’s spoiled the project.
But on the other hand it’s shown people actually care.
People care.
Sam(antha) can’t believe that.
Sam(antha) says he/she had thought of suicide thousands of times.
Deeply depressed because no one cared.
No one cared about anyone else, least of all Sam(antha).
So no one caring had become the background to Sam(antha)’s world.
Just part of the miserable condition of existence.
Now, what Sam(antha) finds is that people care more than he/she ever expected.
And Sam(antha) is wildly elated to discover this.
People keep stopping to see if Sam(antha) is alive and/or injured, does Sam(antha) need an ambulance, is there anything they can do?
And each time Sam(antha) has to explain that thank you but no, this is just an art project.
And this is the last thing Sam(antha) expected when the project began.
In fact so many people stop, Sam(antha) has to abandon the project.
And although the art project itself is a failure, something much bigger has happened.
Sam(antha) has discovered that people do care whether he/she lives or dies.
People care.
And that for Sam(antha) is a totally wonderful thing.
Sam(antha) writes the post out of an amazing wave of joy at being part of humanity.
Suddenly Sam(antha) has a sense of belonging.
And Sam(antha) forgets all about the art project, and thoughts of suicide, because now he/she has got something much better.
Sam(antha) now has a world to be part of.
“They are casting their problems at society. And, you know, there’s no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look after themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then, also, to look after our neighbours.”
Excellent John, I’m guessing that wasn’t Jeremy Corbyn?
🙂