Against Everything: an Anti-Paean to the Isms

I was young, impressionable, desirous of being a good human.

The socialists came first,

Globalisation is neo-imperialism they said, don’t you want equity in society?

I did, so I became a socialist.

A few years later it was the capitalists,

Don’t you want freedom for enterprise, do you like top-down authority?

Yes and no, I said. I was then a capitalist.

Then it was the atheists, echoing everything I felt,

Are you one of us, they asked? Yes, I heartily said- no contest.

A few more years, and it was the feminists’ turn,

Do you not care for equality between the sexes? Should women not have equal rights?

I do! They should! So I must be a feminist.

The years went by and the isms grew,

I know not when the days changed and it came to this.

You dislike Che Guevera? You love Elon Musk?

The socialists were incredulous. You’re not one of us, they said.

You want a more equitable distribution of wealth and access to resources?

That’s theft, claimed the capitalists, going on to disown me.

You say you’re spiritual, is it?

You woo-woo believer, you’re no atheist- they said to me.

Men and women are differently endowed by nature?

How dare you say so, you chauvinist- and so I was feminist no more.

Each recruited me, each demonized me- and yet I remain the same.

There are more isms still, both to recruit and abandon.

There are people ready at the edge, with labels in hand.

One word, one tweet, one opinion- and they’ll stamp you before you know it.

Their questions are alive, seeded to you through everything you consume.

You are this or that, with us or against us. You are a liberal or a nazi.

There is no middle ground, the war-mongers will tell you.

But I’m older, less impressionable.

I still want to be a good human being.

These isms, I tell you, help me not.

Do they help you?