#discursive

This is a practice one i've written:

Humans are social creatures. We evolved to form groups in order to feel Safe, Supported, Connected. So what happens when we start to draw lines? “You can’t do that, you’re not allowed” What happens when we start to disconnect and separate? “We don't want you here” Humans are inherently bad at estimating. Therefore we underestimate just how deep those lines cut when we draw them, how they outline one’s sense of self. Their worth. Their self-esteem. Their humanity.

But what does being human even mean? To me, it's having autonomy, deciding your life and how you live it for yourself instead of letting those lines outline where you go. It's about pushing the boundaries of these lines and exploring how much you can flourish once you cross them.

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.”

Is a quote by Charlotte Bronte from her novel, Jane Eyre, 1847, she perfectly encapsulates what it means to be human in my eyes. The main character, Jane, lives in England during the Georgian Era as a woman. Historically, women have always been oppressed, restrained by the lines that drew women as wives and homemakers; nothing else. Jane, living in the Georgian Era, opposes these lines, the lines that Exclude. The lines that exclude women from basic human rights like education, freedom and an identity.

Twelve-year-old me poured over this book; unaware of how much it would build how I understand humanity at seventeen.

Exclusion strips an individual of their humanity. Their right to be comfortable in their own skin, to live according to what they want.

So why as humans, do we deprive other humans of their right to be human?

Jane contests the exclusion of women of agency, refusing to be seen as anything other than equal as men. Although Bronte wrote this novel criticizing the gender exclusion imprinted into the Georgian Era, it remains a relevant commentary today on not only gender, but; Race exclusion. Religion exclusion. Age exclusion. Pauline Hanson is a senator whose political stance is centred on exclusion and national conformity. Drawing lines between the “average Australian” and the “others,” depriving the “others” of their right to be a human.

But lines aren’t merely drawn with ink. They're drawn with speeches. In language. In policy. Policies that reject and exclude those who aren’t “ordinary” who aren’t “average.” But these lines can only draw so far; we’re all so vastly different from each other, so spread out on the spectrum on what it’s like to be a human. So different that it blurs the lines.

Removes control and growth.

But stories? They have always been political. Not because they’re crude; because they reveal. They insist on showing humanity as it is. If we placed Jane Eyre into the hands of those who construct belonging narrowly, like Pauline Hanson, it would be an invitation.

An invitation to realise when we draw lines, no one remains unscathed.

Those driven out are told they are less than human.

Those who draw them restrict their world to a place barren, dry of empathy and connection.

“Rewinding the Past, Pausing the Present”

There’s a box in my room, hidden in the back of my wardrobe. It’s not special to anyone else, just stuffed with paper scraps and polaroids and birthday cards I never threw out. But sometimes, when the world feels too loud or the future too uncertain, I open that box and sift through the pieces like they’re relics. It’s my time machine—cheap, chaotic, and oddly comforting.

Nostalgia’s like that. A comfort. A soft landing. For me, it’s the feeling of biting into a Milo ice cream on a 32-degree January afternoon. It’s hearing “Lush Life” by Zara Larson and being seven again, dancing barefoot on the verandah with Mum. It’s those primary school notebooks filled with bad cursive and overly enthusiastic exclamation marks. Nostalgia wraps around me like the hoodie I stole from my older brother—too big, too worn, but warm all the same.

But lately, I’ve been wondering: what if that warmth is a bit deceptive?

We’re told that looking back is sweet, even wise. That remembering “the good old days” helps us appreciate the present. And sometimes, it does. But I’ve started noticing how easily nostalgia can become a trapdoor—one that opens beneath you when life gets too complicated, dropping you into a version of the past that’s rosier than it actually was.

I’ve seen it in my own family. My dad still tells stories about how great Australia was when he moved here as a kid. It’s not just about the beaches or meat pies; it’s about a version of life that he’s convinced was simpler, better, purer. But was it? Or is he just editing out the messy bits?

Even I’ve caught myself editing.

I remember Year 7 as a blur of bubble tea and lunchtime gossip, but I’ve somehow managed to forget the panic of trying to find someone to sit with on the first day. I remember sleepovers with my best friend, but conveniently forget the argument that ended our friendship in Year 11. Nostalgia isn’t memory. It’s memory with makeup on.

And sometimes, it stops us from moving forward.

I know people my age who say things like “I wish I could go back to primary school” or “life was so much better before COVID.” And sure, I get it. Life did feel simpler when the worst thing was forgetting your library book. But we can’t rewind. 

I reckon there’s a tension in nostalgia. On one hand, it helps us make sense of who we are. On the other, it can freeze us in a moment that doesn’t exist anymore. It’s like looking at an old photo and refusing to acknowledge that the person in it has grown up.

Music gets this, like in Lorde’s Ribs, there’s that lyric: “It feels so scary getting old.” It’s haunting, right? Like we’re already mourning moments while we’re still in them. Nostalgia can do that. It pulls us out of the present before we’ve had the chance to live in it.

So where does that leave me?

I still open the box. I still flick through the old birthday cards. I still listen to songs that remind me of last summer and cry when I hear my Year 6 graduation song. But I also try to remind myself that I’m not meant to stay there. That nostalgia is a visitor, not a roommate.

Maybe it’s about balance.

Maybe nostalgia is a gift—so long as we don’t let it become an anchor. Maybe it’s okay to remember the smell of your Year 3 classroom and the way your mum used to braid your hair before school, so long as you don’t spend so much time looking back that you forget to see what’s in front of you.

Because the future is coming, whether we’re ready or not. And if we spend all our time rewinding, we’ll never get to hit play.

I announce it to the class like some foul beast that lurks in the peeling paint on our classroom rafters. Feet shuffle. Eyes avert. But I still start my usual spiel.

The discursive essay is the best type of writing that I will be allowed to teach you during the entire HSC. But, I won’t give you a scaffold. I won’t give you letters like PEEL or PETAL or TEEL to clutch like a life-raft. Instead I will give you freedom.

Sure, you’ll have a prompt. But you can interpret it any way that you want. You can use any techniques. You can discuss anything that interests you. You can have an entire paragraph made up of rhetorical questions and still get a band 6. (Trust me, I’ve seen it)

You can write imaginatively, add in some poetry. Experiment with spacing. Use your punctuation for effect. If you want to write about anxiety (or maybe you’re just overthinking it. Again) you certainly can.

It’s your opportunity to throw away the rules and use your voice. Make allusions to the things you know. The things you care about. Link them to your studies. Make me want to keep reading.

Were Machiavelli’s observations of Florentine society and politics decidedly Lady Whistledown’ish. Maybe you want to see if your reader can decipher the difference between a Taylor Swift lyric and a Shakespeare quote.

Make links between your texts and current events. Maybe it is stupid that you sit in a classroom while the person next to you complains that we have no air conditioning so they won’t do their work, but children are being bombed in Gaza and their schools are now empty mouths in the ground and empty mouths not being fed because of the blockade.

Maybe we taught you too well to follow the rules.

To use your scaffolds.

To tie together your five paragraph essays with overly crafted thesis statements.

To use connectives for your ideas

To analyse the techniques.

To repeat what you’ve been taught.

So much that freedom feels overwhelming. It feels dangerous. This unknown text-type that lurks in the shadows and does not get the love it deserves.

But,

Once you start looking. It’s everywhere. It’s the opinion editorial, it’s the recent personal essay written by Lizzo and published on Tumblr (Go read it, it’s fantastic), it’s blog posts, and travel guides and anywhere that someone is sharing their ideas and their story however they want without trying to persuade you.

One of the best pieces of writing advice I’ve received is to write dialogue as if the characters ‘under no circumstances can say what they actually mean.’ Not only did this create tension, depth and complexity in the writing, but made it feel more human. The interactions were less written and more spoken. Naturalistic.

I realised this is because that dialogue technique reflects the way people speak to each other. No one ever says what they mean. Even the most honest, frank, blunt person you can think of is still not telling you the whole truth. Everything we say comes with implications, requires further thought, analysis, introspection. Speech is a fragment of our stream of consciousness––a simple stanza from a much larger, more complicated poem. And it is always filtered by fear and love respectively (or sometimes at the same time, fear of love itself, or of losing it).

I often say, “I wish I could say this better,’ when what I mean is, ‘I wish I could express my emotions in their raw form, in a way you would understand perfectly, and I wouldn’t have to explain myself.’ But this is impossible because the interpretation of our words differs from ear to ear, and this is why miscommunication occurs. Because no one says what they mean, everything is open to change.

To me, giving a compliment like “your hair looks nice today,” could mean anything from, “I haven’t seen you in a long time and I want to say something kind, because you are kind,” to “you are the most beautiful person I have ever seen.” And between those extremes, there is a spectrum of emotion that the individual receiving the compliment can reach into and pick out at random. Either completely missing the point or seeing right through me. I think, a perfect match comes along when you can read between the lines of each other’s words––but this, of course, is also a skill that can be learned by knowing a person. Most people are not prodigies.

We read between the lines with body language, facial expression, intonation––the silent truths our body provides, because it is also listening to our thoughts.

But my favourite way to properly express your truth is to use someone else’s words entirely––not plagiarism but direct citations. Authors, poets, lyricists are practiced in manipulating words to explain universal experiences. By recommending someone a book, or a song that spoke to you, you are transferring those emotions to them, giving that individual a message you may not have been fully aware of sending.

And that is why we need writers, and writing. Without them, we can’t understand ourselves, because we are always lying. We need to catch out someone else’s tells, feel their skipping pulse. Know what makes a liar, and read between the lines.

I once wrote this:

I wish life was as simple as the blueprint made it out to be But the design is flawed It never accounted for human error–– Love, fear, and some.

Title: Discursive

Author: lucyoppa for  forkadionly

Pairing: kyungsoo/kai

Rating: nc-17

Genre: romance, writer!au, fluff, smut

Length: one-shot (12.2k)

Description: Working with Kyungsoo presents a very specific set of challenges that Jongin’s not too sure he’s well enough equipped to deal with.

“Il non-essere, il senza-nome, indica la consapevolezza priva di passioni, di sforzi e di forma. L’essere, ciò che ha nome, indica l’attività intellettuale discorsiva” Frammenti di Tao “Not-being, the nameless, indicates awareness devoid of passion, effort, and form. Being, that which has a name, indicates discursive intellectual activity.” Fragments of Tao

Young people have a tendency to fall prey to trends, adverts and fads, and often thrust their money into chasing new material joys they find off their Instagram “explore” pages. With the rise of Social Media, and the prevalence of young people on it, it has become more than easy for attractive young adults to show off their pricey possessions to teenagers watching from behind small screens. In an age where social media entangles itself in our everyday lives, does it serve as more of a bane or a boon? I personally feel it is a polite mix of both.

Money makes the world go round, and in the world of trade, social media is one of the best marketplaces out there. When the whole of the world pools together to form a segregated online space, it becomes far too easy to find someone who’s interested in something you’re selling. This acts as a massive advantage to businesses, allowing them to market their products free of charge, to people with real interest in buying them. For businesses with heftier budgets, turning to the more influential of the online bunch, whose eager followers are often more than willing to spend, usually promises high returns. So for businesses, Social media is surely a boon.

Everyone wants their 15 minutes of fame. Seeing the lives the rich and famous enjoy, many wish for a chance to live in the spotlight. Social media can bring one to the public eye, but those who reach often lament about the scrutiny they face. When one’s fame is online, it’s often that they will receive bouts of harassment, even if they far from deserve it. Take celebrities like Charli D’Amelio, who rose to fame at the young age of 15, for example. By the time she was 16, she was receiving threats from the online public, claiming she did not deserve her fame, comparing her to her sister, and pointing out the smallest of her shortcomings. A life in the limelight can be thrilling and enticing, but it can also be detrimental to ones mental health. As such, social media can easily bring harm to those who put themselves at the front of it.

That’s not to say that influencers are always right. More often than not, the most well received online personalities plant toxic standards in the minds of viewers and fans. Be it girls with small waists and hourglass figures, or men with broad shoulders and long legs, social media builds an image of the “perfect” body. As time passes, this ideal shape begins to pop up more and more, and evolves into an expectation. This leads to the popularisation of crash diets, bouts of self-hatred, and an increase in eating disorders amongst young people. These unhealthy practices are detrimental to the health of those who fall into their clutches, and affect the growth and development of today’s teens. As such, the unrealistic expectations evolved from social media culture can easily turn social media’s presence into a bane.

Social media allows us to catch up with others, and in some cases, live vicariously through them. It doesn’t matter whether an old friend is an hour or a hundred miles away, social media makes it easy to close the gap. On social media, you can find out what someone has been doing the past month, what someone is looking forward to celebrating in the next few days, or whether someone has just welcomed a child into the family, all in a couple of taps. Along with social media comes the ease of connecting with others, through a platform that requires little to no effort. In this way, social media serves as a boon, giving us the opportunity to come together virtually, no matter how far away we may physically be.

Social Media has clearly proved to be a double edged sword. Despite how it has brought undeniable benefit to our society by shedding light on pressing issues that might not have surfaced otherwise, it has also brought about unrealistic expectations and envy amongst the online community. Many question the ethicality of businesses cashing in on insecurities brought about through social media, and it seems social media is only beneficial to some and greatly detrimental to others. The reality is, nothing can truly be flawless, as consumers of social media, we should be mindful of what we choose to consume. Only then can social media serve as a benefit to us.