Bogdan Raczynski interviews Bogdan Raczynski

The ember for this 2.5/5 star word buffet is the way in which art is entangled with politics, capitalism, stupid, (in)justice, and its responsibility in addressing these issues.

This is incredibly embarrassing to write, a collection of self-inflicted humiliations, like singing on a packed subway train, in your undies; everyone can see your neglect.

But, I hope it might provide some balm to others that are having similar internal dialogues – how can I make a living while still being creative and honest without hastening my own moral and physical demise while still being an ally of Team Good and minimizing the climate chaos spiral.

Tough as it is to acknowledge, we are all responsible for the situation we’re in. It’s insufficient to blame it on a few people, governments, and CEO’s. We know that all of our systems would crumble if we stopped supporting them.

We are doomed if we cannot at least be painfully honest.

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Does anybody still read?

It’s not that there isn’t anything new to say, clearly there isn’t. All we’re doing is freshening things up for a newer generation; cooler slang, edgier analogies, a hipper platform.

No, the question is whether there’s any point in writing any more.

It’s not that I question the value of the word, obviously words mean nothing. They are stones, dead, useless. We, the reader, give them purpose, not by READING them but by doing something WITH them.

No, I question whether there’s any value in the reader.

Yes, you.

If someone shares something with you, but you do nothing with it then you have nullified the meaning of those words.

If we do this often enough and to enough people, then slowly, the meaning bleeds out.

This is what we have been witnessing and grappling with, the loss of meaning.

Artists are the canary in the coal mine.

We entrust them with telling us the truth, the kind that kids know of before they learn about the world of lying. We let artists in to paint our lives and soundtrack our summers and heal our heartbreak more intimately than we allow even ourselves.

There is no greater betrayal than when they, too, have fallen silent.

Bogdan: Hey?
Bogdan: oh fuck, not you again.

Bogdan: what’s up?
Bogdan: Jesus, I’m just trying to get some work done, my taxes are overdue and I’ve got 12 other things I’m rotating between forgetting about while five other mental notifications ding in and out just long enough for me to feel guilty enough that I’m forced to do something. What do you want this time?

Bogdan: have you see that clip of that artist running off the stage in a hissy fit over being called out for being on Team Evil?
Bogdan: you don’t even have the courage to call them out by name?

Bogdan: not really, do you?
Bogdan: no, I’m a fucking coward. But I think in this instance there is more power in being vague. Otherwise, we allow ourselves to think that these are isolated incidents, a few bad apples. But what about the comedians and actors or that boring-ass guy who does those mind numbingly long music gear breakdowns and also happens to be a vocal supporter of mass murder on a genocidal scale?

Bogdan: oh fuck, I could never get into those videos, reminds me of Uni.
Bogdan: well, not everyone’s an idiot like you with the attention span of a dead frog.

Anyway, by NOT being specific, instead of thinking about a few particular people and incidents, readers are left to wonder about all of the others.

Plus, who the fuck am I? It’s taken me 10 years to get 14,162 followers on Instagram and 2539 on Youtube; nobody gives a fuck what I have to say. My biggest achievement is a quote from the Effects Bin saying that I’m “underrated” for some shit I did 25 years ago.

Bogdan: so only people with an ample enough platform should speak up about wrongs? Aren’t you being hypocritical?
Bogdan: shit, fair point… but what are my true intentions? Do I genuinely intend to have an impact or simply virtue-signal from the comfort of my phone? And what about all the other fuckers that’ve been silent or vocally on the side of evil?

Bogdan: well?
Bogdan: well, it’s pathetic, yeah, but aren’t we all? The rest of us think ourselves to be so supreme because we’re aware, yet we sit on our asses doing what… furiously liking and reposting and occasionally meeting up with others to walk down the street and shout at the fucking sky?

Bogdan: so you’re just going to be complicit and not do your part to call that shit out?
Bogdan: fuck, man, idk what the fuck to do.

Bogdan: maybe start with calling out the shit you see in your sphere?

Bogdan: everyone’s afraid to stick their neck out. It’s complicated. We’ve got mortgages and kids and we’re all drowning in debt.

Bogdan: tell that to those being mass murdered or starved or ethnically cleansed or “re-educated” in internment camps or the five year olds digging for rare minerals.

Bogdan: I know, it’s fucked up. Is there an ethical and responsible way to live and work and be creative during this time?
Bogdan: no.

Bogdan: Fuck, so what do I do?
Bogdan: well, for starters we amplify the news sharers and boycott the living fuck out of the complicit corporations.

Bogdan: I’m sure Google and Amazon and Coca Cola and Apple are losing sleep over your armchair activism.
Bogdan: BDS fucking works! What else do you suggest?

Bogdan: There’s no silver bullet. Like I said, start with your own neighbourhood. Why are we avoiding the elephant in the room?
Bogdan: ugh, it’s so difficult. We’ve entrusted the makers and poets and musicians with our hearts and minds and now they’re either silent or cowering behind “it’s-complicated.”

Bogdan: how do we go back to listening and watching and reading the works of these people and institutions…
Bogdan: knowing that (not so) deep down they’re pieces of shit?

Bogdan: yeah, but don’t get fucking high and mighty. What the fuck are you doing?
Bogdan: I know, that’s also why it’s hard to call shit out; how am I any less complicit?

Bogdan: don’t make excuses you coward.
Bogdan: I’m not doing enough, but amplifying and boycotting is better than nothing. And even nothing is better than saying “it’s complicated” or saying that art and politics don’t belong in the same sentence.

Bogdan: That last one drives me fucking insane.
Bogdan: right? Politics is not something you do, it’s something you ARE.

Bogdan: oh, good one, use that.
Bogdan: done.

Bogdan: does that mean that a person’s inaction and/or views can be so bad that we should consider the entirety of their works to be tainted? Poisoned? Empty?
Bogdan: I’m starting to think so. If your wellspring is not empathy then what the fuck is it?

Bogdan: and do you therefore lose all trust in that artist / institution?
Bogdan: yeah, I think it’s that simple.

Bogdan: baby and the bathwater?
Bogdan: fuck it, throw out the goddamned bathtub while you’re at it; the whole fucking system is rotten.

Bogdan: you mean like the one you’re taking part in?
Bogdan: yeah, I know, I’m also neck deep in complicity in this horrible system that pledges allegiance to capitalism and enriching the illionaires. The music industry is no less a part of that.

Bogdan: so you can’t really say you’re doing everything in your power to stop this, can you?
Bogdan: no, I can’t. I can’t avoid the reality that I am benefiting from this horrible system. It is enabling me to sustain myself financially and therefore my family and my creative soul.

Bogdan: that’s fucked up.
Bogdan: we’re doomed.

Bogdan: how do you address the hypocrisy? You’re calling out the system while you sit in the system? Isn’t this some reverse Stockholm syndrome type shit?
Bogdan: yes, I am being a hypocrite. I haven’t figured it all out. I am still profiting from these horrible platforms, whether materially or through reach. But you know what, I don’t need to have the answers in order to ask questions and point fingers. I think this reflexive demand for answers is bullshit. That’s why we’re having a conversation. And please, call me the fuck out! Let’s all call each other out.

Bogdan: dude, how is this a conversation, you’re literally talking to yourself.
Bogdan: whatever, stop interrupting. Why the fuck are we regular folk expected to have the answers? Isn’t that precisely why we have governments and leaders and scientists and experts and all of these international institutions? Aren’t they all supposed to be looking out for us?

Bogdan: so how does burning bridges by calling out people and platform by name help anyone?
Bogdan: because what we need now more than ever is not love, we don’t need more conversations, we don’t need understanding or peace, and we certainly don’t need both sides of the story or respect. What we fucking need now is truth.

Bogdan: you mean the kind of truth where people call you out for being a hypocrite and inconsistent and whiny and partaking in and benefiting from these systems you’re taking shots at?
Bogdan: Jesus, I get it. It’s scary as fuck. As it stands my career is running solely on fumes.

Bogdan: shouldn’t you just keep your head down and play along until you’ve gotten some clout so your words have more meaning?
Bogdan: fuck that, speak now or STFU.

Bogdan: jesus, why do you always have to be so fucking dramatic?
Bogdan: why are more people not more dramatic?

Bogdan: you want everybody to be embarrassing themselves? Do we really need more of your high school art class quality videos of people draping themselves with audio cables?
Bogdan: don’t patronise me. The high schoolers are going to inherit this fucking perpetual fiasco of a world, show some respect. And we’ve been back and forth on this, the cable shit was embarrassing but how can you expect truth if you’re not giving truth? Humility is beautiful, it’s embarrassing and it’s painful but when I say that truth is what we need I mean even when it’s embarrassing and painful.

Bogdan: idk, you raise some decent points, but overall you sound pretty fucking unhinged and self serving. Brolords talking about aliens inventing smartphones sound more grounded.
Bogdan: backwards; if I was unhinged I’d give up, go back to doomscrolling viral cheese recipes and dance crazes and bury deep all those videos of mass murders and ethnic cleansing and internment camps and 5 year olds getting buried in mines as they’re looking for parts for our next phone.

Bogdan: what’re you saying?
Bogdan: I’m saying that all of us “unhinged” ones flailing desperately and naively and uncomfortably and insufficiently are actually the optimistic ones. If we didn’t have hope or didn’t expect better then we’d STFU and be “normal.”

Bogdan: what does all of this have to do with creativity anyway?
Bogdan: what the fuck does it NOT have to do with creativity? What is creativity without honesty or empathy? What is life without empathy?

Bogdan: capitalism?
Bogdan: I’m no longer sure that capitalism is the problem. Just like I don’t think a few specific artists are the problem or that a few specific leaders are the problem. The only reason these people have power is because we give it to them. Maybe the problem isn’t capitalism but people? The “West”? Our ideals? The history we teach our young ones? I don’t fucking know, but what is crystal clear is that the “smart” ones are sure as fuck not going to toss us a vine to get us out of this quicksand.

Bogdan: sounds like you’re making excuses again so you don’t have to make the hard choices and do the hard work. That armchair must be really comfortable, eh?
Bogdan: don’t act so fucking superior, asshole. You fucking are me.

Bogdan: ugh, don’t remind me. We’ve spent 2000 words to get right back to where we started, aka fucking nowhere.
Bogdan: enough of the fucking words already.

You’re Only Young Once But You Can Be Stupid Forever is out now.

All the links are here