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The Virtue of Romanticism

The Virtue of Romanticism

By Punkerslut

Romanticism: An artistic and intellectual movement originating
in Europe in the late 18th century and characterized by a
heightened interest in nature, emphasis on the individual's
expression of emotion and imagination, departure from the
attitudes and forms of classicism, and rebellion against
established social rules and conventions.

-- Dictionary.com

I remember once seeing a small child at a bus terminal, covered
in a blanket and carrying a piece of luggage that was close to
her size. I looked again. I didn't know where she was going. I
didn't bother to ask. But there was something there that maybe a
painting could capture, maybe a song could express, that I saw.
And I looked again.

It is my sole contention in this piece, that the greatest value
of life can be derived from our emotions. To deny what the heart
truly seeks, whether it violates the principles of conventional
society or not, is to deny the liberty of happiness. I contend
that no man is free who cannot live with himself. A prison will
form around his spirit, as he seeks any means of understanding.
To truly live, one must be able to know who they are. Image,
whether it is age or gender, are unimportant in this aspect. The
important part of knowledge, of the wisdom of self, is not what
the world may see when they see you, but how you and your
intimate friends know about how you feel. And in our society,
there is so much inhibition, about recognizing our shame, our
guilt, our happiness, our fears. To speak that your words become
the expression of your soul has been turned into a weakness,
believed by the masses to be the epitome of a soft mind. If a
man were to find his happiness in a lover, in the secret smiles
of watching the movement of one who captures your dreams -- if a
man discovers his own peace in this world of ours, then what
true argument can we offer that it was not his own emotions that
granted him this most perfect truth? If a child is kept up at
night, to the hours of the morning, plagued with misery of
memories of abuse of cruelty, would it not be inhumane, to tell
him to ignore it -- to tell him to close his eyes to the
daemons, while they increase in size with every passing year?

And I contend this: that to truly live, one must be free with
their emotions; and by this, I mean that a person cannot hide
from what they feel, and true happiness is only accomplished
when they speak all worries and dreams with those they are close
to. It is a tragedy to think that billions of men have died on
this planet, before they could truly live.

I remember one night when I saw a California sunset. The orange
melded with the red, almost searing the sky into peace. I'm not
sure I ever saw anything so beautiful. And I am glad that I
spent that moment with those I consider to be my family. When
one thinks of family, they think of blood relatives, whom they
have to aid and harbor in times of distress, due to social
norms. When I think of family, I think of a group bound not by
blood, but by love, and when I aid or help a brother or sister
in their time of need, I do not do it out of an obligation I
think I am tied to -- I do it because they were a shoulder to
cry on, they were the first to stand up and speak when I was
accused of wrong doing. It didn't matter to them that it may
have been a massive army threatening me, just like it didn't
matter to me that I had to travel for three days straight so I
could see their faces.

Dreams keep me from forgetting how much I love them.

If a woman was asked who she was, and if she could not answer,
I would have a hard time believing that she was happy. If you
know that you truly love someone or something, there is always
an inhibition or a fear in telling others that you feel this way
-- but the greater part of our population has gone even further
in this, by having such a fear or inhibition in even telling
themselves. It is here that society turns our emotion into a
crime, turns our hearts into convicts. By knowing ourselves, our
wants and fears, perhaps our shame or guilt, our love and hate
-- by not only knowing, but understanding, the dreams and
nightmares of our soul, the dreaded possibilities that our minds
tumble over every night, the magnificent fantasies that make us
soar with a shy smile -- by understanding our emotions, we can
find an honest path to happiness. If we were to engage in an
activity, because it is expected and not because it is our wish,
it is a lie -- not only to our close allies, but also to the
greatest individual in our life: ourself. When we lie to
ourselves, so we can fulfill a social obligation, or a family
obligation, it detiorates our soul, it destroys the fundamentals
of happiness. Because in that sort of situation, another day is
another excuse for deceit, another confrontation or encounter is
another chance to hide the lies. A sincere person will find
distress in telling a lie to themself while keeping a clean
conscience. Whatever may be the effort that must be exerted in
portraying an image that society demands, it would take all the
effort in the world -- but it is the act of lying to yourself
that weighs heaviest on the soul. Romanticism is about knowing
and understanding the truth of your emotions.

There are so many expectations, so many things that we must do
to uphold our image. Society has already given us a schedule, a
uniform, and a routine. Failure to comply will make people not
trust you, and the idiocy of this is that this is how they
respond once you learned to trust yourself. The sort of
expectation that you are given can vary. Children are expected
to obey and love their parents. There can be hardly any doubt to
the origin of this rule: it was written by adults. Besides that,
children are naturally submissive and needing of parental
affection. There was little objection to this rule. But it
became harder to understand and accept the state of things, when
a child realizes that their parent is doing something wrong,
something cruel, merciless, and brutal. The only crime was
listening and judging for himself, and still the child will be
regarded as a failure of the family for having an alternative
opinion. But imagine if the child had complied with the demands
of the family and spoke lies, that he believed what the father
had done was right -- if they forced themselves to believe this
all their life, every day would be draped in the idea that it is
okay to lie to yourself, if it pleases another. Independence is
perhaps the greatest thing to have. To be deprived of it at such
an early age and for so long is a crime. Perhaps it is a lover
and their expectations of another lover, or perhaps it is a
friend and their expectations of another friend. Perhaps someone
is expected to be sexual because of a stereotype, such as their
gender, and perhaps someone is expected to be non-sexual for the
same reasons. If a person follows these expectations to fulfill
the image that others have thrown on them, they will never find
real happiness. They will find that their days are full of
deceit. Such a life is not a real... All that I ask of my
brothers, my sisters -- my comrades and my friends -- is that
they never deny how they feel, to themselves or those who they
trust; and I ask them this, for their own happiness. Their
suffering is my suffering. Their poverty is my poverty. And my
riches are their riches. Our love belongs to us.

When a lover apologizes to their significant other, when they
are not at fault, just to end the conflict so they can be back
in that blissful affection. They are lying to themselves and
their lover by giving in, but they are honest in one respect --
that they will do whatever it takes to satisfy the person that
means the most to them. I admit it. It may very well be true
that when a lover apologizes to end conflict, when he or she is
not at fault, such a relationship should most likely end anyway.

And when we think of our friends and our family, sometimes it
is hard to say how we feel, what our heart has told us for so
long. Because society keeps telling us that it is a source of
weakness, or a source of depravity. Let society think as it
shall. Social rules should never be a reason for a person to
condemn their lives to sorrow and pain. When I think of my
family, I think of the society of those who have touched my
heart, of the kinship I have formed, of the connection of our
minds. And I remember again...

Dreams keep me from forgetting how much I love them.

www.punkerslut.com

For Life, Punkerslu

About the Author

Punkerslut (or Andy Carloff) has been writing essays and poetry
on social issues which have caught his attention for several
years. His website www.punkerslut.com provides a complete list
of all of these writings. His life experience includes
homelessness, squating in New Orleans and LA, dropping out of
high school, getting expelled from college for "subversive
activities," and a myriad of other revolutionary actions.

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