What Doesn't Kill You

Makes you ugly...

🎶cause this is

this is who we are

it’s our reality

it’s our reality now🎶

Hello again netizens! I have a few words about several things again. I heard you guys are backing out of surrogacy deals by saying you want the child you got paid to carry or you just tell lies until the intending parents come for delivery and there’s no child… what cruel pricks you are!

Between being forced to tolerate a narcissistic POS or watching a male-identified woman ruin a chance to fight the patriarchy I’m less than appointed. In whom? You might ask but we are together 4 days a week and I haven’t enjoyed much of that. It’s so inconvenient. Like slaves who love their chains, the average Nigerian maintains a love-hate relationship with the country’s shortcomings and despite knowing what needs to change we sit in the chaos too anxious to ruffle feathers because God forbid you’re the first to complain or the only one complaining.

There used to be a time when well-meaning young men would blockade a corrupt administrator’s office and organise similar protests across the region demanding a change but I wonder if they were asking for ‘better’ - it doesn’t seem likely. Not with the massive erosion of fundamental rights happening with reckless abandon today. Almost like the UN Assembly of world leaders (more like world looters) sat in a room and asked how badly they could fuck shit up then the jocks amongst them said “here’s what, we could do acid and systematically take their rights away from them” the nerds with the most to prove said “actually, that won’t be the worst thing so I agree” and the rest went with it because original thought almost always moves in paces they could never keep up with. Tell me why we’re in big 2025 and basement dwellers in charge of media keep building tools to objectify the most vulnerable amongst us and the rest of us live with the consequences of their loveless childhoods?

A Telegram group of 70,000 men got busted late last year for hate speech and conspiracy against women’s safety. A number of TikTokers called it out but it never made mainstream news. Perhaps the perpetrators are familiar figures and the outrage has no place in a media consciousness controlled by their brothers. I guess it’s more fun to feign outrage every month than admit that something is broken. Anyway, as you were.

Now this is for the girls and the girls alone, stop breaking and cracking in the name of sacrifice and keeping the peace. Read that again slowly or you’re going to be called ugly for that sacrifice. I let my music play on shuffle the other day and stumbled on some old music I hadn’t listened to for a while, one of the songs from a band inspired the blog’s title and you just know I had to listen to the same albums in rotation until the words stuck. I know the common refrain to what doesn’t kill you but I also agree with the artiste’s take, if you keep having near-death experiences, you will get ugly on the inside. With each situation that threatens your life, you lose trust in people therefore your idea of community is warped. You resent yourself for being in such situations so now you’re more critical, the world is already so unkind to you, why do you join them in the bashing? A situation that doesn’t serve you will not change because of your long-suffering, it might if you got angrier, if you had better boundaries or simply let shit go! (more like break).

And for the boys, stop sitting in shit and acting like it don’t stink. I know your crusty ass is red with hives watching your mates parrot disturbing narratives about masculinity online. Well because of choice you might also enjoy the stink, after all you’re still the prize. Remember, a prize holds its value due to competition if the participants give up then you’re just a shiny cup. Do the difficult work of being better in your daily lives, speak up in the face of prejudice, make that lady’s life easier by not being weird, question your values and why you hold them from time to time. The world is still largely run by you, imagine how much better it would be if you just commit to kindness as a way of life?

Things I Enjoyed…

• Doom scrolling on TikTok

• Break my Face by AJR

• Situation by Àṣá

• Dubai Bling on Netflix

• The best chicken salad I ever had (homemade by my colleague)

• Accepting the reality that I outgrew butterflies as an indicator of affectionate feelings.

• Selecting new books for my reading list this year

I want to be more consistent with this blog so please share and critic it when you get a chance.

Yours rantingly,

GC