I was raised in a patriarchy where
not only did the richest, whitest, men
write the laws in their own interest and gain,
but whether men were rich or poor
-by law, they owned everything.
As heads of families, men rarely stopped
when they realised they were being shouty.
But when they stopped to rephrase their demands
at a lower volume that still meant that when
others said 'No' to them, the men behaved as if
'No' meant 'Yes', and 'Yes' meant 'Yes Master.'.
Shows of obedience hid in plain sight
how much acting out being cowed
both depressed those who made them
whilst making engineered consent 'work'.
Those who were ordered so
might as well have been automata
in some patriarchal fantasy family life,
for the difference their sense of choice gave them.
As we enter another age where machine-think
feeds authoritarian politics, and billionaires
led fantasy lives where reality meant 'more money',
more praise, more power, and the final detachment
I see the return of ''No' means 'Yes'' thinking
in a world George Orwell once defined
by the right to assert 2+2=4. It now seems
as if the new freedom is the slavery to arithmetic.
Be affirmative, and make 'No' mean 'No' again.
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