YOU ARE A RAPIST

I know. You are probably wondering what the hell I am talking about. Allow me rant and let me explain myself;

If I visit a man at his house, I have consented to visiting him at his house. I have not consented to sex. If I love my boyfriend, I have consented to loving him. I have not consented to having sex with him simply because I love him. If I kiss him, I have consented to a kiss. Just a kiss. He cannot decide that because I said yes to one thing, I have automatically said yes to everything else.

We understand this. At least, we claim to.

Consent is specific. Consent has boundaries. Consent to one thing is not consent to everything. So why does this become so complicated when we talk about capitalism?

I got into the system because I needed to live. I went to school because I was supposed to. I got an education. I looked for a job. I got one. I entered the system without fully understanding how much of me it would eventually demand. And now, I'm crashing out as my knees and back hurt on a Thursday morning.

Nobody sat me down and said, “Welcome. You will now spend a significant portion of your life working so that you can afford to continue living, which will require you to keep working.” If they had, maybe I would have asked for a refund.

I agreed to work. I did not agree to give you my entire life. Let's be guided.

You agree to work from nine to five, and somehow, there is always that little expectation that you should still be available at 5:17. They still expect you to be up late working on a presentation for the next day. Do you people want to kill me?

You agree to do your job, and somehow, doing more becomes proof that you are hardworking. No, sir. No! If I do exactly what I was hired to do and refuse to take on all the extra work you keep piling onto my aching back, I am not lazy. We agreed to a kiss with no tongue, so why is Olumachi, who rides you, being awarded Employee of the Month? Which knee would I even use to give you cowgirl? You people just want to kill me.

You agree to a salary, and that salary immediately disappears into rent, food, data, transportation, electricity, healthcare (if you are privileged), and all the other things you need to remain alive enough to go back to work.

You give your labour. You receive your money. Then you give that money right back to the system for the things you need to survive. You wake up the next morning and go back to work so you can earn more money. You work so you can afford to live. You live so you can continue working.

We looked at this cycle and said, “Yes. This is fine.”

Who is “we”? I genuinely would like to speak to whoever approved this. Before you open your mouth to say, “But you chose to work”— yes, I did.

However, choice without context is a very convenient way to talk about freedom.

I can choose not to work. Wonderful. And then what? Do I stop paying rent? Do I tell hunger that I have exercised the right to make an independent economic decision?

Apparently, I am free to refuse employment, provided I am also free to accept the consequences of not being able to afford the basic necessities of life. Do we call that choice?

Capitalism has us trapped in a hamster's wheel, and many of us aren't even going to lose weight from all this running.

If a woman visits a man and he rapes her, we do not say, “Well, she chose to go to his house.”

If she loved him, we do not say, “Well, she chose to be his girlfriend, hence she chose sex.” If she kissed him, we do not say, “Well, she should have known what she was consenting to.”

Side note, if you do say all these things, congratulations, you are now a lawyer defending rape. AYTBJ.

We should understand that her participation in one thing does not give him permission to take everything else.

I agreed to work. I did not agree to be consumed.

This is the absurdity of working under capitalism. You work within the very system that profits from your labour. You spend your time producing things, providing services, creating value, solving problems, and making money for somebody else. Then, you receive just enough money to keep you alive so you can participate in the same economy that requires you to keep doing it.

It is almost beautiful. Beautiful in the same way it would be beautiful to get a woman married to her rapist simply because he raped her.

A very clever, thought-through, premeditated economic rape. Is there really no escape? How does one moan during this kind of economic rape? Has anyone found that loophole yet?

I'm 20, and my back already hurts. This is my cry for help. Help me.

With all my love,

Amarachi 🦄