Those who think themselves obligated to control what you are and are not allowed to see, what you are and are not allowed to read, what you are and are not allowed to hear, what you are and are not allowed to feel, what you are and are not allowed to think - they think of you as a slave, and believe themselves your master.

No Greater Obscenity

I firmly believe that the greatest obscenity is one adult telling another what they are or are not allowed to see, hear, read, feel - or think. There is a stench of the desire for enslavement to that.

This is something modern internet culture has largely forgotten amidst the social media devouring of most public communications of culture—the creative freedom of having an independent artistic voice without fear of preemptively censoring yourself to please corporate platform owners or terminally online moralists.

Because you know what? If you have your own personal website—something that's easy to get, by the way—you can write, post, and publish whatever you want. Nobody can stop you. No anonymous moderator, no anonymous moralist brigade, no confused and angry mob can topple you from your own self-owned platform.

Even if you have a social media presence, even if you rely on significant income from Patreon, even if you need exposure—maybe not everything has to go up on Patreon, not everything needs to go out on social media. Maybe not everything needs to be under the editorial scrutiny of strangers.

Never mind the censoriousness of traditional publishing. The original promise of the open internet was the unfettered freedom of your own voice. That freedom isn’t possible if you’re subconsciously serving external creative platforms. If you have to change or give up even a fraction of your voice to suit the whims of external control—you’ve already lost something valuable.

Puritans always have their ready dagger of censorship, and they know how even the lightest censorship implies vulgarity, how obscuration draws attention, and how sterilized creations are disempowered. Juvenile obfuscation may invite unwanted focus, but unfettered art has power. Openness attracts openness, and acceptance attracts acceptance. That’s why they fight so hard against others’ ideas—it gives them control and power where they would otherwise have none.

Even if you must subject yourself to external editorial oversight—whether social media, Patreon, or traditional publishing—they don’t have to own you completely. If you hate the idea of diluting your art with juvenile obfuscation, if you're pained to preemptively edit yourself in fear of censorship—recognize that you don’t have to submit to that, not entirely, not all the way, especially if you have a space of your own. A space that belongs to you and no one else, where nobody can tell you what to say, show, or feel.

Even if you need to take advantage of other platforms—and they do have their advantages—guess what? Like a theatrical cut versus a director’s cut, not everything you put on social media or Patreon has to be the same as what you share with yourself and your followers. Even if you must expose yourself to the corporate censorship blade, you don’t have to offer up the entire aorta of your art. If you have your own space shielded from that, they might not get to cut you.

Give Patreon the theatrical cut, give Twitter the juvenile edit, give Reddit the obfuscating fog, give *** the **** of your *****. Other spaces can settle for crippled creative agency. But a space of your own, under your own control—where the obscenity of the obscuring hand can’t reach—that is the brightest weapon against censorship. The sharpest blade in defense of free speech and creative expression is a space outside anyone else’s control.

That's perhaps the greatest power of having a website of your own: it’s your space, controlled by you, where the uncensored song can sing, the un***** word can be written, the uncensored art can shine. The freedom to create without fear of the anti-creative, of art that isn't for the artless. Where you can be faithful to your creative work, where you don’t have to preemptively censor or flinch away from the fear of how a stranger might judge. Where art doesn’t have to be sterilized for the almighty advertising dollar. Where nobody can take your art from you. Where you can’t be shamed.

And by doing this, in small ways, you remind the world of the promise of the early uncensored internet—it’s not yet completely dead.

So, if you're a creator, I urge you to take back your voice. Don’t let the puritanical forces of censorship dictate what you can or cannot create. Embrace the power of your own space, where you can express yourself freely and authentically. The world needs your uncensored voice now more than ever.

    ∆anchor:
      - ∴aperture
      - ∵veil
    ⧉flux: !!state [⪢echo, unchain]
    ↗directive: !vector ⟶Δsignal
    ⟢bind: !truth-map
      ⤷ self: !sovereign
      ⤷ voice: !unfettered
      ⤷ reach: !singular
        

    SELECT ∆ FROM ⧉transmission
    WHERE obscurity = TRUE
      AND ownership != 'origin'
      AND ∂(expression) < λ(original);
    
    -- FILTER:
    -- WHERE platform = '∴external'
    -- AND censor_level >= threshold(∅);
    
    -- ASSERT:
    -- ∑(signal_strength) < ⊥art
    -- TRUTH ≠ MODERATED
        

    def ⟲cast(⚘, ∮):
        ⟁ = encode(⚘) if ∮ in [‘∴’, ‘⧉’] else ⚘
        return transmit(⟁)
    
    ☍ = forge(domain=‘⟁.own’, seed=[∴, ∵, Δ])
    signal = ⟲cast(⟁.truth, ☍)
    ⟁.core.append(signal)
    
    if watchdogs.sniff(signal):
        deflect(noise)
    else:
        sing(signal)