Henry_
Our introduction says we’re interested in dialectical thought. Dialectical is an off-putting word for some. Even though I’ve been to philosophy school, and studied ‘the unhappy consciousness’, I’m still not quite sure what it means. I know dialectics can be painful. At the same time, ‘dialectic‘ sounds like such a safe word, confined to school, university, academia. Not something we need worry about in ordinary life. What is anarchist dialectic but a discursive essay, something we perhaps learnt to do at school if we were lucky. Not so frightening. A both/and conversation, a but/and conversation, a both/but/and conversation with a psychological, political or educational stuffing.
But it’s not safe at all! We must try and think two things at the same time, or even more than two. Or even a borrowed word: polylectic, I am a bee!
Have you ever woken up in the small hours worrying about your frail parents. What to do? We have to make a decision; whether to act, to raise uncomfortable choices. We reach out to friends with more experience. We wait for events to make the decision for us. The conclusion might be to do nothing, but is that an abdication or even worse, complacency. As the poet wrote, ‘Teach us to care and not to care.’
This is applying dialectics to daily life, whether to a small scale gesture or to a universal truth. It could be what political writers call a challenge to the ‘dominant narrative’ or a challenge to multiple narratives. Dialectical thinking is itself a challenge to the more commonly received polarised views, opinions of right and wrong, good and bad judgements that news junkies are exposed to every day.Equally, mainstream media often pit two views against each other which barely differ, ignoring more extreme or unfamiliar or uncomfortable narratives.
To wonder what kind of reading, writing and thinking we look for from ourselves and others at Bad Apple takes some thought. The intention moves with the relationships of people involved, the hopes and trust we have in others and them in us.
At the heart there must be some kind of tension, curiosity, doubt. Sometimes writing follows thoughts and experiences that are very private and yet radical, in the sense they are all our own. We think this is the first time anyone has thought them. We need to hear views we don’t necessarily agree with. We need to continue conversations, have doubts, interrogate.
The Bad Apple is a thought that sticks around in your mind, a conceptual brain worm, that keeps you awake at night or wakes you up at dawn. It could be a personal dilemma. One voice is clamouring, persistent, a clashing symbol while the other one is more true but hard to articulate. (Write it!)
As we’ve settled into a collective of three women, situated across the country, Merseyside, Pembrokeshire and London, the relationship between us has grown. The zine has been a way of building a personal and working relationship, trying to sense what the others would like to see in the zine, not always obvious, endeavour to be supportive, to be sensitive to each other’s needs, for space, or for energetic working, for agreed standards. We need to be sensitive and curious about the ways our different minds work.
Widening a network of contributors and readers, online and in real life: this is still a stage in the cycle of forming. Building an audience, a name for ourselves, however tiny, is a welcome shove from behind, which makes us want to continue.
Bad Apple has learnt much from going out in public, to zine fairs, workshops and talks. Zine fairs can be many things: strictly academic, some a bit gate-keepy, some self-labelled, some super inclusive and sensitive, finally some anarchist. Stepping from laptop to church hall or library is not so easy. Whether for the first time or umpteenth time, whether a newbie or seasoned writer, we hope we are helping the ones who write for us to do just that.
Writing in Bad Apple, is to pin your doubts to your sleeve. It is to show your working. The teacher who writes on the interactive whiteboard in front of a class knows this with trepidation. The activist who writes on the wall of a government building will know all about this too. It’s a courageous and powerful move. (The janitor soon comes by with a bucket of warm, soapy water.)
Even if you post on social media, it’s quite another thing for our contributors to commit to their thoughts, write them down, work out what they mean, and entrust them to Bad Apple. To stand behind a table at a zine fair is strength training of ideas. If someone has made the effort to come to a zine fair or book fair or any kind of publishing fair, that’s very different from clicking like or an emoji. Even the shyest among them will eventually say something! ▪️
Bad Apple Magazine 