Individualist Manifesto by Lilly Penhall
I have set myself apart from the world
I choose to be one of the chosen people
I am not a part of consumer America
I am not a number in the corporate cube
I am more than the money I don’t have
I do not heed the subliminal signals in the light box
I live a real life of my own
I leave the house during prime time
I work to keep my mind functioning
I remember the spiritual grandfathers
I read the words of the artist warriors
I do not let my mind solely be filled
with the reflections of digital images
I do not let the media tell me who is right and wrong
I ignore politics because nobody’s right
I use my own mind
I am one who lives for today and lives on forever
I don’t hide myself from the world
I love the way I look even if Hollywood doesn’t agree
I look through microscopes and telescopes
I do not allow the earth to rotate without me
I get actively involved in my life
I get actively involved in others’ lives
I am not content to sit idly by while
the best minds of my generation are destroyed
by the apathy of the general population
I am different than you
Who sits in the supercenter vacuum
Who listens to clichés coughed up by anorexic pantywastes
Who vacates to the ends of the earth
to get away from your worthless existence
Who believes that voting for America’s Next Vapid Star is time well spent
I believe that there is more to life
I believe in things that I can touch, smell, hear, see and taste
I am in tune with the world around me
I am filled with the spirit of light and truth
I may not worship your god
I know that all gods are equally valid
I worship the wind at sixty-five miles per hour
I pray to the ink on pages bound imperfectly
I kneel before jugs of red wine
I give offerings to tightly bound threads sealed with acrylic color
I place value on skin contact
I spread love like dust
I can’t keep it all inside
I catch on fire and rise from the flame in the form of vocal vibrations
I do not do what is proper or normal
I choose not to blend in with the rest of the world
I want to be seen and heard
I want to mean something to myself
I am in the world but not of the world
I do not swim with the current
I believe in what I believe in
I believe in answers from star formations
I believe in truth inside a bottle of whiskey
I am not what is popular or conventional, and
I don’t give a fuck what you think, because
I don’t live to please you