I take it that you've heard #michaelGloss story - an idealist eco-activist turned tankie who decided to join Russian army and invade #Ukraine : https://istories.media/en/stories/2025/04/25/michael-gloss-story/
Instead of talking about modern stalinists I would like to take a look at his obituary and the hero's journey, which might be a narrative poison few of us can see.
From his obituary:
Michael was fascinated by the hero’s journey and loved JRR Tolkien and his depiction of fellowship among heroes. He equally loved Adventure Time and the adventures of Finn and Jake, who were equally just in their quest for simple truth. With his noble heart and warrior spirit Michael was forging his own hero’s journey when he was tragically killed in Eastern Europe on April 4, 2024.
I think we should think about Hero's Journey not only as a surface level narrative making people think that they will be heroes themselves, but also look deeper:
The insidious and hard-to-place narrative present in a lot of western media (not just the superhero cinema) makes it easier for us to internalize some kinds of propaganda - because we expect to be given information in a very specific way (outlined above).
Hero's Journey is being taught as _the_ way of telling stories in most of the Western writing schools. There are very few attempts at alternatives - heroine's journey, or Jeff Gomez's Collective Journet ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIPU-i1ruCU ).
I think we need to see more of these stories to vaccinate us against the more insidious propaganda out there. They will not "cure" us right now, but they will vaccinate us in the next 5, 10, 20 years.
I push for so much community in #solarpunk stories and art specifically to avoid the Hero's Journey. I know that it's much, much harder to write (and publish!) a story which doesn't align with the industry standard, but I believe that it's important.
That's why the @SolarpunkPrompts podcast specifically focuses on communities with tensions and drama, but no easy heros or villains.
We need to find better stories.
alxd of the Story Seed Library
