Monica McNaught-Lee

O N B E I N G A X E N O M O R P H

Art and words by Monica McNaught-Lee

I have always had an affinity for aliens. I truly believe that there are aliens out there pitying Earth humans for what we have become. Lately, I have wondered why I am so fascinated by the idea of them. Then one day while reading about the seeds of Afrofuturism that appeared in W.E.B. Du Bois’s sci-fi short fiction, it struck me that the reason I love alien content so much is that capitalism has forced our alienation — from ourselves and each other.

In the same way that extraterrestrials only exist in opposition to a narrative that falsely centres humanity, the neoliberal human body only exists under the rule of capitalism. As capitalism has progressed, our bodies have become just another product to tweak and alter. Our value exists only in our ability to work, and work, and work without fail.

Afrofuturism is an ideology that looks to reconstruct Black history and the Black present, in search of limitless and beautiful futures. It feels almost impossible to think about existence beyond capitalism, beyond an economic system that gleefully teaches us to sacrifice ourselves and our bodies to the industrial machine. On the days that start to lose hope, I look to the memories of my ancestors in China. Of the way they used stones from the river and mud from the rice fields to build round earthen dwellings called Hakka Tu Lous. These places would house whole communities that cared and provided for each other. Retelling ancestral and Indigenous histories can inspire us to imagine fuller futures where we are not alienated from our bodies. A future where our value is in how we can care for others, not in our bodies ability to produce monetisable labour and conform to unachievable standards.

O N B E I N G A X E N O M O R P H