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MARCH WRITING PROMPT | A-CULTURATED
Our Glorification of Individualism Isn’t Healthy
Where is the line between empowering and egocentric?
There is a contemporary Portuguese artist who has the words “Self Made” tattooed on her hand.
The bold letters inked into her pale skin laminate her with a sense of pride that has always gnawed at me. It’s as though the very act of having the words there could erase the long list of hands that helped shape her course.
Self made?
What does that even mean? It’s a fallacy at best. An illusion of the wildest kind. No one is, nor could ever be, self made. It’s physically impossible. Unless you conceived, birthed, and raised yourself with no help from anyone else, I struggle to see how this title makes any sense.
I appreciate that the idea behind this concept isn’t as literal as I’m making it out to be, but every time I am met with an image of this tattoo, I can’t help but pause. Not out of judgement for this particular artist, but out of an irritable curiosity for the kind of culture we cultivate in the West.
What exactly are we glorifying when we champion the idea of being “self-made”?
