Personal Stories

A follower made a great point: human art is becoming the new organic label. And just like buying organic, figuring out if it's actually real is getting tougher by the day. Another follower who has a graphic design company told me that even with a strict no AI policy, artists are still trying to pass off AI work as their own. So it's a bit bleak. But I’m going to give this one last shot over the next few days. If it doesn't work out, I'm just going to roll up my sleeves and create it myself because yeah that poster has to go down.

I often get comments and DMs from people who feel overwhelmed by decolonization and do not know where to start. And I always say: start small. It is unrealistic to believe you have to undo generations of conditioning overnight while still surviving in the middle of empire. Your ancestors, your family, your body, and your society were forcibly shaped over time. So of course unlearning will also take time. Decolonization is not a one-time achievement. It is a constant practice. It is the slow adjustment of your mind, your relationships, your habits, your desires, and your life. Think of it literally like exercise. Calisthenics means small, repeatable practices that build your capacity over time. You do not build strength by walking into a gym once and trying to lift the heaviest weight in the room. You start where you are. You build the muscle. That is what I mean by decolonizing calisthenics. Maybe, for now, the practice is simply sitting with the discomfort of the subject without running away from it. Once you build capacity for that, maybe it becomes questioning one inherited belief. Then maybe it becomes changing one habit, one relationship pattern, one way you relate to land, family, time, love, or community. You add as you go. You do what you can manage. You move in ways that feel honest, grounded, and possible. Because ultimately, this is not about performing purity. It is about coming back to your soul.

This isn't just a personal milestone; it’s a signals a shift in the cultural tide. It turns out the world is far more hungry for decolonizing the mind than for the status quo. There is a delicious irony in how we got here: I climbed this list on the strength of a piece educating people on setting healthy boundaries. Meanwhile, the man I just surpassed is a felon who was incarcerated precisely because he refuses to respect women’s boundaries. The message is clear: the future is based on consent, not domination. To every single one of my paid subscribers: thank you.

I’m hot. My polycule is hot. My polyamorous friends are hot. And I’m not just talking about the outside. I think naturally polyamorous folks have especially the hottest minds. Like, you never even were monogamous, you started outside the matrix. Hot. Feel sad for those trapped in compulsory monogamy culture. Conscious monogamists are hot though. Thread by @goddess.khali Next Event 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / April 25 5:30am IST / 9:00am JST / 10:00am AEST / 2:00pm NZST

There are far more books on polyamory than Polysecure and The Ethical Slut alone, and I do not recommend the latter. On Goodreads, I’ve found 78 books on polyamory so far, and I’ve been making my way through all of them. I often recommend niche titles to my coaching clients so they can go deeper on specific questions, whether that’s reconciling Christianity with polyamory or navigating neurodivergence within polyamorous relationships. What’s your favourite niche polyamory book? Next Event 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / April 25 5:30am IST / 9:00am JST / 10:00am AEST / 2:00pm NZST

Ain’t that the truth @unapolygeticallyjoy Next Event 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / April 25 5:30am IST / 9:00am JST / 10:00am AEST / 2:00pm NZST

The right applies virtually no moral threshold to its leaders: credibly accused predators can hold power without consequence, as long as they deliver politically. The left, by contrast, enforces an almost impossibly high standard for those in the movement: a single misstep, an outdated opinion, a nuanced position can be enough to exile someone entirely. This asymmetry is how authoritarianism gains ground. When one side accepts anyone, no matter how amoral as long as they reach hateful objectives, and the other rejects everyone who isn’t perfect, then only devils thrive. I write more about how the left eats its own in my latest Substack piece, Is Anyone on the Left Pure Enough?

I first encountered puritan leftism in my early twenties, in the early 2000s, while organizing with social justice groups at university. I was part of a Black advocacy group when a Ghanaian friend and I were pulled aside by some Caribbean students and questioned why we identified with our specific African tribes before identifying as Black. It struck both of us as deeply odd. Our answer was straightforward: our tribes existed long before the colonial imposition of race as a category. Our primary lens would therefore remain African, not the Western racial one imposed from outside. They were not pleased with that response. Since then, I’ve watched puritan leftism grow increasingly rigid, absurd, and aggressive. Identity politics has largely displaced any serious focus on class issues. This dynamic is enforced by people across racial and class backgrounds. People absolutely use it to oppress racialized people but radical Black voices seem to be policed the most aggressively. I remember bell hooks being booed at my university about a decade ago. More recently, I’ve seen a few times adrienne maree brown repeatedly dismissed in comment sections as “problematic.” When thinkers of their depth and contribution can be casually dismissed as insufficiently pure, it raises the question: who, exactly, is pure enough to meet these ever-shifting standards?

The Kikuyu people of Kenya were colonized by the British from 1895 to 1963—a period spanning 68 years. My mother was born at the tail end of colonial rule, and I was fortunate enough to have some conversations with my grandparents about Kikuyu customs before colonization. Thankfully, about a quarter of Kenyans today still maintain elements of indigenous ways of life. Even in 2025, our culture continues to carry the weight of colonial legacies, alongside the ongoing impacts of neo-colonialism. My decolonizing journey has been deeply rooted in trying to understand our past—how we lived, how our ways were altered, and why those changes were imposed. I’m constantly learning new things about our traditions, and I feel grateful to be able to ask my mum—who grew up in rural Kenya, where Kikuyu culture is still deeply held—about our indigenous approaches to relationships and community. This particular conversation was sparked when she mentioned that, during polygamous times, people didn’t experience jealousy over a spouse being with others. That insight opened up a whole reflection on what we’ve lost, what we’ve internalized, and what we might still reclaim. Next Events: 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 19 (SOLD OUT) 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / April 25 5:30am IST / 9:00am JST / 10:00am AEST / 2:00pm NZST

I am so very proud of us. Did we win the by-election? No. And absolutely yes, we did. The Liberals secured their coveted majority. Mark Carney has been very clear that he believes the old order of the American empire is ending and that Canada should step into a new global leadership role. But the Canada he’s describing isn’t the country many of us grew up believing in as a peacekeeper. It’s a Canada with a bigger military, positioned as a financial command centre for global power. And the way this majority was built: floor crossings, the shortest legal election window, timing around religious holidays, tax season, and university final exams, tells us exactly how serious they were about securing it. So yes. They got what they wanted. But hope isn’t dead. Not even close. In University-Rosedale, Serena Purdy and the NDP surged to 19% of the vote: double what we achieved last year. The Liberals stayed frozen at 64%, unable to grow despite Carney’s star power and their massive financial backing. Our NDP result was the strongest performance of any riding in the entire country during this by-election. The Conservatives have been pushed aside as the unofficial opposition in this riding; the NDP now holds that space. And we don’t know what tomorrow brings. Serena, I love you and I am so proud of you. You ran with integrity, courage, and care for this community, and people felt that. Canada is currently in its honeymoon phase with Senator Palpatine, but honeymoons always end. Avi Lewis just won the NDP leadership race, and progressive energy is rising. Shoutout to the Green Party candidate Andrew Massey, who we partied with after the election was over, because real progressives share space, even when our tactics differ. I’m a pragmatic anarchist who will always work with any progressive. Lillian, our incredible actress from our skits and also my good friend worked with the Greens, and they doubled their votes from last year’s federal election as well. Well done! This is a marathon. We’re still here. We’re still growing. And we are still running together. The fight continues, and so do we. Keep going. 🧡

By-elections are decided by turnout. If you're a voter in University-Rosedale, Toronto, your vote Monday 13th matters more than usual.

@serena__purdy is my friend. And I’ve seen her work up close. Not just the public stuff you see in campaign materials. I’ve seen her help build the Kensington Market Community Land Trust so housing stays affordable for the people who actually live here. I’ve seen her fight to regulate Airbnbs when they were displacing long-term renters. I’ve seen her organize no-barrier vaccine clinics that reached thousands of neighbours during the pandemic. I’ve seen her defend public healthcare alongside experts behind the Romanow Report. I’ve seen her launch the My Friends’ Tab program so people could access food with dignity. And I’ve also seen the things that never make it into campaign graphics. I’ve seen her share her home with displaced people. I’ve seen her help someone outside the hospital get home when they were stranded and overwhelmed. She goes above and beyond in ways most people never see. She’s a real one. I honestly can’t imagine someone better to represent University–Rosedale in Ottawa. A lot of people don’t even know there’s a by-election happening Monday, April 13. Turnout in by-elections is much lower than general elections, and that’s exactly why every vote matters. Progressive change only happens when progressive voters show up. Please share this post, remind your neighbours, and check whether someone in your community needs help getting to their polling station. Vote Serena Purdy. Vote NDP on Monday.

Being at Avi Lewis’s first event today as the new NDP leader meant a great deal to me. Avi Lewis is Naomi Klein’s husband, and @naomiaklein was one of the writers who first drew me to Canada. I remember thinking that a country that produces minds like hers was a place where I wanted to study and grow politically. During my first year here, she published The Shock Doctrine, and it changed my brain chemistry. It was one of those rare light-bulb moments when a framework suddenly makes sense of everything around you. We are living in the shock doctrine. So to now be working on a campaign in my own neighbourhood of Kensington Market a place I see as a model for community-based urban living in North America, and to be doing that work in support of socialist politics feels like a real full-circle moment.

This was one our most popular political posts about the ‘race to innocence,’ a term coined by feminist scholar Marilyn Frye. It describes how individuals or groups highlight their oppression to avoid acknowledging their roles in systems of privilege, undermining solidarity in addressing systemic inequalities I had an interesting conversation with an activist friend of mine who fought with the YPJ. We were discussing why there’s been a dearth of leftist activism on the ground, compared to the YPJ and the Zapatistas eras. My friend theorized that identity politics online had come to substitute for real action. I think there’s some merit to that. I’ve definitely seen identity politics evolve from a force for social change to something that’s been used to for inaction. It’s ironic that as minority groups began to win their rights and gain more mainstream acceptance, being marginalized started to be co-opted. Co-option is very subtle and insidious. It creeps in and rots things from the inside out; you only realize what’s happening when things have already gone bad. I believe humanity is at a juncture where coming together and taking action is necessary. We really can’t afford excuses for doing nothing. Next Events: 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 19 (SOLD OUT) 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / April 25 5:30am IST / 9:00am JST / 10:00am AEST / 2:00pm NZST

This week on Get Schooled with Marcela Alonso, I sit down with @decolonizing.love to unpack polyamory, power dynamics, and the narratives we’ve been taught about relationships… and why they don’t always serve us. If you’ve ever questioned the “rules” of love, this one’s for you. 🎧 Episode out now on Spotify & Apple Podcasts

This is my dad and my grandfather and why I am the way I am: political, free, and unafraid. My Italian grandfather came to East Africa as a colonizer. He was arrested during WWII, but something shifted. He began to see how deeply he had been propagandized. He switched sides entirely, using his white privilege to smuggle weapons to one of the world's first guerrilla fighters against colonialism: Kenya's Mau Mau. His family disowned him for it, and again when he married an African woman. He wore both as badges of honor. He raised my father with that legacy, teaching him to stay vigilant and never sleepwalk into blind loyalty. My dad absorbed every lesson. He spent his entire life in service of liberation movements around the world, with his deepest commitment to the Palestinian cause. Even as a teenager he had posters of Yasser Arafat on his wall. He worked as a peacekeeper and diplomat alongside Palestinians. We lived in Israel, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. He served in Iraq, Cambodia where he helped facilitate their first democratic elections and repatriate refugees from Thailand, Somalia, Rwanda during the genocide, and Bosnia. But he always came back to Palestine. Which is why he commissioned this portrait of himself in the keffiyeh. He made sure we didn't grow up as oblivious diplomat children. He took us to demilitarized zones, bombed-out buildings, and divided farms. My first coffee was with a Palestinian family he was helping reconnect with relatives across the border in Lebanon. I learned what colonialism actually looks like, not as an abstraction, but as land split apart and families separated. My favorite memories are sitting in rooms full of peacekeepers and diplomats, listening to them talk late into the night. That was my real education, watching people wrestle with history as it unfolded. That is where I learned what solidarity means, and what it looks like to choose the right side even when it costs you everything.

…and heartbroken—a lifetime of breakups! 🙃 But seriously I love being poly and I wouldn't change a thing, as my queer platonic always says “Also in love great risk, putting yourself out there, is great rewards”. Next Events: 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 19 1:00pm PST / 2:00pm MDT / 4:00pm EDT / 5:00pm BRT / 8:00pm GMT / 10:00pm EET 📆 The Art of Being a Hinge Workshop - April 24 5:00pm PST / 8:00pm EDT / 5:30am (April 25) IST / 9:00am (April 25) JST / 10:00am (April 25) AEST / 2:00pm (April 25) NZST

Back to one of our very first skits. We actually just improvised here. This wasn't scripted.

How many of these have you experienced?

I exist in two extremes. I’m solo poly, which means I practice polyamory while keeping my independence at the center of my life. I have partners and meaningful relationships, but I don’t structure my life around merging households, finances, or building a single shared domestic unit. I genuinely love living alone and don’t want to share my home with anyone. I need long stretches of solitude the way other people need air. It's a time to reset, think, and exist in my own rhythm. Being neurodivergent plays into that too; having my own space helps me regulate and stay grounded. But with my partners I’m intensely present: affectionate, attentive, all over them, completely absorbed in the connection we’re sharing. There’s no half-setting for me. I move between deep independence and deep presence. The solitude is what allows me to show up that way when I’m with someone. So for me there’s no contradiction in loving my independence while also loving people deeply, I just experience those two states very distinctly. Looking for polyamory support? Book a 1:1 coaching session today let’s build the skills to support you and your partners with confidence. Use our Relationship Agreement Generator to set boundaries and agreements for your polycule. Links in bio.