It’s Time for Grassroots Creatives

Our discomfort in the digital age may turn out to be our greatest asset

Last week, I posted a short essay about the 1985 cultural phenomenon called “USA for Africa.”

I watched reaction videos on YouTube, made by kids who had never heard (or heard of) “We Are The World” before, and I wrote about the consistent patterns I observed…the confusion, then the surprise, then the enthusiasm and, ultimately, the tears.

The kids on the videos were joyful, and I think I conveyed some of their joy. At least that was my hope. These feel like dark times and I wanted to let some light in.

Given the response to my little essay, it seems like we all needed a little light last week. It was my most popular (most viewed?) Substack post yet. By a wide margin.

This morning I’m thinking about all the other work I’ve put into the world that didn’t get as broad a reading as quickly, some of it much weightier than a few words about young people trying to make sense of Huey Lewis. (I understand their bewilderment.)

What is the value of all the poems and books and posts and podcasts that don’t get the hearts right away, or find the big audiences, or appease our algorithm overlords?

“Have you ever tried writing something…popular?”

We know the game by now. Social media platforms are based on instantaneous gratification, and insofar as we live in a culture dominated by these platforms, we live in a culture based on instantaneous gratification. Look no further than our ruined politics, as our short-sighted “leaders” become more short-sighted by the minute, legislating for likes and shares.

Even Substack, which often feels saner and a little more leisurely than most platforms, can be a gaming challenge: How long can I keep my post at the top of the stack?

Despite the fact that I lean on social media as my primary marketing and distribution tool (what choice do I have?), I’ve come to believe that most of my work exists on a different karmic timeline. And that’s not just what I tell myself so I can sleep at night.

And it’s not just what I believe about my own work.

I believe that a lot of work, of all kinds, exists on a different karmic timeline from this one. In fact, most of the work of the world, outside the business of “hot takes,” exists on a different karmic timeline.

I’m a one-reader-at-a-time kind of writer. A word-of-mouth kind of podcaster. I’m like a 70s punk handing out his mimeographed fanzines on a street corner. You have to stumble into me at just the right moment, in just the right mood.

I’m a grassroots creative…in the digital age.

My work is out there to be found, and people find it at their own speed—when a line of poetry hits them square, or a podcast topic leaps at them from their phones.

It’s not alway easy to wait, but they do find my work eventually. At least some do. And that’s very gratifying to me.

And as I prepare myself for the storms to come, many of which are likely to be urgent emergencies, I’m starting to believe that “grassroots creative" may be a model for other forms of engagement.

In fact, I think we all need to be grassroots creatives in the weeks and months ahead, as frustrating as it can be.

Yes, there will be (there already are) plenty of catastrophes and emergencies that require urgent attention. We’ve been dragging our feet for so long.

But our audiences are scattered now, and our coalitions have been fractured by change—by the immediate gratifications of social media, by short-sighted leadership, by the shock of naked injustice, by the enormity of the challenges before us.

There is no political party sufficient to the task now. We have to start building again.

And coalition-building, like my audience-building efforts, occurs on a different karmic timeline. It’s a one-person-at-a-time, word-of-mouth, handing-out-posters kind of endeavor.

There’s no way around it.

Once in a while you come across a guy like Quincy Jones, a guy so powerful and respected that he can stand Huey Lewis next to Michael Jackson for a few hours, and tell them what to sing, and make actual music. And people will buy that record immediately. And $60 million will be raised to combat famine.

But individual people can only be fed one at a time. It’s still an analogue world at its core. And it’s time to get back to the grassroots. It’s time to rebuild audiences and coalitions.

That’s not exactly a comforting thought when the world is already on fire, but it gives me an odd kind of hope. After all, I’m an analogue writer in the digital age, living on a different karmic timeline. I already know a little something about the road ahead. I’ve been on it all along. I’m in a position to help.

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