Why 2024 Ended

Just finished crashing out over the holiday season so I’m here to talk about it (and why I’m still going postal regardless).

//CW: discussions of suicidality, s/h, mental illness, war, QAnon, drugs

It’s January 1st, 2025 in the timezone.

Although topping 2022 on the Bad Scale is, dare I say, near impossible considering there were like two months straight in 2022 during which I was crying and having panic attacks daily (it was February and March [bleeding into April] for obvious reasons), 2024 wasn’t exactly 2017 (arguably the best year of my life [I was a literal minor] which I look back upon fondly [but also bitterly]).

Not only did I realise in 2024 that a man pushing 40 has been cyberstalking me for years, but I’ve been trying tooth and goddamn nail to get a friend and her family out of Ġaza which I’m actively crashing the fvck out over because cvnts won’t stop bombing an open-air extermination camp (I hate you I actually fvcking hate all of you so much and so genuinely and so deeply and so eternally), and I stopped taking my meds towards the end there which… let’s just say… being completely lucid with your emotions not blunted at all when you’ve spent years operating on chemically-numbed is actually like having no skin all of a sudden (the reason why I got off meds is because I cannot afford to keep going to the rip-off clinic to renew a stupid prescription I don’t get enough repeats for [give me 12 repeats per visit, cowards!]).

Did I mention I’m crashing out?

So… I was largely inactive online over the month of December—dubbed an “internet break”—and it made me really consider just how much I enjoy being chronically offline, and I will tell you why.

Over 2024, I’d gone to almost every single Palestine rally in the city I currently live in, I’d gotten involved in political organising, I’d unionised in my field (which is bureaucratic as all get-out and for like no reason!), I’d kept up more closely than ever before with geopolitics, and I’d done a bunch of publishing-related stuff and started posting [sporadically] on YouTube.

Overall, it was an extremely productive year.

And that made it fvcking awful.

The burn-out got overwhelming, basically.

Around September was when I started to grow so exhausted day to day that I would just get through work, then lie in bed all evening. It got to the point that people in my real life started to message me on my phone asking if I was even alive because I’d go radio silent on socmed.

And asking if I was alive isn’t an exaggeration.

My worst years for suicidality were 2022 (again, obvious reasons) and 2019 (when I made two attempts). 2024 takes the number 3 spot of the top 3 by this metric.

Please don’t take that as anything too concerning though—I’ve had whte men tell me in my DM requests that I’m too much of a pussy to kms and they’re so right, here’s why:

1. my ethnic and racial identity is way too unique to be lost this early, especially given that I won’t be having kids and thus said unique identity will die with me, and my brother doesn’t count because he’s my half brother and just looks like a very standard and boring brown man (sorry juma [he doesn’t speak English (or Lazuri, for that matter)]).

2. the country I was born and raised in is one of the highest-ranking in the world by self-cessation rate and I just refuse to be influenced like that (vallâhi my country is cooked bro).

If anything, the “are you alive, dude?” texts would’ve made as much sense over my physical health, since that has been nosediving in 2024 just as well. Very recently, my iron dropped to near-fatal levels which probably contributed to my knock-out fatigue if I’m honest. Luckily, iron tablets are a non-prescription medication, so I’m now feeling somewhat further from Mal’ách haMávet’s doorstep.

One worrying thing I started to notice in 2024 as well was my memory declining (I mean I straight-up thought Yevgeny Prigozhin “died” in 2024. It was August 2023 [maybe I wouldn’t have thought that if literally everyone wasn’t dying in 2024! I’m talking Raisi, Haniyeh, Nasrallah, Navalny—]). Things I thought had happened months prior had actually happened a couple weeks ago. Meanwhile, things I thought happened a couple weeks back had actually happened over three months before that. My head was in a whirl, and came a time somewhere in October that I just stopped keeping track, finding I didn’t even remember what happened the previous week.

Though, I don’t think it was so much my memory as it was compartmentalisation.

It’s probably one of my primary trauma responses behind dissociation. I don’t process things on the spot; it’s like I postpone it for after because there’s too much to work with in the now as it is.

Unfortunately, there’s not an “after”, and I don’t think there will be anytime soon, if ever.

(It was the geopolitics, if you’re agog. That’s been a downward spiral into a bottomless abysm since February 2022; it’s almost stupid how much I get physically affected by those things—I’m talking vomiting, and I don’t even vomit when I’m sick for real!).

I happen to be the kind of person who, offline, loves to complain, and btch, and wallow, though not express my grievances to absolutely anyone, which ultimately, at least now that I’m off meds, culminates in me having an atrociously short temper which gets set off at the most minute inconvenience, but which I further suppress—hence come off so steel-nerved to onlookers—and instead land myself with severe anxious breaks and depression. Internalisation as opposed to externalisation; I hit the ceiling, as it were. That happened in the last few days of 2024. Anxiety took me under so viciously that I was losing consciousness over my Olivier salad and lying torpefied in bed; I had like this tiny little bag of gifts I got for Western Christian Christmas (Dec 25th—my step-family celebrates it), and I didn’t unpack it for days because I had no energy or mental fortitude to. And this was during my internet break! My miserable state was partially compounded neurosis—«на нервной почве», my mother would say.

The internet makes me an even worse person.

What I need is to go back to therapy, but I’ve literally gotten off meds because of money, meaning a shrink will be even more inconvenient to afford, especially with renting a new place that’s significantly more expensive than my current one (though still way on the cheap side, all things considered).

Womp womp, I guess.

Those rallies though…

At some point, I started treating them like drugs or something because they were the only things that made me feel anything at all that wasn’t Horrible.

I would work myself up over the 1–2 weeks between each rally with all the negative emotions available—anger, distress, hatred, anxiety—just so I could expel it all at the protests which I advise strongly against. Not only is that a vicious cycle (almost exactly like drugs), but it makes you an absolute cvnt for like 80% of your life, and I’m already a cvnt for at least 72% of my life. Also… you might get done in by the cops which isn’t sustainable for organising—we really can’t afford to lose partisans to the law, especially on grounds of pure stupidity (something I demonstrated [I did not go to jail]).

However, if your sole, only choice is between this (the rally part) and actual drugs… I’m not necessarily or legally saying do this, but I am saying probably don’t do drugs? I just personally think I’ll have a much easier time cutting back on rallies than if I took my hypothetical friend up on his alleged cxcaine connections that might not even exist, ya know what I mean?

YouTube has been kind of a bummer recently, too. Mostly to do with the ads.

My browser has a built-in ad-blocker, and while it used to work splendidly on YouTube, in 2024 it started to become evident that YT is cracking down hard on anything of that sort. Either it pops up with “ad-blocker not supported” (paraphrasing) and you have to go turn it off to watch the video, or the ad just breaks through the ad-blocker, but because it’s “on”, the ad doesn’t pop up with the button to skip, so you’re forced to just sit there for an upward of 60 seconds (and some of these ads are over a minute long!), or refresh the page and hope for a better fate.

In short: YouTube is becoming unusable.

And that sucks, considering I barely got to have my channel for a year!

Also, let’s just talk about how the reason I started getting any real traction on YouTube is because of a video I did on how QAnon appropriates Gnosticism which obviously summoned QAnoners and Antisemites because I guess they just Google themselves at all hours of the day, leading me to private that video because not only am I not about to get bombarded with the worst, most loser takes humanity has to offer, but I’m also not forming a subscriber base of anti-Qs when that was the sole video I was going to post—for the love of the game, might I add!—about the topic (and what is it with seppos and non-Hellenophone Europoids trying to tell Hellenophones how Greek is pronounced? The number of people who told me dumb sht under that video like “tHe ‘G’ iS siLeNt”—I wish you would be που να σε φάνε οι λύκοι κέσκε να Πανάγαθος ήταν τόσο χεροδόσης! Мудило).

You can still read the essay here on Substack, but even I don’t remember what it’s like anymore (as alluded to by the memory debacle). I doubt I’ll ever publicise that video again, but you never know (I say that every time meanwhile it’s yet to be republished).

I think when I first started YouTube, I got so excited about video editing specifically—which I still love, don’t get me wrong—that I burnt myself out on it way too fast and led myself to growing disenchanted prematurely. Writing, recording, editing videos has started to become way too much like an assignment I’m not keen on, which is not what I was planning to have happen (duh). That’s one of the reasons why I cancelled the end-of-2024 upload (the video form of my exploitation as a book genre essay). Despite working on it for months—and in 6 parts because it’s, once again!, too long for my poor program—I just keep editing it and feeling unsure about its quality (even though I’m quoting literature and research in it as usual!) or its reception by an un-curated audience. Besides being exhausted, mentally unstable, and overwhelmed with January looming (I’ll explain what I mean by that towards the end or his pointless rant essay), I feel like the growing anti-intellectualism is discouraging me, which I know means I should be doing the opposite of cutting back on content, but it’s gruelling and, frankly, annoying. I’m merely a btch on the internet.

Not to mention that I don’t think I have all that much left to say that I want to publish in video form, at least not yet.

I love writing on Substack, even if it’s not exactly good for exposure. That almost makes me feel safer, especially as a multiethnic SWANA person talking about multiethnic SWANA things. Anti-SWANA hate is rampant and relentless; I’m in the line of fire damn-near every single day as it is because y’all just wanna call us terrorists and sand monkeys soooooo sososo so bad but know you can’t because you gotta fake that dematerialised Palestine “solidarity” (you should work on that).

Perhaps what I should do instead in 2025 is make bite-sized “previews” of sorts for YouTube that lead people to my Substack, kind of like what the incredible ismatu gwendolyn used to do via TikTok for her essays here before leaving Substack (for very understandable reasons which reaffirm to me, once more over, that a wide reach on a very public platform isn’t something I want). I would need to turn off the comments on said previews though because I wouldn’t want discourse there when the meat and context are in the essays.

I’ll still upload on YouTube. I’m not saying that I’ll just abandon it. However, I think I ought to make it a rarity, and not pressure myself to turn every lengthy written essay into a video. It’s time-consuming, nerve-wracking, and my pubescent hyena voice isn’t a very pleasant sound to listen to.

I’ve also found that I may just not be the best guy to teach people unless they’re okay with being yelled profanity at and possibly insulted.

In the spirit of radical honesty, it is a genuine toxic trait of mine that the moment I get someone coming in any manner sideways at me, with even the tiniest suggestion of bigotry (anti-SWANA in particular, but also anti-Roma), my knee-jerk reaction is to tell them to k*ll themselves. It’s an actual brain disease that I’ve thankfully not succumbed to, but I’ve definitely typed it out only to backspace it because I need to expel the urge somehow (I should work on that). I don’t think that makes me the most qualified to be an educator for the uninitiated, ya know? Unless, again, you’re into that kind of thing which, hey, some people seem to be!

Maybe I’ll become like those YouTubers who post twice per year…

All I’m saying is I really understand D’Angelo now; yani έχω ρούζει στ’ απροχώρητο.

The good things that did come out of 2024 was the political organising and the unionising.

I’ve never been an activist, but I’ve always been political and involved in it in more passive ways (posting online, artworks, etc.). Taking that work into real life has felt like growing up just a little bit. Being around other anarchists in person, bouncing ideas and theory off one another, getting involved in organisation and rallies, working to provide mutual aid that doesn’t stop at monetary (don’t forget to keep financially aiding a single mother with type 1 diabetes)… It’s good. It feels right. I’m still very fledgling, but that’s the point of being young, I think.

It’s a massive re-evaluator, too.

“Touching grass” is amazing. Going outside makes me feel present, and I’ve been trying my best to be present. With all the dissociating, I live on auto-pilot, which isn’t conducive with anything I consider important, and it doesn’t achieve anything.

Being involved tangibly in this way is clarifying and grounding.

Okay… Now what?

In 2025, I’m definitely going to pull back from being so online.

Over my December break, I was still active on my private Instagram that’s mostly for irls and folks I chat to on the somewhat reg, and I don’t have anything more profound to say than… “it was good”? Not awesome, not even great, by any means, but it wasn’t bad. It didn’t feel as good as when I left Twitter some five years ago because of the looming enthronement of the whte South African, but I think in order to feel that good again I’d need drugs and we’ve already talked about that.

I have a couple publications in 2025, but I think after Feed the Forest and Never Choose Death, I might stop to instead focus more on my real-life work. I spend so much time editing and writing (fiction) that I sideline a lot of reading and practice. In 2025 I also want to focus on translating my duology (The Hypostasis of Dissent) into Russian, and maybe then, sometime down the line, Greek (I’d also love to have it translated into Arabic and Armenian but I can’t do that on my own). It always feels more fulfilling.

What I don’t need is to post regularly on YouTube as if it’s my job. I don’t need to keep up my socmed presence like some Hell-spawned “influencer”. I don’t need to robotically pump out art and writing. None of that is something I financially rely on—even the [scant] royalties I earn from my books are donated, which is the only reason I really market them.

I need to go to rallies mindfully. I need to attend politorg meetings. I need to learn organising skills which will only benefit me as I move into my ✨Fully-Developed Brain Era✨ (still far off but a btch can dream). I need to read more (which I do, but very slowly and in too-small a volume for my own liking because of all the distractions). I need to be more an observer, less a mouthpiece (I’m not the best at it, as evidenced by mine wanting to verbally assault idiots on the internet even literally just now).

My January will be fvcked up because I’m moving to a new rental, I have a political conference to attend out of the country which is crazy, a friend is arriving for a short visit from overseas, and I’m going back to work in the literal middle of all that. Therefore, I’ll not exactly be in internet-using condition anyway. I’m also flying to West Asia in spring which I can only hope goes as planned~🧿, to speak nothing of the fact that my mother is suggesting we visit The Birth Country™ in autumn (it might be so over, boys).

A part of me kind of considers not setting up internet in my new rental (where it’s not part of the bills that are covered by the rent) so I’m literally forced to not be online…

Before I give my closing statement, here’s something for the Russophones in the audience:

It’s several New Year’s addresses Vladimir Putin has given over his decades as dictator stitched into a Frankenstein’s monster-esque clip of something he’d say if he was actually honest with the populace and himself.

It’s depressing but funny, which I’d say is the only means by which Rusnationals are able to consume humour anyway.

С Новым годом; с новым страхом~🎇

I genuinely dread what awaits in 2025.

AI is rampant (uni folks are “writing” essays with ChatGPT!), fascism is making a comeback hard, the job market is crashing out worse than me, the housing crisis is reaching cataclysmic proportions, YouTube is declining, I still have a strike on my Instagram account from that one time I told Louis Farrakhan to k*ll himself like four years ago (because obviously I did), climate catastrophe, my region ravaged by war and colonisation, Elon Musk, anti-intellectualism, campism, AND the new Wuthering Heights adaptation STILL doesn’t get a Rromani Heathcliff?¹ And that’s not even the half of it??

In conclusion, 2022 was the worst year probably objectively, but that’s okay because 2024 was scarily likely (cross my fingers I may) the best year for the rest of my life.

Happy new fear~🥂

~Sfar~Ⓐ🧿֎⨳

1. I’m going to complain about Emerald Fennell in a 2025 essay.