YOU ARE NOT THE VICTIM, BE ACCOUNTABLE

Its Sunday, I'm having lunch with my parents, and a conversation that alters my brain chemistry arises. We were talking about the current state of the world and specifically our country, Kenya. As I was listening to them talk, my brain immediately recognized a pattern that I have to talk about here, we are not victims of our life situations, we just need to be more accountable about our contribution to the problem. First of all, I want to give a disclaimer that this doesn't in any way relate to actual victims of abuse or anything of such grave significance. I am more so talking about how we refuse to do introspection on our contribution to the problem

When you hear people talking about the government or anything in that line, it's always pointing fingers to authority and how they should be better. I asked one simple question on the lunch table, where do these leaders come from? are they not elected? by the people of the republic. We have this thing where we separate ourselves from the root of the problem and only acknowledge the burden of responsibility on leaders, yet we elect them. 

Internally, most of us live as victims of our lives. You want people to always feel bad for you because you had it rough. We want to blame all our suffering on the past. You are a slave of your past because you never accept your contribution in your misery. It is only you who can change your life. Jesus has been coming since 1700. Jesus didn't even come during the world wars to save us, Jesus didn't come during colonization, and I hate to break it to you but guess what, Jesus will not come to save us anytime soon. You will die miserably waiting for an illusion because you have refused to confront your demons. We were left with the holy spirit which is intuition and that voice internally that you refuse to listen to and silence with your various addictions like social media, drugs, violence or even religion. The only way to make it out alive is opening that door and addressing all your vices one by one and once you deal with the root cause, your life will shape up. How long will you blame daddy issues for you choosing men who hurt you? How long will you blame your mommy issues on your attachment styles? It's important to evolve from where we have been so as to take the necessary steps forward. It 

The question arises, I didn't choose where I come from, my parents or such intricate details about my development, why change? But being accountable means seeing things for what they truly are and making an active decision to rectify what you can. you can't change your past, but you can always mold your future differently. Accept that they were fucked up people or situations or places and move past it. Accountability for me looks like this. "I chose so and so because they manipulated me with their words and I couldn't see past the lies however, I have made a vow to myself not to do the same again"

Systems are a direct reflection of the people because the people make the system. We inherently cannot separate the problems in the system from the beneficiaries and perpetuators of the system. We for example have a corruption problem in the country that everyone is aware about. It's quite comedic that one of the most famous and influential artists of the 2000s Kenyan music scene, Eric Wainaina, made a song where he said "nchi ya kitu kidogo ni nchi ya watu wadogo" and that song was not only popular, but also extremely relevant at the time

Fast forward to 2025 and we have successfully made him have a timeless hit. My soul arches at the fact that we have reoccurring problems all through generations. That is a sign of a lack of evolution which is a very scary phenomenon to prove. Our leaders have always for decades on end perpetually abused our funds and everything else within and you know what, I don't feel sorry for us. We are addicted to mediocrity. I want to feel bad for saying this, but I don't because it's true. When you hear someone say" rather the devil I know than the angel I don't know" I find it hard to be remorseful for us.

We wake up early on the morning of the second Tuesday in August, stand in lines for hours on end and when you ask a voter, "what made you vote for so and so", their most likely to respond by saying something extremely shallow," ni mtu wetu, ni myoung, alisema atatuletea maziwa na pipe, alisema atafanya unga ishuke, anapenda kanisa, ni mcute kama sakajez" or some bullshit of the sort. Our criteria status of evaluating who needs to lead us is always so shallow. We crave relatability, which is our biggest enemy because how will someone like you make a difference? Someone without information about anything bearing the power to elect a leader feels like the knife of democracy. Democracy may have been a bad idea for our country, but that's a thesis for another day, this has enough fire

We need to hold these people who we expect to lead us at almost impossible standards. If you are going to lead me, you have to be better than me, in terms of academic qualifications, social awareness, language and dialect, spiritual awareness( na si hii ujinga ya Christianity ya siku hizi) and adroit levels. We need people who have so much good that that's all we speak about, we need clean records, we need driven people, we need people who are compassionate, people who want better for the general public THROUGH ACTIONS NOT WORDS. They need to have a proper track record of their contribution to society and not who has the best "manifesto". This can only be achieved if we stop being the victims because we are not. 

Also, religious psychosis is a huge problem in this country. People will overlook someone's actions as long as they associate themselves with God. It's a blind spot that is responsible for a huge chunk of our problems. Society is so naive to the truth and that's why lies sell, fantasies sell, fairytales sell, but the truth, the truth is we are dumb and stupid and victim ass bitches (excuse my French)

So yes, we are not victims. Power lies with the people even as par Artice 1 of the Constitution that makes us sovereign. If we all collectively decided to accept that what we have been doing is wrong and get ready for change, we will with no doubt be able to get out of this constant rut that is being the victim

The next time someone complains about their life by victimizing themselves for their own actions, send this to them and give them a kiss or a slap while you're at it

(Najua itauma wengi but watch this article be relevant in 2075 if you aren't careful)

xoxo

Eric Gichuru