As we all learnt in blockbuster 1960s film Spartacus, slaves can be freaking awesome. The lowest of the low, oppressed by The Man, can in fact turn out to be absolute badasses. Of course they can: they are people. And people all have profound value. And that’s good news for us all, because we all think we are the lowest of the low sometimes – in fact part of the human condition (I believe) is that we can get into cycles where we split into our successes [make us high value] and our failures [make us low value]. Which enables a grand battle within, where we struggle to be ‘good enough’ to drown out the bad stuff. Interesting. This is a common and extremely toxic trap which leads many into self harm and suicide.
So it’s a serious freaking subject, with lives literally at stake. I’m not joking around here.
The message of love, ultimately, is that our value does not go down when we fail, and it does not go up when we succeed. It is a profound and extremely difficult message to accept. Love itself means that our value is not negotiable; it does not go up and down. This is a core ethos of love, and a very good topic for a comic, I think.
I mean, I’m just making these comics up based on my own experiences of love, freedom, abuse, peace, turmoil, suffering and deep joy. But that’s a good story, right? Something real. Perhaps our truth will help to set some people free. In the next comic then, we will see what happens when the profound message of love steps into a place of slavery and abuse.
Because I am Spartacus.
And so are you.
