A Borderless Manifesto

October 5, 2020

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I am sitting in my apartment in Brooklyn, and I am angry at ways in which the structures of life outside my window and my heart seep through the door and haunt me. I am angry at how we have all given into the system of this world; we have given into borders as means to isolate, assimilate, dictate, and define. Borders as a mode of living. Borders as reasons to annihilate. Borders as reasons to kill. Borders as reasons to flee. Borders as the most powerful assertion of manhood. We have given into borders drawn around land, around our minds, our bodies, and the ways in which we are taught to become, or rather unbecome. We are victims, ney slaves to borders. And we walk around and pretend that the chains, with simply small tweaks can become our way to freedom. I refuse for my freedom to be a product of such insane thinking, a product of borders, a product of the desires of men. And yet, as I am sitting in my apartment in Brooklyn I receive a notification by USPS that I have just received mail from USCIS. I run down, open the mailbox, and run back up to my apartment as though I have been blessed, recognized. I frantically open the mail with my partner standing in front of me holding a phone pointing at me, and playing, “American Pie,” from our Google Home. I open the piece of mail and a tear drops down my face as I unfold a folded paper that holds a green card in my full name: Surname and First name. USCIS Number. Country of birth. Date of birth. Sex. Expiration Date. Category: DV6. I am now a permanent resident of the United States of America.

This brings with it both the joy of having gotten away from something, and the anger of needing to have done it. That a Lebanese passport made me feel irrelevant, and a Green Card makes me legitimate. In a world that demands legitimacy, I am devalued by the borders I was born inside. And I know borders. I know borders because I grew up breathing the residues of their construction—I have inhaled them for 30 years and now they live inside me like my veins, so critical for my survival.

And who even decided on these borders but the hunger and greed of men who want power over the fences of the world, the direction of the wind, and the ways in which I live inside my body. I refuse for my freedom to be a product of such insane thinking, a product of the borders inside of me that are imagined and built by the minds of men.

What a lie. All of this. The ways in which we have always lived and have arrived to now. This—screens sitting between us eroding all that comes from human connection, or rather the existence of one in full dimension. I refuse to believe this insanity. I refuse to believe that by existing in even tighter squares—zoom creating harsher virtual borders around each of us—that somehow we are going to be fulfilled. Gratified. Self-actualized.

The refusal of becoming a victim of my circumstances has been the single driving force of my life. You see, I am both Lebanese and Lesbian by birth. Both of these things are inside me and always at odds, like two limbs of my body that are continuously rejecting one another. Or rather, being Lebanese puts an incredible mental, physical, and legal borders around me, my body, my mind. That being a Lesbian is the single most offensive act of being an Arab woman because it means above all the rejection of man, the entire gender and all its rules and norms. It also means brushing up against the barbed wire of marrying a man. It means rejecting it. It means that I neither need a man for love, nor for protection, nor for sex, nor for success. GOD FUCKING FORBID I don’t need a man. But I don’t. We all don’t. The patriarchy wanted to be needed in order to achieve its goals and so it created a system that necessitates having a man at all times. It has built a world from the single focal point of the importance of the man. I refuse the madness of this focal point. I refuse a world that demands of me to need a man.

I come from a place that has used 2020 to remind me, to remind all of us, that even our dreams are a construct of their borders. A year where my country revolted, and despite the odds is surviving a global pandemic, while in a plumitting economic crisis

—and in

the midst of a revolution and a pandemic the third largest explosion erupted to annihilate Beirut. Borders stacked on borders stacked on borders. Life is impossible there it seems. But death in an impossible situation is both inevitable yet so painful it destroys even those who continue to live. Now you see this—this is the context of the tear that ran down my face as I opened the letter from USCIS and held the green card in my hand. The green card that carries my full name: Surname and First name. USCIS Number. Country of birth. Date of birth. Sex. Expiration Date. Category: DV6. Tell me, would you not cry if you were me. Would you not feel this anger. Would you not feel a sweet release after having suffocated because of these borders. Tell me, where the hell is your anger? Why do you accept this? Why are you still sitting in your seat as you read this, get the fuck up and burn, burn these documents and refuse. Refuse this.

Refuse art, technology, and societal norms that convince you of borders, as though they are a reward to abiding by the system.

Refuse a world that imposes more borders on your imagination in order to tame you, in order to imprison and eradicate all that is different.

Refuse the continuation of old practices that perpetuate a long history of murder. Social, cultural, and artistic murder.

Refuse the binding nature of new and old technology, and create anew by letting go of everything you have been taught.

Refuse war—the justified madness of burning humans and the earth. How did they arrive to war, and more importantly how did they legitimize it, make it a part of human exchange and practice. They gave it rules and proper modes of conduct.

Refuse men who have decided they have all the power over us all. They don’t, even if they hate hearing that.

Refuse homophobic constraints over the lives of the LGBTQ+ community. Refuse borders. Refuse their damaging effects on your skin.

In a world that demands bordered lives, become borderless.

October 11, 2020

MANIFESTO ABRIDGED VERSION

(200 Words)

We have all given into borders. We have given into borders as means to isolate, assimilate, dictate, and define. Borders as a mode of living. Borders as reason to burn, destroy, annihilate. Borders as reasons to flee, seek life, become refugees. Borders as the most powerful assertion of manhood—a man harvesting power over others. We have given into borders drawn around land, our minds, and our bodies. We are victims, ney slaves to borders. And we live and pretend that we can navigate these chains and somehow become free. I refuse for my freedom to be a product of such insane thinking, a product of borders, a product of the desires of men. I refuse a world that imposes borders on my imagination in order to tame, in order to imprison and eradicate all that is different. I refuse the binding nature of new and old technology—how everything new is built with the limitations of the past. Borders are limitations to human potential. Limitations to the possibility of change. Limitations to a free world. I will cross every border. I will unchain my mind, my body, my imagination. In a world that demands bordered lives, I will become borderless.