3 October 2025

On the Unpostable

 

https://api.nga.gov/iiif/2d2102d3-7e6d-4d15-938d-cf70757d907b__900/full/!800,800/0/default.jpg

I. 

The unpostable is in some sense the notion of that which cannot literally be posted, although this of course is only secondary. In its primary sense, in naming this unpostable, I name it not something that could not in principle be posted, but something which for some reason, I desire to keep to myself, to keep unposted. The unpostable is that thing which I cannot post for that it would serve against the arbitrary interests of my own self-conviction.

II. 

The unpostable is unpostable because I fear posting it. Because I fear what it might mean to post it. Because I believe there are some things which were better kept private. Or perhaps, to truthfully avoid the endless excuses, because I am afraid. The unpostable mirrors the unsayable, that which I dare not say for a fear of what others might think, on the one hand, but equally as much that I retain to myself for that I wish to control it. This is the deeper truth of what cannot be posted and said: their being-kept-private is the attempt at an exercise of power, an attempt to control "the narrative". Which narrative? That of ourselves, of course. Of what we do - and hence, of who we are. 

III.

The unpostable and the unsayables are private not by default but my privation. Their being kept and labelled as private are not a natural state of affairs, but act either as an admission of either shame or guilt, or as an attempt at control. 

The unpostable within the confines of this blog thus becomes a matter of confession. A confession of shame and guilt - and, especially alongside the guilt, of essential humanity. The blog, in turn, becomes a confessional. And you, the reader, must become the audience which now bears admission to my guilt. For father, I have sinned...