Mariella Gattini

Sophistication is not something worth seeking in writing. The problem lies on the very same premise of the word: Complexity described, and, in the best of cases, narrated with words that most people have in their passive vocabulary and are mostly deceptive. You risk getting lost in the use of words for the sake of words, instead of making a point that goes directly to the matter without forcing your audience to go on a hunting expedition in your brain with no real valid outcome or any kind of reward.

I’m not asking you to dumb it down; I’m actually begging you not to dumb it up. I know, it’s tempting to use a style that would entice your professors to regard you as a sophisticated thinker, so they would be most inclined to reward you with their approval. However, what most people want from you, as a writer, is your honesty and your company. They don’t want to be preached at by somebody on a pedestal located on Mount Olympus. First, because Mount Olympus for writers is only a figure of speech, and second because it becomes clear to us, the audience, that the only one really interested in your discourse is you, and only you. For that reason, your message does not get across, it gets trampled by your own verbosity and by the ambiguity of your ideas.

Sophistication is a kind of interpretative dance, whose only purpose is to attract attention to oneself in a mendacious style that leads us into a tight and suffocating labyrinth, and traps us in a heavy back and forth between smoking mirrors and hostile corners. With that kind of verbalization, you are not helping—you are part of the problem.

My question is, do you really want to be part of the understanding of things? Or are you a simple profiteer of the critical times we are going through today?

If you really want to help, you need to get in, tell us directly what is it that you want to say, develop it, conclude, and you’re out. And don’t think, not even for a second, to insult our intelligence. Sooner or later, we’ll find out. However, I’m not suggesting an oversimplification of concepts or of the perilous days we are living today. What I’m asking for is honesty, open dialogue, and clarity. Leave your false pretenses out. Everybody is tired of that.

Also, leave plenty of space for debate, for counter-arguments, for people to take it the way they want to take it. Never defend your piece, just keep writing, because nobody can do this on their own. We all need each other, for certainty, for company, and for the solution of things. Nobody has all the answers, and some can be really wrong, but together—I mean intelligent people with no other intention other than create new worlds with imagination, love, strength, and introspection—we can be extraordinary.

Life and concepts, in general, can not be encased in one way to be or one way to think. Sophistication, by definition, suggests that our vision of the world depends on the one’s point of view. From that perspective, life and concepts vary according to the person talking. However, a lie is a lie, murder is murder, the sun is the sun, rain is rain, our mother’s face is our mother’s face—there is no room for “interpretations”. All those things we have in common contain a truth in themselves independently from the way we deem them. They are not more valuable or less valuable as concepts depending on who’s evaluating them. They are, period. And they are complex, but not sophisticated.

Sophistication is another way to shape reality. It works by cancelling out the elements that are uncomfortable for the ones trying to manipulate that reality. The result is a false rhetoric that looks credible but it’s actually only one fabricated perception based only on one particular agenda.

There is a technique for that and it’s called persuasion. If you’ve noticed, I don’t use it, because I want you to think with your own head. In that way, you become the thinker; one responsible, and accountable, for the words you use and the ideas you spread.

There is something you always have to keep in mind, though. The First Amendment does not protect individuals who use their outlets to incite bigotry, hatred, or violence in their audience, as much sophistication as they can include in their speech.

If you don’t pay attention to what you read, from the beginning to the end, you are risking getting enveloped by a preaching culture that is not in your best interest. Preachers need herds, not individuals with ideas. Individuals are dangerous to them because they can disrupt their herds, and, as a consequence, they can destroy their pyramid schemes.

For that reason, most people choose to be a follower, especially because they don’t want to step on any toes. They pay by stripping themselves from the richness of their individuality. And individuals with their own ideas pay a toll, too. By always going against the grain of the non-thinkers, which is utterly exhausting. Either way, you pay the price for the one you decide to be. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to go through life without taking a stand. Your inaction will yield serious consequences in your life, too.

Be aware of the new sophisticated ways some pseudo-intellectuals are using to attract attention to their business. They are not interested in you; they only want you as one more in their rosters, period.

Pay special attention to the ones who want to “educate” you about other cultures by dehumanizing those groups of people in a very sophisticated way.