INTRODUCTION:

1. The notion of talent has been the most destructive force in the lives of innocent young people hoping to make it big. This destruction goes unnoticed because the conniving “Big Talent” – namely, pop culture – positions talent as something we should desire and be striving towards.

2. We define talent, with the help of our AI generator¹, as “a natural aptitude or a special ability that someone possesses, often requiring little or no training, and can be demonstrated in areas like music, art, sports, or communication.” We will confine talent’s definition to these areas, because no matter what my parents say, my ability to eat Starbursts with the wrapper on does not count as a talent in the eyes of the general public.

3. The talent-industrial system of “pop-culture” pushes its narrative into the hearts of the young and impressionable. Big Talent forces us to define ourselves by one specific skill because that is what it can market and sell to make a profit, enticing us with stardom. If this system survives, it will reduce human beings to mere cogs in the production of spectacle. 

4. We, the talentless, therefore advocate a revolution against this trick-pony system. The revolution may or may not require violence, depending on whether the talented will resist or concede. I hope it is the latter, but we cannot predict whether a Tanya Harding style anti-talent tactic will be necessary. 

THE CHEAP PLEASURES OF TALENT

5. To be talented is to be defined, a concept so appealing I myself have fallen into it. But, after my (incredibly brief) stint of seeking an angelic voice like the icons of Pitch Perfect, I turned my back on talent. Though perhaps out of necessity, it is true, I thus found a way to escape the confines of talent, and we can all do the same. I refuse to be contained to a single skill.

6. Being talented is a condition that brings pleasure so easily it cannot be considered pleasure. Despite the so-called “hard work” it may take to excel in these abilities, talent remains an easy route to cheap satisfaction, a means for definition so accessible that it holds no weight. Defining yourself is meant to be a difficult process of intense reflection – a process which is not necessitated and cannot occur when you are “really good at singing.”

THE DANGER OF TALENT

7. Those who oppose our theory, namely the talented, argue that the world would be void of aesthetic pleasure without the notion of talent: where would our Mona Lisas, our 9th symphonies, our Beloveds come from? But we say to them that these works only exist through their creators’ rejection of talent.

8. Beethoven was talented at composing. But, he also presents the perfect example of a talented person who rejects the ills of Big Talent. Beethoven transcends through his rejection of talent as synonymous with natural ability: the man quite literally becomes deaf and is still able to compose, evidence of a skill that is curated through doubt and practice and pushing boundaries.

9. We, the talentless, experience the world in all its glory and gore, forced to search through the depths of life to find meaning in and around ourselves. We cannot be satisfied with our lives being characterized by talent, and this dissatisfaction is what gives us the will to continuously redefine and rediscover our very beings.

10. You, the talented, can join us. Become Beethoven and reject Big Talent. In defining yourself by only your talent, you feed a shallower version of yourself, reducing the world to surface-level natural ability. Join with the talentless in our experience and remember that our enemy is one and the same, a pop culture set on the reduction of humans to production and success. 

THE NATURE OF FREEDOM

11. The freedom of the spirit cannot be actualized if one is bound by the chains of talent. Our freedom can only come in our total rejection of the concept – we must refrain from our very desire for talent, our desire to fit in. Instead, pursue the areas of talent without pursuing talent itself: paint and sing and dance and do all of it incredibly poorly, and you will find what it means to be alive.

12. To this day, my one documented example of these pursuits is a video of me dressed as a clown, with terrifying makeup and a red wig, attempting to do an Irish jig. I fail to achieve talent in any of these attempted areas, and yet it is also a documentation of me at my most full of life, of humanity.

ONE FINAL NOTE

13. We, the talentless, must unite against Big Talent. We must revere not the 1st violin but instead the dancing clown. Have “talents,” not those which define who you are but are an expression of your person. Frolic in the pursuit of skill, those you have and those you never will. Turn to the wonders of clownery and drink in the depths of a life free from the chains of talent as a defining force.

¹ I know, I know, you’re going to complain that this use of AI is absurd. But really, cut me some slack – I’m a busy gal, and these talents won’t reject themselves.