The World Needs More Joy

We could have opened with a safer theme. The Ambition Issue. The Taste Issue. Something that photographs cool. Instead, the first word this publication ever committed to was joy, and I want to be honest about why.

Somewhere along the way, cynicism started reading as intelligence. Expect nothing and you’re never embarrassed. Call everything over (the city, the scene, the whole culture) and you sound like you’ve seen things. Meanwhile excitement became something people apologize for. I get the instinct. The world hands you plenty of reasons.

But cynicism has never once filled a room.

Here’s what I know from the production side: joy is a discipline, not a mood. Somebody books the artists. Somebody builds clouds out of chicken wire and paints saguaros on plywood, stays until five, and starts planning the next one on the drive home. Every night that ever felt effortless got that way because somebody did all of it on purpose.

And I’ve watched what it does. A whole table cracking up at art night while somebody fights the sewing machine. Two strangers locked in a Connect Four duel like the rent depended on it. A dance floor at 3am that did not want the sun to come up. None of that is escapism. Nobody in those rooms was hiding from the world. They were rebuilding the part of themselves that has to go back out into it.

One person who came to Babestock said it better than I ever have:

That sentence is the whole issue. That’s what joy is for. It’s the fuel for the serious things, not a vacation from them. People make their bravest work after nights like that. They start the collaboration. They finally book the show.

So no, I won’t be qualifying the hope.
I won’t apologize for the glitter.
I won’t pretend a warehouse full of dancing strangers is a small thing.

The world needs more joy as a practice, not a caption. This whole issue is us doing something about it. Come see for yourself. The door was left open for you.