Really resonating with this essay by Josie Sparrow in the New Socialist on ‘Slowness as Method,’ which she defines as “an insistence on thinking about things.” I’ve struggled to keep up with the content machine over the past few years and I think part of it is that I like to take it slow and go deep in my thinking; something the author brilliantly refers to as mole-work.

“The sort of slow, subterranean (occasionally amphi-terranean, in the way that a mole might briefly emerge above-ground) work called for by periods of retreat, recovery, and renewal. I think that this work is important: a revolution cannot flourish on vibes and Instagram graphics alone.”

I love meandering down long, dark tunnels in my research. It’s an essential part of context collecting for me that involves coming at a topic from even the most obscure angles because you never really know what might matter until you get there. Mole-work is apt description as well because it can certainly feel a bit like emerging from the dirt and into a sort of disorienting light at the end of one of those obscure tunnels.

What I really appreciate is the way Sparrow calls the Left to embrace this slow approach as a way of elevating nuance and complexity when it comes to the way we talk about issues. Rather than chasing the speed at which culture moves, perhaps the Left can help build a counter culture that takes its time and insists that we stop and think.