Het knapperend haatvuur (tja tja tja)

Fijn samen zitten stoken rondom het knapperend haatvuur rauwe bonen worden zoeter en vers geplukte druiven zuur maak het hard en bitter dan blijft de woede puur

een beetje naar links een tikkie naar rechts terug naar het centrum een mars richting bitter end op het ritme van een knallende drum verzamelen op vorm en maat naar aanleiding van een ultimatum

preken voor de massa in stadia van hoogspanning en verval een overdreven reactie naar aanleiding van een fictief getal neem alvast wraak haal de wapens van vergelding van stal

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

fijn opwarmen aan de straling van het knapperend haatvuur hittebronnen onder onze voeten en vast geketend aan elke muur met de herinnering aan die hete lucht zitten stokers aan het stuur

een ritje naar een strijdtoneel uitgevoerd in een kokend hete zaal een pleidooi voor dood en verderf in een voormalig les lokaal waarin vrede en oorlog worden samen gesmeed in dezelfde taal

dezelfde woorden waarmee ze andermans diensten inhuren ingezet om andere ondergeschikten naar het front te sturen waar ze uitblussen in opzettelijk aangestoken alsmaar hetere vuren

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

de hele bende zit samen bij het knapperend haat vuur ze kijken naar zelf gezette tekens, vlekken op een metersdikke muur ze zijn hard en bitter hun woede is en blijft eeuwenlang puur

achter die dikke wand verstoken van alles wat ze milder stemt worden oplossingen niet gebaseerd op bruut geweld gestremd een andere rede waarvoor hun inzet niet nodig is hardnekkig ontkend

alleen met leugens en geweld kan dit haatvuur blijven branden daarvoor moet je een geheel onder verdelen in vele landen en voortdurend zorgen voor zeer oververhitte toestanden

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

als een man samen gekluisterd rondom het knetterend haatvuur ze noemen die zinsbegeestering voor verandering noodzakelijke kuur maar zitten zelf al eeuwen onveranderlijk te turen naar die muur

met woord als daad en andersom de zintuigen elk moment bestoken duizenden mogelijkheden op een ander verloop uit de hersenpan roken die pannetjes blijven ze houden boven het haatvuur tot ze overkoken

vanaf die potdicht afgedekte plek bestaat slechts eenrichtingsverkeer er gaan miljoenen berichten uit maar geen boodschap keert weer binnen die wanden kennen ze alleen hun eigen herrie en niks meer

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

bij het knapperend knetterend opstokend volop rokend haatvuur zitten een paar mannen hard en bitter met hun woede voor altijd puur ze zien niks horen niks voelen niks hun leven een metersdikke muur

vele regels zijn op het haatvuur in overgekookte pannetjes gebrouwen een paar man beter dan alle andere, alle mannen beter dan vrouwen verzet immobiliseren gaat vlot met ogen dicht en handjes gevouwen

of diep ineengezakt door de knieën met het hoofd naar de grond en die lap voor ademende mond houdt alleen haatdragenden gezond aanpasbare regels voor gedrag zorgt voor een eeuwige open wond

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

het knapperend haatvuur eet het vuur uit de man en kookt hem kapot ze blijven verstoken van dit bericht ze horen alleen de zelf gemaakte god rondom verkoolde lichamen van voorgangers nasmeulend in het lot

ze weten niet dat ze achter hun muur niemand meer bereiken ze horen alleen een terugkaatsende stem gaande over lijken over vijanden die voor ze wijken en stervenden die amechtig opkijken

dat is alles wat het knapperend haatvuur heeft te vertellen die deze club in hun korte klote leven zal blijven kwellen terwijl ze denken dat de vurige haat achter de wand blijft opwellen

tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja tja

tja tja tja

Mientras estamos vivos, aunque no llevemos un centavo en el bolsillo, creemos que tenemos algo. Es razonable, porque tenemos el mayor bien de todos que es la vida. Pero eso -también es razonable- nos llena de miedos, pues tememos perderla. Aunque no seamos del todo conscientes. Aunque pensemos que vamos a vivir eternamente.

En la guerra, los soldados saben que todo es del ejército. El arma, las botas, el cuerpo.

-Fernández, vaya a esos arbustos.

Y Fernández va sin preguntar; sin reflexionar. Aún así, Fernández sabe que debe proteger “su vida”.

Si le disparan, todavía es “su vida”.

Aunque tenga el cuerpo como un colador, sigue siendo su vida, y sabe que el deber de sus camaradas es auxiliarlo para que continúe con vida.

Porque su cuerpo es del ejército. Y al ejército le interesa que siga con vida.

Eso dicen. Pero nadie viene a mi rescate.

What I’ve noticed is the part that kind of scares me the most about a breakup in a way is the part that makes it an unhealthy relationship. Today I spent time with some friends, but after that I kind of got really tired and friends got off and so I just wanted to do nothing almost. And the issue is that do nothing means I wanted to spend time with E. Just having her around and being able to spend that passive time together is so nice. Like she’s there and so I don’t even have to worry about boredom or loneliness or just that mind this kind of doom scrolling. I always have something to do when she’s there, and I always have someone to do it with. And I think that is a problem. I think that becomes a problem because I basically always have a source of escapism, and because of that I never actually have to enrich my life and face that discomfort necessary for change. If I could take a pill that removed all discomfort from my life, I would never have any good experiences, or any kind of ambition, drive, or motivation really. And I think that you can argue that maybe a goal in life is to eliminate discomfort, but at the same time I would argue that life is much more meaningful and enriched and actually enjoyed, not just a punishment you can minimize.

And so I guess it’s kind of hard, when I want to just reach out and text her. I think part of the reason why this isn’t affecting me too too heavily it’s because I think it’s temporary, in the sense that this weekend I will be able to interact with her again hopefully. But also I guess what’s the difference then, between this and just the understanding that I will have some sort of social interaction and enrichment soon? Like even if I have to make all new friends, and I have to get past that initial period of both exploration and also hoping that their people I really enjoyed the company of, doesn’t that mean that the discomfort will be temporary?

I think it’s one of those things where a relationship is something that I really hope for in life, but I think it’s one of those things where to be able to use it I need to be able to prove that I don’t need it. And I think that’s something I’m kind of struggling with right now if I’m being honest, meaning there’s significant room for improvement. I know that I will be able to find another relationship, and I also know that I don’t need a partner to satisfy every single niche for them to be a good partner. But I do think that no matter what I would still fall victim to the trap of wanting to move too fast with someone as the shortest path out of loneliness. I do still really care about E, and I know that we do have issues and at the end of the day if things do not work out I’ll be OK. But at the same time I do want to make sure that my love for her is one that sustainable so that if we get this opportunity together I can do my best to make sure it’s good for both of us.

Druglame

Heeft u ook last van zere voeten, kloven door droge huid, kramp in de tenen, de hiel, wreef soms zelfs diep in de kuiten?

Ik wel, gelukkig zag ik toen een flyer hangen aan de plak wand van de super enorm met daar op de contact gegevens van de ProFeet, die heeft alle mogelijke middelen om voet en onderbeen ProBlemen te verminderen. Dank zij de ProFeet heb ik een beter staand bestaan. Ik wandel en ga overal weer heen en weer.

Ja u leest het hier. De ProFeet is een garantie voor verbetering van alle voeten in elk bestaan. Komt u ook dan komt u dat ten goede en mijn verdiensten zodat ik meer druglame kan maken en nog meer mensen op de hoogte kan brengen van mijn voetzool verbeter methodiek, de ProFeetiën.

Hou het op voeten met de ProFeet

The pitch is always the same. A gleaming control room, banks of screens flickering with real-time data, algorithms humming away beneath the surface, optimising traffic flow, predicting crime, routing ambulances, trimming energy waste. The smart city, we are told, will be cleaner, safer, faster, and more efficient. It will save money. It will save lives. And increasingly, as municipal budgets tighten and technology vendors sharpen their sales decks, the conversation has narrowed to a single question: what is the return on investment?

That question is not inherently wrong. Cities should spend public money wisely. But when ROI becomes the dominant lens through which urban AI systems are evaluated, something important slips out of focus. The residents whose data powers these systems, whose movements are tracked and whose behaviours are modelled, are quietly reclassified. They stop being citizens with rights and start becoming data points with value. And once that shift takes hold, the consequences for privacy, social equity, and democratic participation are not hypothetical. They are already unfolding in cities around the world.

The Trillion-Dollar Bet on Algorithmic Urbanism

The scale of investment in smart city technology has become staggering. According to MarketsandMarkets, the global smart cities market is projected to grow from USD 699.7 billion in 2025 to USD 1,445.6 billion by 2030, at a compound annual growth rate of 15.6 per cent. Fortune Business Insights places the 2025 valuation even higher, at USD 952.13 billion, with projections reaching USD 6,315 billion by 2034. Whichever estimate you choose, the trajectory is unmistakable: governments and corporations are pouring unprecedented sums into the digital transformation of urban life, driven by projections that over 68 per cent of the global population will live in cities by 2050.

The McKinsey Global Institute, in its landmark 2018 report “Smart Cities: Digital Solutions for a More Livable Future,” found that smart city applications could improve quality-of-life indicators by 10 to 30 per cent. The numbers were compelling: commute times reduced by 15 to 20 per cent, emergency response times accelerated by 20 to 35 per cent, crime incidents (assault, robbery, burglary, and auto theft) lowered by 30 to 40 per cent, greenhouse gas emissions cut by 10 to 15 per cent. McKinsey also noted that roughly 60 per cent of the initial investment could come from private-sector actors, a detail that has shaped procurement models ever since. The report estimated that in a city with an already-low emergency response time of eight minutes, smart systems could shave off almost two minutes; in a city starting with an average response time of fifty minutes, the reduction might exceed seventeen minutes.

But there is a gap between what these technologies can do and the question of who they do it for. The shift towards ROI-driven deployment is now well documented. A report by IoT Tech News observed that smart city deployments are moving beyond pilot phases as operational leaders prioritise ROI and scalable infrastructure. Investment priorities are consolidating around proven technologies rather than experimental solutions, with AI-powered traffic management, smart grid systems, and digital government services receiving approximately 70 per cent of available funding. Outcome-based contracts, where technology providers guarantee specific performance metrics such as energy savings or traffic flow improvements, are expected to represent 60 per cent of new smart city deals by 2028.

The logic is seductive. If a sensor network can demonstrably reduce energy costs or speed up refuse collection, the business case writes itself. But this framing systematically undervalues outcomes that are harder to quantify: civil liberties, community cohesion, democratic agency, the right to be left alone. When the spreadsheet becomes the arbiter of urban policy, the city risks optimising itself into a place that works beautifully for data but poorly for people.

Surveillance by Another Name

The privacy implications of AI-driven urban management are not speculative. They are architectural. Every smart city system that monitors, predicts, or optimises relies on the continuous collection of data about human behaviour. Traffic cameras capture licence plates. Wi-Fi networks log device locations. Smart meters record energy usage patterns that can reveal when residents are home, asleep, or away. Acoustic sensors detect gunshots but also record conversations. Facial recognition systems, despite regulatory pushback in Europe, remain standard infrastructure in many Asian cities. And the risk of function creep is ever-present: technology deployed for one purpose, such as disaster management or traffic optimisation, can be quietly repurposed for more invasive surveillance activities without the knowledge or consent of the people it monitors.

The European Union's AI Act, which entered into force on 1 August 2024, represents the most significant legislative attempt to draw boundaries around these capabilities. Article 5 of the Act prohibits real-time remote biometric identification systems in publicly accessible spaces for law enforcement, with limited exceptions for serious crimes and terrorist threats. It bans AI systems that scrape facial images from the internet or CCTV footage and prohibits biometric categorisation systems that deduce race, political opinions, religious beliefs, or sexual orientation. Violations carry fines of up to 35 million euros or 7 per cent of global annual turnover. The Act also prohibits AI systems that evaluate or classify people based on their social behaviour, predict a person's risk of committing a crime, or infer emotions in the workplace or educational institutions.

These prohibitions, which took effect in February 2025, are meaningful. But they apply only within the EU, and even there, the Act classifies many other forms of remote biometric identification (such as retrospective facial recognition using closed-circuit television footage) as “high risk” rather than prohibited. By August 2026, high-risk AI systems must be fully compliant with the Act's requirements for risk assessment, human oversight, and transparency. The question is whether enforcement will match ambition, particularly as the smart city consulting market, valued at USD 5.7 billion in 2025 according to HTF Market Intelligence, creates powerful commercial incentives to push the boundaries of what is permissible.

Outside Europe, the picture is far starker. In China, the convergence of smart city infrastructure with state surveillance has produced what researchers at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute describe as “City Brain” systems, where AI integrates data from cameras, sensors, social media, and government databases into unified platforms for urban control. The Chinese AI company Watrix has developed gait recognition software, incubated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, capable of identifying individuals from up to 50 metres away, even when their faces are covered. As Watrix CEO Huang Yongzhen told the South China Morning Post: “Cooperation is not needed for them to be recognised by our technology.”

In Xinjiang province, these technologies have been deployed as instruments of ethnic persecution. The Chinese state collects biometric data from Uyghur Muslims, monitors their movements through GPS, and tracks their religious practices using AI-powered surveillance networks. According to the National Endowment for Democracy, PRC-sourced AI surveillance solutions have diffused to over eighty countries worldwide. Hikvision and Dahua, two Chinese surveillance camera manufacturers, jointly accounted for roughly 34 per cent of the global market as of 2024. Through the Belt and Road Initiative, Chinese companies have provided 22 African countries with public security systems including cameras, biometrics, internet controls, and surveillance infrastructure.

The lesson from China is not that all smart cities will become surveillance states. It is that the same technology can serve radically different political purposes, and that the distance between urban optimisation and authoritarian control is shorter than many democratic societies have acknowledged.

The Ghost in the Data

Shoshana Zuboff, the Harvard Business School professor emerita whose 2019 book The Age of Surveillance Capitalism redefined the debate about data extraction, has argued that surveillance capitalism “unilaterally claims human experience as free raw material for translation into behavioural data.” In the smart city context, this dynamic takes on a distinctly spatial dimension. The city itself becomes the extraction zone. Every journey, every transaction, every interaction with public infrastructure generates data that can be captured, analysed, and monetised.

Zuboff's framework illuminates a fundamental tension in smart city governance. Technology vendors frame data collection as a public good: better services, faster responses, more efficient resource allocation. But the commercial models underpinning many smart city deployments depend on the same data having private value. When a municipality partners with a technology company to deploy sensors across its transport network, who owns the data those sensors generate? Who decides how it is used, stored, and shared? And who profits? These are not abstract questions. They sit at the heart of every public-private partnership in the smart city space, and the answers are rarely negotiated in public view.

The collapse of Sidewalk Labs' Quayside project in Toronto offers a cautionary tale. Announced in October 2017 with the backing of Alphabet (Google's parent company), the project envisioned a high-tech waterfront neighbourhood featuring autonomous vehicles, heated sidewalks, and pervasive sensor networks. Sidewalk Labs committed USD 50 million to the planning phase and projected USD 38 billion in private investment over two decades. The company claimed the development would create 44,000 jobs and generate CAD 4.3 billion in annual tax revenues.

But the privacy backlash was swift and sustained. Ann Cavoukian, who served 17 years as Ontario's Information and Privacy Commissioner (from 1997 to 2014) and was hired as a consultant on the project, resigned in October 2018 after Sidewalk Labs refused to commit to de-identifying all sensor data at the point of collection. Instead, the company proposed a “civic data trust” run by an independent group with the power to approve technologies that did not de-identify data at the point of collection, a structure that Cavoukian viewed as fundamentally inadequate. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association filed a lawsuit in April 2019. The grassroots campaign BlockSidewalk mobilised public opposition, drawing explicit parallels to the movement that had forced Amazon to abandon its planned second headquarters in Queens, New York.

The project was cancelled in May 2020, with Sidewalk Labs CEO Daniel Doctoroff citing the economic impact of COVID-19. But observers widely agreed that the pandemic was merely the final blow. The project had been fatally undermined by its failure to address legitimate concerns about data sovereignty, corporate control, and the absence of meaningful consent mechanisms for residents. A controversial June 2019 scope expansion, in which Sidewalk Labs proposed a project spanning 77 hectares (sixteen times the original five-hectare plan), had further eroded public trust.

As Cavoukian warned at the time, other cities would take notice of how Sidewalk Labs “flagrantly” underestimated public privacy concerns. The data privacy strategy that the company used in Toronto, she argued, was unlikely to work anywhere else.

Sensor Deserts and Algorithmic Redlining

If privacy concerns affect everyone in a smart city, the equity implications are distributed unevenly. There is mounting evidence that AI-driven urban management systems do not merely reflect existing social inequalities; they amplify and entrench them.

The mechanism is straightforward. Smart city systems rely on sensor data. Sensors cost money. And the decisions about where to place them are shaped by the same political and economic forces that have always determined which neighbourhoods receive investment and which do not. The result is what researchers Rachel S. Franklin of Newcastle University and Jack Roberts of the Alan Turing Institute have called “sensor deserts”: areas where the absence of monitoring infrastructure renders communities invisible to algorithmic decision-making.

In their 2022 study published in the Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Franklin and Roberts examined Newcastle's Urban Observatory sensor network and found significant coverage gaps. Relatively deprived, post-industrialised areas along the north bank of the River Tyne were underrepresented, despite 23 per cent of Newcastle's population living in the 10 per cent most deprived areas nationally. Environmental justice research, they noted, confirms that these populations are likely to be more exposed to pollution and other urban hazards, making them a priority for monitoring. Yet the sensor infrastructure systematically overlooked them. The researchers developed a decision support tool demonstrating the significant trade-offs involved in sensor placement: increasing coverage of workplaces, for example, necessarily reduced coverage of older persons due to their different locations in the city.

This pattern is not unique to Newcastle. A January 2026 analysis by the University of the People found that placing more sensors in affluent neighbourhoods leads to interventions that disproportionately benefit those communities while leaving others in “data shadows,” reinforcing cycles of neglect where the lack of data becomes a justification for the lack of investment. The phenomenon resembles a digital-era version of redlining: not a line drawn on a map by a bank officer, but an absence of data that produces the same discriminatory effect.

The bias extends beyond sensor placement to the participatory systems that smart cities rely upon for citizen feedback. Research by Constantine Kontokosta and Boyeong Hong at NYU's Urban Intelligence Lab, published in Sustainable Cities and Society in 2021, examined Kansas City's 311 reporting system and found that despite greater objective and subjective need, low-income and minority neighbourhoods were less likely to report street condition or nuisance issues. The study analysed 21,046 resident satisfaction survey responses, more than 500,000 service reports, and 29,884 objective street pavement condition assessments. The findings were stark: predictive algorithms trained on this complaint data would systematically under-allocate resources to the neighbourhoods that needed them most, further reinforcing existing disparities. The likelihood of a resident calling 311, the researchers found, depended heavily on awareness, trust in city services, and socioeconomic factors, meaning that the communities with the greatest need were precisely those least likely to be heard.

The implications for smart city governance are profound. When algorithmic systems are trained on biased data, they do not merely reproduce historical patterns of neglect. They encode them into infrastructure decisions that can shape urban life for decades. When a machine learning model recommends where to build a hospital, extend a metro line, or increase police patrols, it is making choices that will persist long after the algorithm itself has been updated or replaced. If the underlying data reflects discrimination, the AI automates inequality at scale, transforming historical bias into what one analysis described as “architectural permanence.”

Predictive Policing and the Feedback Loop of Injustice

Nowhere is the equity problem more acute than in predictive policing, one of the earliest and most controversial applications of AI in urban management. The premise is simple: use historical crime data to predict where future crimes are likely to occur, then deploy officers accordingly. The problem is equally simple: historical crime data does not measure where crime happens. It measures where police have been. A 2019 study by Rashida Richardson, Jason Schultz, and Kate Crawford at the AI Now Institute, published in the New York University Law Review, described how some police departments rely on “dirty data,” defined as data “derived from or influenced by corrupt, biased, and unlawful practices,” to inform their predictive systems.

The Los Angeles Police Department adopted the predictive policing tool PredPol in 2011, claiming reductions in burglary in pilot districts. By 2020, the programme was discontinued after independent audits revealed that the system had created a feedback loop: police patrols generated more recorded incidents in already-targeted areas, which reinforced the algorithm's prediction that those areas were high-crime, which generated more patrols. An audit by the LAPD inspector general found “significant inconsistencies” in how officers calculated and entered data, further fuelling biased predictions. The department's separate LASER programme directed heightened surveillance against minority neighbourhoods based on historical arrest records that were themselves products of discriminatory policing.

Chicago's experience followed a parallel trajectory. In 2012, the Chicago Police Department implemented the “Strategic Subject List” (colloquially known as the “Heat List”), an algorithm designed to identify individuals at higher risk of involvement in gun violence. The system disproportionately targeted young Black and Latino men, subjecting them to intensified surveillance and police interactions. An analysis found that 85 per cent of those flagged had no subsequent involvement in gun violence. Chicago abandoned the system in 2020.

In January 2025, seven members of the US House and Senate jointly wrote to the Department of Justice calling for an end to federal funding of predictive policing projects “until the DOJ can ensure that grant recipients will not use such systems in ways that have a discriminatory impact.” The EU AI Act classifies predictive policing systems as “high-risk,” requiring conformity assessments, documentation, and human oversight. The UK Home Office AI Procurement Guidelines, issued in 2025, require explainability, bias testing, and ethical board review before operational deployment of such systems.

These regulatory responses are welcome but belated. For the communities that lived under the algorithmic gaze for years, the damage has been done. And the underlying structural problem remains: any predictive system trained on data generated by a biased institution will reproduce and amplify that bias, regardless of how sophisticated the algorithm.

Democratic Deficits in the Automated City

Beyond privacy and equity, there is a deeper question that smart city advocates rarely confront: what happens to democratic participation when urban management is increasingly delegated to algorithmic systems?

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has noted that AI is becoming an integral part of digital government worldwide, facilitating automated internal processes, improving decision-making and forecasting, and enhancing fraud detection. The OECD also recognises that AI can facilitate innovation in civic participation, generating simulations and visualisations that allow citizens to engage with complex urban planning decisions. In Hamburg, Germany, the CityScope platform developed at MIT Media Lab used 3D and AI technologies to engage stakeholders in deciding on 161 viable locations to house refugees. In Greece, the opencouncil.gr platform uses AI to automatically transcribe local council meetings and generate summaries, making local governance more accessible.

But these are exceptions rather than the rule. In most smart city deployments, the algorithmic layer sits between citizens and the decisions that affect them, operating with minimal transparency and limited mechanisms for democratic input. When a traffic management system reroutes vehicles through a residential neighbourhood based on real-time congestion data, the residents of that neighbourhood have not voted on the decision, been consulted about it, or in most cases even been informed. When a resource allocation algorithm determines which parks receive maintenance funding and which do not, the affected communities have no insight into the criteria or the weighting. The decisions are made, in effect, by code.

Digital twins add another dimension to this problem. These virtual replicas of physical urban systems, combining real-time sensor data with simulation models, are increasingly used to test infrastructure scenarios before implementing them in the real world. A 2025 review in the Journal of the American Planning Association warned that AI algorithms used in digital twin urban planning “will likely rely on historical data for training models” and that “these historical data may carry biases inherited from past discriminatory practices and systemic inequalities.” When an AI model recommends building new infrastructure, extending a metro line, or reallocating resources, it shapes urban life for decades. If the training data favours investment in affluent areas over marginalised ones, the digital twin will recommend resource allocation that continues to neglect underserved communities, all while presenting its recommendations with the veneer of computational objectivity.

A January 2026 study published in Telematics and Informatics examined what the authors called the “smart governance paradox”: the finding that smart city development may intensify socioeconomic inequalities by excluding digitally disadvantaged groups from participatory governance. Wealthier communities with greater digital literacy and connectivity receive prompt responses from algorithmic systems, while lower-income neighbourhoods, lacking broadband access or the capacity to navigate digital platforms, are effectively shut out of the feedback loop that determines how city resources are distributed.

The paradox is sharp. The technologies that promise to make government more responsive also risk making it less accountable. When decisions are automated, the lines of responsibility blur. A human official can be voted out of office. An algorithm cannot. A council meeting can be attended by the public. A machine learning model's training data cannot be interrogated by a concerned resident. The democratic infrastructure that allows citizens to challenge, contest, and shape the decisions that govern their lives is being quietly bypassed, not by design necessarily, but by the relentless logic of efficiency.

Barcelona, Amsterdam, and the Counter-Models

Not every city has followed the ROI-first playbook. Some have attempted to build smart city infrastructure around democratic principles rather than despite them, and their experiences offer instructive contrasts.

Barcelona's trajectory under Mayor Ada Colau, who took office in 2015, represents perhaps the most ambitious attempt to reimagine the smart city as a democratic project. Francesca Bria, an Italian innovation economist appointed as the city's Chief Digital Technology and Innovation Officer in 2016, argued that the traditional smart city approach was “technology-heavy, pushed by a Big Tech agenda with a lack of clarity around data ownership, algorithm transparency, and public needs.” Under her leadership, Barcelona pursued a model of “technological sovereignty” built on several pillars.

First, the city mandated that digital infrastructure and the data it generates should be treated as a public good, owned and controlled by citizens rather than corporations. Barcelona adopted a technological sovereignty guide and digital ethical standards stipulating that digital information and infrastructure used in the city should be publicly owned and controlled. Second, Barcelona rewrote its procurement policies to prioritise open-source software, committing 70 per cent of its budget for new digital services to free and open-source development, a move designed to eliminate vendor lock-in and retain public control over data. Third, the city launched the DECODE project, a five-million-euro EU-funded initiative to develop blockchain-based tools that would give citizens granular control over how their personal data was shared and with whom. Fourth, and most significantly, Barcelona deployed Decidim, an open-source participatory democracy platform that enabled direct citizen engagement in urban planning and budgeting. Nearly 40,000 people and 1,500 organisations contributed over 10,000 proposals through the platform, with 71 per cent of citizen proposals ultimately accepted and incorporated into the city's Municipal Action Plan. By 2023, Decidim had grown to over 120,000 registered participants and more than 31,000 proposals across 126 participatory processes.

Amsterdam pursued a complementary approach through its Tada manifesto, developed between 2017 and 2019 by a coalition of 60 experts, organisations, politicians, and businesses convened by the Amsterdam Economic Board. Tada established six core values for the responsible use of data and technology in the city: inclusivity, citizen control, human-centricity, legitimacy, openness and transparency, and universality. Deputy Mayor Touria Meliani translated these principles into concrete policy, including proposals for data minimisation, privacy by design, open data by default, and a ban on Wi-Fi tracking. The city also launched a digital map showing where the municipality had placed cameras and sensors and what data they collected, and created “My Amsterdam,” a personal digital environment where residents could view all information the municipality held about them. Amsterdam's Datalab conducts neutral audits of the algorithms used to route the 250,000 issues in public space reported annually, testing whether those algorithms are biased towards particular privileged areas or problems.

These models are imperfect. Academic research on Barcelona's implementation has noted a gap between inspiring rhetoric and practical delivery, and critics have argued that participatory platforms can create an illusion of engagement while real decision-making power remains with elected officials and their advisers. But the fundamental principle they embody (that citizens should have sovereignty over the data generated in their city, and that democratic participation should be designed into smart city systems rather than bolted on as an afterthought) stands in stark contrast to the vendor-driven, ROI-first approach that dominates most deployments globally.

Governing What We Have Built

The challenge facing cities in 2026 is not whether to adopt AI-driven urban management. That train has left the station. The challenge is whether the governance frameworks surrounding these systems will evolve fast enough to protect the rights they threaten.

Several principles are emerging from the academic literature and from the practical experiences of cities that have grappled with these questions. Igor Calzada of the University of the Basque Country and colleagues, writing in Discover Cities in 2025, call for an “Urban AI Social Contract” that would embed digital inclusion, equity, and democratic legitimacy into the design of AI-enabled cities. Their work argues that participatory governance architectures, cross-sectoral policy coordination, and mechanisms such as data cooperatives are essential to ensuring that AI deployments serve the public interest rather than private profit.

The OECD recommends structuring smart city governance across seven functional layers, embedding cross-cutting principles of human agency, participation, fairness, transparency, accountability, and sustainability. Research published in Frontiers in Sustainable Cities in 2024 proposes a comprehensive governance framework integrating privacy-centric AI, fairness-aware algorithms, and public engagement strategies.

These frameworks share common elements. They call for algorithmic transparency: citizens should be able to understand how automated decisions are made and on what basis. They call for mandatory bias audits: AI systems that allocate public resources or determine policing priorities should be regularly tested for discriminatory outcomes. They call for meaningful consent: residents should have genuine choices about what data is collected about them and how it is used, not merely the option to accept or reject an opaque terms-of-service agreement. And they call for democratic oversight: elected officials and the publics they represent should retain authority over the goals that algorithmic systems are designed to optimise.

The question is whether these principles will be adopted as binding requirements or remain aspirational. The EU AI Act represents a significant step, but its geographic scope is limited and its implementation timeline extends to 2027 for many provisions. In the United States, the White House Office of Management and Budget issued a landmark policy in March 2024 expanding reporting requirements for AI systems “presumed to be rights-impacting,” but this policy does not cover state and local law enforcement, where the vast majority of smart city policing applications operate.

Meanwhile, the commercial pressures driving ROI-first deployments show no sign of abating. Outcome-based contracts tie vendor compensation to measurable performance metrics, creating strong incentives to maximise the volume and granularity of data collection. Public-private partnerships, which have become the dominant funding model for smart city projects, align public policy objectives with private-sector profit motives in ways that can obscure accountability. And the sheer pace of technological change means that regulatory frameworks are perpetually playing catch-up, governing yesterday's capabilities while tomorrow's are already being deployed.

What Citizens Deserve From Their Cities

The smart city is not a neutral proposition. It is a political project dressed in technical language. The sensors, algorithms, and data pipelines that constitute its infrastructure are not merely tools for improving urban efficiency. They are instruments of power: power to observe, to predict, to classify, to include, and to exclude.

The evidence assembled here points to a clear set of risks. Privacy erosion is not a bug in the smart city model; it is a feature of systems designed to generate continuous behavioural data at population scale. Equity failures are not aberrations; they are predictable consequences of sensor networks and algorithmic systems that reflect and amplify the socioeconomic hierarchies already embedded in urban geography. Democratic deficits are not temporary growing pains; they are structural outcomes of governance models that prioritise computational efficiency over citizen agency.

None of this means that AI-driven urban management is inherently harmful. The McKinsey data on reduced emergency response times and lower crime rates describe real benefits with real human value. The question is not whether these technologies should exist, but who they should serve, who should govern them, and what rights citizens retain in a city that increasingly thinks for itself.

Barcelona and Amsterdam have demonstrated that alternative models are possible: cities where data is treated as a public good, where algorithmic decisions are subject to democratic scrutiny, and where participation is not an afterthought but a design principle. Toronto's Quayside failure has demonstrated that ignoring citizen concerns about surveillance and data sovereignty carries tangible costs, measured not just in lost investment but in eroded public trust.

The trillion-dollar smart city industry will continue to grow. The algorithms will become more sophisticated. The sensors will become cheaper and more pervasive. The question that remains, and that no amount of ROI analysis can answer, is whether the cities of the future will be governed by their residents or merely optimised around them.

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References and Sources

1. MarketsandMarkets. “Smart Cities Market Size, Share and Growth Report, 2025-2030.” MarketsandMarkets, 2025. https://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/smart-cities-market-542.html

2. McKinsey Global Institute. “Smart Cities: Digital Solutions for a More Livable Future.” McKinsey & Company, June 2018. https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/operations/our-insights/smart-cities-digital-solutions-for-a-more-livable-future

3. IoT Tech News. “Smart city deployments shift to prioritising ROI.” IoT Tech News, 2025. https://iottechnews.com/news/smart-city-deployments-shift-prioritising-roi/

4. European Commission. “AI Act: Shaping Europe's Digital Future.” European Commission Digital Strategy, 2024. https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/regulatory-framework-ai

5. EU Artificial Intelligence Act. “Article 5: Prohibited AI Practices.” 2024. https://artificialintelligenceact.eu/article/5/

6. ASPI (Australian Strategic Policy Institute). “Data-Centric Authoritarianism: How China's Development of Frontier Technologies Could Globalise Repression.” National Endowment for Democracy, 2024. https://www.ned.org/data-centric-authoritarianism-how-chinas-development-of-frontier-technologies-could-globalize-repression-2/

7. Zuboff, Shoshana. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. PublicAffairs Books, 2019.

8. CBC News. “Sidewalk Labs cancels plan to build high-tech neighbourhood in Toronto amid COVID-19.” CBC News, 7 May 2020. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/sidewalk-labs-cancels-project-1.5559370

9. Smart Cities Dive. “Sidewalk Labs advisor quits Toronto project over privacy concerns.” Smart Cities Dive, 2018. https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/news/sidewalk-labs-advisor-quits-toronto-project-over-privacy-concerns/539034/

10. Franklin, Rachel S. and Jack Roberts. “Optimizing for Equity: Sensor Coverage, Networks, and the Responsive City.” Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 2022. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/24694452.2022.2077169

11. University of the People. “Designing Equitable Smart Cities: Computer Science Approaches to Fair and Scalable Urban Sensing Architectures.” University of the People Blog, January 2026. https://www.uopeople.edu/blog/designing-equitable-smart-cities/

12. Kontokosta, Constantine and Boyeong Hong. “Bias in smart city governance: How socio-spatial disparities in 311 complaint behavior impact the fairness of data-driven decisions.” Sustainable Cities and Society, Vol. 64, 2021. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2210670720307216

13. TechPolicy.Press. “Politicians Move to Limit Predictive Policing After Years of Controversial Failures.” TechPolicy.Press, January 2025. https://www.techpolicy.press/politicians-move-to-limit-predictive-policing-after-years-of-controversial-failures/

14. Brennan Center for Justice. “Predictive Policing Explained.” Brennan Center for Justice, 2024. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/predictive-policing-explained

15. Brennan Center for Justice. “The Dangers of Unregulated AI in Policing.” Brennan Center for Justice, 2025. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/dangers-unregulated-ai-policing

16. OECD. “AI in Civic Participation and Open Government: Governing with Artificial Intelligence.” OECD, June 2025. https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/2025/06/governing-with-artificial-intelligence_398fa287/full-report/ai-in-civic-participation-and-open-government_51227ce7.html

17. “The paradox of smart cities: technological advancements and the disconnection from social participation.” Telematics and Informatics, January 2026. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0736585326000122

18. Bria, Francesca. “Digital sovereignty and smart cities: what does the future hold?” Domus, March 2021. https://www.domusweb.it/en/sustainable-cities/2021/03/24/digital-sovereignty-and-smart-cities-what-does-the-future-hold.html

19. Barcelona City Council. “Decidim Barcelona: Digital participation platform.” Ajuntament de Barcelona, 2024. https://ajuntament.barcelona.cat/digital/en/technology-accessible-everyone/accessible-and-participatory/accessible-and-participatory-5

20. Amsterdam Smart City. “Tada: Data Disclosed.” Amsterdam Smart City, 2019. https://amsterdamsmartcity.com/updates/project/tada-data-disclosed

21. Calzada, Igor and Itziar Eizaguirre. “Digital Inclusion and Urban AI: Strategic Roadmapping and Policy Challenges.” Discover Cities, 2025. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44327-025-00116-9

22. “Social smart city research: interconnections between participatory governance, data privacy, artificial intelligence and ethical sustainable development.” Frontiers in Sustainable Cities, 2024. https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-cities/articles/10.3389/frsc.2024.1514040/full

23. South China Morning Post. Watrix gait recognition technology reporting. Referenced via the South China Morning Post and Associated Press coverage.

24. “The Ethical Concerns of Artificial Intelligence in Urban Planning.” Journal of the American Planning Association, 2024. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01944363.2024.2355305

25. Richardson, Rashida, Jason Schultz, and Kate Crawford. “Dirty Data, Bad Predictions: How Civil Rights Violations Impact Police Data, Predictive Policing Systems, and Justice.” New York University Law Review Online, 2019. https://www.nyulawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/NYULawReview-94-Richardson-Schultz-Crawford.pdf

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Tim Green UK-based Systems Theorist & Independent Technology Writer

Tim explores the intersections of artificial intelligence, decentralised cognition, and posthuman ethics. His work, published at smarterarticles.co.uk, challenges dominant narratives of technological progress while proposing interdisciplinary frameworks for collective intelligence and digital stewardship.

His writing has been featured on Ground News and shared by independent researchers across both academic and technological communities.

ORCID: 0009-0002-0156-9795 Email: tim@smarterarticles.co.uk

I have a wide social network because of the size of my Indian family, stated honestly and in a non-boastful manner. The effort to hide my name on this blog is not to cover any illegality, as I am a law-abiding person, but to let out some of the tension. I want to be brutally honest here. I noticed that on 2/14 there was an uptick in interest on the blog, perhaps around the love topic, so let’s start with marriage. Marriage in the US.

If you don’t have a mentality to serve, if you don’t have the mentality to serve and take many losses before you get a win, and if what you are really seeking is safe and frequent sex, then don’t get married. Plain and simple. You end up satisfying everyone else except yourself.

So what does it mean to serve as a Husband ?

You will not get everything you want (ie instant sex)

You have to help your wife with her goals while you have yours

You have to help around the house when she’s sick or even when the both of your are sick

(This are just a few)

Part of that dissatisfaction, for me, showed up socially. I hated having to go to every single relative’s house and be fake with a bunch of people I didn’t care much for. It wasn’t that I wished ill on their lives; it just didn’t sit well with me. I almost wanted to say, I just don’t care.

Another part of it showed up intimately. I begged for sex. I craved it. I never stepped out on her, but she would allow dry sex or other forms of manipulation; nothing was interesting to her. My wife at the time had low self-esteem, which was another matter I had to contend with. Her body image was poor, and apparently it affected her desire. Yet when it came time to engage in infidelity, the urges returned. I always wondered how the psyche could change so fast. For me, she laid lifeless on a mattress. Her eyes were soulless with a “are you done yet?” Attitude. It felt demeaning to me -it was my norm.

So what was my role in the dynamic? Brought a stable income home, reared my kids. That’s all I was. That’s all I remember. It devolved to this.

Don’t ever let it devolve to this

In Summary: * Listening now to the Pregame Show ahead of tonight's men's college basketball game between the Syracuse Orange and the Duke Blue Devils. The radio feed is coming in strong from the Blue Devils Sports Network. After the game I'll finish my night prayers and head to bed.

Prayers, etc.: * I have a daily prayer regimen I try to follow throughout the day from early morning, as soon as I roll out of bed, until head hits pillow at night. Details of that regimen are linked to my link tree, which is linked to my profile page here.

Health Metrics: * bw= 229.06 lbs. * bp= 155/92 (71)

Exercise: * morning stretches, balance exercises, kegel pelvic floor exercises, half squats, calf raises, wall push-ups

Diet: * 06:40 – 1 banana * 08:30 – 1 seafood salad sandwich * 09:30 – crispy oatmeal cookies * 11:20 – salmon with a cheese and vegetable sauce * 14:30 – garden salad * 15:15 – 1 fresh apple

Activities, Chores, etc.: * 04:30 – listen to local news talk radio * 06:45 – read, pray, follow news reports from various sources, surf the socials, and nap * 10:00 – start my weekly laundry * 15:15 – listen to The Jack Ricardi Show * 15:45 – listening to relaxing music * 17:30 – trying to connect to a streaming radio feed for tonight's basketball game

Chess: * 15:35 – moved in all pending CC games

Meu amor, como é bom te ver!!!

Como eu sonhei durante todos esses anos em te ver.

Como eu senti falta do seu abraço, do seu toque, do som da sua risada e do teu calor.

Como que meu corpo reconheceria o seu abraço ainda que vendado e amarrado, como que você consegue despertar tanta coisa em mim apenas com um olhar.

Como eu amei te ter de volta, ainda que por um curto período de tempo, como eu amei te sentir minha, como eu sou teu.

Como queria te aninhar no meu peito e te fazer cafuné, te pegar no colo e te prometer que você não precisa se preocupar mais com nada, que agora eu estou aqui. E como que ao mesmo tempo eu queria te agarrar, te rasgar no meio, te fazer minha, te beijar, te morder, arranhar e chupar, até deixar minha marca no teu corpo e na tua alma.

Como eu quero viver com você meu bem, como eu quero casar contigo, envelhecer com você, criar uma família com você.

Como eu quero contar nossa história para os nossos filhos, do tipo: a mamãe de vocês não queria o papai, fez ele correr atrás dela durante muito muito tempo, mas quando você encontra a pessoa certa, você tem que lutar por ela….

Ahhhh meu amor, como que você é o meu sonho bom, como que você é o sentido para todos os meus outros sonhos.

Durante as horas de viagem eu pensei em tanta coisa, eu tinha certeza que você não iria querer me ver, ou que você perceberia que eu não sou igual era na sua cabeça e desistiria de mim, se desiludiria….

Mas você me amou, me amou com sono, fome, sem perfume, sem roupa bonita, com a barriga roncando e o cabelo cheirando a shampoo barato de motel.

E ainda assim você me amou kkkkk

Meu amor, essa viagem encheu minha cabeça de “como?”; e sinceramente eu não tenho resposta pra nenhum deles, eu não sei o pq eu sinto o que sinto, e pq mesmo sendo tão “complicado” esse sentimento só cresce.

O que eu posso dizer é que eu te amo, e to com disposição de sobra pra travar uma guerra contra o mundo pra ficar com você.

Eu quero muito você, e eu sei que se estivermos juntos e colocarmos Deus no centro, tudo vai se ajeitar.

Um cordão de três dobras não se quebra…

Te amo meu bem, estou morrendo de saudade de você, e do seu beijo que é tão meu..

Meu amor como estou com sono kkkk

Vou dormir essa noite com a sensação dos teus lábios nos meus, e com a certeza de que tudo que conversamos é real.

Te amo, sou completamente apaixonado por você

Sou completamente teu…

I my back teeth chatter as I walked on a cold New York street when I noticed a softly lit apartment glowing above me, warm chandelier orbs floating in a minimal room that looked almost inviting from the outside. It felt cozy, like the kind of place you’d want to step into just to thaw out for a moment. I like cozy homes and nooks, especially with lamps.  But inside, the man under that golden light wasn’t relaxing. He was locked in, phone in hand, eyes scanning, jaw slightly tight, focused on something that carried weight. There were faint lines on his monitor that looked like stocks or metrics, and his movements weren’t frantic, just charged, like someone running scenarios in his head. What struck me was the contrast. From the sidewalk, the room looked like comfort. From inside, it might have been pressure. Same light, same space, completely different realities depending on which side of the glass you stood on. That’s the Fish Bowl effect.

https://youtube.com/shorts/-4UtgOCgSBo?si=7r1sKxcy30TNtUNN

 

There is a version of Heaven most people carry in their imagination that feels strangely small compared to the promises of God. It is often reduced to clouds, harps, endless white light, and a kind of spiritual floating existence that feels disconnected from the ache and substance of real life. For many, Heaven has become either a sentimental comfort at funerals or a vague religious reward for good behavior. Yet when we slow down and honestly ask what the Bible really says about Heaven, something far more powerful, grounded, and breathtaking begins to emerge.

Heaven in Scripture is not an abstract escape from reality. It is not a spiritual retirement home for disembodied souls. It is not a celestial waiting room where eternity is spent in passive stillness. The Bible presents Heaven as the fulfillment of everything God has been building from the beginning. It is not the abandonment of creation but the restoration of it. It is not the rejection of the physical but the redemption of it. It is not less real than this life. It is more real.

From Genesis to Revelation, Heaven is woven into a larger story about God dwelling with His people. In the opening chapters of Genesis, humanity does not begin in Heaven but in a garden. God walks with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day. The picture is not of humans escaping earth to find God, but of God coming near to His creation. Sin fractures that intimacy, and the rest of Scripture unfolds as the story of God restoring what was lost.

When people speak of going to Heaven, they often picture leaving earth behind forever. Yet the final vision in the Bible, found in Revelation 21 and 22, does not describe believers ascending into the sky. It describes the New Jerusalem descending. “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man.” That is the climax. Not that humanity escapes earth, but that God makes His home with us. The holy city comes down. Heaven and earth are joined. The separation is removed.

This changes everything about how we understand eternity.

Heaven, according to the Bible, is not merely a location. It is the unfiltered presence of God. Wherever God’s glory is fully unveiled, that is Heaven. In the Old Testament, Heaven is described as God’s throne room, His dwelling place beyond the visible sky. The prophets glimpse it in flashes of overwhelming glory. Isaiah sees the Lord high and lifted up, the train of His robe filling the temple. Ezekiel sees a vision of radiant fire and living creatures surrounding a throne. These are not cartoon images. They are attempts to describe something beyond human language.

In the New Testament, Heaven becomes even more intimate. Jesus speaks of His Father’s house with many rooms. He tells His disciples He is going to prepare a place for them. Yet He also says the kingdom of Heaven is at hand. It is near. It is breaking in. Heaven is not only future. It is intersecting with the present through Him.

This is where many believers miss the depth of what the Bible teaches. Heaven is not simply a distant reward. It is the ultimate reality that begins now. Eternal life is not something that starts after death. Jesus says eternal life is knowing the Father and knowing Him. That relationship begins here and continues beyond the grave. Death does not create eternal life. It cannot. It only transitions the believer into the fullness of what has already begun.

So what actually happens when someone dies according to Scripture? The apostle Paul writes that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. He speaks of departing and being with Christ as far better. There is a conscious, immediate presence with Jesus for those who belong to Him. This is sometimes referred to as the intermediate state. Yet even this is not the final picture.

The final hope of the Christian faith is not merely Heaven as a spiritual realm. It is resurrection. The same Jesus who walked out of a sealed tomb in a glorified body is the pattern for believers. First Corinthians 15 makes it clear that the resurrection of the body is central to the gospel. If Christ is not raised, faith is futile. But He is raised, the firstfruits of those who sleep.

This means that Heaven is not the permanent abandonment of physical existence. It is the transformation of it. The Bible promises a new heaven and a new earth. Not a replacement that discards the old like a broken toy, but a renewal. The language echoes Romans 8, where creation itself groans, waiting for liberation. The earth is not disposable in God’s plan. It is destined for redemption.

Imagine a world without decay, without injustice, without death. Not a ghostly realm, but a tangible one where righteousness dwells. Scripture describes trees bearing fruit each month. It describes nations bringing their glory into the city. It describes work without frustration and worship without distraction. The curse is lifted. The river of life flows clear as crystal.

Heaven, in its final form, is life as God always intended it.

There is continuity and discontinuity. We are not turned into angels. That is a common misconception. Angels are a separate order of beings created by God. Humans remain human, yet glorified. Jesus after His resurrection eats fish, invites Thomas to touch His wounds, and yet passes through locked doors. His body is physical but transformed. It is recognizable yet radiant.

The Bible also tells us that relationships endure in some form. When Jesus speaks of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom, He presents them as living, not dissolved into anonymity. The book of Hebrews describes a great cloud of witnesses. Revelation speaks of martyrs crying out for justice. Heaven is not the erasure of identity. It is its purification.

One of the most comforting truths about Heaven is the absence of sorrow. Revelation says He will wipe away every tear. Death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain. The former things have passed away. This does not mean we become numb or unaware of our earthly story. It means that whatever grief or injustice marked our lives is healed in the presence of perfect justice and love.

Heaven answers the deepest longings of the human heart because those longings were placed there by God. C.S. Lewis once observed that if we find in ourselves a desire nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world. The Bible affirms that instinct. Ecclesiastes says God has set eternity in the human heart. There is a homesickness in us that no success, relationship, or achievement can quiet.

Heaven is not escapism. It is fulfillment.

Yet it is important to confront a sobering truth. Not everyone experiences Heaven as Scripture describes it. The Bible is equally clear about judgment. Jesus speaks more about Hell than anyone else in the New Testament. He describes a separation, a place prepared for the devil and his angels, a realm of outer darkness. These are not comfortable teachings, but they are present in the text.

Heaven is not automatic. It is not inherited by default. It is received through Christ. Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” The cross stands at the center of the path to Heaven. Without the atonement, there is no reconciliation. Without the resurrection, there is no victory over death.

This exclusivity is often criticized, but it is rooted in love. If sin separates humanity from God, then a bridge must be built. Christianity declares that God Himself built that bridge through the sacrifice of His Son. Heaven is not earned by moral effort. It is granted by grace.

This has profound implications for how believers live now. If Heaven is real, if resurrection is promised, if eternity stretches beyond this life, then our choices matter. Paul writes that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed. He also writes that our labor in the Lord is not in vain. There is continuity between faithfulness now and reward then.

The Bible speaks of crowns, of varying rewards, of treasures in Heaven. These are not incentives for selfish ambition. They are acknowledgments that God sees. Every act of obedience, every hidden prayer, every sacrifice made in love carries eternal weight. Heaven is not a bland uniformity where individuality disappears. It is a kingdom where justice and generosity are perfectly balanced.

When we reduce Heaven to sentimental imagery, we strip it of its transformative power. But when we see it as Scripture presents it, everything shifts. Fear of death loosens its grip. Suffering finds context. Injustice does not have the final word. The believer’s hope is not wishful thinking. It is anchored in a historical event: the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Consider how the early church lived in light of this hope. They faced persecution, imprisonment, and martyrdom. Yet they rejoiced. They sang in prison cells. They forgave their executioners. Why? Because they were convinced that death was not defeat. It was passage. Heaven was not fantasy. It was certainty.

In Philippians, Paul writes that our citizenship is in Heaven. That does not mean disengagement from earthly responsibility. It means allegiance. Believers belong to another kingdom even while living in this one. Their values, priorities, and identity are shaped by eternity.

This perspective guards against despair and against idolatry. If Heaven is the ultimate home, then no earthly success can define us, and no earthly loss can destroy us. Wealth fades. Beauty fades. Influence fades. But the soul, redeemed by Christ, endures.

There is also a communal dimension to Heaven that is often overlooked. Salvation is personal but not private. Revelation describes a multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language standing before the throne. Heaven is not homogenous. It is diverse. Cultures are not erased but redeemed. The unity is centered on worship of the Lamb.

Worship itself is central to Heaven’s description. This does not mean an endless church service in the way people fear. Worship in Scripture is not confined to singing. It is the full expression of delight and obedience toward God. In the restored creation, every task becomes worship because it flows from love. There is no division between sacred and secular. All is sacred because God is fully present.

The imagery of the New Jerusalem includes gates that are never shut. Light that never fades. A city that needs no sun because the glory of God illuminates it. These symbols communicate security, permanence, and joy. Nothing impure enters. Nothing threatens. Nothing corrodes.

One of the most overlooked truths about Heaven is its relational center. The greatest joy is not the absence of pain or the presence of beauty. It is God Himself. “They will see His face.” That is the promise. In the Old Testament, to see God’s face was unthinkable. Even Moses could only glimpse His back. In eternity, the barrier is gone.

The human heart was made for that encounter.

Many people fear that Heaven will be boring. This fear reveals more about our limited imagination than about God’s creativity. The One who designed galaxies, oceans, and the intricacies of the human mind is not preparing a monotonous eternity. If this fallen world contains such wonder, what will an unfallen one hold?

The Bible hints at responsibility and purpose in the age to come. Jesus speaks of faithful servants being entrusted with cities. Paul writes that believers will judge angels. These statements suggest activity, growth, and meaningful engagement. Eternity is not static. It is dynamic, yet free from corruption.

At the same time, Heaven resolves the tension between justice and mercy that we wrestle with now. Every wrong is addressed. Every hidden motive is exposed. Every act of cruelty is accounted for. For the believer, judgment has already fallen on Christ. Therefore, there is no condemnation. For those who reject Him, judgment remains.

This dual reality should not produce arrogance. It should produce humility and urgency. Heaven is not a badge of superiority. It is a gift. If it is truly a gift, then it is meant to be shared in proclamation and invitation.

Another misconception is that Heaven erases memory. Scripture gives no indication that believers forget their earthly lives. In fact, the continuity of identity suggests the opposite. Yet the memory of pain is transformed. It is viewed through the lens of redemption. Scars become testimonies. Wounds become reminders of grace.

Think of Jesus’ resurrected body. The scars remained. They were not removed. They were glorified. In the same way, the story of each redeemed life becomes part of the tapestry of worship. Nothing is wasted.

When the Bible says that no eye has seen and no ear has heard what God has prepared for those who love Him, it is not exaggeration. Language strains to describe the indescribable. Gold like transparent glass. Gates made of single pearls. Streets reflecting light. These images are not meant to fuel materialistic fantasy. They communicate value and beauty beyond comprehension.

Heaven is the reversal of the curse introduced in Eden. The tree of life, once guarded, reappears. The river flows from the throne. Access is restored. What was lost through rebellion is regained through redemption.

Understanding what the Bible really says about Heaven reshapes how we endure suffering. When Paul speaks of light and momentary afflictions preparing an eternal weight of glory, he is not minimizing pain. He is magnifying eternity. In comparison to forever, even decades of hardship are brief.

This does not trivialize grief. Jesus wept at Lazarus’ tomb even though He knew resurrection was moments away. But it does anchor grief in hope. For the believer, goodbye is not final.

Heaven also reframes ambition. Jesus teaches His followers to store up treasures in Heaven where moth and rust do not destroy. He is not condemning productivity or excellence. He is redirecting it. Investment in eternity means loving people, advancing truth, and living in obedience.

In the end, Heaven is not primarily about location. It is about restoration of relationship. The story that began in a garden culminates in a city-garden where God dwells with humanity. The distance caused by sin is permanently removed. The voice that walked in the cool of the day once again speaks openly among His people.

The question is not merely what Heaven is like. The question is whether one is ready for it. The Bible’s description is not intended to satisfy curiosity alone. It is meant to awaken faith. Jesus’ invitation is simple yet profound: repent and believe the gospel.

Heaven is not earned through religious performance. It is received through trust in the finished work of Christ. The thief on the cross had no time for good deeds, no record of righteousness to present. Yet Jesus said, “Today you will be with Me in paradise.” Grace opened the door.

If the Bible is true, then Heaven is more solid than the ground beneath our feet. It is the future toward which history moves. Empires rise and fall. Civilizations flourish and collapse. But the kingdom of God endures.

There is a day coming when faith becomes sight. When hope becomes experience. When love remains the atmosphere of existence without interruption.

Heaven is not a myth to comfort the weak. It is the promise of a faithful God who does not abandon His creation. It is the inheritance secured by a risen Savior. It is the home for which every restless heart longs, whether it knows it or not.

And it is far greater than we have been taught to imagine.

If Heaven is as Scripture describes, then it is not simply the conclusion of a story. It is the unveiling of the story’s true meaning.

From the beginning, God has been moving history toward a moment when everything fractured by sin is made whole. The prophets pointed toward it. The apostles anchored their courage in it. Jesus secured it. Yet modern conversations often shrink Heaven down to sentiment or speculation. The Bible does neither. It presents Heaven as concrete, intentional, and inseparably connected to the character of God.

One of the most misunderstood aspects of Heaven is time. We think in terms of endless duration because that is the only framework we know. But eternity in Scripture is not just infinite extension of minutes and hours. It is a different quality of existence. It is life fully aligned with God, unthreatened by decay, unburdened by entropy, unshadowed by death. Eternal life is not merely long life. It is restored life.

This matters because it changes how we see the present. If Heaven is simply endless time, then it can feel distant and abstract. But if Heaven is the perfected state of what God is already beginning in those who belong to Him, then eternity is closer than we think. The transformation that will one day reshape the cosmos is already at work in the redeemed heart.

Scripture speaks of believers as new creations. That phrase is not poetic exaggeration. It is the beginning of Heaven’s architecture inside the human soul. The Spirit of God dwelling within a believer is described as a deposit, a guarantee of what is to come. The same power that raised Christ from the dead is at work now. The resurrection is not only future hope. It is present reality in seed form.

This is why Heaven cannot be separated from holiness. The Bible does not describe Heaven as morally neutral bliss. It is a realm where righteousness dwells. That does not mean Heaven is restrictive. It means it is free from corruption. In this world, even our best intentions are tangled with pride or insecurity. In Heaven, motives are purified. Love flows without distortion. Joy is no longer fragile.

When Revelation describes nothing impure entering the New Jerusalem, it is not describing elitism. It is describing protection. Sin destroys. Pride fractures. Greed corrodes. Heaven is the permanent removal of what poisons joy. It is not God withholding pleasure. It is God removing the very things that make pleasure collapse.

The presence of God in Heaven is described as light. There is no need for sun or lamp because the glory of God gives it light. Light in Scripture represents truth, purity, and revelation. There are no hidden corners in Heaven. No deception. No shadow. Everything is fully known and fully safe.

This raises a profound truth about identity. In this life, many people build identities on fragile foundations. Achievement. Reputation. Appearance. Influence. These structures crumble under pressure. In Heaven, identity is anchored in being known by God and belonging to Him. The name written on the forehead in Revelation is not branding. It is belonging. It is intimacy without fear.

The Bible also hints that Heaven includes recognition and continuity of self. When Jesus is transfigured, Moses and Elijah appear and are recognizable. In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, both retain awareness of their earthly lives. These glimpses suggest that personality and memory are not erased. They are redeemed.

Think about that carefully. The talents you developed. The gifts you stewarded. The passions you cultivated under the lordship of Christ. These are not wasted. Heaven is not the flattening of individuality. It is its purification. The artist still creates, but without ego. The leader still leads, but without pride. The thinker still explores, but without arrogance. The craftsman still builds, but without frustration.

The curse introduced toil and futility. Heaven removes futility but not purpose.

The New Jerusalem is described as a city. Cities represent culture, community, and structure. The Bible does not end with a return to isolated wilderness. It ends with redeemed society. The gates are open. The nations bring their glory into it. Culture itself is purified and offered back to God.

This speaks directly to the fear some have that Heaven erases diversity. Revelation explicitly celebrates diversity. Every tribe and language stands before the throne. Unity does not require uniformity. It requires a common center. That center is the Lamb who was slain.

The Lamb is central to Heaven’s imagery. Not merely as a symbol of sacrifice, but as the enthroned King. The scars remain visible. The throne is occupied by One who conquered not through domination but through surrender. This shapes the atmosphere of eternity. Authority in Heaven is not coercive. It is cruciform. It is love demonstrated at infinite cost.

The cross is not forgotten in Heaven. It is celebrated. Worship surrounds the memory of redemption. Worthy is the Lamb who was slain. The anthem of eternity is not self-congratulation. It is gratitude.

This confronts another misconception. Some imagine Heaven as human achievement rewarded. Scripture presents it as grace received and magnified. Even the crowns believers receive are cast before the throne. Reward does not inflate ego. It fuels worship.

What about those we love? This question rises in every honest heart. Will we know one another? Scripture suggests recognition and relational continuity. Yet the relationships are transformed. Marriage, for example, is described as a shadow of Christ and the church. In eternity, the greater reality eclipses the shadow. This does not diminish love. It expands it. No relationship is lost in selfish exclusivity. Love is universal, yet still personal.

There is no jealousy in Heaven. No competition. No insecurity. Imagine celebrating another’s joy without comparison. Imagine loving without fear of betrayal. Imagine trusting without hesitation. That is relational life in the presence of God.

Another important dimension of what the Bible says about Heaven involves justice. In this life, justice is partial at best. Crimes go unpunished. Lies distort narratives. The innocent suffer. Heaven does not ignore these realities. Revelation shows martyrs crying out for justice. God does not silence them. He responds in His timing.

Heaven includes the vindication of truth. Every hidden act comes to light. For the believer, condemnation is removed because it has already fallen on Christ. For the unrepentant, accountability remains. The final judgment is not arbitrary wrath. It is perfect justice administered by a perfectly holy and loving God.

This is why the gospel is urgent. Heaven is not universalism. It is invitation. The door stands open now through Christ. The book of Revelation ends with an invitation: “Let the one who is thirsty come.” That invitation is extended in the present.

It is also important to understand that Heaven is not earned by accumulating spiritual merit. Ephesians declares that salvation is by grace through faith, not by works, so that no one can boast. The Bible is unambiguous. Human effort cannot secure Heaven. Only Christ can.

That truth dismantles both pride and despair. Pride cannot boast in moral superiority. Despair cannot conclude it is too broken. The ground at the foot of the cross is level. Heaven is a gift purchased at infinite cost.

What about the fear of boredom? That question often reveals a view of eternity shaped by limited imagination. God’s creativity is boundless. The complexity of a single human cell testifies to His ingenuity. The vastness of galaxies speaks of His scale. If this fallen world contains such wonder, the renewed creation will surpass it in ways language cannot capture.

Scripture hints at ongoing exploration and responsibility. Faithful servants are entrusted with more. The parables of Jesus imply growth and stewardship. Eternity is not static stagnation. It is expanding joy rooted in unchanging security.

The river of life flows from the throne. Trees bear fruit every month. These images suggest continuity of seasons, rhythm without decay, movement without loss. Eternity is not endless repetition. It is unfolding revelation.

Heaven also reshapes our understanding of suffering. The Bible does not promise believers exemption from pain. It promises redemption of it. Paul calls present suffering light and momentary compared to eternal glory. That statement is not denial. It is perspective. In light of forever, even decades are brief.

This perspective empowered martyrs to face execution with peace. It enabled persecuted believers to forgive. They were not detached from reality. They were anchored in a greater one.

If Heaven is real, then courage is rational. Generosity is wise. Forgiveness is powerful. Risking comfort for obedience makes sense. Eternity reframes calculation.

The Bible repeatedly encourages believers to fix their minds on things above. That is not escapism. It is alignment. When priorities are shaped by eternity, earthly anxieties lose dominance. This does not eliminate responsibility. It clarifies it.

One of the most moving descriptions of Heaven is simple: “They will see His face.” In the Old Testament, the face of God was unapproachable. Even Moses was shielded. In eternity, the barrier is gone. The longing for unmediated presence is fulfilled.

Every human pursuit of beauty, truth, and love is a shadow of that longing. Heaven is not merely the absence of Hell. It is the fullness of God.

This raises the most important question. Are we prepared for that fullness? Heaven is not simply a change of address. It is the completion of transformation. Those who resist God now would not find His unveiled presence comfortable. C.S. Lewis observed that Heaven would feel like torment to a heart bent on rebellion.

Preparation for Heaven begins with surrender. Repentance is not humiliation. It is alignment. Faith is not blind optimism. It is trust in the One who conquered death.

The resurrection of Jesus is the cornerstone of Heaven’s promise. If He did not rise, the hope collapses. But historical testimony, eyewitness accounts, and the explosive growth of the early church testify that something happened that transformed fearful followers into bold witnesses. They did not die for metaphor. They died for conviction rooted in encounter.

Heaven stands on the empty tomb.

The Bible closes with a prayer: “Come, Lord Jesus.” That prayer is not escapist longing. It is desire for completion. It is yearning for the day when faith becomes sight.

Until that day, believers live between promise and fulfillment. The Spirit is present. The kingdom has begun. Yet the world still groans. This tension can feel heavy. But it is temporary.

Heaven is not fragile hope. It is guaranteed inheritance for those in Christ. Peter describes it as imperishable, undefiled, and unfading. Stored in Heaven. Guarded by God’s power.

Imagine an inheritance that cannot be stolen, diluted, or destroyed. Imagine a home where the foundation never cracks. Imagine joy untouched by anxiety. Imagine love without fear.

This is not fantasy. It is promise.

The Bible does not give exhaustive detail about Heaven because its purpose is not to satisfy curiosity but to cultivate trust. We are given enough to anchor hope, enough to inspire perseverance, enough to awaken longing.

The final chapters of Revelation close the loop opened in Genesis. The serpent is defeated. The curse is reversed. Access to the tree of life is restored. God dwells with His people. The story that began in a garden ends in a city-garden radiant with glory.

And at the center stands Jesus.

Heaven is not primarily about streets of gold. It is about the presence of the One who gave Himself so that humanity could be restored. It is about seeing the face that bore thorns. It is about hearing the voice that calmed storms. It is about standing in a reality where love has no rival.

When we ask what the Bible really says about Heaven, the answer is far richer than sentimental imagery. It says Heaven is God’s restored creation. It says it is resurrection life. It says it is justice fulfilled, sorrow healed, identity redeemed, purpose renewed, worship unhindered, and love perfected.

It says Heaven is home.

And home is not reached by moral effort. It is entered by grace.

May we live now in light of that promise. May our priorities reflect eternity. May our courage be shaped by resurrection. And may our hope remain anchored in the One who declared, “Surely I am coming soon.”

Until that day, we walk by faith. But faith is not fragile. It rests on a risen Savior and a coming kingdom that cannot be shaken.

Your friend, Douglas Vandergraph

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Warning: Contains some spoilers

#books #fiction #feminism

Something is rotten in the Republic of Korea. Its shining reputation as a miracle of post-war economic development obscures deeply troubled gender relations. Misogyny is more prevalent and firmly entrenched than in most other parts of the developed world, fueled by a combination of strong patriarchal traditions and increased economic insecurity. This is the backdrop against which Han Kang’s The Vegetarian, winner of the 2016 Man Booker Prize and superbly translated by Debora Smith, emerges.

At under 200 pages and written in a minimalist style evoking the surrealism of Kafka and Murakami, The Vegetarian describes the events that take place after Yeong-hye, a young woman, stops eating meat. The seemingly simple decision to adopt a vegetarian diet is met with increasingly aggressive incomprehension by her family, and their attempts to ‘cure’ Yeong-hye of her deviation have calamitous consequences. The Vegetarian is a powerful story of a woman who refuses to be an object and against all odds tries to eke out some agency in a world that is set against her.

There are three parts to The Vegetarian, none of which are narrated by Yeong-hye herself. We see her evolution first through the eyes of her husband, then her brother-in-law, and finally her sister. All three respond in different ways to Yeong-hye’s actions, and can be read as representing different perspectives on South Korean gender dynamics.

The husband, ‘Mr. Cheong’, is a singularly unpleasant character, who takes objectification to a whole new level. He relates to his wife in the way one might relate to a toaster or a toothbrush, and so responds to Yeong-hye’s conversion with about as much tact, understanding and interest as one would show a malfunctioning household object. At no point does Mr. Cheong refer to Yeong-hye by name, instead only thinking of her as ‘her’ or ‘his wife’. Fully absorbed in his own petty ambitions, Mr Cheong inevitably simply discards Yeong-hye once she no longer serves his mundane needs.

Part two shows us Yeong-hye through the eyes of her sister In-hye’s artist husband, who is pathologically sexually obsessed with her. His fixation only intensifies after she converts to her deviationist vegetarianism. Possessed by a vision of himself and Yeong-hye having sex while covered in painted flowers, he feels compelled to turn his fantasy into a reality. The brother-in-law may despise Mr. Cheong for his callousness towards Yeong-hye, but is singularly blind to his own objectification of her. If Mr. Cheong represents men treating their wives as property, the brother-in-law personifies the male gaze.

In the third and final chapter we experience the novel’s conclusion through In-hye. For In-hye, relating to Yeong-hye’s refusal to conform challenges her own sense of self and the roles she has played for her family and society, and the harms she has suffered as a result. Positioning In-hye’s perspective after the two male parts is a brilliant move, and Han Kang very carefully and sympathetically evokes the sisterhood and comradeship that can blossom between two dissimilar women who may not fully comprehend one another, but nonetheless come to see that they share a bond forged from the same patriarchal oppression.

Weaving together its story from these three parts, The Vegetarian executes something like a reverse-Kafka manoeuvre. In Kafka’s novels, it is the protagonists who make sense, but find themselves fatally stranded in surreal worlds governed by ineffable logics of their own. The Vegetarian appears to do the opposite: it is the world that we recognise and Yeong-hye who is impelled by a irrational motives. But it is only an apparent opposition, because Han Kang’s superb writing shows us that it is actually Yeong-hye’s world that does not make sense, and against which her actions are undeniably logical. What alternative is there for a woman, crushed beneath stifling conformity and murderous objectification, but to drastically rebel, even if it means renouncing who and what she is? If there is no way out, the only escape is inwards, into an alien state where we might finally be free of the strictures placed on us by society.

Yeong-hye’s withdrawal from society and eventual incarceration in a psychiatric asylum are reminiscent of Mark Fisher’s argument that what we call ‘mental illness’ can be a logical reaction to the unbearable demands placed on us by a hostile world. A refusal or an inability to conform to the impositions of neoliberal capitalism or traditional patriarchy. Even prefigurative revolutionary praxis cannot save us from emotional exhaustion, as we saw in Hannah Proctor’s Burnout. There is no way to be whole in a sick world.

The Vegetarian is a magnificent and unflinching illustration of the harms inflicted on countless women. Similar to Kafka, Han Kang’s pared-down, detached and factual writing style enhances the surrealist atmosphere of her story, and is more merciless in its evisceration of its male characters than any overt outrage, albeit its existentialist view on the nigh impossibility of human communication will not appeal to readers seeking rounded psychological development. If one is willing to accept that the characters are archetypes, The Vegetarian is however utterly compelling, though it would be difficult to call it enjoyable, with its harrowing and visceral abuse and aggression against women, and the dismissive, uncaring banality of the men perpetrating them.

I wonder what the impact of The Vegetarian has been on debates on feminism and gender in South Korea. It is maybe not surprising that the book had a better reception in the Anglophone world than in South Korea itself, which remains riven by gender conflict and where accusations of feminist thought routinely result in violent backlash. How many Mr Cheong’s are still out there? We can only hope that some might dislike their reflection in Han Kang’s mirror enough to shake off their entitlement and learn to treat and respect women as equals.

Notes & Suggestions

• South Korea’s endemic misogyny has found some very specific expressions, not only in direct violence against women, but also for example the unconsensual and covert recording of women using spycams hidden in innocuous objects. In response, it has also given rise to specific forms of feminist organising, such as the 4B movement.
• In-hye’s struggles to keep her life together put me in mind of the excellent song ‘labour’ by Paris Paloma.
• Consider supporting or joining a feminist or women’s organisation. Alternatively, broader campaigning organisations such as Amnesty International or trade unions also have spaces for feminist organising.

Connie Caskett works in the library and is a death metal fan…

Connie Caskett stamped the return date on a copy of Introduction to Thermodynamics. She did it with a rhythmic, percussive thud that would have made the drummer of Rotting Corpse proud. Her Doc Martens tapped a syncopated beat against the leg of the issuing desk. Today’s ensemble featured a cropped tee. Decorated with a skull that spat snakes. Wearing a leather mini-skirt that broke the library’s dress code. And fishnets that had seen many mosh pits. Her septum piercing glinted under the fluorescent lights.

The double doors swung open. In marched Mrs Humber-Smithers, a woman made of tweed and exuding disapproval. She stopped. Her eyes scanned the desk, bypassing the “Librarian on Duty” sign to search for a cardigan or a pearl necklace. Finding only skulls and heavy eyeliner, her lips pursed into a thin, white line.

“I wish to speak with Mrs Higgins,” Mrs Humber-Smithers announced. “The proper librarian.”

Connie offered a smile that showed a surprising amount of genuine warmth. “Mrs Higgins is on holiday in Mallorca. I am running the desk this week.”

The older woman clutched her handbag. Her gaze drifted down to Connie’s fishnets, then up to the snakes on the t-shirt. She sniffed. “This is quite unusual.” A place of learning requires a certain… decorum. One expects professionalism, not a costume party.”

“I assure you, I know the Dewey Decimal System better than the fretboard of a Flying V guitar,” Connie said. “How may I assist?”

Mrs Humber-Smithers looked around the empty foyer. She leaned in, her voice dropping to a whisper. The haughty posture crumbled. “I have got a reservation.”

Connie tapped the keyboard. “Name?”

“Humber-Smithers. It should be under the counter.”

Connie reached below the desk. Her hand brushed past a leather-bound history of The Black Dahlia Murder. It landed on a pile of mass-market paperbacks. The covers showed shirtless men holding swooning women. She pulled them out: The Duke’s Forbidden Caress, Ravished by the Stable Boy, Passion in the Pantry.

The cover of the top book showed a Fabio-like figure. His shirt had given in to gravity. Connie slid the stack across the counter.

Mrs Humber-Smithers snatched them, her face flushing a deep, violent crimson.

“Excellent choices,” Connie said, her tone deadpan. “I hear the stable boy has a very compelling character arc in the third act.”

Mrs Humber-Smithers shoved the books into her tote bag. Burying them beneath a sensible wool scarf. She mumbled something about “research” and dashed for the exit. The squeak of her sensible shoes echoed in the quiet. Connie watched her go, then turned up the volume on her headphones. Slayer began to play. It was going to be a good shift.

There is something unsettling about Luke 14. It does not read like a gentle devotional meant to soothe fragile emotions. It reads like an invitation that feels more like a confrontation. It begins in a house filled with religious power and ends with a crowd thinning under the weight of truth. It moves from a dinner table to a construction site, from a wedding feast to a battlefield, from polite hospitality to crosses and renunciations. Luke 14 is not comfortable, and that is precisely why it matters so much. It exposes the silent calculations of the human heart and asks a question that cannot be avoided: do we truly want the Kingdom of God, or do we only want its benefits?

The chapter opens with Jesus entering the house of a prominent Pharisee on the Sabbath. The setting is deliberate. It is the Sabbath, the day of rest, the day guarded by religious interpretation. It is the house of a leader, not a sinner, not a tax collector, but someone respected for outward obedience. And there, in that house, stands a man suffering from dropsy, a condition of swelling that would have been visible, uncomfortable, and socially awkward. The religious leaders are watching. The sick man is present. The tension is thick.

Jesus asks a question before performing a miracle. “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” Silence follows. It is not the silence of ignorance but the silence of calculation. If they say yes, they concede authority. If they say no, they appear heartless. So they say nothing. And Jesus heals the man.

Luke 14 begins by revealing something profound: religion without compassion is not righteousness. The Pharisees knew the law. They guarded the Sabbath. They were serious about obedience. But they missed the heart of God standing in front of them. Jesus reminds them that if their son or ox fell into a well on the Sabbath, they would pull him out immediately. Why? Because love overrides legalism. Value overrides ritual. Relationship overrides regulation.

The first lesson of Luke 14 is that God’s Kingdom is not defined by rule-keeping divorced from mercy. It is defined by a heart that reflects the Father. The Sabbath was made for restoration. Healing was not a violation of rest; it was its fulfillment. But the religious leaders could not see that because their identity was entangled with control.

This is where the chapter quietly turns the mirror toward us. It is easy to criticize ancient Pharisees. It is far more difficult to examine the ways we guard our systems, our reputations, our theological comfort zones, while missing the suffering person standing in front of us. Luke 14 exposes how quickly spiritual pride can masquerade as faithfulness.

From there, Jesus shifts the scene from healing to humility. As He observes guests choosing places of honor at the table, He tells a parable about seating. When invited to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, because someone more distinguished may arrive. Instead, take the lowest place, so that the host may say, “Friend, move up higher.” For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

This is not social advice. It is Kingdom revelation. In the ancient world, seating reflected status. Honor was currency. To sit closer to the host meant importance. Jesus dismantles this instinct. In God’s economy, self-promotion is spiritually dangerous. The Kingdom does not advance through grasping but through surrender.

Humility in Luke 14 is not a personality trait; it is a posture of trust. When you refuse to fight for the highest seat, you demonstrate confidence that God sees you. When you choose the lower place, you are not diminishing your value; you are placing your value in the hands of the Host. This is radical because the world teaches constant positioning. Build the brand. Claim the spotlight. Secure the seat.

Jesus says take the lowest seat.

The irony is that those who fight hardest for recognition often reveal insecurity, while those who are secure in the Father can afford obscurity. Luke 14 invites believers to release the exhausting pursuit of human approval and to rest in divine affirmation. Humility is not weakness; it is freedom from comparison.

Then Jesus turns to the host himself and challenges cultural hospitality. When you give a banquet, do not invite your friends, brothers, relatives, or rich neighbors, because they may repay you. Instead, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. You will be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.

This instruction disrupts every transactional instinct. Most of us give strategically. We invest in relationships that can return something. We network. We align. We cultivate circles that enhance our influence. Jesus dismantles reciprocity as a motive for generosity.

True Kingdom hospitality is given without expectation of return. It seeks the overlooked. It blesses the inconvenient. It dignifies the marginalized. It refuses to measure generosity by social advantage. And the reward, Jesus says, is not earthly applause but eternal resurrection.

Luke 14 is slowly building a case. First, compassion over legalism. Second, humility over self-exaltation. Third, generosity without repayment. Each movement presses deeper into the interior life. Each exposes subtle pride.

Then someone at the table makes a pious comment: “Blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the Kingdom of God.” It sounds holy. It sounds safe. It sounds like distant celebration. And Jesus responds with one of the most sobering parables in Scripture.

A man prepared a great banquet and invited many. When the time came, he sent his servant to tell the invited guests that everything was ready. But they all alike began to make excuses. One bought a field and needed to inspect it. Another bought five yoke of oxen and wanted to test them. Another had just married and could not come.

These excuses are not sinful on the surface. Land is not evil. Business is not evil. Marriage is not evil. But each represents a legitimate good elevated above the invitation of the host. That is the danger of distraction. Rarely does rejection of God come in the form of blatant rebellion. It often arrives disguised as reasonable responsibility.

The invited guests were not uninterested in the banquet. They simply had something else to attend to. They did not insult the host; they postponed him. And postponement, in the Kingdom, can become rejection.

The master of the house becomes angry and sends his servant into the streets and lanes of the city to bring in the poor, crippled, blind, and lame. When there is still room, he sends the servant to the highways and hedges, compelling people to come in so that the house may be filled. Then comes the chilling statement: none of those originally invited shall taste my banquet.

Luke 14 reveals that proximity to invitation does not guarantee participation. Religious familiarity does not equal response. The Kingdom is offered, but it is not forced. And excuses, even respectable ones, can close the door.

The parable exposes a sobering truth: those who assume they belong may exclude themselves through indifference. Meanwhile, those who never expected a seat are gathered in. The outcasts become guests. The marginalized become celebrated. The unqualified become honored.

This reversal is central to Luke’s Gospel. God’s Kingdom disrupts social hierarchy. It exalts the humble and humbles the proud. It gathers those aware of their need and bypasses those confident in their sufficiency.

The banquet imagery points forward to the Messianic feast, to the culmination of redemption, to the joy of restored communion. And yet the seats are filled not by entitlement but by surrender. The invitation is wide, but the response must be willing.

As the chapter progresses, large crowds begin traveling with Jesus. Popularity is rising. Momentum is building. And in what may be the most counterintuitive move in ministry history, Jesus turns to them and says, “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple.”

The language is severe. It demands attention. In the Hebrew context, “hate” is a comparative term. It does not command emotional hostility but radical prioritization. Allegiance to Christ must eclipse every other loyalty. Family ties, cultural expectations, personal ambition, even self-preservation must bow to discipleship.

Luke 14 does not present a diluted version of faith. It confronts shallow enthusiasm. The crowd is growing, but Jesus thins it by clarifying cost. He refuses to build a movement on half-hearted followers.

Then He adds, “Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.” In the first century, the cross was not symbolic jewelry. It was an instrument of execution. To carry a cross meant walking toward death. It meant public humiliation. It meant irreversible commitment.

Jesus is not inviting admirers. He is calling disciples. He is not recruiting fans. He is forming followers willing to die to self. The cross represents surrender of control, surrender of ego, surrender of comfort.

Luke 14 forces a reckoning. Do we want Jesus as an accessory to our lives, or as Lord over our lives? Do we want inspiration without transformation? Do we want blessing without obedience?

To illustrate this, Jesus presents two metaphors: a builder calculating the cost of a tower and a king considering war against a stronger opponent. In both cases, wisdom requires honest assessment before commitment. No one begins construction without ensuring sufficient resources. No king goes to battle without evaluating strength.

The implication is clear. Following Christ is not impulsive emotionalism. It is deliberate surrender. It requires counting the cost. It demands understanding that discipleship will confront comfort, relationships, priorities, and identity.

The tragedy, Jesus implies, is not that the cost is high. The tragedy is starting without understanding it and abandoning the journey halfway. An unfinished tower becomes a monument to miscalculation. A retreating king becomes a picture of unpreparedness.

Luke 14 does not exist to discourage believers but to anchor them. A faith built on convenience will collapse under pressure. A faith rooted in surrendered allegiance will endure.

The chapter concludes with an image of salt. Salt is good, Jesus says, but if it loses its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile. It is thrown away. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

Salt in the ancient world preserved and flavored. It prevented decay. But salt that lost potency was useless. The warning is subtle but serious. Disciples who dilute devotion become ineffective. Commitment that evaporates under cultural heat ceases to transform anything.

Luke 14 is not primarily about etiquette, banquets, or seating charts. It is about allegiance. It is about whether we prefer respectable religion or costly discipleship. It is about whether we accept the invitation on the Host’s terms or insist on our own schedule.

And this is where the chapter becomes deeply personal. It asks whether our faith has been reduced to inspiration without obedience. It asks whether our generosity seeks repayment. It asks whether our humility is performative. It asks whether our excuses are masking resistance.

The beauty of Luke 14 is that it does not leave us in condemnation. It leaves us with invitation. The banquet is still prepared. The table is still set. The cross, though heavy, leads to resurrection. The lowest seat becomes the place of honor in due time. The unqualified are welcomed.

But the cost remains real.

Discipleship in Luke 14 is not transactional. It is transformational. It reshapes priorities. It reorders loves. It dismantles pride. It confronts distraction. It demands totality.

The world offers countless invitations promising fulfillment without surrender. Jesus offers a banquet that requires everything and gives more than everything in return.

Luke 14 is a chapter for serious hearts. It strips away sentimentality and calls for substance. It reveals that following Christ is not an add-on to life; it is the redefinition of life itself.

And the question lingers long after reading it: when the servant announces that everything is ready, will we still be busy? Or will we come?

When Jesus finishes speaking about salt that has lost its flavor, He ends with a sentence that echoes through centuries: “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” It is not a poetic flourish. It is a summons. Luke 14 demands more than casual reading. It requires reflection. It requires response. It asks whether we are merely impressed by Christ or whether we are prepared to follow Him wherever obedience leads.

By the time we reach the end of the chapter, the pattern is unmistakable. Luke 14 is structured like a slow unveiling of the heart. It begins with religious leaders observing Jesus. It moves to guests positioning themselves for honor. It shifts to a host calculating invitations. It expands to a crowd following at a distance. And finally, it narrows to the individual conscience. Every scene exposes a subtle form of self-preservation. Every teaching peels back another layer of self-interest. And at the center of it all stands Jesus, not accommodating these instincts but confronting them.

The healing on the Sabbath reveals that compassion outranks ritual. The lesson on seating exposes the illusion of self-exaltation. The instruction about inviting the poor dismantles transactional generosity. The parable of the great banquet uncovers the danger of distraction. The call to carry the cross reveals the cost of discipleship. The metaphors of construction and war emphasize sober commitment. And the warning about salt confronts diluted devotion.

Luke 14 is not a collection of disconnected teachings. It is a unified vision of Kingdom life.

One of the most profound threads running through this chapter is the reversal of human assumptions. The honored become humbled. The overlooked become invited. The powerful are exposed. The unqualified are welcomed. Those who think they are secure find themselves outside, while those who know they have nothing find themselves seated at the feast. The Kingdom of God does not mirror earthly systems. It overturns them.

This reversal is not accidental. It is rooted in the character of God. Throughout Scripture, God consistently chooses the unlikely. He calls shepherd boys to defeat giants. He selects fishermen to proclaim the Gospel. He speaks through prophets who tremble. He exalts those who confess weakness. Luke 14 fits perfectly within this pattern. The banquet of God is filled not with those who think they deserve it but with those who know they need it.

Yet there is tension in this grace. The invitation is wide, but the allegiance required is total. That is where many struggle. We celebrate the inclusivity of the banquet but hesitate at the exclusivity of the cross. We rejoice that the poor and crippled are welcomed, but we hesitate when Jesus says that even our closest relationships must take second place to Him. We love the image of the feast but resist the image of the crossbeam on our shoulders.

Luke 14 refuses to separate grace from cost.

The parable of the great banquet is often read primarily as a story about Israel’s rejection and the Gentiles’ inclusion. While that dimension exists, the personal application is equally urgent. The excuses offered by the invited guests reveal how subtle avoidance can be. None of them openly reject the host. They simply prioritize something else. That is how spiritual drift begins. Rarely does someone wake up and decide to abandon faith outright. More often, faith is crowded out by legitimate pursuits.

A field must be inspected. Oxen must be tested. A marriage must be enjoyed. Responsibilities accumulate. Careers expand. Schedules fill. Invitations from God feel less urgent. The servant’s announcement, “Everything is now ready,” collides with our internal calendars. And without realizing it, we begin to live as though the banquet can wait.

Luke 14 challenges that assumption. The banquet is not secondary. It is ultimate. It is not one invitation among many. It is the invitation. And to decline it is not neutral; it is consequential.

When the master sends the servant into the streets and highways, compelling people to come in, we see both urgency and generosity. The house must be filled. The celebration must proceed. God’s redemptive plan does not stall because of human hesitation. There is a sobering truth here. The Kingdom moves forward. The invitation will reach someone. The question is whether we will be among those who respond.

This is not written to produce fear but clarity. Luke 14 is clarity embodied. It reveals that discipleship is not passive. It is not accidental. It is intentional and wholehearted.

The statement about hating one’s own life for the sake of discipleship is perhaps the most misunderstood portion of the chapter. Jesus is not commanding emotional cruelty toward family or self-loathing. He is demanding reordering. The loyalty to Christ must be so supreme that every other loyalty pales by comparison. In a culture where family bonds defined identity, this was radical. It still is.

There are moments when obedience to Christ will conflict with expectations from those closest to us. There are seasons when faithfulness will require standing alone. There are decisions where cultural approval must yield to Kingdom conviction. Luke 14 does not romanticize these moments. It acknowledges them and insists that Christ’s authority surpasses all.

Carrying the cross is not a metaphor for mild inconvenience. It is surrender of the right to self-rule. It is daily alignment with Christ’s will over personal preference. It is trusting that resurrection follows crucifixion.

When Jesus speaks about counting the cost, He dignifies the listener. He does not manipulate emotion. He does not obscure difficulty. He invites honest evaluation. Faith is not blind enthusiasm. It is informed commitment. The builder calculates resources. The king assesses strength. Likewise, the disciple recognizes that following Christ may involve loss of reputation, comfort, or security.

But here is the paradox. The one who loses life for Christ’s sake finds it. Luke 14 does not explicitly state that promise, yet it echoes throughout the Gospel. The cost is real, but so is the reward. The surrender is complete, but so is the restoration.

Salt that loses its saltiness becomes useless. This final image serves as both warning and invitation. Devotion that begins fervently but fades into cultural compromise loses its distinctiveness. The world does not need diluted disciples. It needs faithful witnesses whose lives preserve truth and reflect grace.

Salt functions quietly. It does not demand attention. It simply changes the environment it touches. That is the vision of discipleship in Luke 14. Not spectacle, but substance. Not status, but surrender. Not performance, but perseverance.

As we step back and consider the entire chapter, a theme emerges that cannot be ignored: God is preparing a banquet, but He is also preparing a people. The feast and the cross are inseparable. The invitation and the cost are intertwined. The Kingdom is both gift and calling.

For many, Luke 14 feels demanding. It is meant to. It exposes the tension between admiration and obedience. It reveals how easily we can attend religious gatherings while withholding allegiance. It confronts the illusion that we can add Jesus to an already crowded life without rearranging anything.

But beneath the confrontation is profound love. The master desires a full house. Jesus desires authentic disciples. The warnings exist because the invitation is real.

There is a beautiful irony in the structure of the chapter. It begins with a man suffering from swelling, physically bloated with fluid, and it ends with a warning about salt losing its substance. One image reflects excess without health. The other reflects emptiness without potency. Between those two images stands the path of discipleship, neither swollen with pride nor hollow with compromise, but filled with surrendered allegiance.

Luke 14 calls us to that path.

It asks whether we are willing to release the need for recognition and choose humility. It asks whether we are willing to bless those who cannot repay us. It asks whether we are willing to respond promptly to God’s invitation rather than offering polite excuses. It asks whether we are willing to prioritize Christ above even our most cherished relationships. It asks whether we are willing to carry the cross daily, knowing that surrender leads to life.

This chapter does not end with applause. It ends with ears to hear.

Hearing, in the biblical sense, is not passive. It implies obedience. To hear is to act. To hear is to align. To hear is to follow.

Luke 14 is not merely a historical account. It is a present invitation. The banquet is still prepared. The cross is still offered. The cost is still real. The reward is still eternal.

And perhaps the most comforting truth in the entire chapter is this: those brought into the banquet from the highways and hedges did not qualify themselves. They did not earn their seat. They responded to grace. The same grace that calls for surrender also empowers it. The same Christ who demands allegiance provides strength to live it.

The world measures life by accumulation. Luke 14 measures life by surrender. The world prizes elevation. Luke 14 prizes humility. The world builds monuments to self. Luke 14 builds altars of obedience.

In the end, the chapter leaves each reader standing at a crossroads. The servant announces that everything is ready. The invitation is extended. The excuses are forming. The cross is visible. The cost is calculable. The seat at the banquet is waiting.

The question is not whether the feast exists. The question is whether we will come on the Host’s terms.

May we not be among those who politely decline. May we not be among those who begin and do not finish. May we not be salt without substance.

May we be among the unqualified who accept the invitation, count the cost, carry the cross, and discover that the banquet of God is worth everything.

Your friend, Douglas Vandergraph

Watch Douglas Vandergraph’s inspiring faith-based videos on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@douglasvandergraph

Support the ministry by buying Douglas a coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/douglasvandergraph

I had already posted this once before but I lost my blog and hadn't run the back up where that post was located.

So! What is this? Awhile ago I realized that with the way the internet is, people being caught off guard by things, I realized that it would be important to have some sort of safety for those who use writefreely and may have NSFW images on their blog.

What this code does is allow you to add to an image a nsfw class that blurs the image and makes it visible if it clicked on.

NOTE: This only works on the website itself. If you post the link to your social media, it'll show the nsfw image if that is your primary image.

How do you do this? Try this out! There are two methods. One for the selfhosted instance and the other is if you have an account with write.as.

Self-host Method

This is going to be how you will add the NSFW image filter on your selfhosted writefreely instance. You'll need to edit the following files:

• collection.tmpl
• collection-post.tmpl
• chorus-collection.tmpl
• chorus-collection-post.tmpl

When you set it up, make sure you put the css in the header of the document and the javascript after </body>.

Too use either of these methods, you'll want to add the class="nsfw" to the image. For example, it would look like <img src="image.ext" alt="FileName" class="nsfw" />

Javascript

	<script>
		document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", () => {
			const nsfwImages = document.querySelectorAll("img.nsfw");

			nsfwImages.forEach(img => {
				// Create wrapper
				const wrapper = document.createElement("div");
				wrapper.classList.add("nsfw-wrapper");

				img.parentNode.insertBefore(wrapper, img);
				wrapper.appendChild(img);

				// Create overlay
				const overlay = document.createElement("div");
				overlay.classList.add("nsfw-overlay");
				overlay.textContent = "NSFW — Click to Reveal";
				wrapper.appendChild(overlay);

				wrapper.addEventListener("click", () => {
					wrapper.classList.toggle("revealed");
				});
			});
		});
	</script>

CSS

<!-- NSFW ADDITION --> 
	<style>
	.nsfw-wrapper {
		position: relative;
		display: inline-block;
	}

	.nsfw-wrapper img.nsfw {
		filter: blur(20px);
		transition: filter 0.3s ease;
		cursor: pointer;
	}

	.nsfw-wrapper.revealed img.nsfw {
		filter: blur(0);
	}

	.nsfw-overlay {
		position: absolute;
		inset: 0;
		background: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.45);
		color: white;
		font-size: 1.1rem;
		font-weight: bold;
		display: flex;
		justify-content: center;
		align-items: center;
		pointer-events: none;
		border-radius: 4px;
		transition: opacity 0.2s ease;
	}

	.nsfw-wrapper.revealed .nsfw-overlay {
		opacity: 0;
	}
	</style>
	<!-- END OF NSFW -->

Write.as method

This is the easiest one to do as Write.as already has a place that you can put your javascript.

All you need to put in the javascript section is:

(function () {
  function initNSFW() {
    document.querySelectorAll("img.nsfw").forEach(img => {
      // Prevent double-wrapping
      if (img.parentElement.classList.contains("nsfw-wrapper")) return;

      const wrapper = document.createElement("span");
      wrapper.className = "nsfw-wrapper";

      const overlay = document.createElement("div");
      overlay.className = "nsfw-overlay";
      overlay.textContent = "NSFW. Please click to view";

      img.parentNode.insertBefore(wrapper, img);
      wrapper.appendChild(img);
      wrapper.appendChild(overlay);

      wrapper.addEventListener("click", () => {
        wrapper.classList.toggle("unblurred");
      });
    });
  }
  initNSFW();
  document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", initNSFW);
})();

And the CSS you want to add in the CSS section is:

/* ==============================
   NSFW Labels
============================== */
/* NSFW image blur system */

.nsfw-wrapper {
  position: relative;
  display: inline-block;
  cursor: pointer;
}

.nsfw-wrapper img {
  filter: blur(18px);
  transition: filter 0.25s ease;
  display: block;
}

.nsfw-wrapper.unblurred img {
  filter: none;
}

.nsfw-overlay {
  position: absolute;
  inset: 0;
  display: flex;
  align-items: center;
  justify-content: center;
  background: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6);
  color: #fff;
  font-family: sans-serif;
  font-size: 16px;
  font-weight: bold;
  text-align: center;
  padding: 0.5em;
  pointer-events: none;
}

.nsfw-wrapper.unblurred .nsfw-overlay {
  display: none;
}

Ending

There you go! Enjoy!