A Weekend Thought: The Quiet Grief of Working in the Media

Working as a lifestyle editor, especially when my desk sits right at the intersection of art, culture, and women’s empowerment, I often find myself in conversations with artists, activists, and sometimes artist-activists who blur both roles. Those encounters are deeply empowering because they remind me why I love this work, but to be honest not all moments feel easy.

There are times when they look at me and ask, straight up: so where do you stand? what side is your media really on? And honestly, that question lingers with me more than I’d like to admit.

The deeper I go into my work, the more I realize that life (and especially work in the media and art world) is inevitably political. Every editorial choice, every headline, every voice we choose to amplify (or not) is never neutral.

Lately, I’ve been caught in this tension: people ask if the media I work for is still about women, if our art direction aligns with one circle or another, or if our voice is shifting away from empowerment into something more 'general', womething more 'diluted'.

Diplomatically, yes, we are widening the space: for men, for those 'in between', for broader conversations about humanity. About how architecture shapes families, how one character in a movie chooses 'the poor guy', how artists see commodification, or how art is examined under a microscope, and also: what happens behind the scenes. But underneath that diplomatic answer is a quiet grief: the pressure of not being able to push harder, to carve out more space for women, female artists, activists, storytellers.

Sometimes I wonder if this is what people mean when they say, “Don’t put your soul into your job.” Because when you care, you inevitably clash with the politics of it all. And yet, isn’t the work more meaningful because we put our soul into it?

And then I see politics creep in because culture is a form of power. Media, art, publishing... they’re all contested terrains. To give women space is political. To withhold it... It's political, too.

But maybe, maybe that’s the paradox: life doesn’t have to be political, but the moment you want change, it always is.

Batukaras, August 29, 2025