I’m having trouble bringing myself to take on new projects right now.
Not because I hate what I do. I don’t. I love it. I love language. I believe in language. I adore helping organizations articulate who they are.
But when I see powerful executives named in court documents tied to exploitation, corporate diversity commitments not-so-quietly disappearing, companies aligning themselves with controversial policies, I feel at a loss and–to a point–at fault.
In Thin Skin, Jenn Shapland writes about novelist Daisy Hildyard’s idea that, as individuals, each of us has more than one body. The first body is “‘the place you live in, made out of your own personal skin.’” The second body is “‘a body which is not so solid as the other one but much larger.’”
Shapland describes this second body as the body that hovers over a pharmaceutical plant– the body which– in purchasing said pharmaceuticals, is implicated in the plant's emissions, its waste, the slow seep of byproducts into the local water supply, people’s lungs.
“You are alive in both,” she quotes Hildyard, “You have two bodies.”
I have been thinking a lot about these two sentences, these two bodies.
In my first body, I sit at a desk, and for all intents and purposes, I move words around. My job: to tell stories and make companies sound coherent. To make their benefits feel true. To translate ambition into narrative, features into reasons to believe.
But, as I sharpen messaging, clarify language, tell better stories, I can’t help but wonder: what scales have I tipped? And in whose favor?
Like many of us, I come upon projects now and feel a tightness in my chest, as I confront the reality of:
- My lived values and the very source of my livelihood.
- The words I think I will write and the actions I might possibly see.
- The difference between contract and complicity–and where the line sits.
It’s not with every job that crosses my plate that my warning system blares. But lately, a general unease stays with me–an “uncomfiness” hovering.
For me, these are the facts about our work as branding practitioners that I keep circling.
I. We Don't Just Reflect Culture, We Actively Shape It
“Words are events, they do things, change things. They transform both speaker and hearer.”
- Ursula K. Le Guin
As branding professionals, we don't just help companies articulate who they already are. We define futures. We identify unseen gaps and create new categories. We challenge how audiences perceive the world, and invent the language–and POVs–of tomorrow.
We may hem and haw when we see these concepts in a boardroom today, but we ushered them into being: human-centered, democratization, the third space, radical transparency, everyday essentials, elevated basics, frictionlessness, seamlessness, scalability, authenticity, disruption.
Like the cerulean that trickles from the runway into Andy’s wardrobe in The Devil Wears Prada, the narratives we create filter into everyday life.
It should come as no surprise that those of us who have the capacity to build lifestyle brands, can and do affect life itself.
II. What We Leave Out Matters
“What we do is more important than what we say or what we say we believe.”
- bell hooks
We pride ourselves on finding the Brand Essence, on carving out ownable spaces and identifying winning ideas, on massaging rally-behind values to perfection.
But the fact is: positioning is not the same thing as truth. And what’s laid out as moral code in writing, is not the same as principled action.
We’ve all been there.
We've written “direct-to-consumer,” knowing it means bypassing retail markups, but not always controversial production practices.
We've used the word “transparent,” knowing transparency might only come to audiences in the form of sourcing maps, vague origin stories, and soft-focus pictures of hands touching textiles.
We’ve softened harm into strategy, reworked faults into benefits, shaped a silver lining.
Often we know the gap between values language and lived behavior even before a brand launches. But we aren't paid to thoughtfully interrogate, to press pause and raise questions, to question. Period. So we write, name, Figma the damn thing, and move on.
III. We Help Clients Take Positions, But Rarely Take Positions Ourselves
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
- James Baldwin
We ensure brands take bold stances.
We help companies articulate access and trust and future-forwardness. We give non-living entities meaning. We codify their purpose. We charge manifestos with epistrophe and anaphora.
And yet we hesitate to be loud about what we stand for ourselves.
Maybe because some of us–and the studios we work for and run–truly don't have opinions.
Or maybe because we do, but are afraid what they might cost us: current clients, future pipeline, being labeled.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve worked on projects whose broader implications were murky. In one case, a brand I supported in my 20s later became the subject of a documentary that traced its meteoric rise and eventual fall–a fall marked by regulatory scrutiny and legal challenges. At the time, I felt comfortable taking the work. In retrospect, I realize how little I understood the company's playbook, its downstream effects. My role: a sliver of the whole.
And I sometimes wonder: if I had, would I have said no?
Because “work,” for many of us, becomes a kind of screen. Something we can disappear behind when a company we’ve worked on or for goes to market with a complicated proposition. And also a necessity that keeps the lights on.
We say, Let’s just stick to the brief. We say, It’s just not our place. We convince ourselves, We’re just here to do a job.
But complacency isn’t neutral, just as silence still speaks volumes.
So, as brand practitioners, what comes next? It’s less a revolutionary act than a personal reckoning.
The question isn’t whether our work shapes culture. It does.
The question isn’t whether our work affects power structures. It will.
The question is whether the work we do aligns with the world we want to live in. And what it would mean to draw lines–and hold them.
BIO:
Stevie Belchak is a freelance namer, strategist, and writer living in Georgia. When she's not "wording out" for work, she's writing out of love - publishing poetry and essays in journals, across the web, and through her Substack.
I’m having trouble bringing myself to take on new projects right now.
Not because I hate what I do. I don’t. I love it. I love language. I believe in language. I adore helping organizations articulate who they are.
But when I see powerful executives named in court documents tied to exploitation, corporate diversity commitments not-so-quietly disappearing, companies aligning themselves with controversial policies, I feel at a loss and–to a point–at fault.
In Thin Skin, Jenn Shapland writes about novelist Daisy Hildyard’s idea that, as individuals, each of us has more than one body. The first body is “‘the place you live in, made out of your own personal skin.’” The second body is “‘a body which is not so solid as the other one but much larger.’”
Shapland describes this second body as the body that hovers over a pharmaceutical plant– the body which– in purchasing said pharmaceuticals, is implicated in the plant's emissions, its waste, the slow seep of byproducts into the local water supply, people’s lungs.
“You are alive in both,” she quotes Hildyard, “You have two bodies.”
I have been thinking a lot about these two sentences, these two bodies.
In my first body, I sit at a desk, and for all intents and purposes, I move words around. My job: to tell stories and make companies sound coherent. To make their benefits feel true. To translate ambition into narrative, features into reasons to believe.
But, as I sharpen messaging, clarify language, tell better stories, I can’t help but wonder: what scales have I tipped? And in whose favor?
Like many of us, I come upon projects now and feel a tightness in my chest, as I confront the reality of:
- My lived values and the very source of my livelihood.
- The words I think I will write and the actions I might possibly see.
- The difference between contract and complicity–and where the line sits.
It’s not with every job that crosses my plate that my warning system blares. But lately, a general unease stays with me–an “uncomfiness” hovering.
For me, these are the facts about our work as branding practitioners that I keep circling.
I. We Don't Just Reflect Culture, We Actively Shape It
“Words are events, they do things, change things. They transform both speaker and hearer.”
- Ursula K. Le Guin
As branding professionals, we don't just help companies articulate who they already are. We define futures. We identify unseen gaps and create new categories. We challenge how audiences perceive the world, and invent the language–and POVs–of tomorrow.
We may hem and haw when we see these concepts in a boardroom today, but we ushered them into being: human-centered, democratization, the third space, radical transparency, everyday essentials, elevated basics, frictionlessness, seamlessness, scalability, authenticity, disruption.
Like the cerulean that trickles from the runway into Andy’s wardrobe in The Devil Wears Prada, the narratives we create filter into everyday life.
It should come as no surprise that those of us who have the capacity to build lifestyle brands, can and do affect life itself.
II. What We Leave Out Matters
“What we do is more important than what we say or what we say we believe.”
- bell hooks
We pride ourselves on finding the Brand Essence, on carving out ownable spaces and identifying winning ideas, on massaging rally-behind values to perfection.
But the fact is: positioning is not the same thing as truth. And what’s laid out as moral code in writing, is not the same as principled action.
We’ve all been there.
We've written “direct-to-consumer,” knowing it means bypassing retail markups, but not always controversial production practices.
We've used the word “transparent,” knowing transparency might only come to audiences in the form of sourcing maps, vague origin stories, and soft-focus pictures of hands touching textiles.
We’ve softened harm into strategy, reworked faults into benefits, shaped a silver lining.
Often we know the gap between values language and lived behavior even before a brand launches. But we aren't paid to thoughtfully interrogate, to press pause and raise questions, to question. Period. So we write, name, Figma the damn thing, and move on.
III. We Help Clients Take Positions, But Rarely Take Positions Ourselves
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
- James Baldwin
We ensure brands take bold stances.
We help companies articulate access and trust and future-forwardness. We give non-living entities meaning. We codify their purpose. We charge manifestos with epistrophe and anaphora.
And yet we hesitate to be loud about what we stand for ourselves.
Maybe because some of us–and the studios we work for and run–truly don't have opinions.
Or maybe because we do, but are afraid what they might cost us: current clients, future pipeline, being labeled.
I’ll be the first to admit I’ve worked on projects whose broader implications were murky. In one case, a brand I supported in my 20s later became the subject of a documentary that traced its meteoric rise and eventual fall–a fall marked by regulatory scrutiny and legal challenges. At the time, I felt comfortable taking the work. In retrospect, I realize how little I understood the company's playbook, its downstream effects. My role: a sliver of the whole.
And I sometimes wonder: if I had, would I have said no?
Because “work,” for many of us, becomes a kind of screen. Something we can disappear behind when a company we’ve worked on or for goes to market with a complicated proposition. And also a necessity that keeps the lights on.
We say, Let’s just stick to the brief. We say, It’s just not our place. We convince ourselves, We’re just here to do a job.
But complacency isn’t neutral, just as silence still speaks volumes.
So, as brand practitioners, what comes next? It’s less a revolutionary act than a personal reckoning.
The question isn’t whether our work shapes culture. It does.
The question isn’t whether our work affects power structures. It will.
The question is whether the work we do aligns with the world we want to live in. And what it would mean to draw lines–and hold them.
BIO:
Stevie Belchak is a freelance namer, strategist, and writer living in Georgia. When she's not "wording out" for work, she's writing out of love - publishing poetry and essays in journals, across the web, and through her Substack.
Further Reading
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