“Standard Issue” Verse 1 Why these rules feel holy, carved in stone, Never voted in, but somehow known. Ink and paper crowned a certain sound, Called it “proper” just to keep control around. Printing press needed letters to behave, So they froze a language just to scale the wave. Factories, courts, desks in a row, Scan the page fast, don’t ask what you know. Empire taught a pen how to point, Class wrapped grammar in a badge and a joint. If you spoke too sideways, too local, too raw, They called it broken—said it needed the law. But spell “through” three ways, say it’s fine, Tell me again how these rules are divine. Pre-Chorus Feels natural ‘cause it’s old as dust, But old don’t mean fair, just means we trust. Chorus They don’t gatekeep talent, they gatekeep tone, If you don’t sound right, you’re left alone. Brilliant mind, but the format’s wrong, So the truth shows up but can’t get on. They don’t say “no” to what you bring— They say “say it different” to belong. Verse 2 My thoughts come in constellations, not lines, You want bullet points, I see designs. Ideas crash like weather systems, You want a thesis—I want to listen. ADHD eats the margins alive, Autism tells truth without the disguise. Dyslexic letters doing backflips on sight, Still the insight lands every time. But run-ons mean “unprofessional,” Messy means “don’t take this credible.” So we mask, we burn, we edit our soul, Till the spark fits Times New Roman control. Chorus They don’t gatekeep talent, they gatekeep tone, Polished words get a safer throne. Say it clean, say it calm, say it brief, Even if that cuts the root from the leaf. They don’t say “no” to what you bring— They say “say it normal” to belong. Bridge Efficiency builds planes that land, Contracts signed with a steady hand. I get it—clarity matters here, Ambiguity kills when the stakes are severe. But when every door has the same lock code, You lose the minds that bend the road. Einstein thought in pictures, not prose, Breakthroughs don’t always come in rows. Some of us rule the rules to survive, That ain’t neutrality—that’s a disguise. Verse 3 Academia bleeds red ink pride, Jobs skim letters, don’t read inside. Social feeds crown the cleanest thread, While deeper truths get ratio’d dead. Legal words, medical screens, Assume one brain, one way to mean. Double weight if your dialect’s marked, If class or color leaves an extra scar. Lost ideas, lost years, lost sleep, All ‘cause the wrapper wasn’t neat. Chorus They don’t gatekeep talent, they gatekeep tone, Trust the polish, not the bone. You can change the world but miss a comma, So they file you under “trauma.” They don’t say “no” to what you bring— They say “translate yourself” to belong. Outro Standards ain’t evil, they’re just stiff, Built for scale, not the human drift. The future bends—voice to text, mixed modes, Let meaning lead, not dress codes. Keep the clarity, lose the cage, Let ideas speak in their native shape. ‘Cause the problem ain’t rules existing— It’s pretending pretending one mind wrote the system.
