“Truth is bitter” is an all too familiar expression. As it seems to me, the expression borrows its validity from an understanding of “bitter” as the opposite of “sweet” – chocolaty, ice-creamy, sweet – as such, the antithesis of comfort and the comfortable. Many English words and adages ought to be passed through the scrutiny of a renewed gaze if they are to retain in them anything of a life-giving, regenerative meaning. “Truth is bitter” carries within it something of a malediction, an indictment, a condemnation even before Truth is born. Truth becomes judgemental even before it has a space to form itself into a revelation. Truth is bitter because there continues to be a hegemony of Truth, or more leniently, a truth that supersedes other truths. Truth is bitter because it fears being contested and doubted. Truth is bitter because, for a long time, it has been conflated with “facts”. Yet in a world where facts are synthesised and manufactured – like wearables are churned out from sweatshops – and sold for profit to keep …