Really loved this analysis (also brilliantly written). It IS weird that so many people's ideas and convictions are being continually tested against real-time audience reactions—and it shapes people's personalities and political ideas in deeply strange ways.
As an example…I'm impressed and horrified by how an (imo necessary and even valuable) level of dirtbag left–y critique of identity politics, which seemed to be in vogue around 2016, somehow transitioned into outright revanchist racial insensitivity. It's surreal to see people totally shift their political convictions in such a short timeframe; it makes me feel like there weren't political convictions there after all, just personal ambitions (for fame, money, power) that were channeled into ANY discursive stance that was valuable.
Also very much relate to your closing thoughts on the repetitive narratives of the Asian American Narrative Industrial Complex (also there's surely some kind of psychological complex going on there too)…we know that actual people's lives/ambitions don't fit into the same tired tropes. And yet so much media produced by Hollywood—and independent sources—and random Substack blogs—are all so limited. Why are they so limited??? Because falling in with an existing discourse gets you attention; having your own thing to say, that can't neatly be categorized into some standard-issue party line, is a riskier strategy.
Regarding "dirtbag left-y critique of identity politics" becoming more "outright revanchist," are you talking about people who once identified as leftist but now have moved more to the right, or are you talking about shifts in broader popular sentiment in general?
I was thinking about the first one: self-professed leftists who once critiqued identity politics as distracting from class/materialist concerns, and now barely talk about class/materialist concerns…instead they're obsessed with discussions of gender/race/sexuality, and often taking fairly conservative positions in these areas.
But the second thing you point out (shifts in broader popular sentiment) is also very interesting to me. I don't feel qualified to comment on what is "actually" happening politically, but on a discursive level it feels like centrist positions are totally hollowed out because they are not algorithmically rewarded and don't lead to an outsized platform online. There's obviously so much written about how the internet rewards extremism (I really like Zeynep Tufekçi's writing here)…but that line of thinking assumes that the internet functions to entrench people's political opinions into gradually more extreme positions.
It seems like what you're arguing is that there is another force as well—that, if you're someone who wants attention, the internet will function to make your opinions more flexible, and more loosely held, because you might need to pivot at any moment to what your newfound audience will reward you for. And audiences seem to disproportionately reward and share extreme political opinions + contributions to niche discourses (the amount of articles I've read on girlhood, pros/cons of an MFA, tradwives, etc—these are actually not very universal concerns, they're very niche concerns that have an outsized amount of attention and takes…)
Some people are conversation takers, and other conversation makers. Is my thinking here. The more the left that is interested in identitarian concerns control the conversation, the more you have to meet them where they're at, which means discussing that. Even if your ultimate goal is to get them to start talking about class and materialism again. You have to work through it, as it were.
this is so thoughtful. i am really grappling with how people may have been aping their values before, so the switch-up facilitates whatever the new trend is.
Thanks! It's being said more these days, but there's a virtue and wisdom in not having loud opinions on everything online and sticking to what you feel and know most deeply. Like Abolish ICE. Whatever happened to that? Did those problems get solved? I'd hate for my online record to reveal that I never really cared about that issue and was just momentary into it for the "fun" of the moment.
What happened was that Biden got elected, and calling for the abolition of ICE was tantamount to criticism of Biden, since he was in the White House and yet not calling for any such thing.
An experience I recently had was publishing a substack post and then noticing that my subscriber count slightly decreased - made me feel (briefly) regretful about posting.
I can't imagine the psychological oscillations when you have a LARGE subscriber base.
Can't wait for the Discourse Blockbuster piece! It's definitely something I've noticed as well. This whole thing rings very true-- even for spaces without algorithms, but I often wonder if we carry with us that interactive model to those spaces as well, the worst of online behaviour has been encouraged after all.
Re: boyhood essays, I feel like I've read a lot of boyhood books and seen a lot of boyhood movies they just haven't been labeled as such? But that could also just be reflective of what I was exposed to growing up, which I always think I have to account for because YMMV and all that. I can't help but feel like a lot of it these days boils down to marketing as well. When Linklater's Boyhood came out there was a fantastic French film called "Bande de Filles" about girl gangs in Paris. The direct translation is essentially Girl Gang, but the English title is Girlhood. I got into an argument with an AV club reviewer about this title translation even cause it annoyed me so much--pure marketing tactic.
My theory was that it was just opportunistic to ride off Boyhood comparisons. It's a brutal movie so the English title very much feels like false advertising.
Man, I remember when that Intelligencer piece about the DSA came out, I had a socialist friend who was fucking pissed that it was being presented as a social club rather than a genuine political movement. I plead the fifth on whether it was either. But it *is* interesting to me that people still rally around student loan debt forgiveness in a way they don't with, e.g., Abolish ICE.
I learn towards "both" - DSA had genuine political power and could make total nobodies into viable candidates, but it clearly was also a social milieu which allowed the overeducated 20somethings who were gentrifying Brooklyn to frame their takeover of the borough as a good thing (because they weren't displacing black native New Yorkers, they were taking on machine politicians! who just happened to be black native New Yorkers supported almost exclusively by black native New Yorkers!)
I think a lot of what we see as subculture demise has to be influenced by alienation, and our city infrastructure in turn can have a large impact on cultural development. Subculture survives in the margins of US society at the moment, it’s the underground scenes that scrape and scrounge to survive (primarily? I’m not sure but the flattening of the internet by algorithm does no favors) offline with the limited infrastructure available for it (demise of 3rd spaces, mezoculture discourse, technological and/or socioeconomic access, etc.). That’s why it can seem so opaque and eclectic to brooch the topic, it’s obfuscated by the culture industry. People are aching for cultural variety, it has to be experienced offline.
What I appreciated most about this brilliantly written analysis is certainly the topic of cultures and subcultures. I think the fundamental point is the absence of subcultures because ideas are developed in too 'a short time'. In fact, the link between content, ideas and algorithms is something increasingly close, however, at least among many online users, the coherence - even pre and post success on different platforms - of different online characters seems to be appreciated by different communities. Naturally, however, there is a large part of people who still manage to manage opinions and 'declared values' based on the 'mood' they perceive. But even more interesting in my opinion are, for example, all the discussions and consolidation of steaming film products in pop culture, which are increasingly following a different but more particular process in recent years. Thanks for sharing!
Really loved this analysis (also brilliantly written). It IS weird that so many people's ideas and convictions are being continually tested against real-time audience reactions—and it shapes people's personalities and political ideas in deeply strange ways.
As an example…I'm impressed and horrified by how an (imo necessary and even valuable) level of dirtbag left–y critique of identity politics, which seemed to be in vogue around 2016, somehow transitioned into outright revanchist racial insensitivity. It's surreal to see people totally shift their political convictions in such a short timeframe; it makes me feel like there weren't political convictions there after all, just personal ambitions (for fame, money, power) that were channeled into ANY discursive stance that was valuable.
Also very much relate to your closing thoughts on the repetitive narratives of the Asian American Narrative Industrial Complex (also there's surely some kind of psychological complex going on there too)…we know that actual people's lives/ambitions don't fit into the same tired tropes. And yet so much media produced by Hollywood—and independent sources—and random Substack blogs—are all so limited. Why are they so limited??? Because falling in with an existing discourse gets you attention; having your own thing to say, that can't neatly be categorized into some standard-issue party line, is a riskier strategy.
Thanks, Celine!
Regarding "dirtbag left-y critique of identity politics" becoming more "outright revanchist," are you talking about people who once identified as leftist but now have moved more to the right, or are you talking about shifts in broader popular sentiment in general?
I was thinking about the first one: self-professed leftists who once critiqued identity politics as distracting from class/materialist concerns, and now barely talk about class/materialist concerns…instead they're obsessed with discussions of gender/race/sexuality, and often taking fairly conservative positions in these areas.
But the second thing you point out (shifts in broader popular sentiment) is also very interesting to me. I don't feel qualified to comment on what is "actually" happening politically, but on a discursive level it feels like centrist positions are totally hollowed out because they are not algorithmically rewarded and don't lead to an outsized platform online. There's obviously so much written about how the internet rewards extremism (I really like Zeynep Tufekçi's writing here)…but that line of thinking assumes that the internet functions to entrench people's political opinions into gradually more extreme positions.
It seems like what you're arguing is that there is another force as well—that, if you're someone who wants attention, the internet will function to make your opinions more flexible, and more loosely held, because you might need to pivot at any moment to what your newfound audience will reward you for. And audiences seem to disproportionately reward and share extreme political opinions + contributions to niche discourses (the amount of articles I've read on girlhood, pros/cons of an MFA, tradwives, etc—these are actually not very universal concerns, they're very niche concerns that have an outsized amount of attention and takes…)
Aimee Terese comes to mind.
Some people are conversation takers, and other conversation makers. Is my thinking here. The more the left that is interested in identitarian concerns control the conversation, the more you have to meet them where they're at, which means discussing that. Even if your ultimate goal is to get them to start talking about class and materialism again. You have to work through it, as it were.
this is so thoughtful. i am really grappling with how people may have been aping their values before, so the switch-up facilitates whatever the new trend is.
Thanks! It's being said more these days, but there's a virtue and wisdom in not having loud opinions on everything online and sticking to what you feel and know most deeply. Like Abolish ICE. Whatever happened to that? Did those problems get solved? I'd hate for my online record to reveal that I never really cared about that issue and was just momentary into it for the "fun" of the moment.
What happened was that Biden got elected, and calling for the abolition of ICE was tantamount to criticism of Biden, since he was in the White House and yet not calling for any such thing.
"Do you want Farmer Jones to come back!?!"
listen chris i think you just need to brand yourself as a boy blogger
Anoint me
An experience I recently had was publishing a substack post and then noticing that my subscriber count slightly decreased - made me feel (briefly) regretful about posting.
I can't imagine the psychological oscillations when you have a LARGE subscriber base.
Fuel for craziness IMO.
I kind of wish there was a way to hide metrics. Knowing how many subscribers I have makes me anxious!
Can't wait for the Discourse Blockbuster piece! It's definitely something I've noticed as well. This whole thing rings very true-- even for spaces without algorithms, but I often wonder if we carry with us that interactive model to those spaces as well, the worst of online behaviour has been encouraged after all.
Re: boyhood essays, I feel like I've read a lot of boyhood books and seen a lot of boyhood movies they just haven't been labeled as such? But that could also just be reflective of what I was exposed to growing up, which I always think I have to account for because YMMV and all that. I can't help but feel like a lot of it these days boils down to marketing as well. When Linklater's Boyhood came out there was a fantastic French film called "Bande de Filles" about girl gangs in Paris. The direct translation is essentially Girl Gang, but the English title is Girlhood. I got into an argument with an AV club reviewer about this title translation even cause it annoyed me so much--pure marketing tactic.
Did they soften the translation because "Girl Gang" sounded too violent?
My theory was that it was just opportunistic to ride off Boyhood comparisons. It's a brutal movie so the English title very much feels like false advertising.
Man, I remember when that Intelligencer piece about the DSA came out, I had a socialist friend who was fucking pissed that it was being presented as a social club rather than a genuine political movement. I plead the fifth on whether it was either. But it *is* interesting to me that people still rally around student loan debt forgiveness in a way they don't with, e.g., Abolish ICE.
Fifth Amendment has been repealed. Spill.
I learn towards "both" - DSA had genuine political power and could make total nobodies into viable candidates, but it clearly was also a social milieu which allowed the overeducated 20somethings who were gentrifying Brooklyn to frame their takeover of the borough as a good thing (because they weren't displacing black native New Yorkers, they were taking on machine politicians! who just happened to be black native New Yorkers supported almost exclusively by black native New Yorkers!)
Educate us further in Available Asian American Life Scripts, please!
I could write a long reply, but I think most of what I'd say is best encapsulated in my Asian American Psycho piece!
Link?
Here it is! https://salieriredemption.substack.com/p/asian-american-psycho
Thanks!
I think a lot of what we see as subculture demise has to be influenced by alienation, and our city infrastructure in turn can have a large impact on cultural development. Subculture survives in the margins of US society at the moment, it’s the underground scenes that scrape and scrounge to survive (primarily? I’m not sure but the flattening of the internet by algorithm does no favors) offline with the limited infrastructure available for it (demise of 3rd spaces, mezoculture discourse, technological and/or socioeconomic access, etc.). That’s why it can seem so opaque and eclectic to brooch the topic, it’s obfuscated by the culture industry. People are aching for cultural variety, it has to be experienced offline.
i love kidology
Great piece.
Thanks, Kate!
Really enjoyed this. I’d love to see a Where Are They Now update for that New York Magazine cover lol.
There should be such a documentary for all the online figures of the Trump Era.
What I appreciated most about this brilliantly written analysis is certainly the topic of cultures and subcultures. I think the fundamental point is the absence of subcultures because ideas are developed in too 'a short time'. In fact, the link between content, ideas and algorithms is something increasingly close, however, at least among many online users, the coherence - even pre and post success on different platforms - of different online characters seems to be appreciated by different communities. Naturally, however, there is a large part of people who still manage to manage opinions and 'declared values' based on the 'mood' they perceive. But even more interesting in my opinion are, for example, all the discussions and consolidation of steaming film products in pop culture, which are increasingly following a different but more particular process in recent years. Thanks for sharing!
So… Always Be Capturemaxxing. I understand and am preparing my stinky lunch thinkpieces with haste