"The aesthetic tyranny of Instagram-determined good taste" Is My New Favorite Dystopic Novel Setting
Happy Tuesday, my darlings! As you drink that hot beverage of choice and steel yourself for the four-day week ahead, don’t forget that you are lovely and that I think you'll have a wonderful day. We can do this. Deep breaths. Drink water.
Not that you’ll be surprised about this, but it seems our current president wasn’t exactly sensitive when he visited the African American History Museum in D.C.
After getting all of us addicted to the dopamine hits that come from watching those online validations roll in, Now Facebook says it may remove Like counts.
From 2016—published a few days after the 2016 election— but this is the content I live for: This 90-Year-Old Lady Seduced and Killed Nazis as a Teenager. (Also one of the stories I save and forget: did I get this from the Odd Salon Something Weird facebook group, where all the best #content is shared?)
Also, to put in the above category: How Colonialism Shaped Body Shaming (cw: colonial racism / sexism / general sh!tiness of people.)
And finally, this is from last week but once again, Amanda Mull at The Atlantic perfectly captures my eye-rolling when it comes to trends in booze: White Claw Is What Happens When Being Cool Becomes Exhausting. This part discussing why aging millennials and Gen Zs are gravitating towards this [checks notes] spiked seltzer [REALLY PEOPLE? I quit drinking, and this becomes popular??!?! Back before I quit in 2015, you got laughed out of a bar if you couldn't name the specific artisan bitters to accompany that old-fashioned you didn’t actually like drinking, but did!] is fascinating: “Trends are born when groups of people grow bored with the things they’re supposed to like… All these groups have lived much of their adult life under the aesthetic tyranny of Instagram-determined good taste.”
You’re awesome. Be kind to each other.
xoxo Amy