Btw, as I've said many times, the key to "retarded" is to use it SPARINGLY and on the right occasions. The edge-youths just use it all the time and indiscriminately. There's an art to it.
I have only known Meghan from her podcasts — but the writing in this post will keep me coming back for more. Reading her prose is like watching a champion figure skater.
Maybe the woke will only get woker, but the radical moderates (because it's now radical to be moderate) will break away. From both parties! And we'll have a celebration of moderation in the form of a new, third party, where people actually care about governing more than winning. I understand that this is as likely as me owning a Brooklyn brownstone, but I'm always dreaming about that, too.
It’s not the end of woke but it’s the beginning of a movement away from woke. However AOC may have dropped her stupid pronouns but she’s doubled down on her antisemitism.
I hope you are wrong but fear you are right. It is hard to watch my wife and daughters navigate their social circles. As you say, the pearl clutching has only worsened post-election. I have only issue with what you wrote: I have always used my Massachusetts heritage as justification for calling anything or anyone retarded at as many inappropriate moments as necessary. Many of my loved ones profess deep shame when it falls out of my mouth in public but I have yet to find a reasonable substitute.
My prediction: The people who've seized-back the reins of culture won't be able to stop themselves from imposing a new set of orthodoxies and pieties of their own. They'll be too drunk on their feeling of victory to not let it get to their heads.
So, while I think we're about to enter an edgier period in pop culture akin to what we saw in the 1990s, my sense is that the rebellion and iconoclasm that's been waiting to boil over will end up being pointed in two directions because the paradigm will flip back very quickly.
Let's not forget that the "edgy" crowd over the last 10-12 years has leaned towards "traditional" values. Lowbrow podcasts that constantly bash OnlyFans models as sluts like Whatever and Fresh & Fit are somewhere on the same continuum as return-to-tradition intellectuals like Louise Perry. Let's just imagine for a moment what a new cultural paradigm that flips in their favor looks like.
Throw-in the fact that working-class Americans and (legal) immigrant communities mostly resonate with conservative values and don't feel spoken-to by the pop culture of the last decade, not to mention that comedians have become the vehicle for anti-progressive values... and you have a recipe for a new/old brand of repression.
The younger right/conservative generation is too young to remember the '90s, when the polarity was reversed. They don't remember just how fervent conservatives were about curtailing speech. Those censorious impulses haven't gone anywhere -- we saw them spring into action when much of the don't-cancel-me/free-speech brigade (Konstantin Kissin, Gad Saad, etc) tapped into their desire to silence others and showed us their true colors overnight after October 7th.
Obviously, MANY people feel burned and aggrieved by cancel culture. Those resentments have been festering for a decade -- and they're going to be taken-out in a kind of social bloodletting revenge party that will harden into Establishment Prudery in the blink of an eye.
The thing Americans in particular need to understand is that both Left and Right in this country are driven by a deep Puritan streak. Both are prudes. Both are terrified of the unrestrained elemental power of sex. Neither can grapple with what a society that unleashes the shackles on femininity would really LOOK like.
We may look like a permissive country, but we're Puritans at our core, no matter how many tattoos, amateur porn sites, and weed dispensaries we're drowning in.
Example: I'm about to head out to see comedian Akaash Singh (best known as Andrew Schultz's co-host). He's edgy, hilarious, and sharp -- but his ENTIRE act consists, basically, of asking pairs of people in the crowd why they aren't married.
Singh is also a good indicator of the pending re-alignment that Sarah Haider and others have pointed out. But I feel like MANY people are still keyed-into the two-tribe mentality. And revolutions always end up with the victors becoming just like the people they've deposed.
I just hope we get some great, intelligent art out of the deal. I'm SICK AND TIRED of every press release about a band or artist reading exactly the fucking same. Good god, that's annoying. It'll be nice to see all these cowardly musicians who've sung the same tune just shut the fuck up already.
You seem to be conflating heterodox people and conservatives, fearing that the former have a censorious streak equal to the latter.
That conflation ignores the fact that the overwhelming majority of heterodox are classical liberals/libertarians. They have always stood apart from the Puritanical Left and Right. They may have common cause with conservatives on some narrow issues, mostly trans ideology, but are far from right wing.
And the idea that old right-wing cultural paradigms will return is unfounded. I lived through the 1980s culture wars and now realize that their power is negligible. A few ninnies on the Podunk School Board or Library Commission may want to "ban" an otherwise widely-available book. But they are nowhere as powerful as the Random House staffers who prevent a book from being published in the first place. The Moral Majority is not coming back to stop you from enjoying your favorite book, movie, tv show, or artwork.
I do think we need to distinguish between "heterodox" and "conservative" -- and think that far too many heterodox thinkers get unfairly smeared as right-coded by parties who use terms like "alt-right" in the most pejorative, fear-mongering sense -- almost like a slur. But there's clearly a Venn overlap we shouldn't deny.
I don't think I'm conflating the two at all -- it's obvious that much of the opposition to the censoriousness of the last decade-plus has come from people who've ended up sliding into shades of conservativism (for better or worse).
I also think it's clear that many voices who roll in the "heterodox" crowd are demagogues in disguise as "free thinkers" -- or they >became< that as they garnered more and more support from audiences who were reacting against cancel culture and thus positioned themselves in opposition to "the Left." So many of these YouTubers and public intellectuals pander to that sentiment.
I disagree with you that "a few ninnies on the Podunk School Board" are "nowhere as powerful as the Random House staffers who prevent a book from being published in the first place." It may appear that way now, but I think that's a misdiagnosis of where we're at -- and, in fact, you saying so mirrors the people in progressive bubbles who swear up and down that cancel culture is an overblown myth cooked-up by right-wing hysterics.
People who ignore the threat from either "side" are missing the forest for the trees. For one, the power dynamic will inevitably shift -- I'm arguing that it's going to happen faster than we might expect, and that soon the annoying "blue-haired" people demanding pronouns are going to be the ninnies.
I do agree with you that "progressives" have exerted an enormous level of institutional and cultural control, but I would counter that arguing about who's worse when it comes to curtailing free speech is a fool's errand. What I'm saying is that "the Right"s lust for censorship will rear its head again in short order.
The clear lesson we should've learned in the wake of October 7th (or, really, any time) is that Americans of ALL stripes are snowflake-y and extremely averse to speech and ideas they don't like. Which means that the two teams are gonna bounce the ball back and forth a bunch over the course of time.
You’re right, of course. I’m just finding it amusing to see the new heights of spittle flying during even more heated rants about the state of things while heels are being even more firmly dug in for the long haul.
Yes, utterly true. Academia continues to resist an analysis of its rapid onset enshrining of the new illiberal orthodoxy - (reporting from Canada) it still takes some courage to expose your heresy by not including your pronouns and a land acknowledgment in your email signature. It is a religious war. What is the four letter word for the massive middle held hostage between the MAGA and the WOKE? Maybe if we can name ourselves we can lift our heads from the foxhole? (Not to be confused with the FOXhole or MSNBChole, it’s the big, normie, sometimes nuanced, and amorphous hole in between.)
LET’S HOPE. I think it largely is…broadly speaking. Academia and publishing and The Arts will triple-down. They’ve invested too much emotionally into it. Said too many things they can’t walk back. Too much ego and pride involved. But fuck it: We’ll ignore and mock them.
The Studio 54 heterodox fantasy photoshoot part was over-the-top "literally" laugh-out-loud funny; the humorous-to-harsh key change in the middle was elegantly jarring & genius. This is simply great writing. Too bad the MacArthur prize got woke/captured—time for a Substack SchmacArthur Prize—eight figures, no strings attached.
Very insightful essay. The description of the imaginary photo shoot was priceless.
We have to be careful not to overstate the importance of electoral politics on culture. The 50 year march through the institutions has entrenched a certain leftist cultural sensibility that endures. We can wish that principles of classical liberalism would prevail but the proverbial horse has left the barn
I love your writing, Meghan, and your podcast. One reason I gravitated to heterodox world is that I was afraid identitarianism and censoriousness on the left were going to cause Democrats to lose, and here we are. I think the Democrats lost on a number of fronts, including people being sick of the woke narrative, but Russian interference and disinformation as well as voter suppression laws and shenanigans like bomb threats had a hand in it. As it is, I am way more afraid of Trump, his nutso cabinet picks, a lack of institutional guardrails, and armed Christian nationalists than I am of wokeness.
Btw, as I've said many times, the key to "retarded" is to use it SPARINGLY and on the right occasions. The edge-youths just use it all the time and indiscriminately. There's an art to it.
I have only known Meghan from her podcasts — but the writing in this post will keep me coming back for more. Reading her prose is like watching a champion figure skater.
Oh, thank you!
You are very welcome! ☺️
Maybe the woke will only get woker, but the radical moderates (because it's now radical to be moderate) will break away. From both parties! And we'll have a celebration of moderation in the form of a new, third party, where people actually care about governing more than winning. I understand that this is as likely as me owning a Brooklyn brownstone, but I'm always dreaming about that, too.
👍👍👍
Yeah but you have to win to govern, unfortunately.
The doubling down will continue until morale improves
I hope you can get Justine Bateman on. She seems like a kindred GenXer and good person to discuss this stuff with.
Justine eas excellent on the Adam Carolla show a few days ago. She just espouses simple common sense.
It’s not the end of woke but it’s the beginning of a movement away from woke. However AOC may have dropped her stupid pronouns but she’s doubled down on her antisemitism.
right on the money but I do hope we've seen the beginning of the end.
I think it's more the end of the beginning.
I hope you are wrong but fear you are right. It is hard to watch my wife and daughters navigate their social circles. As you say, the pearl clutching has only worsened post-election. I have only issue with what you wrote: I have always used my Massachusetts heritage as justification for calling anything or anyone retarded at as many inappropriate moments as necessary. Many of my loved ones profess deep shame when it falls out of my mouth in public but I have yet to find a reasonable substitute.
My prediction: The people who've seized-back the reins of culture won't be able to stop themselves from imposing a new set of orthodoxies and pieties of their own. They'll be too drunk on their feeling of victory to not let it get to their heads.
So, while I think we're about to enter an edgier period in pop culture akin to what we saw in the 1990s, my sense is that the rebellion and iconoclasm that's been waiting to boil over will end up being pointed in two directions because the paradigm will flip back very quickly.
Let's not forget that the "edgy" crowd over the last 10-12 years has leaned towards "traditional" values. Lowbrow podcasts that constantly bash OnlyFans models as sluts like Whatever and Fresh & Fit are somewhere on the same continuum as return-to-tradition intellectuals like Louise Perry. Let's just imagine for a moment what a new cultural paradigm that flips in their favor looks like.
Throw-in the fact that working-class Americans and (legal) immigrant communities mostly resonate with conservative values and don't feel spoken-to by the pop culture of the last decade, not to mention that comedians have become the vehicle for anti-progressive values... and you have a recipe for a new/old brand of repression.
The younger right/conservative generation is too young to remember the '90s, when the polarity was reversed. They don't remember just how fervent conservatives were about curtailing speech. Those censorious impulses haven't gone anywhere -- we saw them spring into action when much of the don't-cancel-me/free-speech brigade (Konstantin Kissin, Gad Saad, etc) tapped into their desire to silence others and showed us their true colors overnight after October 7th.
Obviously, MANY people feel burned and aggrieved by cancel culture. Those resentments have been festering for a decade -- and they're going to be taken-out in a kind of social bloodletting revenge party that will harden into Establishment Prudery in the blink of an eye.
The thing Americans in particular need to understand is that both Left and Right in this country are driven by a deep Puritan streak. Both are prudes. Both are terrified of the unrestrained elemental power of sex. Neither can grapple with what a society that unleashes the shackles on femininity would really LOOK like.
We may look like a permissive country, but we're Puritans at our core, no matter how many tattoos, amateur porn sites, and weed dispensaries we're drowning in.
Example: I'm about to head out to see comedian Akaash Singh (best known as Andrew Schultz's co-host). He's edgy, hilarious, and sharp -- but his ENTIRE act consists, basically, of asking pairs of people in the crowd why they aren't married.
Singh is also a good indicator of the pending re-alignment that Sarah Haider and others have pointed out. But I feel like MANY people are still keyed-into the two-tribe mentality. And revolutions always end up with the victors becoming just like the people they've deposed.
I just hope we get some great, intelligent art out of the deal. I'm SICK AND TIRED of every press release about a band or artist reading exactly the fucking same. Good god, that's annoying. It'll be nice to see all these cowardly musicians who've sung the same tune just shut the fuck up already.
You seem to be conflating heterodox people and conservatives, fearing that the former have a censorious streak equal to the latter.
That conflation ignores the fact that the overwhelming majority of heterodox are classical liberals/libertarians. They have always stood apart from the Puritanical Left and Right. They may have common cause with conservatives on some narrow issues, mostly trans ideology, but are far from right wing.
And the idea that old right-wing cultural paradigms will return is unfounded. I lived through the 1980s culture wars and now realize that their power is negligible. A few ninnies on the Podunk School Board or Library Commission may want to "ban" an otherwise widely-available book. But they are nowhere as powerful as the Random House staffers who prevent a book from being published in the first place. The Moral Majority is not coming back to stop you from enjoying your favorite book, movie, tv show, or artwork.
I do think we need to distinguish between "heterodox" and "conservative" -- and think that far too many heterodox thinkers get unfairly smeared as right-coded by parties who use terms like "alt-right" in the most pejorative, fear-mongering sense -- almost like a slur. But there's clearly a Venn overlap we shouldn't deny.
I don't think I'm conflating the two at all -- it's obvious that much of the opposition to the censoriousness of the last decade-plus has come from people who've ended up sliding into shades of conservativism (for better or worse).
I also think it's clear that many voices who roll in the "heterodox" crowd are demagogues in disguise as "free thinkers" -- or they >became< that as they garnered more and more support from audiences who were reacting against cancel culture and thus positioned themselves in opposition to "the Left." So many of these YouTubers and public intellectuals pander to that sentiment.
I disagree with you that "a few ninnies on the Podunk School Board" are "nowhere as powerful as the Random House staffers who prevent a book from being published in the first place." It may appear that way now, but I think that's a misdiagnosis of where we're at -- and, in fact, you saying so mirrors the people in progressive bubbles who swear up and down that cancel culture is an overblown myth cooked-up by right-wing hysterics.
People who ignore the threat from either "side" are missing the forest for the trees. For one, the power dynamic will inevitably shift -- I'm arguing that it's going to happen faster than we might expect, and that soon the annoying "blue-haired" people demanding pronouns are going to be the ninnies.
I do agree with you that "progressives" have exerted an enormous level of institutional and cultural control, but I would counter that arguing about who's worse when it comes to curtailing free speech is a fool's errand. What I'm saying is that "the Right"s lust for censorship will rear its head again in short order.
The clear lesson we should've learned in the wake of October 7th (or, really, any time) is that Americans of ALL stripes are snowflake-y and extremely averse to speech and ideas they don't like. Which means that the two teams are gonna bounce the ball back and forth a bunch over the course of time.
You’re right, of course. I’m just finding it amusing to see the new heights of spittle flying during even more heated rants about the state of things while heels are being even more firmly dug in for the long haul.
Yes, utterly true. Academia continues to resist an analysis of its rapid onset enshrining of the new illiberal orthodoxy - (reporting from Canada) it still takes some courage to expose your heresy by not including your pronouns and a land acknowledgment in your email signature. It is a religious war. What is the four letter word for the massive middle held hostage between the MAGA and the WOKE? Maybe if we can name ourselves we can lift our heads from the foxhole? (Not to be confused with the FOXhole or MSNBChole, it’s the big, normie, sometimes nuanced, and amorphous hole in between.)
LET’S HOPE. I think it largely is…broadly speaking. Academia and publishing and The Arts will triple-down. They’ve invested too much emotionally into it. Said too many things they can’t walk back. Too much ego and pride involved. But fuck it: We’ll ignore and mock them.
The Studio 54 heterodox fantasy photoshoot part was over-the-top "literally" laugh-out-loud funny; the humorous-to-harsh key change in the middle was elegantly jarring & genius. This is simply great writing. Too bad the MacArthur prize got woke/captured—time for a Substack SchmacArthur Prize—eight figures, no strings attached.
Dearest Meghan,
Very insightful essay. The description of the imaginary photo shoot was priceless.
We have to be careful not to overstate the importance of electoral politics on culture. The 50 year march through the institutions has entrenched a certain leftist cultural sensibility that endures. We can wish that principles of classical liberalism would prevail but the proverbial horse has left the barn
I love you Meghan!
I love your writing, Meghan, and your podcast. One reason I gravitated to heterodox world is that I was afraid identitarianism and censoriousness on the left were going to cause Democrats to lose, and here we are. I think the Democrats lost on a number of fronts, including people being sick of the woke narrative, but Russian interference and disinformation as well as voter suppression laws and shenanigans like bomb threats had a hand in it. As it is, I am way more afraid of Trump, his nutso cabinet picks, a lack of institutional guardrails, and armed Christian nationalists than I am of wokeness.