the center? it ain't holding, babes 😢⛓️‍💥

On the decentering of America and how creator culture is now all of culture.

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Tears and shock in Ukraine
Trump-Zelensky row signals major crisis
What it was like in the room
Embarrassing — and bad, bad, bad. We often wade through deep history, in real time, but this was truly historic. It will get a paragraph in an eventual history book.

Five key takeaways from German election
Merz warns Europe should seek ‘independence’
"gap in voting between young men and women”
"how do we solve the gen z men problem"
Highest turnout in forty years, the biggest (center-left) loss in a century, youth and gender divisions, a fascist party winning on deportation: sound familiar? We’ll talk about this in a moment but don’t be fooled that “it’s just one place.” Time for lesbian Hitler or whatever! At least Austria is doing things right!! (Also: I was going to do a Nazi-watch 2025 breakdown but opted not — but here’s an idea of what’s happening.)

Pope retirement questions percolate
Prayers and support for Pope Francis
Poor Pope Francis! Also, I don’t think many people are clocking how bad this will be once he dies, less because of him, as a person — which will be sad — but because he is a progressive. Some are eager for him to die, to install a far right Pope. Then, the world will really shift into legitimized anti-poor, anti-immigrant, anti-LGBTQ+ chaos, among other things, considering Catholicism is seemingly the world’s top religion. I’ve said it before, I’m saying it again: please read Opus. Why? Well, here are some reasons. Don’t take the bait of the religion being very chic!

Rich People Are Firing a Cash Cannon
Americans filing for unemployment rises
An insane finding, the bolding for emphasis: “The wealthiest 10% of American households—those making more than $250,000 a year, roughly—are now responsible for half of all US consumer spending and at least a third of the country’s gross domestic product.” And we wonder we’re in this political nightmare — and that Pew found people are becoming more religious again!

Baby bump in South Korea
Japan births fall to lowest
Make a baby, don’t make a baby: which will you choose?

Why Chocolate Is Suddenly So Expensive
Not to be that woke friend but we’ve literally beenwriting about thissince at least 2014. We fucked around and we finding out!!

It’s not often that the center of the universe shifts with your noticing and, yet, somehow the creeping feeling of this fact was very clearly witnessed.

“Have you ever been to Ukraine to see the problems we have?” Zelensky asked JD Vance, pointedly, after being scolded for disrespect and thanklessness. What resulted was a rarely televised — and rarely that evil or pre-planned — world politics clashing, as performed by two television stars turned politicians and a performative Hollywood hillbilly venture capitalist aspirant turned politician. One represented the pursuit of freedom, the other represented the pursuit of empire. You know who is who and, if you don’t, it may become the most think piece'd moment of the year: we’ll find out together, won’t we?

It’s a big deal because of the Ukraine and Russia conflict but also because this specific moment coalesces NATO (and UN) struggles and American political meddling, inspiring European defense exercises and conversations about renewed (or faltering) power. Then there is the ongoing murder of Palestinians by Israel and USAID cutting vital resources worldwide and India becoming the most populous country in the world and China asserting itself as the world’s generator of products: this is what the post-America moment looks like. After a decade (if not this past quarter-century) creeping in this direction, the happenings of the past month — for a bit better and a lot worse — has shown the center cannot actually hold when it comes to the United States acting as the international glue bringing power and culture together: that has all been disappeared from the table, as if a magician clearing a tablecloth. How quickly things can change, no? This isn’t to say America still isn’t that girl, that she isn’t the biggest economy in the world: no, no — but a great pivot has begun, where America is now “just another country,” as it makes itself unspecial and unenviable. Like the rest of the world, it’s now in the shit instead of “above” it, leaving us with two options: shift to nationalistic slop or invest in global citizenry. We all know which is better.

The aforementioned items are hard proof of undeniable soft proofs that will become more and more important. An example: the recently released Chinese kid’s movie Ne Zha 2 has become the most successful animated movie of all time, is likely to be the first animated film to make $2B. It’s also the fifth biggest movie — ever. What does that mean for a Hollywood on its knees? For Bollywood? For European cinema? Then there’s TikTok and DeepSeek (and RedNote) from China and K-pop mega moments like Jennie and Lisa (who is also in White Lotus) and the long awaited return of Bong Joon-Ho with Mickey 17, not to mention the continued dominance of SHEIN and Temu. “It’s Xi Jinping’s World, and Trump Is Just Living in It,” Bloomberg mused this weekend. “Why a Rapid U.S. Withdrawal From Europe Will Reinforce China,” international think tank Carnegie Europe mused in late 2024 — and they were right, as that is the current situation. Even people on TikTok are mumbling about this! Whether or not China, specifically, steals the crown doesn’t matter because the bigger story is that a politi-cultural abdication has happened, playing into a theme of isolationism that ironically requires a greater global mindsets to solve. Meaning: it’s not just Make America Great Again but also Make Europe Great Again and Make Argentina Great Again — or wherever else feels so emboldened now. Just look at how multinational CPAC was! The promise of globalism has been fulfilled, as politics and culture are now of everywhere and nowhere all at once.

This is the point where I offer solutions, where I say “Now that we know the trend, you should BLAH BLAH BLAH.”: I don’t have that, given how complicated (and overwhelming) this obvious-but-new reality is. That said: decentering America can help, as the leader is now part of the pack, that we are truly citizens of the world instead of under an umbrella of a specific politi-cultural power. “Think globally, act locally” is more relevant than ever: push your news diet beyond the states (I swapped New York Times for Financial Times and Al Jazeera.), understand how your money hurts and helps others (Ex: who made your clothes? Who suffers when you want a lil treat?), invest in multiculturalism beyond tokenism (Watch Ne Zha — and seriously learn Chinese.). Just a few ideas, mostly things I am telling myself.

But here’s the thing: none of this should be scary or surprising, as we’ve known this was coming, Trump or not. Given Putin’s near thirty year reign, given the meddling of the hyper-rich in all of global politics, economics, and climate, this is a stop on the tour of logical conclusions. Our connecting local struggles in America with a place like Palestine was the start of realizing collective struggles, despite the problem being viewed a bit too myopically and with a self-centeredness (a la: it only affects us here and there in this moment). You, like me, aren’t special: we never were. We got here specifically because of such individualism (and neoliberalism). Now…how can we lock in together, from where we are, to affect change?

Two things!!

• This week I’m in Madrid and, if you’re there, drop me a line as I’ll be covering the art fairs the following week. Stay tuned! But also: if you’re in town, Bobby Aaron Solomon and I will be stationing ourselves at Gota this Thursday, 6 March, starting at 6P until we leave for dinner (with or without whomever we meet). Let’s hang!!

• The first Trend Report Live™ (or TRL™) happened and…it was a success! The event was a prototyping of the format with friends, to make sure it “worked” before sharing it with y’all — and it did! Curious what the format is? Take a look at the deck here and the game board here. If you’re in Barcelona, the next (First?) event is on March 30 at a TBD location. Have a location idea? Want to come? I’m all ears: send me a note!

A movement calling for ‘economic blackout’
Why Consumers Are Embracing ‘No Buy 2025’
“I haven’t bought paper towels”
"What happens when you stop shopping"
“Boycotting ain’t enough”
To the point of global citizenry: it’s great that people are finally opening their third eye when it comes to consumerism. This is good for the planet and bad for brands, even if it is way overdue — and I doubt it will crossover to people like, um, [Insert Friend From High School] unless people can bridge the gap with direct pleas for money saving (versus “CAPITALISM! RICH PEOPLE!!” which sounds elitist).

Virgil Abloh’s Trailblazing Legacy in Biography
Written by the Robin Givhan, out June 24. LET’S GOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Sam Fender: music industry "rigged"
No idea who this dude is but…SPEAK ON IT, MY MAN!! SPEAK ON IT!!!!!!!

"behind the scenes with Jesse Krimes"
This Artist Takes on the Prison System
This mini-doc is incredible and, if you are in New York, please see this Jesse Krimes show for me.

Is it the end for hanging out?
”you dont party”
"these cold, giant, empty houses?"
I was going to write a longer piece about how “not hanging out” and dorm aesthetics and empty culture multiplied by Amialivecore and the “I CAN DO EVERYTHING!!”-ness of now enabled by non-expert “expert” tools like AI and CapCut and Grammarly and Canva divided by being “too anxious” about doing something wrong at work taken to the hyper-identity-ism culture of the 2010s power results in what is essentially conservatism without conservatism: too scared to do anything but mumble in place about being too scared to do anything because you have just enough money to complain as such. Get off your ass and be a real human challenge!!!!

"Millennials are cooler than us"
“I feel so bad”
“Millennials told me”
“music got y’all fooled”
“my heart hurts for them”
See directly above, which is all to say: this has to do with people aspiring for money instead of living life. Another victory for Millennials 💯

The social media managers, digital producers, and creators won: TikTok’s favorite real-not-real Best Actress nominee, Paloma Diamond, is doing award season press with a Hollywood Reporter interview and an ABC News interview; Keke Palmer stopped her SAG Awards entrance not for an interview — but to get a pep talk from creator, Nia Ivy; Drew Afualo scooped the scoopers for In Style by getting Best Actress winner Jessica Gunning to give an off the record awards speech; Leo González had his own Keke Palmer moment with Jessica Williams; and the Chicken Kitchen Queen had brunch with Oscar nominees and was featured in The New Yorker and AP and The Independent. It’s our world, baby! It’s our world!!!

But what do we get, now that Hollywood is repaved in our honor? Like all cool things and all cultural generators, we copied by children but also chewed up, adopted, and made disposable by the machine — and by “the machine” I mean politics and forces of power. It’s The New York Times making a TikTok obituary edit for DEI and Gavin Newsom launching a podcast. It’s Trump dropping deportation ASMR videos and making deportation Valentine’s, likely by using Canva. It’s using OpenAI tools to make an AI trailer for Making Gaza Great Again, proving that these dream machines aren’t just climate negative silly content creation streams for work and play but also prompts for expressing imperialist genocidal agendas. Yes, memes-to-movements a la Chile’s Gabriel Boric in 2021 (Positive!) or Italy’s Giorgia Meloni in 2022 (Negative!) — but we’re in a different era, where the gestures of digital entertainment are instruments of extremism, normalized communication. Candace Owens' "pivot" to gossip, pop culture to alt-right beliefs pipelines, Evie Magazine as TikTok slopped MAGAcore, body building to raw milking to right winging, Jubilee using the Buzzfeed model to spread hate: it’s all an extension of the digital culture and conversation machine being used and abused. Digital culture has sold itself out, by design. This was always the point.

“But we need a liberal Joe Rogan!” people scream. “He will save us!” they say, scrambling to push poor Hasan Piker in front of the bus that is saving America before pushing Dean Withers and Daniel Tosh and Mr. Bulwark, Tim Miller, and that Republican Makeup Mean Girl and those sweet talking southern podcaster reality stars and David Pakman and the adorable Basement Yard boys. Do they matter? No, because all this misses the whole point: we’re playing by an already dated playbook in that we’re not wielding it to generate movements or make power, settling only for conversation instead of ideological conversion. Jaskaran and I have been messaging about this for a few weeks now, concluding that creators themselves (and by extension digital producers and social media managers) may not be taking themselves seriously which means the powers that be make meaningful action on their behalf or co-opt their abilities for the worse. “Creators have a huge problem with switching their human side on and off,” Jaskaran shared with me, of liberal creators, when I told him about this story. “They use it to justify their actions, but they rarely use that human element to control their fans. This week, I’m seeing another discourse unfold between a creator I like and one I haven’t heard of. But the creator I like is in the wrong because their fans are at fault…Every liberal creator is too busy defending and spreading their views when those views are challenged. They defend themselves, but audiences are left to act on their stance.“

“Basically,” Jaskaran continued, “liberal audiences organize coups against each other while the creators are either preaching peace or even engaging with each other.”

This gets at a great lesson of these times, a tale as old as time: to be a creator, creative, or artist is to be used, to be taken for granted, with little guidance or help on what you’re doing until you “become valuable” to the machine. From carla lalli music’s YouTube exposé to Grace Helbig reflecting on being abandoned to debating Lilly Singh’s SAG Awards coverage, the results are the same: one day you’re in, the next you’re out — but you, unlike Hollywood stars or politicians, have no infrastructure to keep you afloat, to parlay ideas into action. You get used just like users which, to the point of Patreon’s recent State of Create report, reveals just how hollow the promises of social platforms are in 2025: all ships rise — if you’re a shareholder, if you’re already in power. As social culture and creator culture are now “all of culture,” as the Kai Trumps and Alabama Barkers rise, there is a need for a pivot, to change, to use our powers to make real change or to abandon the game, lest we get played again.

"*precios expresados en usd"
"would rather land upside down"
"my super liberal leftist white woman friend"
"ai generated"
"one influencer that predicted fresh food"
"Glimbo Schnordelle"
"Every moment of life is annoying"
"this site still has the juice"
“If Miranda Sings sang”
A few posts about culture that feel very now. The last one is a post of the year.

“where are their girlfriends”
"John Waters in Donkey Kong"
“no puede ser”
“a perfect orgasm”
“an emergency divas”
“THIS TOMORROW”
Some gay stuff!

"Let's go Bonnie!"
"#masterofthehouse"
AI Trump Kissing Elon's Bare Feet
"Trump sucking Musk’s toes"
Apple to fix bug that replaces ‘racist’ with ‘Trump’
When I said to use the tools to dismantle the master’s house from within, this is what I meant. Well done, people! KEEP IT UP!!!!

"millie bobby brown grab"
“era dolly”
“Bette Midler??”
The Sephora kid’s final form. Y’all teens need to stop dressing like septuagenarians.

“my brain buffering”
“my brain buffering”
“never will i ever drink”
Something’s happening in the space of people’s brain buffering.

“If this is true”
Fellas, is it incest for your dad to marry your wife’s twin sister, therefore becoming your brother?

And, finally, something that delights me and likely you too.

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