The Trend Report™: Young Money
Look at the history of "with help from their parents."
Where to Get COVID Tests & Why They're Hard to Find
Tests have been hard to find – but stock up! That’s the best way to stay safe these days. Hopefully they’ll be free at some point.
Seriously, Upgrade Your Face Mask
WAH I LIKE MY CUTE CLOTH MASKS
Nasal Spray Could Provide Temporary Covid Protection
This would be cool! Perfect for travel and close-quarters situations!
U.S. Ranks 59th Globally for Covid-19 Vax
oof
Where was Justice Neil Gorsuch's mask?
Why is something like masking political in this dumb country!!!!
"301 of the 458 died of Covid-19."
This is not funny but also: police officers are very dumb, apparently!
Man hiding with daughter bc mother wanted vaccination
This was in Canada so…I guess it’s not-just-us!!
"Ideal co2 level <800ppm"
I keep seeing CO2 monitors and I am very curious about them!! I guess they are real, as Washington Post wrote about them last year. Might fuck around and get one.
The Economy Killed Millennials, Not Vice Versa
Hate this ❤️
Grocery store shortages are back
Don’t like this trend!
View of Extreme Weather: Temperature Records in the US
This is very interesting, to look at recent weather as a pattern instead of isolated events.
129 Degrees as Argentina Suffers Blackouts
9 Cool Things That Got Way Too Hot Last Year
Don’t like these.
“Despite still being in elementary school,” the Insider Tweet begins. “An Australian girl is on her way to retiring as a millionaire at the tender age of 15.”
It’s an interesting lede, a story about precocious entrepreneurial success and financial wins, written to make adults envious and wish “Damn. I wish I got to retire when I was 15.” But, as these stories go, the truth is less satisfying and takes a discerning eye to notice: the Australian girl did all this with the help of her mother, who is “the owner of several successful businesses” including a publicity firm. Or, as someone wrote in reply to the Tweet, in a statement that got higher engagement than the original post, “so her mother set up the companies, gave her all the capital necessary for a just-established company, and even...ran one of them.”
This is a predictable type of story in the twenty-first century, one that sees a style or think piece about a person in a luxe situation enjoying the fruits of their ostensibly hard work, only for it to be revealed that they had a leg up from familial finances and other related privileges. This trend has probably always existed but seemed to come into its own in the mid-aughts, via New York Times real estate stories about young home buyers (a la, 24 and 27 year olds) who are remarkable for buying near-million dollar apartments “independently,” when much of the money came from parental help. (Cut to a literal decade later, almost down the the exact date, and the same publication is finally writing stories about such parental help in real estate.)
Stories like this have become a bittersweet joke, creating a culture online from parody stories (“How I Saved Enough To Buy A House With My Parents’ Money”) to TikToks exposing you favorite celebrity’s rich kid roots to Twitter memes about the rich twist ending for so many who feign normalcy. Even this specific real estate item has its own meme subgenre. This may seem petty, in some ways, but this reaction ladders back to economic inequality and labor movements, as the rich are ostensibly the un-named parents in question. It’s a trigger of how there isn’t a greater accountability for the well off, that those who say they pay taxes but don’t really or say they fight climate change but don’t really get to do whatever they want because they’re rich. No wonder grifters like Anna Delvey are beloved enough to get high-gloss movies. No wonder there’s a subgenre of memes about people being tired of this shit. People are tired of working so hard for nothing. But, yes, by all means: tell us about the child who is on track to becoming a millionaire at fifteen. Tell us why we should care.
Exhausting Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy
Robin Givhan delivering some truth in advance of MLK Day.
2,400-Year-Old Tea Residue Found in China
Oldest brew in the world discovered in China
Interesting! I only put this here as I drink tea every day and am in the tea hive. For reference and comparison, modern coffee is only a product of the 13th century. The more you know!
What Happened to Christy Giles & Hilda Cabralez?
3 Men Arrested in Connection to Deaths of Models
“This is what happened from the beginning”
I haven’t heard about this (ostensibly) local story but it seems to have grabbed the attention of two types of TikTok girlies: gossip TikTokers and true crime TikTokers. Like Gabby Petito, this is the perfect storm of social media detective mania.
What Stuff Printed on an Egg Carton Actually Means
This is interesting! Since eggs always seem “official” but the language around them are more flimsy than one might think (like “cage free”).
Dolphins Have a Fully Functional Clitoris
I see you, dolphins, out there, getting pleasure in your dolphin parts.
Every Movie Villain Is a Tech Bro
A good, somewhat dim, read on why tech bros seem to be movie villains these days.
Never Say to Someone Struggling with Depression
A good reminder and exploration of what to say – and not say – when someone shares that they’re struggling with depression and other mental health items.
Fugitive Who Faked His Death Caught in Scotland
Here’s a wild story for you! All because he caught Covid too.
Life Stinks. So He Invented the Nasal Ranger.
I want a Nasal Ranger sooooo baddddddly 😭😭😭
That Cloud of Smoke Is Not a Mirage
No <3 This reminds of a moment in a recent episode of Project Runway where, when confronting a group of designers smoking, a Real Housewive scoffs “Why is everyone SMOKING now?” I feel you, girl.
How Hobbies Infiltrated American Life
"this piece made me angry"
Two sides of a coin here, the moral being: how and when did doing nothing, having a life, become monetized? This is a late-capital something, born of the hustle, I think.
"curious about what we can learn from crows"
On the intelligence of crows, as a result of a pandemic pet.
"about dirty work by steely dan"
Zoomies, you wild for this.
"i thought for sure she had a Black dad"
"they really played it up"
…so many of us were duped into thinking Pink was Black!! The early aughts were wild.
“i was today years old”
And aquatic wildlife everywhere rejoiced.
"about 300,000 years ago"
This got me thinking! Humans are old but we only know what was written, which is a relatively recent invention happening 6500 years ago. As someone in the comments said, “no records, just vibes.” How lucky they were!
“they collectively went ‘ohh that’s not…’”
Lady Gaga going full theater kid.
"when you fuck up the meal on a video game"
I keep seeing this gross food and this Tweet captured what it looks like best.
"why'd he make that noise"
No notes!
"wheezing at this"
Death by fashion.
And, finally, who The Trend Report™ is written for.
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