you won't remember this 🤔🤔

On the incoming false memory economy and exploring a new friendship scam.

Airman dies after setting himself on fire
“Wild to see on CNN”
This is the story of the week. It’s remarkable that this hasn’t gotten more attention, as it captures a turning point both as far as activism, media representation and reaction, and the state of war. RIP, Aaron Bushnell.

Sizeable ‘uncommitted’ vote in Michigan
And Democrats wonder why voters are turning up to vote for no one. See also: the poll of people who say Biden is too old and Trump is too dangerous. This isn’t hard, people!

Court Throws Wrench Into Trump Trial
These continue to be nothingburgers until they are realburgers but this is just…stupid. We gotta redo that Supreme Court, y’all! I hope Ruth Bader Ginsburg is enjoying her rest at least, or relishing in leading the charge to gerontocracy.

Oil and gas profits triple under Biden
Joe Biden I stg I will hunt you down and steal your dementia medicine.

CDC ending five-day COVID isolation
Can someone set an alarm in two months, when there’s an uptick again? Ludicrous!

Musk: 'Media Blackout' in Death of Georgia Student
My mom tipped me off to this “immigration boogeyman” murder story in Georgia, which Musk has been fanning the flames in the stupidest ways.

Ghana passes bill making identifying as LGBTQ+ illegal
Um.

Cherry blossom forecast: peak bloom March 21
This feels very wrong, if you’re at all familiar with the very-April phenomena of cherry blossoms in DC.

Microplastics found in human placenta
Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s just microplastics.

Vice ends town hall after thumbs-down emojis
lmao

The dementia crisis is here.
"Dementia tsunami is coming"
“Dementia is not a joke”
“What’s Oscars?”
The (very sad and exploitative) Wendy Williams documentary has seized a moment for an important conversation: we are entering an era of high levels of dementia. This will be an ongoing subject of interest!

I was at dinner where we landed on the subject of notation apps. Some use Notion, some use Evernote, some use iA Writer. I use Apple’s Notes app. So simple, so stupid, backed up by the cloud. I could do something fancier but I am tired of constantly starting over with technology, or investing in a technology that dies, taking with it all of your memories, investments, and time. There one day, disappeared in a computer meltdown or the magically unsaving Microsoft Word file. While less frequently occurring, to participate in technology is to understand that everything you have in your type-type box will disappear. It happened to me with with Rdio, with This Is My Jam, with MySpace, with Xanga, with Path — and it will happen again. Will it be Blogger? Last.fm? Twitter?

This is what happens when your tools are based around capital, yes, but it doesn’t end there: ask any writer and you’ll hear about all the writing that they’ve done that have disappeared, going down with defunct publications, lost websites, and digital outlets lacking archives. I have an entire catalogue of writing, of work, of history that is just…lost. All those artists that I wrote and took pictures of for Los Angeles, I’m Yours? Nowhere to be found. A capsule of a time and place simply bye-bye’d by technology. This wouldn’t be a problem outside of bruised egos and a loss of one’s own “work” but it becomes problematic in situations when the work you did gets mentioned in legitimate archives, like an interview I did of A.L. Steiner being a literal footnote in Made In L.A. 2014: people will search for a record of nothing.

Now we are entering a mass version of this, a precarious space where so many aspects of our lives are being deleted or rewritten with AI: we are entering a false memory economy, as brilliantly coined by TikToker @inner_werk. Let me explain with examples: you choose to retouch pictures of yourself but save over the raw photos; you write something that Grammarly edits, sharing the edited version; you appear on a recorded Zoom call with the “touch up my appearance” option turned on; you delete an event in your calendar from a week ago because you didn’t like the event and don’t want to remember it; you make a joke on Twitter that flops or does too well — and you delete it, as to note draw attention; you crop out someone who you don’t want to include from a picture; you use Photoshop to extend an image a little bit, or to completely remove something that you don’t want in the image; you try to write something in another language but have a translation service rewrite it for you; you and some friends record a song for fun and opt to auto-tune it; you create and share an AI headshot. You get what I’m getting at?

These are every day “blips” in our lives, microaggressions of truth that we play on ourselves that we “don’t notice” but are our accidentally deletions of our own archive in real time. In the grander, culture-wide scale, we see this with true-or-not culture wide Mandela Effects which are reinforced by media and tech companies changing the record. This past Super Bowl, when Alicia Keys flubbed her first note, CBS, the NFL, or whomever was quick to fix the flub creating a fact that is fictional. We also have Google working to remove the News tab and soliciting publishers to have AI write stories for them, both of which create altered versions of truth, a lack of ability to pinpoint records, while eroding the credibility of everyone involved. (Lest we forget: Google liberal’d too close to the sun recently, with AI that produced women popes and Black nazis. Talk about altered archives!) Facebook agrees, as they’re removing their news tab because “people don’t come to Facebook for news and political content.” In using AI tools, the tools often make shit up — and people take that as truth. When celebrities get plastic surgery and lie about it, a similar editing of truth happens, as

The Weekly Work

so sagely has chronicled in the case of Kylie Jenner. But it’s not just Kylie: we’re in an epidemic of young people scrubbing out their youth and likenesses because of cosmetic procedures. The Row recently made a stir by disallowing phones at their fashion show, which is a “win” for old-school, anti-tech experiences — but this also means you’re only getting what the brand deems worthy of sharing. No outtakes, no ugly off-looks, no non-curated anything: you only get what “the state” gives you as truth. As ugly as they are, more and more public figures are getting veneers to suggest their teeth have always been perfect. This may seem “big” and like something that happens only to business persons, celebrities, and politicians — but just ask the students who are being plagued by AI generated nudes at school. Are they not dealing with a crisis of truth, that anything can be faked or real at the same time now? How can one qualify such a situation?

Now think: what happens when issues like rewritten history, an inability to preserve our records, and the AI generation swirl together? We enter a very concerning space where truth disappears. You know this, as has been written again and again and again, but this “post-truth” time is here — and we can’t blame it all on AI: it’s from an inability to record keep, neither in the macro (Alicia Keys at the Super Bowl!) or the micro (Altering an image!). I deleted my Facebook and Instagram account — and so did my personal history of over a decade! That’s a trivial me thing but the deletion of Flash and similar technologies is that an entire era of life and work goes away too. Those pictures you took of your now-deceased friend on your old phone? Those photos are all gone. Think of the kids, who will see something like Olivia Rodrigo’s Delia’s inspired concert items and believe that this is the first time something like this “has been done.” Do references even matter anymore, if there’s no paper trail to bring us back to them? There was a time when we carried cameras around to keep memories, which isn’t why young people are carrying around physical cameras now — but this reveals just how far in the technology game we’ve gone, only to realize we optimized too much. We’re now deleting life instead of simply improving life.

As we said in the beginning of February: big tech has busted. This is just another side-effect. We live in a state of cultural veneers, where everything is “perfect” but not-real at the same time. We take this for truth despite knowing better, or until we forget the truth at all. That doesn’t feel so good, but that’s the world today. There will be a day when we have memories of having memories.

Glasgow's Sad Oompa Loompa
"The Julie Ragbeer discourse"
Where's Kate Middleton?
This was a week when it came to memes. These stories capture them, but don’t account for, other popping items like the crying Taylor fan, the 97 year old dinner, PUSSY IN BIO, and the mix there of. I almost had an essay about this but we witnessed a rare, digital cultural souping where all these phenomenas collide. The echoes will exist for years, as this Björk/Lorde/Charli joke reveals.

"#LinenMoves"
Please don’t buy the hype: GAP made an ad with some TikTokers that literally rips off and recreates that viral Jungle video. It’s so lazy, but people in the comments are like “MARKETING TEAM ATE!!” Like? How deranged is that? Everyone needs to get a life: this is a commercial. It’s not art! Talk about dissolving truth!!

BTS Fans Demand HYBE Fire Scooter Braun
“BTS stans renting trucks”
Like the Aaron Bushnell item, this captures a change in the public’s relationship to the Israel/Palestine conflict. See also: Selma Blair getting dropped by her reps due to Islamaphobia.

Craft carrying Koons sculptures loses power
Jeff Koons sent sculptures to space only for the device to fall over and die: absolutely crying. Who’s surprised though? It’s a SpaceX craft.

Surrealism Is 100. The World’s Still Surreal.
Surrealism has turned 100, which is interesting because the weird world that yielded it is still weird. Cue the memes-as-dada conversation!

Iris Apfel Dies at 102
RIP TO A LEGEND WHO WAS OLDER THAN SURREALISM!!!

Taylor, Beyoncé Drove “Literally All” AMC Revenue
As annoying as both of these films were, I do think this is the future of media, as we discussed last week. Say what you will about deranged Swifties in the front row but they’re getting at a locally activated group experience!!

Jodie Turner-Smith Talks About Divorce
More people need to talk about how admitting failures — Especially in relationships, between lovers, friends, and family! — is actually a very important thing to do.

Mom loses $800K disability case
From photos of her throwing a tree. This story went very viral this week for good reason.

No, you don’t need to be drinking raw milk
“millions of babies used to die”
What’s up with raw milk right now? It’s not good for you, morons.

Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World
I just read this and, as everyone said last year, it’s a must-read, incredible, no notes, brilliant capturing of technology, health, politics, and so much more. Which is all to say: she talks about shit like the above, which turns people into anti-vax “Just asking questions!” morons in the name of “health.”

Have you heard about the Target scam? People on TikTok (Women! Femmes!) are sharing how people are coming up to them, chatting them up and befriending them, only to get lured into a multi-level marketing scheme. It happened to this woman twice and to this woman twice, while a similar version (Not at Target!) happened with this woman after her son died.

Scams happen and are always based on the vulnerable but I want to highlight what’s particularly pernicious about this: the “contract” of the scam is based in friendship and freedom from work, two things that are very much on the American mind. In all of the aforementioned situations, a person is targeted (lol) because they “seem friendly” and are looking for friends. They are then lured into a conversation where the person explains how they do little work, thanks to their mentor. This is when people smell the fish and, after some time, realize that this is not legit. Couched in “financial freedom,” this is the Amway scam which is very well documented, very high-functioning, that pops up literally every decade, and is tied to Betsy DeVos.

While scamming is the gesture of our times — Elizabeth Holmes, Donald Trump, the wash-your-groceries fad, Fyre Festival, this week’s Willy Wonka fiasco, Joanne The Scammer — this specific scam is colliding with this week’s viral new-old story of the plague of Americans no longer hanging out, which is interesting when we consider loneliness an expression of political, corporate, and economic fatigue. What this new “scam” does is promise freedom from all of our modern maladies, while ostensibly sweeping up the now largest religious group: people without a religious affiliation, who lack community and connection.

I’d like to pair this with something else happening: media about realizations, or stories about discovering that you are locked in a cage and have to get out. I recently watched Severance and had this thought, as this show about work-life imbalances but also about the meaning of one’s life and relationships. Barbie was a similar thing, with the song “What was I made for?” summing up this philosophical dilemma so succinctly. Jury Duty, The Good Place, Parasite, The Rehearsal: we are steeped in media about going through the motions, about being suck in something, about realizing slowly or quickly, happily or sadly, that everything is a fucking joke. The scam is the simulation! Everything, fact and fiction, somehow has become The Truman Show — even things that are wrapped up and delivered to you as the promise of friendship.

But this isn’t new, is it? Ponzi schemes are now timeless, as is longing for friendship. In my own short-long life, I almost fell prey to something similar: when I first moved to Los Angeles after college in the late aughts, I was starved for a role model, for friends to guide me, and turned to the internet for help. I posted an ad on Craigslist looking for a mentor. I heard back from one person, who was very kind and seemed to be like myself but a few steps ahead. We met for the (now closed) WeHo Starbucks. He gave me advice, before trying to inspire me to reach financial freedom — and he could help, he could coach me. I immediately felt like I had been robbed, or like I was naked, even if I didn’t realize then what had happened other than being so foolish to think I could find a lifelong friend by simply asking the internet for one.

And here we are, the snake looping it’s tail around. You don’t even need to advertise you’re lonely now to be targeted apparently. But doesn’t it feel good, to be desired in this way, to be sought out as you shop for little treats, while escaping your shit-life at Target? We’re all locked up, waiting to be released. It’s so easy to be lured by the promise of a key.

Some words and phrases that are ~popping~ that you may need to know about, in case you don’t know about them. Many are not new-new but are peaking and get at something we’ve discussed months ago: words and phrases are badges of internet cool. Get on our level!!

• "hit the pentagon": I was delighted to see this this week in

  💌shit you should care about💌
  because it’s a hilarious 9/11 reference to now mean “did it again.”

• “gnawing” / “bars of my enclosure”: Horny on main, as if a caged animal who needs to be free. This came from Brittany Broski via that one Appalchian creator. See also: “foaming.”

• “open the schools!!!”: This just means someone did something dumb but is a reference to Covid school restrictions.

• “well yes / well no / sorta kinda”: The least new, these are used exactly as they are used and reference a now iconic Tokyo Tony interview.

• “tea”: Serving, typically body.

• “sprinkle sprinkle”: This is something people will leave in comments but gets at a specific type of you-help-me transactional relationship. Some are seeing it as a new form of feminism!

• “little treat”: This is just a snack, one that scares away how shitty life is. See also “sweet treat.”

• “mewing”: This is a facial fitness exercise that is going off with kids, largely to represent alpha male / Chad behavior and being “above it.” There’s a gesture involved and more to this, which this article can explain.

• “bookie”: Variation of pookie, sometimes used less lovingly.

• “oh that’s not”: Means exactly what it means or surprise/double-take, as drawn from this cringe Kelly Osbourne The View clip.

"if Roger doesn’t win"
“MEET THE QUEENS”
I will not keep this a secret anymore: my obsession for the past few weeks are AI cartoon character Drag Race competitions. I leave comments and vote and everything….take me TO JAIL. I am wrong, but I am free.

”we saw the video”
Rihanna performed at a richie rich wedding in India. This is the best take. Talk about Savage by Fenty!!!

"we’re late"
"oh my god"
While you were at the Willy Wonka experience, I was at the Autism Reality Experience.

“lessons to be taught”
New unhinged Kamala Harris video just dropped!! She’s just like me.

“nothing could’ve prepared me to hit translate”
This translation is how I felt about those Paul Mescal photos.

“marathon at Costco”
I love the marathon-at-Costco woman.

“favorite film ever made”
This what-I-did-in-a-weekend video from 2022 is a must-watch.

“Björk and Vivienne Westwood”
I guarantee you won’t guess where this post is going.

"2036 Democratic and Republican nominees"
It wouldn’t be funny if it weren’t true!

“Babies trapped in my knees”
Zendaya has babies trapped in her knees.

"amazed at what Ai has given us"
Thank you, Google, for making fart house a real genre.

“Facebook is wild“
Let more kids play video games, you know?

“I reassembled him”
Oh! I didn’t realize these cigarette packages were collectibles.

“hop on one leg”
This is deeply unsettling.

“NEEEEED THIS”
Babe, wake up? Your alarm clock killed you.

And, finally, a proper reply to each of these dispatches.

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