We all agree that identity politics need to die, yes? They've been infiltrated and exploited by the wealthy and the elites, they led to years of scamming, and they have created a standstill where nothing can be done because nothing can be totally equal. But a return to the bad old system where various identity groups have their needs belittled and ignored would also be a mistake. Could the answer be a politics of dignity? As the Catholic church pivots toward human dignity as the center of their priorities, can we as political actors learn something from this? And is the Catholic Church now the new counterculture?

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

Lately social media has been inundated with the loneliness influencer, the people (mostly women) who glamorize and romanticize a cozy little life alone: frozen pizzas, a glass of wine, and a sweet treat eaten in front of a TV, snug in yoga pants or luxury sweats, in your perfectly gray urban apartment. Is this helpful for those still stuck in our loneliness crisis, teaching them to turn solitude into meaningful me-time? Or is this going to drive everyone insane and lead to the dying out of humanity as a species? Why not both? Jessa and Nico look at the so-called loneliness crisis to see how it got so gendered, whether it's a crisis at all, and how this is how American infrastructure wants us, atomized and confusing people on our screens for our friends and enemies.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

The Pope's encyclical on the subject of AI inspired a flurry of headlines and quick takes, but then people got distracted. But did the Pope really say Death to All Clankers or was there something else going on there? Jessa and Nico look at this very interesting document, which continues the pivot away from individual sin and toward structural evil and asks if there might be something beautiful and dignified about the un-optimized, un-perfected, un-productive human life? What if there is a way to engage with the idea of the value of a life without focusing on metrics and profit? With the art world totally bought in to Silicon Valley and capitalism's worldview, with the Evangelicals dreams of apocalyptic disaster, and with universities functioning first and foremost as landlords and money managers, maybe the Catholic Church is the only institution offering a different perspective.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

With new books like "How to Be a Dissident," "Read This When Things Fall Apart," "How to Save Democracy," "Beyond Molotovs" and others flooding the shops, it's obvious that the anti-racist grift has morphed into an anti-authoritarian grift. Will the Yale professors really be able to save us? And what exactly do these books propose? Jessa and Nico sift through the new releases to figure out whether democracy will be saved one six-figure book deal at a time.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

While America's religious revival is being a bit overblown, the fact is that the long decline in church attendance and religious belief is over and a new era of stabilization may have begun. The media focuses on the extreme end of this -- the Christian nationalists, the surge in Orthodox conversion, etc -- but much of this is about the return of the casual, non-fanatical churchgoer. The person open to being bored in a pew once a week rather than the believer who makes their faith the entirety of their being. Jessa and Nico discuss going back to church, what drove them away in the first place, and why the pope is back to being a central figure in political and religious life.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

So we made a mistake. We thought, based on the reviews and interviews and podcasts and think pieces we saw, that the Devil Wears Prada sequel would be our topic for the week. Then we saw the film, and it was bad. Bad in that way that resists inquiry, lacking in substance to the point where you feel dumber trying to discourse about it. But we had no other things planned, so here's our episode about it anyway! Jessa and Nico discuss: why the fashion industry lacks sophistication, why media figures fell over themselves to praise and discuss this film that has nothing going for it, and why the media class will always run cover for the mega-rich -- even when pretending to satirize them.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

If we didn't have manfluencers and bro podcasts and a mass media owned and operated by billionaires, what would a supportive media environment for men even look like? What are the ideas, problems, and possibilities that men have that are being ignored by the professionals? Jessa and Nico discuss how men's media differs from women's, how magazines like Esquire and GQ in the 90s helped create the reactionary culture men live in now, and whether the suffragettes having social media would have tanked the whole feminist project before it even got started.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

Yes, we are doing Hasan Piker/Jia Tolentino microlooting discourse. Microlooting is one of those cursed words -- like latinx, like unhoused -- that accomplishes zero things, is politically alienating, and allows a group of millionaires to talk about "the rich" as some other group with zero self-awareness. If woke won't die, it's because our communist millionaires won't let it.

But a millionaire-led discourse is why these conversations about contemporary ethics always dead-ends in the question, What is the best way to spend money? Jessa and Nico discuss why our rich love anti-social behavior (they always have! they are bored!) and why, ultimately, their class solidarities will probably always be with the Epstein class.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

The New York Times recently cut ties with a freelancer after it was revealed he had used AI to assist in the writing of a book review. What is the source of the scandal -- that an underpaid worker uses technology to help him meet a deadline, or that your publication uses such a predictable structure in the work it puts out that AI can easily mimic the formula? The outrage that typically greets any use of AI comes out of a fear that maybe we don't need humans to write our book reviews, our movie scripts, our military propaganda at all. When filmmaker Steven Soderbergh announced he'd be using AI for a future project, there were immediate calls to boycott. But if anything, AI usage seems like a wake-up call to notice how we've created a gatekept, risk-averse cultural space. Jessa and Nico discuss artistic workslop and why everyone going into the trades isn't going to save us from AI.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com

The upcoming elections are littered with former reality TV stars who have pivoted to politics -- from Fboy Island, The Hills, Teen Mom, and more. We already have the archetype of the failed artist politician (from Hitler to Mamdani), so is the reality star politician just the latest iteration or something different? Jessa and Nico discuss our reality star president and the precedent he has created, and why when someone fails to get into art school or get their rap career off the ground, the next step is often public office.

Shownotes and references:

http://theculturewedeserve.substack.com