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break every rule you can and try writing intoxicated sometimes-

Viviane Namaste observed that “the field of Anglo-American feminist theory has relied on transsexual women to ask theoretical questions since the 1990’s” (Namaste 12), with trans people often being not only excluded from participating in theory, but also actively discussed, used as a frame for asking epistemological questions. Namaste aims to not only critique this exclusion and way of theorizing, namely Judith Butler’s works, but also point out the political consequences of the rehashing of the “transgender question.”  Namaste critiques Butler as Gayatri Spivak does Deleuze, Foucault. Components of the system of Anglo-American feminist theory that Namaste describes bear a vague resemblance to the critique Spivak makes in her 1985 text Can The Subaltern Speak?, where she describes the subaltern’s position within contemporary theory just a generation prior. I see Can The Subaltern Speak? as a sort of predecessor, mayhaps even the progenitor of theory such as Namaste’s, and I see Namaste’s theory to be a sort of extension of the concept of subaltern studies. 

The subaltern in Spivak’s theory never adopts the dominant point of view or lexicon as reflective of its own identity, constantly remaining submissive to it while never totally submitting to its control. Subalterns are individuals who did not belong to the colonial elite in the context of India, such as lower rural gentry, poor landowners, rich peasants, and upper middle class peasants, and yet the subaltern is “irretrievably heterogenous.”(Spivak 26)

In Spivak, when the subaltern attempts to speak, their intended meaning is completely skewed because others are unwilling to listen to them. The idea of "voice" as a whole is formed by the "subject," and those who fall into the category of "the other" lack their own voice. Many assume that Spivak is positing that the disenfranchised are not capable of speaking for themselves, when in reality it's the privileged who are not capable of comprehending what the subaltern is saying. 

Spivak describes how Foucault and Deleuze have been equivocating in their arguments, contesting the idea that human beings are sovereign subjects with autonomous agency over their consciousness. In post-structuralist thought, human awareness is created discursively. The shifting discourses of power that continuously speak through us and put us in specific places and interactions are what shape our subjectivity. In this sense, we cannot say that we are our own authors. We don't create our identities; they are created for us. Therefore, the subject cannot be sovereign over the process of creating one's own identity. Instead, the subject is decentered since it constantly constructs its consciousness from viewpoints outside of itself. Therefore, the individual is an outcome of discourse rather than a clear depiction of the self. By giving people back a fully centered consciousness, Spivak contends that, shockingly for these figures, when Foucault and Deleuze discuss oppressed groups like the working classes, they revert to exactly the same naïve concept of "sovereign subjects." They believe that the work of intellectuals like themselves can act as a clear channel for the representation of the voices of the oppressed. The intellectual is portrayed as a dependable conduit for the words of the oppressed, a clear-speaking mouthpiece for the voiceless. 

Spivak emphasizes the importance of not falling for equivocation, pointing out the generalizations that philosophers like Foucault make when discussing the oppressed. Spivak explains her concerns by relating the "remotely managed, far-flung, and heterogeneous attempt to construct the colonial subject as Other"(Spivak 76) to Michel Foucault's concept of epistemic violence, where intellectual power creates the very subject it later controls through discursive action. 

This argument is in parallel to Namaste: trans people are central to the Anglo-Saxon feminist project similar to how the subaltern is central to the French post-structuralist project as well as social theory as a whole. In my reading of Undoing Theory, Namaste urges the reader to be wary of errors in equivocation, in regards to theory as well as statistics on violence towards trans people. She critiques Butler’s Undoing Gender in its attempt on “thinking about people who are often excluded from the very category of human” (Namaste 15), though its simplification on trans violence whilst using the issue as central to their whole theory. Namaste prefaces the meat of the text with a section on statistics regarding HIV rates and effects in trans women - which she points out as a different way of presenting theory on the matter - which in my personal reading of it, is more effective and confrontational to readers that are probably more accustomed to a mere skimming acknowledgement of harsh realities before being able to continue with their guilt-free intellectual inquiry. 

Namaste acknowledges that Butler does attempt to create knowledge useful to the victims of this violence, but also should “argue for the political function of a knowledge that makes visible such realities”(Namaste 16) - since as Mirha Soleil-Ross details, not every instance of violence towards trans people is gender-based necessarily, but that there are political and social systems that affect where trans people become situated within society, such as the the high rate of trans women turning to sex work for survival, or poverty and mental health statistics within trans populations. 

This dire argument for intersectionality is similar to Spivak’s statement on leftist intellectuals, describing how they romanticize the oppressed, essentialize the underprivileged and perpetuate the imperialist discourses they claim to be critical of. Spivak reminds us that a person's or group's identity is relational, a function of its location in a system of distinctions - to replace this leftist dream of an untouched or essential purity anchored in a particular group. The other always already exists in relation to the discourse that would label it as other; there is no such thing as a real or pure other. 

Namaste goes on to make her main point: that the Anglo-Saxon feminist theoretical canon has a gap where critique and acknowledgement of the role of labor should be, and that gender primacy makes a fallacy of feminist theory. She then argues that since Butler strives to examine the constitution of gender, ignoring labor is ignoring the ways in which the gender and physical embodiment of transsexual women is constituted and created through their work. They need work, money, to be able to go through the world as women. Butler’s statement about trans people of color experiencing violence in an inordinate amount also fails to acknowledge the ethnic makeup of geographic areas of violence, which can be used to either differentiate between race-based and gender-based violence or to acknowledge the contributing factors of both. Namaste argues that Butler’s simplification of violence against transgender people is not a useful model in undoing the perception of trans people as monolithic, mythical, and even less than human.  

According to Spivak, postcolonial studies are a fresh effort to liberate the other and provide that other the chance to experience and express those aspects of themselves that are distinct from what the dominant discourse has defined as their subjecthood. She questions the viability of such an endeavor. Can the "subaltern" speak—with or without the help of well-meaning intellectuals? Her frank response is no. Despite acknowledging the epistemic violence imposed out to Indian subalterns, Spivak argues that any effort made by the outside to improve their situation by allowing them collective speech will necessarily run into the following issues:

-A reliance on Western intellectuals to "speak for" the subaltern condition instead of letting subalterns speak for themselves.

-A hyper-generalized perception of cultural solidarity among a very heterogeneous group.

Spivak portrays Western capitalism and colonialism as having won. The economic, political, and cultural structures of the entire world have been modeled after Western discourses. The marginalization of the subaltern is reinforced rather than undermined by these discourses. Namaste takes a different approach to her own dilemma: she literally proposes a series of solutions as the first steps to undoing theory as we know it - and I think that’s something that could not have happened if Spivak and this new tradition of subaltern studies had never penetrated into the mainstream theoretical canon. 

Both Namaste and Spivak pick apart the epistemological issues in the post-structuralist works they are respectively critiquing. They both stress the importance of realizing the difference between actual empiricism (knowledge from personal experience) and experience in proximity to issues. Namaste describes how Butler’s work merely seems empirical, but has limitations and missing gaps, failing to acknowledge the force of labor, namely prostitution, in the regulation of trans lives.  She stresses the importance of a class conscious and class focused framework of trans theory, arguing that the regulation of public space is directly concerning “not only the repression and violence against transvestites and transsexuals, but also that directed against the homeless, street vendors, and street prostitutes.”(Namaste 23)

Spivak seeks to create a suitable representation of intellectual endeavor by turning to Freud. By showing us how the very identity of whiteness itself is established in part through the self-declared benevolence of colonial activity, Freud can be used to help advance our understanding of colonialism. He forewarns us subtly against constructing scapegoats or, alternatively, saviors. If white men are viewed as saviors and brown men are used as oppressors, the statement, "white men are saving brown women from brown men," serves to justify colonial interventions. A post-colonialist narrative might just as readily blame white males, which would inevitably result in brown men or brown women being presented as the heroes.

Spivak believes that Freud can help us to examine the dynamics of developing human connections without precluding narratives by assigning fixed roles (as both a positive and a negative example, because he himself did not always resist scapegoating). She continues to be wary of any attempts to correct and glorify the subaltern's unique voice by making assertions that they fill various roles such as victim, abjected other, scapegoat, rescuer, etc. The mobility of potential relationships and acts must always be kept in mind. Spivak's examination of Freud is presented "in recognition of these hazards" of reading and representing the other, not "as a solution."

Thank you :)

It's okay to feel crazy... release yourself, cure yourself from chronic don't-belong syndrome!

There's a particular facet of womanhood and girlhood that I find to be barely talked about, usually only briefly mentioned in feminist discourse - the competition between women, and beauty standards as a means to even be accepted by other women. I feel like "the competition" (as I will now be referring to it) takes up such a large space within women's lives, and I would argue even more so than the approval and acceptance of men, such a large space that we have barely known alternatives, or what the lack of the competition could look like.

Mainstream feminist discourse often centers around the general idea that "women do not do [xyz] to please men!" - often referring to makeup, cosmetic surgery, and other aesthetic rituals. In reality, in many instances, it genuinely is partially for men, but I will argue that it is mostly for the approval of other women. Women want other women to be jealous of them. Women are in a constant competition to be the most desirable, the most fuckable, and on top of it all, we are in a competition to see who can pretend as though we are not even aware of the mere existence of the competition, who can convince other women that they are the most -effortlessly- desirable and fuckable. Because if you fit a certain beauty standard that traditionally fits what is called the "male gaze", then you also fit in with other women that are in the same place in "the competition" as you.

Mainstream feminist discourse too often focuses on what we, feminists, can do about men, when we, women, are just as wounded by our patriarchal matrix and heteronormative delusions. It is rarely discussed that women will go through lengths of extreme aesthetic alterations (nose jobs, BBLs, lip injections, and whatever else is popular right now) not only to fit the male gaze and feel that euphoric rush of male approval, but also to be accepted by groups of women, to fit into the "pretty" group, for other women to perceive you as competitor. Because ironically, it happens quite often where the more you are seen as competition, the more the competition want to be friends with you. Society loves a group of pretty women. Think of the Kardashians, the Real Housewives, the appeal of sorority culture, and think about how reality shows about groups of pretty women are often solely based around the competition between each other. Because the truth is, we (as a whole) have been conditioned to find entertainment in a "catfight", we're all perverts, eyes and ears glued to the objectified gaggle of women claiming to be "best friends" as they jump through hoops to see who can be the most successful in fame, desirability, money, and often intellect as well. We secretly want them to fail; we have been trained to secretly want our own friends to fail as well.

In terms of desirability, I will speak on personal experience when I say that in adolescence into young adulthood, most girls do not actually want to have sex, especially not with the partners that they usually "choose" in adolescence (I use the term choose very loosely. I actually think young girls often get tricked into thinking they have full control in their choices). No, rather, they would like to be desirable, fuckable. Not only that, but they would especially like to tell their friends about how desirable they are via tales of sexual and romantic (mostly sexual) exploits with boys. Sexual gossip is a very important bonding factor in friendships between girls and young women, and I will argue that for some it is one of the largest reasons why many will partake in our current zeitgeist's soulless digitalized hookup culture.

In high school, I was fascinated and intrigued to hear about the sexual adventures of my girl friends, not only because I had none, but also because none of these stories were positive. They made me sick to my stomach. Stories of boys who refused protection, stories of boys who coerced girls into anal sex, stories of dry, painful penetration, stories of boys getting girls too drunk or stoned to consent. And the girls? Too often did they tell me these stories with a proud smile on their face, thinking that it was funny, not a big deal. I think when you're young you thirst for experience whether it is good or bad. You want stories. You want to be interesting. You're definitely more interesting than your prudish and awkward friend (me). They liked it when I freaked out about these stories. They would reassure me that it wasn't a big deal, as if they were telling me that I will experience it one day, because they think every girl does, and that's just how it is. They liked feeling older, more mature and more experienced than me. They liked when I pried them about their sexual experiences in detail. I only pried because I wondered if they'd get to a point where they really heard themselves, and the words they were saying to me. I don't think anyone's really having any great sex in high school, and everyone was trying to convince everyone else that they were having great sex.

I feel for these girls. I feel for my sixteen year old self that secretly envied these girls. I acted shocked to them as they told me of these traumatic events with a smile on their faces, having read Germaine Greer and De Beauvoir, trying to explain to them why they deserve to be treated better, and how male validation is not worth it. They simply thought I was a silly virgin who did not understand. I secretly wished to have just not thought about these things. Back then I thought things would be so much easier, simpler, if I just let myself be treated that way. I would feel more loved. I would feel closer to my friends. I'd have some really "fun" stories to tell. I felt alienated from my friends because I couldn't relate. Back then I convinced people around me that I was not so lonely. That I didn't see a point in relationships, that I was too busy to bother with them (busy with what?? Algebra 1? Who was I fooling...). That I wasn't so interested in sex. I wanted to act like I was above sex and love (or what high schoolers thought love was). I even identified as asexual and later, gay, for some of this time because I felt so alienated from the adolescent rehearsal of heterosexual sex and love.

But that doesn't mean that I was above an interest in boys - especially platonically. I think I have noticed (as well as perpetrated) women and girls not only competing for sexual and romantic desirability in the eyes of men, but also platonic desirability (which in reality is often just hidden sexual desire because straight men and women often cannot fathom of pure platonic relationships between each other). An example of this is women having a complex, often encouraged by men, that they are "one of the boys". Women saying things like "I just get along better with guys", feeling a sort of competition to see who can have the most male friends. Women can be guilty of valuing men and male friendships over women, just as men can. Men often don't view women as -full people-, and maybe, just maybe, many women subconsciously feel this way too.

Don't get me wrong, I am definitely still trying to shake out of being entrapped within the competition. I think we all are, especially recently. But it's hard when one is surrounded solely by people who are perpetuating the competition further, when one is trapped. I get that. This post is definitely not to bash other women and girls for perpetuating the competition in any way. I was and probably always will be entrapped in the competition in one way or another. We women are all traumatized, brainwashed to romanticize that trauma, and brainwashed to compete in who has more of it, because -trauma makes you interesting-. I think it's getting better, I really do, but that might also be my experience from the people I choose to surround myself with and love. Sometimes I find myself talking with a girl who I would not normally talk to, and find myself back in high school again, prudish as she is beaming with tragedy.

I think when women live in more privileged societies in terms of gender equality (I mean as in, women who are not forced into marriages, are able to access education, etc.), internalized misogyny is just as important of an issue to address as the everyday misogynies of men. It is too often that men pit women against each other, especially explicitly, and women will agree and be complicit to it. It starts with recognizing the misogynies. It starts with analyzing why you -really hate that girl you have never talked to-. It starts with recognizing the difference in how you act around men versus around women.

Preface: I posted this as a gaggle of thoughts some months ago, which you can see if you scroll down just a little bit on my blog. These thoughts were decently unorganized and months later, after slow broiling and marinating these thoughts some more, I decided to turn it into a real conjecture of sorts.

Very special thanks + shoutout to my philosophy professor Daniel Rodriguez-Navas for his careful, thoughtful, constructive, and encouraging guidance throughout the development this paper.

Most young people are socially expected to have a form of social media now, and especially expected to have some form of personal information be public. Many find it strange if one does not post photos of themselves online. Most of us, generation Z, are expected and encouraged to contribute to this massive user-curated database, and in exchange, we are able to receive more attention than what was previously fathomable in the form of likes, shares, and comments. This attention is addictive, debilitating, heart-wrenching and hyper-fixated. It has never been possible in human history to access this many people at once, to be heard by this many people and hear this many people. The digital space has never been “natural” - though depending on particular definitions of “natural”, the transhumanist may argue that the digital space is the next step in evolution; an extension of the human realm. But we were not eased into this digital realm, we were thrown, many of us at a very young age, into this realm with a violent and perverted amount of freedom, enticed by information overload and the addiction of attention. The societal over-exposure to the current climate and habits of social media platforms has had not only a detrimental effect on users’ physical health and self esteem, but has also created an uncanny simulacrum of the ways in which we interact and present ourselves with/to others in real life. The incorporation of social media in our everyday lives has solely transformed the ways in which we love, hate, cry and laugh, prioritize - at others and especially ourselves. 

The new product of attention has become a pinnacle of desire; and we pay with sensation, with shock, with beauty and individuality. When these technological experiments first came out, our young, malleable, dissatisfied minds were the first to latch on. Our parents critiqued this, which made the project even more successful. But it is not a phase like our parents said it would be. They caved. All it took was a few years of normalization - advertising, attention, and they too, became hooked. A 2021 Pew research center study found that 91% of US adults aged 30-49 use online platforms, slightly decreasing in ages 50-64 with 83%, and 49% in adults aged 65 and up. We no longer even have an ancient antagonist to complain about “kids these days”. It has become all free and liberated, no shame in this addiction because the algorithms have improved, proved to be impenetrable in its strategy. 

What we now value is increasingly impacted by the digital sphere, riddled with advertisements for particularly desirable lifestyles. With a life revolving so much around the aspect of the digital realm, and with the digital realm being created on the foundation of capital pursuit, value is no longer personal. Life and culture are no longer personal. The personal is no longer personal. Lee Artz, author of “Global Entertainment Media: A Critical Introduction” describes how world culture no longer stems from local cultures, created by people. Instead, TNMCs (TransNational Media Corporations) create a culture based off of the pursuit of production and wealth, skillfully peppered with some features of local culture for the sake of relatability and familiarity, sold under the guise of “cultural diversity”. 

The transaction is subtle - we buy a fix of attention, a sense of connection in exchange for personal information, the more intimate the better. Post a photo of yourself - better if you are wearing less, better if you are doing something vulnerable, intimate, better with more controversy. A 2018 study by Bell, Cassarly and Dunbar examines the extent to which young women aged 18-24 posted self-images that were sexually suggestive and its correlation with the amount of “likes” and online engagement one would receive. The results concluded that this type of positive engagement on sexually suggestive photos encouraged young women to post more of them. As young people have been subject to this reward system for longer and whilst our young minds are still developing, we have a heightened sensitivity to this type of social reward. The oversharing of one’s sexuality and body essentially transfers ownership, or feeling of entitlement to the consumer, who possesses the power of encouraging it, or negatively engaging.

It’s not only sexualization that receives this engagement - the new phenomenon of oversharing personal information on the internet, especially now that less people are choosing to stay anonymous on the internet than ever before, has become essentially a new norm. Simply opening the Tik Tok app will present you with people in their homes, talking to the camera about intimate, vulnerable, and often embarrassing stories in full detail. The fascination with this seemingly raw and unfiltered form of content, or sexualized content, taps into a different type of perversion in the human psyche; this type of content, because it is in a way so humiliatingly honest, welcomes the most brutal responses. Though many love informational oversharing, with netizens commonly expressing that it makes them feel better about themselves, or relieved in its relatability, a 2022 study concluded that informational oversharing stems from anxiety and alienation from society, where people desperately try to find intimacy, attention, and relatability in their vulnerability.  “Better to shock than to bore” - or relevance over irrelevance, has become the subconscious logic. Relevance is emphasized more than ever now, where even “normal” people have a fixation on “staying relevant”, much like a celebrity would traditionally have. The “digital footprint” is no longer about reservation or preservation, it is about sensation and impact. That’s the new age of fame, and it is stupidly easy, stupidly addictive. 

I feel like this newfound addiction to attention and instant gratification has shifted our collective values. We value privacy much less, in favor of attention. Social media platforms have taught us that we can receive a great amount of attention, validation, and discourse just by trading one’s privacy, the value of which has been artificially decreased by TNMCs just as the value of fame/exposure has been artificially increased. 

The strategy of self advertisement is now learned by young adolescents before, or even instead, of the strategies of self preservation and self protection. No real cyber literacy is taught - it is simply learned through experience. Older generations and very young children do not have the years of developmental experience infiltrated by the digital space to garner an awareness of the real-life-to-digital dissonance. The two are not as easily separable to someone naive to the difference of impact they have. The digital space gives one, in a way, the illusion of ultimate privacy, almost like it encourages the exploitation of your deepest vulnerabilities. You can tell your innermost secrets out loud, alone, in the comfort of your own room, and be heard and seen by millions. Accounts of very young children or older people often go viral because their personas online are often either the most vulnerable pure reflection of their reality, or they are presenting themselves in a very obviously curated way, where they naively act like how they think people on the internet should act. These types of accounts are almost always loved by the public in an exploitative or patronizing way, where the humor lies in the fact that they do not act on social media in the way that shows a sense of “getting it”, part of this dreadful post-ironic, terminally blasé attitude that has plagued those with experience-based, shame-based digital literacy. I propose that this attitude is formed out of self protection, or a need to present oneself as somebody who is impenetrable in vulnerability.

The internet is where anything is said mostly without real life consequences - and this is another large aspect of why the digital space is addictive. One gets addicted to the honesty, which coaxes you into delving into and producing opinions that one would not think of producing in real life. Because of this honesty, people often purposefully think of things to critique and reasons to attack. But this is also a product of the oppressive real-life social norms of courtesy and the overbearing expectation of niceness. The digital realm is, in a way, a solace where we can reject that. But that freedom of communication is simply on the other extreme end of the spectrum of healthy communication. The pendulum never stops in the healthy middle. I often like to think of all my social media comments as if they were being said to me, in person, by the people behind these profiles. They usually have photos of themselves publicly posted. They say vile things because I am not real. To them, and funny enough, oftentimes to myself as well, I am just a monkey that is dancing on the circuit board inside their phones, in their pocket, accessible at any time and able to be deleted at any time. I am so beautifully insignificant, so temporary, and yet it inexplicably gives me a sense of a permanent presence - a stable one, that will not fade. I am not immune to the fetishization of fame.

Schlosser identifies self presentation versus self disclosure; self presentation being a goal-oriented, strategic, and curated presentation of the self, with self disclosure being sharing factual information to another about oneself, regardless of its impact on one’s social reputation. She finds that the internet gives affordance for self disclosure due to the option of anonymity, but also discourages disclosure through unfiltered and open audience feedback. Through personal observation, I believe that the issue is more complex, and calls for a more nuanced discussion than whether social platforms promote or discourage presentation or disclosure - because this discussion suggests that there is no blurred line between the curated self and the objective self. Even in a non-social media context, it is hard to differentiate between genuine and performative behavior, since it is so hard for a subject to differentiate and admit to it. With how engrossed most people are within their digital selves, I will argue that it is all presentative - and that even content that feels like disclosure is self presentation. Is there really no motive in disclosure, as Schlosser puts it? 

Maybe disclosure is innocence - a naieveté that is ironically revered and unironically feared. With the internet being an automatic concrete archive of one’s opinions and expression and a machine that almost always guarantees a consequence, there is a saying that has emerged in recent years: “be careful of what you say on the internet”. This is referring to the fear of getting “canceled” for saying something problematic, or to the possibility of publicly embarrassing oneself whether in action, speech or aesthetics. When people have an understanding of this ruthless internet system, everything one says and does on the internet is purposefully curated, with extra care in the desired effect of the content. Even when content is created for the purpose of self-degradation or self embarrassment for humor, it is still careful to not be too vulnerable, or too weird. 

Referring back to my earlier observation of how content from young children or older people who do not necessarily “get” the internet often go viral, I think that maybe this form of simple, naive, innocent and vulnerable content is the only true disclosure that exists on the internet - unintentional disclosure. Unintentional disclosure also can come forth in times where one may try to present a lie to consumers, and are proven false. I believe that this is why these videos and posts go viral - we all truly do love disclosure. We love honesty and vulnerability, proof of humanness and unintentional subjects of endearment. I do believe that my current generation is striving for real human connection, closeness, and earnest communication in this epidemic of loneliness, spearheaded by the cave-like illusion of comfort that technology brings. We’re just scared - I know I am - because who wouldn’t be, as involuntary test subjects for mystifying technologies? 

Altman and Taylor proposed the social penetration theory (SPT), where surface-level relationships can develop into much deeper ones, where the seal of intimacy gets penetrated, in a sense, through the sharing of personal information - self disclosure. The goal within self disclosure is social penetration, which is more present than ever in the context of social media, except social media does not give the affordance of other strategies to gain social penetration - such as a slow, gradual relationship, face-to-face contact, and mutual acknowledgement. Since content creators do not have these other affordances, I will argue that they feel the urge to go to extremes with a performance of self-disclosure, for the main goal of social penetration, creating parasocial relationships. 

The parasocial relationship is the driving force of the use of influencers in modern day advertisement. Simulating intimate, honest relationships is what the content creator strives for, because that is what creates the most engagement and makes for the best product endorsements, encouraged and funded by TNMCs. It is what the consumer also loves to consume, because without the added aspects of social penetration such as a slow, gradual relationship, face-to-face contact, and mutual acknowledgement, the consumer is able to have a fundamentally not whole but idealized version of the curator, where the curator’s personality can seem much more wholesome, specified, honest and relatable than the personality of anyone that the consumer could know in real life. 

The influencer blurs the line between “normal” person and celebrity. Celebrities used to be elusive creatures, where a sighting of them outside of a movie or magazine was considered fascinating - because celebrities used to be untouchable. They were Gods rarely among men and worshiped for their unapproachability. The influencer in the digital age has fundamentally transformed the concept of fame into one based not necessarily on traditional talent, but on social penetration, controversy, and very importantly, attractiveness. Even traditional celebrities are now, in recent years, joining social media platforms to engage with fans in a parasocial way - to show that celebrities are just like us! They eat food, shit it out, and have bad hair in the morning! We have all found out how profitable it is to be human - but not too human - that now, even the Gods have come down to earth to cash in. 

Even if consumers are aware of these dynamics in their media consumption, they will still often choose to engage positively in this system. 54% of young Americans would even become an influencer themselves if given the chance, because of how it is advertised and idealized. The parasocial relationship has created a simulation of what a person should be, due to the lack of affordances for actual human connection whilst simulating a version of human connection that is advertised as better than a real human connection - but I will argue that in reality, digital social penetration, or maybe even the illusion of it, fails to satisfy real social needs, but instead of this dilemma spurring people to seek out in-person connections, the instant and effortless gratification of a digital parasocial relationship makes users simply seek out a surplus of it.

My image, or at least the image I carefully project, has been seen by millions. Millions now have a specific perception of me - two-dimensional and dictated by an altered fraction of my legitimate self, locked in time. But what is the legitimate self? The digital age has created a larger gray area in the concept of “self” and “individual”, widening the hole that capitalism has created, where one is not only a product, but a walking advertisement. We now express and define the self through sousveillance, and often do not know ourselves without it. The self has come to be defined as the density and reaction of digital perception. Sometimes people no longer know who they are after their popularity leaves them. Late stage capitalism, bass-boosted by new technologies, has made individuals to be solely defined by reaction - because reaction is what creates transaction, what creates currency, whether it be a fix of mental gratification or actual money. I cannot think of anyone who would possibly like to admit it, but there is certainly a present attitude of “if you don’t exist online, do you even exist? Why wouldn’t you want to be online?” Why wouldn’t you want to partake in this addictive algorithm, endless scrolling, information overload, stimulation overload, and the promise of attention? You are weird if you don’t.

 With the value of personal information going up, and the value of privacy going down, with people believing that they are so insignificant that their information does not matter - I will refrain from using that as a main talking point. The promotion and investment into the advancement of social technologies almost feels like state-funded propaganda, but I also will not get into that talking point in fears of sounding like a crazed conspiracy theorist. The main issue is how it has shifted our entire social attitude, and has deeply affected the social dynamics of communities and circles in real life. Human connection is strained by image and obsession. It is strained from a disembodiment of the self and the environment. We now have to control our social lives online (transcending location and social boundary) as well as our social lives in real life. Because of how personal one’s social page seems, and how unintimidating and easy it is to contact anyone, there is no secrecy left. And some of the world’s greatest stories revolve around the beauty of secrecy.

This conjecture is not just to say that everybody should return to analog, and that the digital age has not had its glorious moments - but social media tries to convince you that the main purpose of your patronage to their platform is connection, fun, and inspiration, while the purpose is really all capital. And because we, the 21st century, have become test subjects for these new, cruel, untested technologies, there was truly no restriction or boundary on who was deemed able to access essentially this panopticon of positive/negative reinforcement, and content from every dark crevice of the world. This promotion of self exploitation has wedged its way into being a priority for many. Friends become friends and lovers become lovers based on aesthetics, image, and attraction. The curation of a profile is just as important as the curation of the real self. The curation of a profile becomes the self. The line between who one is online and in real life is becoming more and more blurred; people try to mold themselves to act in the way they are able to online. Online, one is free to lust and lie and hate and obsess and love. Online, one can be confident, sexy, loud, carefully vulnerable, relentlessly controversial, smart, beautiful, mysterious, careless, carefree, detached, ethereal and unreal. But maybe humans were not meant to be all of those things, all at once.

Men are emotionally challenged from a young age due to the construct of masculinity, which therefore they do not create platonic bonds as intimate and deep as women do with each other. Women touch each other. Women tell each other everything and look out for one another at all costs [yes - this can be debated but relationships between women souring almost always stem from male intervention/influence]. Women often make friends in dyads, become friends in dyads, and then bond in larger groups that require more personal investment whereas men often hang out in groups and do group activities that are often competitive and always impersonal. Women’s friendship style of a dyad creates a better equipped mindset for the socially expected monogamous romantic relationship. Men often blame this on “nature”, and even often view the sexes as constantly being in competition with one another. Tori DeAngelis’ “Are Men Emotional Mummies?” (2001, American Psychological Association) is really great research on men’s emotional development. I often feel, in my own experience, that the emotional gap that men and women is so far that it is very difficult to find male friends that I do not have to be less emotional for them to tolerate/feel comfortable. I really do feel like I can tell the women in my life about anything. The conversations I have with women deal with the senses, the intuition, consciousness and are often had with care and kindness. To put it simply, because men are emotionally stunted, they lack empathy as well - which I can feel might be a falling piano of a statement, but most men really do live life with a Randian mode of solipsism that they are not aware of. There’s a reason for the humorous stereotype of men trying psychedelics for the first time and “discovering” empathy, or that other people exist.

I often doubt that it will be possible for me to have a truly intimate and all-satisfactory relationship with any man - because I am not stupid. I’m Just kidding. Kind of.

[These statements can also apply to women, and I have definitely experienced it as well. I am truly under the belief that though both sexes may contribute to the strange game of heterosexuality, it is definitely built from patriarchal standards and benefits solely men, leaving women with false senses of benefit.]

Men see romantic relationships with women as entirely a game, in competition with other men. They also see women as conquests, and as objects of affection they must “trick and woo” into the transaction of heterosexuality. Many men do not have a single woman friend that they do not see as a possible romantic or sexual opportunity. Men’s chronic stoicism and inability to talk about the concept of emotion as a positive thing also stems from misogyny and the idea that the sexes are in competition - convincing them that men are superior and that women are inferior because they’re... not repressed. Can a man truly love a woman? Love is real, but is it muddled by misogyny, competition complex, repression and lack of empathy? How can you love someone that you were raised to feel superior to? How can you say you love someone with your whole chest, after stoicism is pushed down your throat for years?

And how can you love someone you do not see as a person?

I don’t think men really love women. The entire concept of being a man is to not be a woman. And they are taught to avoid it, avoid the feminine, detest it, because who, even girls, would ever want to become a woman? There is so much built-in shame revolving around the concept of being a woman. They are taught that the worst thing you can possibly be is a girl/woman. And then are expected to like women, and to love women. And they often do, but for the reason that men are taught that women are a status symbol. It all relates back to the self. “I love you because you benefit me”. Men want women to gain the approval of other men. Other men are the people that men actually respect, revere, admire, are inspired by. Men could not care less about a woman’s approval. There goes the Randian solipsism again.

I have seen men suck the souls out of women I love. Okay, a bit dramatic. But truly, when a woman enters a relationship with a man, she is his lover, companion, therapist, and in many cases, his mother. She is his all-encompassing on-demand devotee.

It is not that he finds her particularly a deeply interesting person, or a person at all that makes him fall in love, but it is how he benefits - it is that she was willing to revolve her whole life to this disguised servitude for whatever particular reasons [I might write a piece on observing women in relationships soon]. I wish more women thought about this. It would probably make us rethink a lot of the imaginary “competition” we are convinced we also have with one another.

On another observation, I feel as though men do not act genuinely around women. The “trick and woo” mentioned previously. Men curate a concept of self they feel would optimize their chances of getting closer to women. This is often the ruse of being more emotional. Though some of it is real, I will say that anybody can spot a bad actor. And there are plenty of men who I have seen pathetically fake emotions to evoke empathy in women, because women are trained from a young age to be caretakers. Men also highly sanitize themselves around women, and I’m not just talking about censoring pornographic talk, but they sanitize themselves to the point of, in a way, dumbing themselves down. Men can have basic conversations with women, but often save their real joyous or passionate or humorous conversations about their interests for their groups of male friends, because maybe they do not deem women to be worthy enough to share it with, or they do not think that women would “get it” [note: like how often men have a “hobby room”, “man cave”, or have “boys night”, etc].

I met Eli in fourth grade. I was scared to talk to other kids, especially if they were older than me, even by a year, so we didn't speak until halfway through high school. That's when we found out we grew up only a middle school field apart - the middle school we both went to. The exact moment that we clicked is blurry; but we ended up together almost every day, at the oddest hours, from when they shaved their head up until I moved away for college. We would always meet in the middle, on the bench, facing the field and under the street lights. Eli likes cigarettes and facial piercings. Horror films and Japanese city pop. I always thought that was textbook cool. Eli is depressed. They did not know what they were going to do in life for a lot of our friendship, but I was sure they would figure it out. Eli is probably the best person I know. I would spill my guts and truths in great detail and they always knew what to say. We worried about each other's health. We knew everything about each other and our friends we never met, and even these days we try our very best to keep that up. Now I see Eli maybe twice a year - I try to make it happen. After saving money from working construction, Eli finally moved away from across the field and into one of those big cities, much like I did. Not often are we both home, and we are not too good at texting. I am tempted to, but I do not mourn their company too much. All I can feel is proud. In an ideal world, I would still see Eli every day, be only a field's distance. Times are much fewer, but now life feels so much more cherished and real. I think they feel that way too. Eli still cries a lot but is working on it. Their hair is so long. High school is over and we cannot miss it. It was a miracle we both survived, and we know that very well. Eli hugs me a lot tighter now. Says I love you now. I think Eli loves Eli a little bit more now, too.

Judith Butler describes gender as something that one does, that one performs - so as a coping mechanism slowly gaining more mainstream popularity, many choose to take the label of an absence of gender. But this de-gendering is still performed, and it is performed within the heterosexual matrix, and many times in purposeful blatant rejection of it. There is no system of gender that operates outside of the current system of gender, so long as one lives amongst or in the influence or imagination of others. With late-stage capitalism and the urge to hyper-commodify every individual, soon after the concept of de-gendering popularized in the current generational zeitgeist, the absence of gender has curated a stereotype within itself that has proven to be very narrow and elitist and White. Humans naturally gravitate toward stereotypes in the sense of finding commonality, though stereotyping remains centered around White normality. So is de-gendering merely a coping mechanism, a coping label, a label to state your awareness of gender theory; perhaps a coping mechanism to escape sexism even if targeted? Sexism is still sexism if one is misgendered.

So while gender is considered a performance, in which I do agree, is there something innate in us that urges this performance? Butler also proposes that women have nary in common with one another aside from oppression - but women are also entirely shaped and connected by this oppression and inherent pain with a much heavier weight than Butler describes. Though I do not follow the Aristotelian ideology nor the modern ideology of essentialism, I believe that over time the human experience has created an inherent essence of woman, slowly ever-changing but constantly informed by history. Experiences of oppression not only changes a person during their lifetime, but also passes down as generational trauma through epigenetics. With the millennia of generational trauma passed down through our mothers and their mothers and our father’s mothers, we have formed what is defined as woman and womanhood today. As women, not only are we reacting to our environment which is inherently traumatizing, we are also reacting to the environment with the passed down instinct of our mothers, who have lived in more oppressive environments. Though a deliberating thought, what if due to epigenetics and generational trauma, womanhood has become an inherent substance itself? Because women are directly tied to oppression through both experience and genetics, is the current concept of commodified de-gendering avoiding the sad aspects of it as a coping mechanism?

[I will put a disclaimer here that I am not trying to invalidate anyone who identifies with gender non-conformity, I am trying to examine why this attempted movement to de-gender exists in this patriarchal binary framework. I am also trying to analyze the popularized notion that “gender isn’t real” whilst gender is framed and molded and even created by oppression.]