Has QAnon been vindicated?
The online movement has, obliquely, been the best guide to events over the past decade
Internet
Tuesday
Sunday
The perils of Catholic social media evangelism
One of the new crop of self-made and self-credentialed online evangelists has flamed out in spectacular fashion
Tuesday
What folklore can teach us about our online lives
Like fairyland and the astral plane, the online world is navigable only if you learn its rules
Tuesday
Nihilism is destroying young minds
Before the internet, killing manifestos would have stayed in evidence lockers. Now they circulate endlessly online
Thursday
America’s ‘fringe’ has taken over the country
How did regular people become so radicalized?
The meme election
The Kamala Harris campaign clearly isn’t about policies or speeches; it’s about willing her presidency into existence
Inside the unlikely success of Patrick Bet-David
The YouTuber and entrepreneur has improbably emerged as one of the most prominent voices in right-wing media
Friday
Robin Westman and the unstoppable tide of ‘slop violence’
These shooters are radicalized, but in no particular direction. Their identities fragment. There is a deep fear of being forgotten
Wednesday
Essex-boy Elegy: J.D. Vance meets the Bosh man
Two netizen allies meet at last
Friday
A global MAGA crusade against web regulation?
We are often – wrongly – told that MAGA is simply a politics of expediency and national self-interest
Wednesday
The UK censorship files: Jim Jordan’s crusade against Britain
British officialdom’s zeal for online regulation is setting it on a collision course with a resurgent and energetic US free-speech lobby
Tuesday
The internet is dying and so are we
If we aren’t dead inside already, tech is doing its best
Thursday
Don’t mourn the death of TV
America is better for having largely abandoned television
Tuesday
Left-wing violence is being normalized
We’ve come to a series of startling conclusions about a change that’s happening in US society
Thursday
An insightful account of America’s decline
Matt Purple’s Decline from the Top: Snapshots from America’s Crisis and Glimmers of Hope is a veritable joy to read
Thursday
Russell Brand lauds magical amulet keeping him safe from WiFi
But does anyone sell an amulet that will keep the wearer safe from dodgy salesmen?
Monday
The peculiar appeal of ‘sad-girl literature’
Prose style matters less than access to toxic love, pain and suffering… and a light smattering of suicide and violent death
Wednesday
X and the return of the social-media sandbox
Until a competitor amasses the platform’s kind of clout, the wannabe censors will be stuck hearing opinions for which they once tried to get people banned
Thursday
Why is Generation Z so undersexed?
The answer could lie in the decline of mystique
The delight of reading the New York Times Cooking comments
With all their foibles, this community of commenters has become essential to my kitchen