Arianna Issa

Trends that once travelled through underground networks over months now rise and vanish within days. And with it, the feed collapses the gap between creation and commodification; cool is no longer tied to scarcity or authenticity, only to visibility. And visibility itself becomes the currency.

How desperate I would be

if I couldn’t remember

the sun rising, if I couldn’t

remember trees, rivers; if I couldn’t

even remember, beloved,

your beloved name.

“Once upon a time people were born into communities and had to find their individuality. Today people are born individuals and have to find their communities.” — K-Hole, “Youth Mode,” (December 12, 2014)

you post so that your kids don’t have to.

we’re good friends, and we have sexual chemistry.

He explained it to me like this: “Once you have sex, then it’s over. Even as you have sex, the sex is over.”

The almighty algorithm trains us to scan for sameness. We scroll until we find people who mirror ourselves back to us, who react in the ways we would, who say the things we were just thinking.