culture

mostly of the internet kind

A lot has been written about how the internet radicalizes people. But the same dynamics that turn a slightly lonely young man into a seething misogynist—recommendation algorithms; social contexts that concentrate and intensify discourse—are also the dynamics that turn a young person who “likes reading” into someone who spends a year reading Proust,... See more

Celine Nguyen • in praise of writing on the internet

What gives multinational corporations the right to pollute the air we breathe, drain our groundwater and exhaust our planet’s dwindling resources – and deprives us of the right to stop them? One powerful idea: private property. Because the rich own things, and the poor do not, it is legal for the rich to destroy Earth and illegal for the poor to st... See more

Sally Rooney • Sally Rooney: When are we going to have the courage to stop the climate crisis?

Here’s some extremely obvious advice for anyone living in San Francisco (or any city, really) that feels lonely: go outside, strike up conversations with strangers, and accept every invitation someone extends to you until you become BFFs and/or your social calendar is full for the next 3 months.

Celine Nguyen • In Defense of San Francisco

I ultimately think that the people who are histrionic about safety in San Francisco—they just hate cities! They hate the fact that they have to interact with other people, people who are visibly poorer than them and different from them, when they go out into the world. They hate the fact that homeless people exist and that they have to see them, in... See more

Celine Nguyen • In Defense of San Francisco

The internet-ification of our lives is not a response to the hostility of the built environment to communal life but a continuation and intensification of that hostility.

Celine Nguyen • In Defense of San Francisco

As a musician, listening to a song can teach you a lot, but it’s not the path to rigorous learning. Mastery comes through practice, discipline, and the often uninspiring grind of didactic instruction.

The same principle applies to gaining wisdom. Art and literature are secondary sources to wisdom, philosophy is the primary source.

Omar F. Najjarine • Why modern life feels meaningless

This is where I disagree. At least on the surface. If the implication is that you go and read the primary texts themselves, of philosophy, which is often considered “Great” philosophy, then you will be doomed. Great philosophy is not always good, helpful, useful. It is great as a result of stirring attention, thought, etc. I think most people do fine without studying philosophy itself. I do think, though, we need to think more, rather than prescribe philosophy as the sole source of wisdom. Wisdom is something learned and gained in action and reflection. Philosophy (as a field) can inspire that, but I do not think it is the only way.

Money and health are nothing more than the means by which we build a meaningful existence. Yet, in the grip of a neoliberal culture, these means have become ends. Money and health, instead of supporting a life of purpose, have become the ultimate purposes of life.

Omar F. Najjarine • Why modern life feels meaningless

Yes. I think my detachment from my health has been downstream of a lack of meaning in my life.

How many of us actually identify the public good with our own good? For most of us, the outside world exists for our income and our enjoyment. We have a using-based relationship with the world, not a caring one. Again, this is not entirely our fault.

Omar F. Najjarine • Why modern life feels meaningless

So the loss of autonomy, of self-reliance, is the primary driver of the meaning crisis. Work itself is not the problem, it’s 'wage' work: work we don’t care about, work we’re forced to do for the majority of our lives. Everything else follows from this. When we are alienated from our labor—when our best creative energies are spent on meaningless pr... See more

Omar F. Najjarine • Why modern life feels meaningless

Historically, work looked very different. In the 1700s, approximately 90% of Americans were self-employed or engaged in family-owned trades or agriculture. Even by the early to mid-1800s, around 80-85% were independent artisans or farmers, continuing the tradition of self-employment. This dynamic began to shift dramatically with industrialization, ... See more