language

To share parts of ourselves as a way of undoing aloneness, as a method of connection, as a form of putting words to something someone else might not yet have the words for, feels like shining a flashlight on something that would otherwise stay hidden, or as Ocean Vuong said, building fire escapes for each other.

As we are fed more content, we are pushed deeper into algorithmic niches. In return, we are encouraged to engage with more extreme and polarizing identifiers because it is more labelable, more indexable by the machine — the creation of the “Island". On this island, the slang, in-jokes, and archetypes which emerge as a community develops in... See more