#719: Anti-woke tech bros and Midwestern moms

Plus: the real reason young people don't read anymore

Hi, hello!, and happy weekend. You’re reading the Saturday edition of Links I Would Gchat You If We Were Friends: a lovingly curated collection of brand-new writing on internet culture and technology, culled from the hundreds of RSS feeds I read each week for this ~express~ purpose.

Last week, I recorded a podcast with Francis Zierer from Creator Spotlight (… NOT my strong suit, so thanks Francis; it’ll be out in a couple weeks), in which he asked me about the proliferation of “link recommendation” newsletters and what, if anything!, is special about Links. The answer here is pretty straightforward: I approach the compilation of these weekend emails like a whole-ass research project. I don’t just round-up things that tickle my personal fancy or that I come across in passing via algorithmic feed; instead, like a crazy person, I review every single headline published by hundreds of conventional and independent media outlets every single week. I then read some portion of those stories in their entirety, generally totaling between eight and 10 hours of work, and recommend the best ones in this newsletter.

If that work is at all valuable to you, please consider upgrading your subscription. And thank you, as always, to the beloved paid subscribers who have already made this work possible. <3

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If you read anything this weekend

“Allrecipes, America’s Most Unruly Cooking Web Site,” by Ruby Tandoh for The New Yorker. Lately I’ve been thinking a bit about this notion that function follows form on the social internet — we get rigid, preset templates in which to pour our ideas, so our ideas take the shape and tone of the template. I wrote about this a little bit on Wednesday, in the context of silly faux-bread recipes, which proliferate on platforms that prioritize engagement over … er, edibility.

But contrast that with a site like AllRecipes, which undoubtedly harbors plenty of garbage “breads” of its own — but also developed with these unsnobby, almost wiki-like conventions that encouraged home cooks to post ordinary, relatable recipes ( … and that allowed those recipes to become popular). The result, Tandoh writes, is “one of the greatest archives of American food culture the country has produced.” LOVE to see the Midwest moms getting their due.

“The Cultural Power of the Anti-Woke Tech Bro,” by Rebecca Jennings for Vox. This is a really smart, snappy synthesis of several overlapping subcultures that make me want to move to the Arctic and never interact with an unknown man again: extremely online libertarians, devout Joe Rogan fans, Cybertruck drivers, reactionary “free thinkers,” carnivorous, supplement-swilling gym rats. These “anti-woke tech bros,” broadly construed, are a rising force in culture and politics, which is — unfortunate? terrifying?! — since they’re motivated largely by insecurity and status. (Stay tuned for more on this general theme in Wednesday’s edition. Faux-bread one week, tech machismo the next … Links contains multitudes, my friends!!)

“The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books,” by Rose Horowitch for The Atlantic. Possibly I’d dismiss this as pointy-headed hand-wringing if I weren’t currently teaching a college journalism class … but the most consistent advice I got before I started was to steer clear of lengthy reading assignments. “They don’t like to read,” I was often told. (Then how do they want to be journalists?!) Or: “You can assign short articles, but they don’t have the attention span for longer narratives.” You want to blame social media here — and indeed, many authors have! — but the aversion to longform reading, fascinatingly, may relate far more to changes in K-12 education.

“The Perfect Girlfriend,” by Michal Lev-Ram for Esquire. A June report from the tech-focused investment firm Ark Invest predicted that the market for “AI companions” could reach $150 billion by decade’s end. That’s a big number — a stupid-big number! A number suggestive of hype and bullshit. But it’s also indicative of the truly fascinating number of people who are already using AI girlfriend/boyfriend apps, sometimes in addition to real-world relationships and sometimes as a replacement.

“Digital Divinity,” by Cengiz Yar et al for Rest of World. There are *so many* wonderful, weird little gems in this wide-ranging package: A Taiwanese temple whose website offers “virtual oracle consultation services.” A Turkish app that helps Muslims track prayers, like a Fitbit for devotion. An Argentinean nun whose TikTok followers watch her preach, pray and … perform dance challenges. I could go on, but I won’t!! You’ll just have to click through yourselves.

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In case you missed it

The most-clicked link from our last edition was this Cut deep dive on Ruby Franke, the abusive mommy vlogger.

#718: Punk libraries and American dreams

On Wednesday, I went down the rabbit hole of faux-bread creators, a project that left me both hungry and mildly exasperated.

Breaking bread

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Postscripts

App overload. Winter arcs. The fall vibes have shifted. How Age of Empires, now 25, inspired historians. Dogs really DO look like their owners. Moo Deng DOES have really dewy skin. A chart of the most common -y adjectives in the NYT Cooking section.

In praise of silent walking and TikTok grandmas. In defense of fridgescaping and Gen Z men. Carmakers are killing off CDs and AM radio. Many “good” password rules are actually bad. Do I need to write a defense of IG dumps???! “Do you want to automate one of the few ways that we’re still interacting with each other?” I just learned of this thing called “the cobra effect,” and now I see it everywhere. True crime TikTok is out of control. “The experience of watching people on the internet is simultaneously horrifying, transcendent, and boring.” (Also, sometimes, fun!) These devastating stories on teen suicide have something beside social media in common: In almost every instance, the child also had easy, in-home access to a gun.

BELOW the paywall you’ll also find:

• Unlocked links from the The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Atlantic

• Further fall vibes, two semi-spicy media opinions, Nemo’s review of a faux muffin and some advice for quitting your day job (… on the one-year anniversary of my resignation!!)

That’s it for this week! Until the next one. Warmest virtual regards,

Caitlin