I was conscious of the dandruff salting my work shirt as I sat in front of Bardo on Broadway surrounded by some pretty hip people. The guy I’d been talking to (a potential source for a new story) turned out to be plugged in, and soon enough we were joined by several of his friends who happened to be walking by.
“This dude is printing 10,000 magazines!” my source announced, referencing yours truly and addressing a young musician who leaned against the brick of the cafe, tattooed and comfortable in rings. We shook hands, and I performed my awe shucks routine. Afterward, there was talk of their movement, sprinkled with mentions of Brooklyn.
“You could really move the needle with this thing. You could change the culture,” my source said. “This could be like Rolling Stone.”
I thanked him for the kind words, awe shucks, but honestly I didn’t think I’d be changing the culture anytime soon. The magazine wasn’t big enough for that sort of thing and even if it were, hell, Culture’s not your friend.
I took that line from Will Wood, who took it from Terence McKenna (born right here in Colorado). It’s one of those cryptic maxims, making it ironically perfect for hipster philosophers. What does it mean? Who cares! It sounds cool. Culture’s not your friend. Print it on a t-shirt and call it a day.
I won’t actually do that, of course. I’m not a walk-off cool kind of guy, and I never will be, despite the booster seat of ego my little magazine provides–which is indeed one of the hazards of cozying up to culture, this thing that is not your friend.
Culture, as a concept, is something we love, especially these days. Culture implies, necessitates even, social bonding, which seems to be in short supply as we attend more to our screens than our neighbors.
I ought to be generally pro-culture, as the publisher of a culture magazine. And I guess I am, when it comes to the work of illustrating and analyzing it. But there’s a pressure in the media business–especially the alternative media business–to be a cultural influencer, to push the culture in some favorable direction (and coincidentally, one that aligns with your personal values and politics as the owner of a media company).
This dynamic extends from barons like the Murdochs, the Hearsts, and now the Ellisons to your media upstarts: your Dave Portnoys, your Cenk Uygurs, your Ben Shapiros, etc. We could include the social media moguls here too, as every CEO of a major platform has come under fire for trying to manipulate algorithms to prioritize content in line with their own ideology.
What we have here–to reference another great maxim (from a fellow journalist, incidentally)–is a great power/great responsibility problem. If someone builds an influential platform, perhaps they feel it’s their duty to use that platform to push a narrative that favors their worldview (which they presume to be righteous). Or maybe the entire reason they own a media company in the first place is because they wish to push a set of values.
Regardless, wielding greater influence does not suddenly make someone less of a human idiot. People who run media companies are just as fallible as everyone else, even while their ability to disseminate opinion becomes the recipe for a god complex. This is what happens in Citizen Kane, of course. You give an idealist the power of mass media, and before long he’s bullying the public toward whatever petty shit happens to catch his fancy. But just because you think you hold sway over the culture doesn’t mean you can’t become its victim.
Our culture, our society, our economy, etc., are all products of a collective intelligence. Thousands of brilliant, conniving, ambitious people collaborating, competing, dialectically, subconsciously. If you have an average IQ, above-average IQ, or even if you’re a genius, you are navigating a labyrinth that has been iteratively constructed by a mass of intellect that dwarfs your comprehension. And that is what culture is, among other things. Even an industry titan, a mover and shaker like a Jeffrey Bezos, becomes a dustmite when viewed in the cosmic bin of culture.
A note on the whole genius thing real quick. If this labored prose of mine hasn’t already made it clear, I’m not one. But I have associated with them before. In fact, one of my closest friends for a while was a certified genius. And what I learned during our time together was very similar to what I learned at the gym, when I was wrestling.
That is, at a certain point, the skill/knowledge gap between you and another person can make one of you absolutely helpless. When I would wrestle, there were much larger, stronger guys that I could overpower. Actually, “overpower” doesn’t get it right. They were like babies. It was laughable if they didn’t know what they were doing. Same thing though for the guys who were vastly more skilled than me. You could tell they were just playing with you, that you had no chance in hell. And these people weren’t even athletic geniuses, which do, of course, exist. There are wrestling and jiujitsu savants out there, sharks in the water. Stay humble.
But just like there are wrestling geniuses, there are geniuses who specialize in politics, mathematics, war, technology, deception, or art, all that is human. And every day you draw breath you’re rolling with them on the mat. Not just one of them, but thousands upon thousands who are unconsciously conspiring to create this thing we call culture.
It’s not just that you have no chance at beating them, it’s that you don’t even know how they’re beating you. What seems like rebellion may actually be conformity. What seems like conformity may actually be rebellion. You really have no fucking clue. Sorry. But don’t worry. Individually, neither do they. Again, culture as an animal is the sum of all parts, an all-consuming blob that is beyond comprehension and control.
Am I saying it’s impossible to influence culture? No, of course not. Someone like a Jeffrey Bezos or a Jann Wenner from Rolling Stone, can certainly make an impact on culture. You can still grapple with the thing, exert some pressure, push & pull, struggle. But if you think you’ll be able to make it submit to you, you’re either going to become deluded or (best case scenario) humbled.
To be clear, I’m also not trying to make a fatalist case for activism or political engagement. I think it’s important to do our best and try (Because what else are you going to do? Maybe you’ll make a dent, after all!). What I am saying again is that if you fall for the trap of thinking that you can direct culture toward your own ends, as so often happens for people in charge of media organizations, big and small, it will destroy you. Culture’s not your friend. You should be suspicious of it at all times. There are plenty of historical examples of people who believed they could control the culture in a positive way, only to become villains. And there have also been people who gleefully participated in that culture, even as their way of life backchanneled the terrorizing, subjugating, or exterminating of others. Those uniforms are so cool! Hey, all the kids are getting kickass knives!
Lately, there’s been a lot of talk about elites trying to seem cool, especially ones who appear to be exerting significant pressure on the culture They’re sharing memes. They’re owning their opponents online. Trying to seem hip, as a performance, has reached a level I never thought possible. The Department of Homeland Security is putting up AI videos that use the Pokemon theme song while officers round up and deport people. The president published a post where he pilots a military jet (also AI) that bombards a bunch of American protesters with liquid shit. The dignity of governance has become passe. The whole world’s a high school. And yes, social media has been a big part of that development. Before Trump’s second term, Biden shared a meme of himself as “Dark Brandon” with glowing red eyes to troll his opponents. And Obama would also go out of his way to create hip viral moments, like when he “dropped the mic” at the Correspondents Dinner.
I remember presidents and public officials making attempts at humor before social media, but they were usually more restrained (and certainly didn’t pander as much to our youngest demographics). Today, the highest offices in the land are content firehoses that are also trying really hard to be cool. It’s a transaction that’s all too familiar on the internet–you swap your dignity and authenticity for some form of posturing that attracts attention. But, as any savvy teenager can tell you, trying to be cool is a losing game.
It’s no coincidence that the same people who have the arrogance to believe they can be masters of culture are also trying to be cool. Both ventures share the same futility and awkwardness. It’s one of the reasons “cringe” has become such a watchword.
As a publisher, I’ve been tempted to adopt a cooler aesthetic. You see a lot of magazine people–especially ones from Brooklyn–doing this. Everything is conspicuously slick and fashionable, or it’s going out of its way to be edgy, incendiary. But one thing that the majority of publishers and politicians have in common is that these people were not the cool kids in high school. They all want to build their little platforms though. Unfortunately, having a platform doesn’t change anything about who you are. That ought to be a different journey, and the culture can only pollute its attempt. You can do an interview with Kurt Cobain, you can distribute Kurt Cobain’s music, but you’ll never be Kurt Cobain. Know thyself. Culture’s not your friend. Come as you are, dork.
Image credit: Pixabay
Paul M. French is the founder and editor of Denverse Magazine.
