Podcast appearances and mentions of katherine dee

Katherine Dee, the writer behind the "Default Blog" on Substack, joins us to explore the unexpected legacy of Art Bell and how his non-political, free-form radio style contrasts with today's charged conspiracy culture. Discover the intriguing intersections between Bell's approach and modern figures like Joe Rogan and Alex Jones, and how these dynamics have shaped contemporary internet culture. We reflect on the transition from Bell's open dialogue to a more politically saturated landscape, offering insights into how these shifts impact cultural narratives.Our conversation navigates the evolving world of internet fame, where politics and media collide, shaping a new breed of celebrity akin to fan communities. Katherine provides a fresh perspective on the younger right-wing culture, drawing parallels between political affiliations and fandoms that drive emotional engagement in today's discourse. We discuss the transformative role of social media platforms like X in molding public opinion, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, and how these platforms reveal the ever-changing American zeitgeist.From gender dynamics to parenting challenges, we tackle a wide array of social phenomena affecting our cultural landscape. We probe into the shifting perceptions of "wokeness," the complexities of dating culture, and the commodification of mental health. We also delve into the unique dynamics within religious communities, the contrasting experiences of different generations, and the unexpected resistance to traditional political spaces. Whether it's examining the aspirational aspects of therapy culture or the rise of unconventional cultural trends, this episode offers a comprehensive look at the ever-evolving interplay between politics, media, and society.Send us a text Musis by Bitterlake, Used with Permission, all rights to BitterlakeSupport the showCrew:Host: C. Derick VarnIntro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.Intro Video Design: Jason MylesArt Design: Corn and C. Derick VarnLinks and Social Media:twitter: @varnvlogblue sky: @varnvlog.bsky.socialYou can find the additional streams on YoutubeCurrent Patreon at the Sponsor Tier: Jordan Sheldon, Mark J. Matthews, Lindsay Kimbrough, RedWolf, DRV, Kenneth McKee, JY Chan, Matthew Monahan

The Shakespeare Book Club meets tonight to talk about A Midsummer Night's Dream. Zoom link here for paid subscribers. Paid subscribers can also join this chat thread and ask me (or other subscribers) whatever they want. Tell us what you are reading, what you disagreed with me about this month. Ask niche questions someone here might be able to answer. Ask me anything you like (I might not answer!) This is an experiment... let's see where it goes... Join the chat.Katherine Dee InterviewWhen we have strong feelings about literary characters, isn't that somewhat the same as ficto-romantics—people who fall in love with fictional people and create part of the identity around that relationship? This is the sort of question you can talk about with Katherine Dee. I am a long-time fan so I was delighted to be able to ask her about the way AI is changing writing, fandom in culture, role play writing, fan fiction, ficto-romance, internet culture, and the way technology is changing what we read, how AI is changing Katherine's writing, and how she uses ChatGPT to discuss her emotional life (she says it is pretty good!). Katherine is one of the most interesting Substackers, writing at default.blog, as well as writing for other publications. You might remember her piece called “No. Culture isn't stuck”. I find her case-studies especially interesting (this is the one we talked about in the interview). Katherine is not judgemental: she simply tires to understand. Here is her Twitter. Here's what Katherine told me about fandom in modern culture.Henry: Why is there so much fandom in modern culture? We've got LARPing, people having AI boyfriends and girlfriends, fictoromance. You're writing about all these things all the time. Why is this such a big part of culture?Katherine: That's a great question. I think that the foundational reason is our culture is oriented around consuming media. And this is, you know, like, the subculture of media consumption is always going to be a fandom. But also, like, other things have eroded, right? Like, you know, it almost feels cliche to bring up, but everything from, like, third places to organized religion, you know, to national identity, you know, all of these things, right? What remains in its status is fandom. And so, you know, the marriage of the erosion of these other sort of cultural cornerstones, plus the importance of consuming media and the way we communicate, it creates this perfect storm. And I've even argued that, like, fandom is, in a way, like, you know, the main way that we know how to organize at this point. It's the chief way we express ourselves. You know, politics tend to, like, devolve into fandom. But the question is, like, well, what else do we have, really?And here's part of our discussion about ficto-romance.Henry: Now, about ficto romance. I find this, like, really fascinating and I've been reading your case studies avidly. But I also am confused, like, people have always had strong feelings for characters in novels, right? So I read an essay, a 19th century essay about Pride and Prejudice recently. And I mean, this made me laugh. Some people don't like it. But the critic was like, these are the five most attractive heroines in 19th century English fiction and had, like, robust views about what made these fictional women attractive. What is different or what feels different about ficto romance today?Katherine: You know, I don't think it is that different is the thing. I think a lot of stuff maybe feels different because it's somehow like more lowbrow or we don't respect the expression as much. I also think the role of art has changed. Like, we don't see, you know, like I talk to a lot of I actually posted an interview today with a guy who identifies as fictoromantic and his fictive other, which is the term they use instead of like significant other, is from Homestuck, which is a web comic that was really popular on Tumblr and is still very popular on Tumblr. And I think, like, ordinary people don't consider that art. Right. And so, like, it's difficult. Like, you see someone who maybe has this, like, devotion to, you know, someone in a great novel or maybe to, like, you know, Aphrodite or Venus or something like that. And they're producing what we're already primed to think of as great art in service of this love. And because the media properties that many of these people are emotionally attached to feel lowbrow, we take it less seriously and we think they're crazy. But if you actually talk to them, they're not crazy at all. I mean, it's a spectrum of expression. But I've never spoken to someone who feels like they're in active psychosis or something. It feels very familiar. Like I brought up in this interview that I posted today, you know, the way this young man was talking about this Homestuck character. And this is going to sound, I mean, this is going to sound crazy, maybe, but it reminded me of Mirabai, who I don't know if I'm pronouncing her name correctly, but she is this Hindu poet who had this great devotion for Krishna. And it was it felt very similar to me. It's just that it's reskinned in this way that is there's some dissonance.There's a complete transcript of the interview below. Transcript (AI generated so there may be errors)[00:00:00] Henry Today, I'm talking with Katherine Dee, the internet culture writer and the author of the default friend, Substack. Katherine, welcome.[00:00:11] Katherine: Hey, thanks for having me.[00:00:15] Henry: So how is AI changing writing right now and how is it going to change it in the next, say, couple of years?[00:00:22] Katherine: In the next couple of years, I'm not sure. But right now, I've noticed a lot of people who write news are using AI. AI is interesting because it's like, you know, if you read a lot of fan fiction, for example, there's like a fan fiction register. And so if you then go and read like a mass market paperback, you know, a lot of these people start off in fan fiction, you can kind of tell like who's who, right, because there's certain phrases that are common, certain slang. And the same is similar with AI, right? And so I can, I've, I use AI so much as like a chat companion, that there's like certain phrases that I know, are very specific to AI. So I've picked up from like, talking to it and, you know, it being sort of like a friend of mine, for lack of a better word, that people who write news and write digests, use AI a lot. And I've also noticed that people do like, polish on their writing, like they will fix the grammar, or what have you, which I think is less, less scandalous. But I do think that there's also a backlash, right? There is this, people want to sound human. And it's, it's opening up like, more space somehow, right, somehow, more, even more space for like, messy confessional writing. And maybe just, you know, validating that our, our, our long love for it, is never, is never going away.[00:02:03] Henry: Yeah, just when you thought there couldn't be any more personal essays, right, here they come.[00:02:07] Katherine: There's even, Substack really like, created an explosion of them. I thought, I thought it was over, but it absolutely is not.[00:02:17] Henry: I was amazed the other day, because I've been writing like, I would say quite a balanced view of AI, but people take it to be highly positive. And someone who was writing against it, actually said in their piece, oh, that last sentence was written by AI, by the way. And I was like, it's insane to me that that would happen. If you're so against it, but also that people don't realize that if he hadn't mentioned that, you wouldn't have said, oh, that was an AI sentence.[00:02:46] Katherine: Well, you don't know that it, I do think, and I went, I can't quite figure out what, what is the tell for AI writing when there's certain words that I could list, but there is a register, right? So if you're using it a lot, like, I use, I use like deep research all the time to find like, contact information for people. If I have a problem in my life, it's like, I asked chat GPT first, right? So there's like words like, you know, people have pointed out that it uses an em dash a lot. It uses the word crucial a lot. The word realm, weirdly, I've noticed, right? So you kind of internalize it, right? But there's also a register that is very like, AI specific. And I think, all this to say, I think people can tell.[00:03:38] Henry: You said you're talking to it a lot, like every day. What are you talking to it about?[00:03:45] Katherine: Like, you know, if I get anxiety about something that feels silly, or like, if I get upset about something, sometimes, like, I can't, because I'm online so much, like, very susceptible to getting this sort of, like, internet tunnel vision, where I don't know if I'm like, if my reaction is really to scale, I try not to get into, like, fights on the timeline or anything. But it doesn't mean I don't have the reaction, right? So I'll ask AI, like, I had, you know, this back and forth with someone on Twitter, and I feel like, pretty upset about it, am I overreacting? And it's not always actually, like, a good tool for that. But even just the process of me, like slowing down to ask, has made me, I think, a little bit more rational.[00:04:35] Henry: Do you think you're better at seeing when something's written with AI, because you've got this background in fan fiction and online writing, so you're, like, in a way, very highly trained on different internet registers? Whereas to some of us, it's like, people are just doing internet speak, and we don't have that kind of discrimination between the types?[00:04:55] Katherine: No, I think that if you read a lot of anything, you sort of, you pick up, you become fluent in the tone. People who, you know, there's an academic register, right? Like people who are in STEM speak in a particular way and write in a particular way. And it's not necessarily that the topics that they're talking about, it's certain phrases. People who are the humanities, there's similar things. And I think we're not conscious of being able to detect these different tones or registers, but everyone is capable of doing this.[00:05:34] Henry: How many people, how many, like, prominent people or people who are known for their voice do you think are using AI without telling us?[00:05:43] Katherine: I can only think of one who I would bet money that they're doing it. They mostly send out, like, a news digest. So it might be, you know, I haven't noticed it in their, like, opinion pieces. But in, like, their news digests, definitely, right? There's all sorts of tells. But there's, I mean, there has to be more, right? Because there's so many people who have interesting ideas, but aren't necessarily articulate. And there's probably a lot of people who collaborate with AI, right? So it's, they will have the, you know, Chachapiti or Claude or whatever, structure their piece. And then they will go in and edit it and put it in their voice. Or even the reverse, like, they'll structure it, and then they'll have it be polished or fix the grammar or put it in the tone that they want, and then they'll do minor tweaks. I think that is probably super common. But, like, wholesale, yeah, I've only picked up on this one person.[00:06:48] Henry: How close are we to a time when writers are going to feel obliged to put a little disclaimer saying this is what I do and don't use AI for in my writing? Or will that not come?[00:06:59] Katherine: Some people already do that. I don't want to skip ahead to mention our conversation, but I know we're going to be talking a little bit about fan fiction. And on fan fiction sites, there is, like, an AI-generated tag. And then in some digital magazines, they'll be like, this piece was generated with AI or, you know, was edited with AI or something like that. But I think there's probably a lot of shame around it. And people don't want to feel like they're not a real writer. We don't really know where to place or how to conceive of these tools. And it's complicated, right? And you see these conversations playing out in fandom quite a bit. And you see just how complex it is. I don't think there are easy answers.[00:07:53] Henry: Why is there so much fandom in modern culture? We've got LARPing, people having AI boyfriends and girlfriends, fictoromance. You're writing about all these things all the time. Why is this such a big part of culture?[00:08:06] Katherine: That's a great question. I think that the foundational reason is our culture is oriented around consuming media. And this is, you know, like, the subculture of media consumption is always going to be a fandom. But also, like, other things have eroded, right? Like, you know, it almost feels cliche to bring up, but everything from, like, third places to organized religion, you know, to national identity, you know, all of these things, right? What remains in its status is fandom. And so, you know, the marriage of the erosion of these other sort of cultural cornerstones, plus the importance of consuming media and the way we communicate, it creates this perfect storm. And I've even argued that, like, fandom is, in a way, like, you know, the main way that we know how to organize at this point. It's the chief way we express ourselves. You know, politics tend to, like, devolve into fandom. But the question is, like, well, what else do we have, really?[00:09:22] Henry: Right. Fandom, but also anti-fandom, right? I think that's a big part of culture.[00:09:25] Speaker 3: It's like. Yeah, absolutely.[00:09:28] Henry: Now, about ficto romance. I find this, like, really fascinating and I've been reading your case studies avidly. But I also am confused, like, people have always had strong feelings for characters in novels, right? So I read an essay, a 19th century essay about Pride and Prejudice recently. And I mean, this made me laugh. Some people don't like it. But the critic was like, these are the five most attractive heroines in 19th century English fiction and had, like, robust views about what made these fictional women attractive. What is different or what feels different about ficto romance today?[00:10:14] Katherine: You know, I don't think it is that different is the thing. I think a lot of stuff maybe feels different because it's somehow like more lowbrow or we don't respect the expression as much. I also think the role of art has changed. Like, we don't see, you know, like I talk to a lot of I actually posted an interview today with a guy who identifies as fictoromantic and his fictive other, which is the term they use instead of like significant other, is from Homestuck, which is a web comic that was really popular on Tumblr and is still very popular on Tumblr. And I think, like, ordinary people don't consider that art. Right. And so, like, it's difficult. Like, you see someone who maybe has this, like, devotion to, you know, someone in a great novel or maybe to, like, you know, Aphrodite or Venus or something like that. And they're producing what we're already primed to think of as great art in service of this love. And because the media properties that many of these people are emotionally attached to feel lowbrow, we take it less seriously and we think they're crazy. But if you actually talk to them, they're not crazy at all. I mean, it's a spectrum of expression. But I've never spoken to someone who feels like they're in active psychosis or something. It feels very familiar. Like I brought up in this interview that I posted today, you know, the way this young man was talking about this Homestuck character. And this is going to sound, I mean, this is going to sound crazy, maybe, but it reminded me of Mirabai, who I don't know if I'm pronouncing her name correctly, but she is this Hindu poet who had this great devotion for Krishna. And it was it felt very similar to me. It's just that it's reskinned in this way that is there's some dissonance.[00:12:35] Henry: So you don't think, because I read that interview and I thought it was great. Do you don't think like the behavior that the person you interviewed, like it's actively living with this fictoromantic partner and there's lots of like daily behavior involved. Right. And it's part of the structure of this person's life. Whereas, you know, in the past, like Diana Wynne-Jones used to say that she got a lot of letters about Hal's moving castle from, I think, basically teenage girls who fell in love with Hal. But that would be like. Almost entirely in their imagination, maybe if they wouldn't structure their life around it, is there some kind of difference there?[00:13:18] Katherine: What is different is I feel like because everything's commercialized, there's maybe more of an opportunity to buy products associated with the character that they're attached to. But if you look at the way people, most people, not all of them are expressing these relationships, like I ask these people, what does your relationship look like? It looks like creating art. And, you know, in another time, maybe they wouldn't have become a famous artist or whatever. But like I think it would have been more socially acceptable somehow. The student we used was Puppet, which is sort of maybe a little silly. But Puppet, who's the young man I interviewed, when I asked him, what does your relationship with Ro Strider look like? He said that he writes, he draws, he fantasizes. There is also, you know, there was also like a commercial component, like buying the body pillow. And that's maybe a little different. But to me, it reminds me of just any sort of creative expression. It's just phrased in a slightly different way.[00:14:36] Henry: Right, right. And one thing I liked about that interview was that I don't do the creative activities that this person does, but I was like, well, I speak pretty intensely about fictional characters. It made me sort of I was sort of forced to think, like, how different am I from this guy? Like I'm I have very strong feelings about people in books.[00:14:59] Katherine: I think a lot of us do.[00:15:02] Henry: Or movies, right? For a lot of people, it's movie characters, right?[00:15:04] Katherine: Yeah. I mean, that's that's the beauty of like dramatic structure, right? Like it you it allows us to suspend our disbelief and we feel like we're within the world of the narrative. And if you really like it, you want to take that feeling with you after the show has ended or the book has ended.[00:15:23] Henry: So I guess you're saying that this what it looks very weird to a lot of people, but it's not really so different from the way people grieve about like when Matthew Perry died and people were just completely distraught. It's kind of a similar thing because they had this strong identification with his character.[00:15:42] Katherine: Yeah, I mean, it's more intense, but like there were probably people who felt a really strong connection to Matthew Perry or to any celebrity. And again, it applies also to fictional characters, of course.[00:16:03] Henry: So what are people getting from fan fiction that they're not getting from other sorts of art? Like why is fan fiction so big now?[00:16:13] Katherine: It's playing in the space of a media property and an established world that you already have an attachment to. You know, people bring up a lot like there's, you know, there's certain stories that are like retold over and over and over again. Right. There's certain characters that reappear throughout novels through centuries. Right. And it's a similar idea. Right. It's like you enjoy the world of the story and you want to make it your own. Fan fiction is incredibly diverse. Right. There's some fan fiction that is that moves away from the canon so much you almost wonder, like, why, you know, why aren't you just creating an original work? But there's something that lies in there. And I also think part of it is the types of media that people are consuming are they already have these fandoms set up. Right. So it's it's it's it almost invites that form of expression.[00:17:21] Henry: Do you mean like you read Harry Potter and then you realize that there's already a massive Harry Potter fan fiction ecosystem so you can… it is to us what a theme park was to the 80s or whatever.[00:17:35] Katherine: Yeah, there's there's already this there's already somewhere to go and to meet people.[00:17:41] Henry: I was researching it earlier because I like I know nothing about it. And obviously I was asking deep research. And as I was reading all the stuff it gave me, I was like, people are trying to create almost like folktales based on this, you know, whatever the the original sources in this collectivizing impulse, whereas you say like it diverges, it has these repetitive tropes that they almost want to turn it into these kind of fairy tales or a collection of stories like that. So it seemed it seemed quite interesting to me. Now, you personally, you wrote on your sub stack, you said my lineage isn't literature, it's text based online role playing. Yes. Tell me what that what is that?[00:18:28] Katherine: So I so I always wanted to be a writer, but I wanted to be a writer because I would role play and role play, role playing the way I did it is is like playing, you know, it's like imaginative play that children do, like with Barbies or, you know, even just themselves. But it's it's translated to text because it's it's mediated. And so I would do, you know, I would role play all the time. And it wasn't like I was a voracious reader. I never was. And I don't think I am now. And I think it's it's actually reflected in my writing, actually, but it was because I was like role playing all the time. And I think a lot of people are like this, right? Like I didn't even really write fan fiction. I preferred role playing, which is a little bit more dramatic than than just than just writing. But I but at the time I thought, oh, because I'm I am literally writing something down that I am a writer. But really, it's more like theater, if anything.[00:19:28] Henry: So tell me what's happening, like you would be logging on to some kind of forum and you would be writing as if you were a particular person or character in this in the scenario and other people would be responding.[00:19:43] Katherine: Yeah, it's it's like acting, but through text, so you could do when I started, you could either do it in a chat room, there is text based role playing games, which I didn't actually participate in, like mod some multi user dungeons. I didn't I didn't even know those existed at the time. And then there was forums where and so there would be a theme and the theme could either be from a fandom like Harry Potter, for example, or it could just be a setting. So like high school or the beach or, you know, like an apartment complex and you would design a character and then you would it was it sort of looked like a collaborative story. But really, it was like you were you were just you could only control your own character. So you would just write a description of like, you know, someone says the setting is the beach and then character one comes in and describes what character one is doing and then character two comes in. And, you know, sometimes you would be ignored. Sometimes people would start a fight with you. All sorts of things could happen. And I it's I spent most of my time doing this for like over a decade.[00:20:53] Henry: So are there certain areas where this doesn't does not happen? Like, is there Jane Austen role playing or is it is that not the sort of premise?[00:21:02] Katherine: No, there's role playing for everything. There's like historical role plays. There's, you know, any novel under the sun. You could probably find someone, you know, more like Jane Austen. There's like a there's a rich role playing tradition. People love Jane Austen novels. Something I would do very often is if I was learning about a particular historical period in school, I would get like I would have I would develop these sort of like parasocial attachments with certain historical figures or even settings very similar to the way people feel about fandom. And then I would go home and role play the historical setting and I would read a lot about, you know, whatever it was, ancient Rome or whatever. And it would help me in school because I would be like acting it out online.[00:21:49] Henry: Yeah. You're working on fan fiction and A.I. at the moment. And I'm interested in this because I have this feeling everyone's like A.I. is only going to produce slop. It's not going to do anything new. But I've seen people. I've saw an interesting essay on Substack about someone writing their own fan fiction with A.I. And I sort of I wonder if the confluence of these two things is going to start leading to lots of very new types of fiction and potentially even I don't I mean, this is like a long term speculation, but even some kind of new type of literature. Tell us what you're working on with that.[00:22:32] Katherine: So I was curious the way I was curious, like how people were using A.I. in fandom spaces. And right now it looks it looks like there's this prohibition against using A.I. like people do you do create A.I. generated fan fics, but there's something about like the process and the love that you put into writing your fan fiction that people are very precious about. And they feel that A.I. infringes on this. And part of it is they're very concerned about like, where is the data coming from? Right. Is it somehow unethical because of the data that these LLMs are trained on? But where you see a real difference is people who use A.I. to role play. And that's where it's it seems like people are more open to it. It the feeling the feelings and reactions are a bit more mixed, but there does seem to be like a debate in different fandom spaces. Like some people argue like A.I. is an accessibility issue, like some people aren't good at writing. Maybe English isn't their first language. And this opens up a lot of space for them. And they feel like they're they're collaborating with this tool. Other people say that it's it's unethical and that since they're taking away the process, it is it's harming the work.[00:24:04] Henry: If they could be convinced or, you know, to their own satisfaction that it's not unethical, the data, the data sets and everything like it would be fine. Would they still just not want to do it? It would be fine. Would they still just not want to do it? Because this is the wrong phrase, but like it ruins the game. It's not the point.[00:24:25] Katherine: I think for some people. Yeah, I think the the ethical dimension is is extremely significant for a lot of people. But but for some, it's like, you know, they're not doing it to produce work for its own sake. Right. To go back to the example I gave about the writer who I suspect is using AI to create these news digests, like that person has committed to producing these digests, you know, X number of times a month as part of their livelihood. And so you can sort of see like, well, them using AI is a little bit more sympathetic. But if it's something you're doing for free, for fun, as an expression of love, I can I can see where people are like, well, you're farming it out. But I also am very sympathetic to the other side of that, where it's like maybe, you know, your writing skills aren't as strong and it does open doors and they are your ideas. And it's helping you speak more clearly in a situation where you couldn't otherwise.[00:25:32] Henry: Is it because the way people do this online together, it's a form of communicating, like it's all very oblique and indirect, but it's really just a form of people socializing and they feel like if the AI is there, then they're not getting what they need from it in that sense.[00:25:49] Katherine: Um, it is a form of communication. But I also think there is really a value placed on the like the personal dimension of it. Like, um, like bad fan art, right? Like if you know someone, someone's really trying their best, they really are committed to a fandom. They really love it. But their drawing isn't great and they share it. Of course, there will be people who are mean and who shame them. And there's all sorts of weird, like, you know, labyrinthine dramas that occur in these spaces. But there will also be people who are like, this is beautiful because you tried, because it was coming from a real place of love. And that that that devotion is a very important piece of the puzzle. Again, there there are gatekeepers, there is shaming that occurs. And you know, there's a lot of people who feel like they're not good enough. Like you constantly see this in forums on Reddit, on Wattpad, on AO3, like on all these spaces, people who are like self deprecating, they feel like their work isn't good enough. But there's again, like this, this sense of like, I did it because I love the property. I love the character. Which I guess sort of ties back to the thing about ficto romance, where it's just this extreme expression of, you know, a pulse that's already moving through the space.[00:27:12] Henry: The piece I read on Substack, it wasn't written by the person writing the book. It was written by her roommate. And she was saying, you know, to begin with, like, oh my God, I thought this was dreadful. But actually, the more I saw what was going on, she was like, I can see my roommate has written like 20,000 words in a week. And she's working really hard at it. And she's, you know, prompting and reprompting. And she knows what she likes. She really knows what she's doing and what she wants and how to get it to change its output. And she kind of, she didn't come around to saying, oh, this is a good thing. But I think she mellowed on the idea. And she could see that there was a certain amount of, there's something new happening, right? Some new kind of fiction is coming out of it.[00:27:55] Katherine: I totally agree too, that like, prompting and reprompting is in itself a creative expression. And this is something I tried to argue about AI art, where there is like, you know, not everyone is going to be able to produce the same thing. Like the writing the prompt is in it of itself a skill. And also there's your own taste, which informs the prompt and informs what you include. Like, I'm very proud of the images that I've produced with Mid Journey. Not, you know, not the same way I would be if I had, you know, painted it myself. But like, I do feel like it's informed by my unique experience and taste. And this particular combination of things is unique to me. And that's a type of art, even if it's involves different things than, you know, again, if I were myself painting it. And I think that applies to fan fiction as well. What I have been worried about, I mean, this is a tangent, is like, what happens to the generation that is like, all they know is prompting and AI, and they don't have that space to develop their own taste and their own perception. Like, I think that like, if you start out too fresh, if you started too green, and you haven't had time to develop taste, and that's where I see these platforms being a little bit more dangerous.[00:29:23] Henry: But couldn't we say that about you in the role-playing forums? Like, when they develop taste through like, deep immersive experiences with the AI?[00:29:36] Katherine: Well, no, because with the role-playing, it has to come from myself and from other people, right? And there's nothing like limiting it, right? Like, it's purely through my eyes. Like, maybe there's an issue here where like, the actual writing product would have been better if I was, you know, if I read more, right? Or if I watched different films, but it's only filtered through myself and through other people. Whereas, you don't know how you're gonna get walled in with the AI, especially if you go in too fresh, and you don't know how to prompt it.[00:30:17] Henry: Weren't those people more likely to be, aren't they more likely to get bored?[00:30:24] Katherine: I don't know. I don't know if they're more likely to get bored. I think they might get stuck. I mean, the flip side is maybe they'll innovate more because they're coming from a completely different perspective.[00:30:37] Henry: Right, that's true. I had this interesting experience recently where I saw a whole load of young people that I'm related to. They range from like eight to 16 or something. And some of them just could, they could not not be holding their phone. And some of them, they're like, they don't like the phone. They're reading Jane Austen. So there's a diversity in that sense. But they were all just against AI. Like it's a bad thing. People use it to cheat, all the usual stuff. And I was fascinated. I was like, guys, you should all be using AI. Let me tell you what the good models are. So I wonder if we'll see this bigger diversity within that generation where some of them, a bit like in our generation, right? Some people were online a lot. Some people weren't. And some people are still.[00:31:24] Katherine: I've noticed that there's a very strong anti-tech sentiment among younger generation. And it seems like bifurcated. In the same way you described, people who are so online that they're just like these internet creatures, right? Like if the internet is a forest, like they're like natives of it. And then the other side of it is people who feel like it stole a lot from them. It took a lot from their childhoods. And they're moving away from it. And as a statement, they're either getting like dumb phones or they don't have social media. Or if they do have social media, it's like very sparse. And they tend to have like two very different outlooks. The ones who are more online seem to be more chaotic, a little more nihilistic. And the ones who are more offline, like they seem to be like looking for something more. Like they're more obviously searching for meaning.[00:32:24] Henry: Are we gonna see more like book reading among the offline people?[00:32:30] Katherine: I mean, I would hope so. Who knows, right? Like who knows how much of it is a performance and how much of it is really happening. But I mean, I would imagine so. It does seem also that like a lot of digital outlets feel like something is changing. And I've noticed a lot more like physical media seems to be coming back. I'm interested in seeing how this develops in fan spaces. Early in fandom, like in the... And I guess like early is like right when it was like really starting to grow. So not at the origins, but it's sort of this like... Fandom exponentially grew in the late 70s. And the way people communicated with each other and like a very important mode of expression was a physical fanzine. And this was because first there was no internet and then the internet was confined to certain populations and not everyone had it. And I wonder if fanzines will come back or like handwritten letters. Even I have a couple of books that are collections of letters that these sisters wrote to a particular fandom. And it was just like, it was just a huge part of that particular world. And I thought that was really interesting as a way to keep in touch with people and to keep the community together.[00:34:01] Henry: Yeah, that sounds like a fascinating book.[00:34:05] Katherine: Yeah, it's a collection of... It's called like elf magic letters or something. It's really interesting. And it's also interesting because it's like not something that you can easily read because it's so specific to the time and the place. Like it really was for the people it was for, right? It's not, it doesn't stand the test of time in the same way.[00:34:28] Henry: So is there not much sense of tradition in fandom? Like are people going back to read the fanzines and stuff?[00:34:37] Katherine: There is a sense of tradition for sure. Some of these fanzines are hard to find. It depends on which fandom you're in. Fans love whatever property it is they're fans of. So there's always archivists and people who are curating these things and making these things available. I just wonder if it'll become more popular to return to physical media. And it probably is in certain spaces. I'm just not personally aware of them. Okay.[00:35:09] Henry: Do you think, like, how do you think fan fiction is going to change significantly with AI? Beyond questions of like register and stuff that you were talking about before. Are we going to see, is this going to be like a significant step change in the evolution of the form? Or is it just going to be what people are saying? Like lots of slots in the form of slot content, nothing new as it were.[00:35:33] Katherine: I'm not sure. There's a lot of fan art that's generated with AI that I feel like at first people were really skeptical of. And now they really like it. And it's sort of proven itself. I mean, there's still people who are fiercely against it. But with writing, it's a little bit trickier. And again, the reactions are like very mixed, mostly negative. Again, where I think you will see the most change is with role-playing. You know, AI is always on. You can say whatever you like without feeling embarrassed. Something that I've noticed in reading transcripts of people who, like, on some of these sites where people role-play with bots, you could publish the role-play. You could publish the transcript. And there's just completely disinhibited. Like, they're just really just saying whatever, right? Not in a way that they're trolling or trying to break the bot. But it's like, you know, there's a certain etiquette when you role-play. And they're really just going for it. And I'll just be honest. This is particularly obvious with sexual role-plays, right? They'll just get straight to it. If the person is there to role-play sex, they'll just jump straight to the point. And you don't have to worry about that. You don't have to worry about being embarrassed. If it doesn't work out or, you know, you don't get the response you want, you start it over, you reprompt it, or you go to another bot. So I think it might take away from that social aspect. Not everybody likes role-playing with bots, but I think a lot of people do.[00:37:21] Henry: To me, this is like prime material for people to write novels about. But I don't see, I don't yet see a lot of people taking that up. Do you think, like, how likely is it, do you think, that some people from within this space will end up, in whatever way this looks like in the future, writing and publishing something like, you know, a straightforward literary, whatever the word is, novel, about this subculture and about these ways of existing? Do you think some people will, like, prompt themselves into being novelists, as it were?[00:38:00] Katherine: I mean, I definitely think that people will write about AI companions and chat bots. I think we're already seeing that to some degree. I think, you know, it seems that everyone is fascinated by emotional attachment to chat bots. And there's, like, just explosions of big pieces about this, because it's so new. And what's surprising to me is, like, there's very little judgment. You know, there's very few people who are like, this is dystopian, right? You see some of that, but most of it is like, well, it is real love, you know? That's been very surprising to me. Something that I could foresee is, and I think would be very ethically tricky and might cause some controversies, people trying to publish their role-playing transcripts. Which, you know, some fan fiction is, like, downstream of role-playing transcripts, and it'll be, like, a collaborative work, right? But it would be, like, very controversial if, you know, like, you and I had a Pride and Prejudice roleplay. And, you know, so we were sending emails back and forth or something, and then I collated all of that and published it as my own story, like, you know, with some edits or whatever. Like, that would be stealing your work. What I could see happening is someone having, like, a really good roleplay and wanting to save the transcript and then, you know, cleaning it up, maybe running it through AI, and the prompt is, you know, turn this into a story and, like, remove redundancies or, you know, whatever. And then it'd be, like, is that their work, right? Like, how much of that belongs to them?[00:39:38] Henry: But I can see something happening where it's, like, you know, in the 19th century, things that were supposed to be cheap and lowbrow, like crime stories and things like that, became a whole new genre of literature, right? And by the end of the 19th century, you've got detective fiction, science fiction, fantasy fiction. They're all flourishing. They've all had decades of really interesting work, and it becomes, like, maybe even the dominant form of fiction in the 20th century. Do you think there's scope for, like, you know, a weird novelist like Muriel Spark, a new one of her to come along and, like, turn this, whatever this is happening with these role plays and everything, turn that into some kind of new kind of fiction, whether it's created with the AI or not with the AI, like, you'll get both, right? Is this, like, everyone thinks the literary novel is exhausted, is this the way out? I don't know.[00:40:37] Katherine: I think that they, like, maybe, maybe, like, a new type of, like, pulp novel or something, you know, something that's, like, considered, like, something that's considered lowbrow, right, and maybe isn't always treated that way. But I'm curious, like, how, like, I'm imagining, you know, people printing, like, paper books or creating EPUBs, but do you mean, like, an interactive form of a novel, maybe, or, like, are you talking about people, like, I mean, what are you imagining, I guess, is my question? I think, so I think it could be, I think in terms of format, it could be all of those.[00:41:25] Henry: What I really want to see is how this interacts with audiobooks, because I think audiobooks have become, like, quietly very dominant in the reading habits of people who are typically reading, like, highbrow nonfiction, literary fiction, whatever. And I can sort of imagine a scenario where, I don't know how long this takes, but, like, a new kind of pulp fiction has been created, it's drawing on fandom, roleplay, AI, so we've got this new kind of sub-genre, and then that gets morphed, a bit like genre fiction in the 19th century, into something much more, quote-unquote, literary, and that could be, like, a boring, typical old book, or it could be some kind of audio thing where, like, you're interacting with it, and you're picking the route and whatever, or you could interact with it through your LLM. You see what I mean?There's all these different ways, right?[00:42:26] Katherine: So I think this stuff already exists. Oh, okay. Oh, so that, I think that maybe what I was confusing was, you know, like, imagining, like, a new style, or, you know?[00:42:37] Katherine: But all of these, so all of these things, so I don't know if they're books, I mean, that's actually a good question, like, is it a form of literature? Like, are these bots that people are roleplaying with, is that literature, right? Because there's set parameters, and when you create these characters, you can, you have a lot of control over designing them, what their world is, what the person talking to them will receive back, right? And there's audio versions of that. So it is, like, stepping into a pre-created world where there's, like, some kind of collaboration. And then on the other hand, there's been lots of novels that started off as fan fiction, and this is actually pretty common, a lot of these, you know, like, teen romances or whatever that get popular on TikTok, a lot of those come from people who had been writing fan fiction smut, right? And turned it into original work. And you can see the traces of whatever fandom they were operating in, in the work, whether it's, like, an allusion to a pre-existing character in another property, or it's just the style of writing, or, like, the way they express romantic intimacy. So both things exist in different forms. I wish I had asked a clarified question earlier, because I feel like we were talking in circles a little bit, so I wasn't quite sure what you were envisioning. But yeah, there's a lot of, I wondered also, like, how will reading change as these bots become more sophisticated? Right now, it's a lot of, like, it's a lot of, like, just, you know, like, teenagers messing around in their fandoms, or people doing erotic role-playing, right? But what is the literary version of that? And that's a very exciting question, and, like, interesting realm of inquiry.[00:44:38] Henry: It's a good, it's currently a very good, like, footnotes-on-demand service, right?[00:44:44] Katherine: Yeah.[00:44:45] Henry: Yeah, like, what the hell is this kind of carriage that they're talking about, or whatever? Do you think it'll, you think it's going to develop beyond that kind of thing?[00:44:53] Katherine: Um, yeah, I do. I mean, something really interesting, I don't know if you've heard about this, it's not literature, but the website Every, so they have, like, several different tech newsletters, and they have a service where they'll take all the research for a given article, and you can talk to an LLM about the stuff they didn't include in the piece. But, so, here's even another idea, like, let's say, you know, you take, like, Harry Potter or something, and then there's, like, a Harry Potter LLM, and you can ask questions about the book, or, like, you know, what's in the store that didn't, you know, that we didn't open, right? Metaphorically, you know, what's behind the scenes and all this stuff we don't see in the actual text? And ordinarily, that's where fandom steps in, and fans will fill in that white space for themselves with their headcanon, so the decisions they make about the whatever narrative universe they're choosing to step into. But maybe in AI, you know, the author can say, all right, these are all my notes, and this is all the, this is the whole world that I couldn't fit into the actual story.[00:46:07] Henry: How is AI changing the way you write?[00:46:12] Katherine: All right, so I correct my grammar a lot. My grammar is, like, atrocious, or at least it is in my own opinion. Maybe it's actually not, but so I'll check for grammatical errors, and then I use it all the time as, like, a search engine. So I love, like, the deep research function on chat GPT. It's, like, I never use Google anymore. So if I have, like, questions about something, or if I'm not sure that an argument makes sense, either I'll, like, run it by, you're like, all right, I'm arguing, you know, like, this, this, and this. Like, does this make sense in my own head, or does this actually make sense? So that's a common DF question to chat GPT.[00:47:05] Henry: But, like, are you thinking about, you know, are you going to be a different sort of writer? Are you going to write more or less of certain things? Are you thinking about how people will be reading less? You know, you're competing with the AIs, you've got to write for the AIs. Is it affecting you like that, or do you feel like what you do is reasonably immune?[00:47:26] Katherine: Um, no, you know, I don't feel like I'm competing with AI. I feel like I'm competing with other people, but I'm not competing with AI. And I'm not, I'm not writing for it. I, you know, I remember that, that Tyler Cowen quote, and I wasn't totally sure what he meant by that. I mean, like, I don't know. I'm definitely not writing, writing for it. I mean, does he mean, like, as the AI, like, learns about each person and learns that, you know, each, each writer is contributing to the conversation, you want to make sure it's easily parsable. So you could, you could be included in history or something as AI starts to write our history. Actually, I guess that's a good point, if that doesn't end up happening. But no, I don't, I don't consider either of those things.[00:48:17] Henry: Um, you wrote about, you wrote a short response to the Machine in the Garden essay that was famous on Substack a few months ago. You said, if you don't have copycats, then you're doing something wrong. Just make sure people don't forget you're the original article. How, how do you do that? How do you, how does that affect the way you organize your writing?[00:48:43] Katherine: Oh, man, I publish a lot. If I feel like something is my unique idea, I repeat it over and over and over again. Yeah, I mean, that's, I guess it also, I mean, a question I don't have the answer to is like, you know, people worry about being plagiarized from or copycats, but what happens, you know, what happens with AI, right? Like, how does AI change that equation? I don't know. But, you know, you just hope for the best, you know, that humanity, you know, just the fact of being human is enough.[00:49:26] Henry: Do you think that the internet and social media are making things worse in the culture generally, the way that people like Ted Gioia argue, or are you more optimistic?[00:49:39] Katherine: Um, I'm slightly more optimistic. I think Ted Gioia is as much too dismissive of technology to the extent that I feel like I've, I've almost like taken a contrarian position, you know, and I, I've been a little bit I've been a little bit more techno-optimist than I would have been normally, because I just like, can't all be bad, right? There's a lot of really good things about the internet and about social media. I think that we really undervalue the friendships people make. And then people will say, well, like, well, look at, you know, how so-and-so got screwed over, you know, whatever famous drama. It's like, those people will f**k you over in real life, you know, in the physical world, right? That's a human problem. That's not a technology problem. I think we also, I, particularly people like Ted Gioia and John Height and Freya India, I mean, and I like all these people. I'm not, you know, but I think they also are, like, I don't know where Ted Gioia lives, but John Height's in New York and Freya is in London, as far as I know. When they talk about going like phone-free or like using the internet less or screen-based childhoods, you know, I, like, I agree. Like, look, like, I don't want my son attached to a phone or something. But I also live in Chicago. There's like a ton of stuff going on. And every single day, no matter what the weather is, he can go, one, see other children and two, go do something really fun. And so can I, right? And that's because I live in Chicago. But if I lived in a small town in Texas, like I did, you know, 10 years ago, like I need the, I, like the internet was my lifeline. Then it's how I made friends. It's how I entertain myself. And it sucks that it was like that. But like, not everyone has the privilege of a rich culture in their immediate environment. You don't have, you know, like, it doesn't mean you have to be online 24 seven, but for social media is like very important for people in those situations. And it's, I think there's this weird binary in the discourse where it's like, you're either online all the time, you know, rotting your brain with just like, you know, nonstop live leak videos, right? Or you have no phone at all, right? But I think there's even like high volume usage that isn't, you know, what I just described, that it's beneficial for certain people in certain situations.[00:52:12] Henry: What is it that you like about Mirabi's poetry? You mentioned this earlier, but I wanted to ask you specifically.[00:52:18] Katherine: Yeah, so I discovered her in my senior year of college. And I didn't know what ecstatic love was. Like I had never, I was completely unfamiliar with that concept. So even on the conceptual level, I was like, so struck by this ability to feel love for a deity, feel love for something non-physical.[00:52:54] Henry: Do you admire other poets in that tradition like Rumi?[00:52:59] Katherine: I'm not as familiar with other poets in that tradition.[00:53:02] Henry: Okay. After fan fiction and AI, what will you do next?[00:53:08] Katherine: I'm working on a whole bunch of stuff. Another piece I'm working on is about techno-animism. So this idea of like, I don't believe that technology is literally insoled, but I think that it's maybe not a bad thing to treat it as if it was. And if we're going to be in such like a technologically rich environment, like maybe if we did see a little bit of life in it, it would be better for us psychologically, which is like kind of a hard thing to argue because I think it turns people off like immediately. And I think there's like a lot of fear around it, but it's a very sad and sterile world, right? If we think that we're around all this lifelessness. And I think that's why I'm so attracted to writing about ficto-sexuals and ficto-romance because I love this idea of being able to see life in something where other people don't see it.[00:54:15] Henry: Katherine Dee, thank you very much.[00:54:18] Katherine: Thank you for having me. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.commonreader.co.uk/subscribe

Buckle up for a wild ride through the digital apocalypse with Katherine Dee, where influencers are dying, AI's churning out slop, and Substack's the artisanal Etsy of writing in a world drowning in fluff. From the collapse of legacy media to TikTok as "digital fentanyl," she's got the scoop on how we're all losing our humanity to screens—yet craving real connection so bad we're anthropomorphizing our toasters. Touch grass or go transhuman? Hollywood's fleeing LA, kids are Wild Westing online, and nobody beats Gen X when it comes to phone brain rot. It's a postmodern nightmare where there's no such thing as "too soon" in the face of memeing tragedy—dive in, because this future's weirder than you think. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Walk-Ins Welcome with Bridget Phetasy - Podcast Bridget Phetasy admires grit and authenticity. On Walk-Ins Welcome, she talks about the beautiful failures and frightening successes of her own life and the lives of her guests. She doesn't conduct interviews—she has conversations. Conversations with real people about the real struggle and will remind you that we can laugh in pain and cry in joy but there's no greater mistake than hiding from it all. By embracing it all, and celebrating it with the stories she'll bring listeners, she believes that our lowest moments can be the building blocks for our eventual fulfillment. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- PHETASY IS a movement disguised as a company. We just want to make you laugh while the world burns. https://www.phetasy.com/ Buy PHETASY MERCH here: https://www.bridgetphetasy.com/ For more content, including the unedited version of Dumpster Fire, BTS content, writing, photos, livestreams and a kick-ass community, subscribe at https://phetasy.com/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/BridgetPhetasy Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bridgetphetasy/ Podcast - Walk-Ins Welcome with Bridget Phetasy https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/walk-ins-welcome/id1437447846 https://open.spotify.com/show/7jbRU0qOjbxZJf9d49AHEh https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/I3gqggwe23u6mnsdgqynu447wvaSupport the show

In this second episode of the Searching for the Self in an Age of Simulation series, Stephen G. Adubato, host of Cracks in Postmodernity, joins Abigail Favale, professor at the McGrath Institute for Church Life, and Katherine Dee, internet subculture chronicler, to discuss the body positivity movement.  What lies beneath the surface of the Body Positivity movement? How do societal standards shape our perceptions of beauty, and why are eating disorders so prevalent? Join Abigail Favale and Katherine Dee for an in-depth discussion on the origins and impact of eating disorders and the cultural forces that define beauty. Thanks to Interintellect for hosting our salon! https://interintellect.com/

In this second episode of the Searching for the Self in an Age of Simulation series, Stephen G. Adubato, host of Cracks in Postmodernity, joins Abigail Favale, professor at the McGrath Institute for Church Life, and Katherine Dee, internet subculture chronicler, to discuss the body positivity movement.  What lies beneath the surface of the Body Positivity movement? How do societal standards shape our perceptions of beauty, and why are eating disorders so prevalent? Join Abigail Favale and Katherine Dee for an in-depth discussion on the origins and impact of eating disorders and the cultural forces that define beauty. Thanks to Interintellect for hosting our salon! https://interintellect.com/

This week on Upstream, we're releasing an episode of Econ102. Erik Torenberg and Noah Smith talk with Katherine Dee (@default_friend) about dating in the 21st century, differences in dating markets, the impact of feminism, technology's influence on cultural creativity, societal shifts, and the state of online subcultures. —

In this fourth episode of the Searching for the Self in an Age of Simulation series, Stephen G. Adubato, host of Cracks in Postmodernity, joins Katherine Dee, internet subculture chronicler, Esmé Partridge, writer and consultant working at the intersection of religion, philosophy and politics, to discuss spirituality in the digital world. How are TikTok reels and social media content sparking a postmodern religious revival? What impact are these digital spiritual practices having on their followers? Join Katherine Dee and Esmé Partridge for a fascinating discussion on the rise of New Age spirituality in the digital age and its effects on modern souls. Thanks to Interintellect for hosting our salon! https://interintellect.com/

This week, Erik Torenberg and Noah Smith discuss modern dating dynamics, cultural shifts, and the impact of technology and social media on relationships with author and former dating advice columnist Katherine Dee, exploring generational differences contributing to the gender war and the broader societal implications. --

Writer, Columnist and Computer Room Podcast Host Katherine Dee joins me to discuss the future of online ecosystems, AI companions, and the future of online political spaces. Find Katherine Dee Her Blog: https://default.blog/ Twitter: https://x.com/default_friend Support the ChannelSubscribestar: https://www.subscribestar.com/the-prudentialist Twitter: https://x.com/MrPrudentialist Merch: https://mr-prudes-wares.creator-spring.com/ All other links: https://findmyfrens.net/theprudentialist/

For this episode, we were joined by the reigning Empress of Internet Anthropology, Katherine Dee!Pro-ana, or pro-anorexia, is a largely-online subculture based on the experience of anorexia nervosa. At times promoting this illness, at times offering a refuge for those struggling with eating disorders, the broader eating disorder subcultures offer us a way to explore our relationship with food, control, body image and more.Katherine DeeX: @default_friendSubstack: https://default.blog/VERY IMPORTANT INFORMATIONJack has published a novel called Tower!Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Tower-Jack-BC-ebook/dp/B0CM5P9N9M/ref=monarch_sidesheetThe first nine chapters of Tower are available for free here: jackbc.substack.comOur Patreon: www.patreon.com/TheBookClubfromHellJack's Substack: jackbc.substack.comLevi's website: www.levioutloud.comwww.thebookclubfromhell.comJoin our Discord (the best place to interact with us): discord.gg/ZMtDJ9HscrWatch us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0n7r1ZTpsUw5exoYxb4aKA/featuredX: @bookclubhell666Jack on X: @supersquat1Levi on X: @optimismlevi

Join Boyd Matheson in digging into Tuesday’s headlines! Carly Cooperman breaks down the influence of swing voters in this presidential election. See how our online world is reshaping politics with Katherine Dee. Rachel Miner shares her experience with how genocide survivors taught her about human dignity and More!

As the world becomes more digitized, a fascinating transformation is reshaping how we engage with politics. The rise of social media and digital footprints has created an unprecedented level of scrutiny and accessibility to politicians' lives. And with millennials entering positions of power, bringing decades of online history with them, we're witnessing the emergence of a new political landscape where the lines between public service, celebrity culture, and personal privacy are increasingly blurred. Katherine Dee from The Computer Room shares what the future of democracy will look like in an always-online world.

Minds Almost Meeting: Season 9, Episode 2. View the transcript for this episode here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://mindsa⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠lmostmeeting.com/episodes/internet-culture Imagine two smart curious friendly and basically truth-seeking people, but from very different intellectual traditions. Traditions with different tools, priorities, and ground rules. What would they discuss? Would they talk past each other? Make any progress? Would anyone want to hear them? Economist Robin Hanson and philosopher Agnes Callard decided to find out. Visit the Minds Almost Meeting website here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://mindsalmostmeeting.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Katherine Dee is something of an internet archivist. She publishes Default Wisdom, writing about online subcultures you've never heard of as well as AI boyfriends, dating advice, and girl boss feminism. In this episode, Meghan Murphy speaks with her about using dating apps in a non-horrible way, whether TikTok is the worst thing in the world (and whether Twitter is better), Andrew Huberman takes, and more. Find Katherine on “X” @default_friend. The Same Drugs is a fully independent, listener-supported podcast. Please consider ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠supporting us with a donation⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, beco⁠ming⁠ a ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠patron⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠subscribing on Substack⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can watch select clips and episodes of The Same Drugs on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Full videos are available on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Substack⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon,⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and to YouTube channel members. You can support The Same Drugs on Spotify by ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠clicking the "support" button⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ or you can ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠donate directly via Stripe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. The Same Drugs is on X ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@thesamedrugs_⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Meghan Murphy is on X ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@meghanemurphy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and on Instagram ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@meghanemilymurphy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Purchase your very own ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Don't Drink the Kool Aid t-shirt at: meghanmurphy.ca⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Get tickets to my event in Victoria, B.C. on May 30th at ⁠⁠tickettailor.com⁠⁠. --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-same-drugs/support

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.louiseperry.co.ukMy guest today is the writer and expert on online culture Katherine Dee, also known as Default Friend. We spoke about why TikTok isn't as bad as everyone thinks, how the internet is warping women's sexuality, and what journalists misunderstand about femcels (that is, female incels). In the extended part of the episode, we spoke about whether elite polit…

Paid subscribers get full access to my interview with Katherine Dee. The first half of this episode is available to all listeners. To hear the entire conversation, become a paying subscriber here. Katherine Dee is a writer, cultural commentator, and a phenomenally astute observer of online culture. If you want to understand the rise of the “tradcels,” the “girl boss” trope (and subsequent backlash), and how identity concepts like “otherkin” become connected to social justice politics, Katherine is the one to explain it. In this conversation, she talks with Meghan about how ideas on places like Tumblr found their way into our political discourse, academia, and even the retail space and they had a profound impact on young people's psychological development, especially when it comes to dating and relationships. Katherine herself was so indoctrinated by online manosphere content and it's the scarcity complex it engendered that she ended up marrying someone she met online after knowing him in person for three days. She also discusses why Taylor Swift is just the latest example of a powerful woman reframed as a sad cat lady, why the beauty standards of the 1990s were so destructive, and why New York City arts and media circles are incubators are terrible places to meet heterosexual men. (But very good places to be one.) GUEST BIO Katherine Dee is an internet culture blogger. Everything else is secondary. You can find her at default.blog. Want to hear the whole conversation? Upgrade your subscription here. HOUSEKEEPING

Katherine Dee returns to break down the overwhelming apathy many seemed to feel during 2023 and look ahead to what we might be facing in 2024. She and Bridget discuss her culture war burnout prediction, why the Zoomers feel like the internet belongs to them, the pressures of being a content creator, treating it like a business yet being unable to admit to other content creators that it is a business, kids who are growing up with their parents putting their lives online, the trick to being uncancellable, the effects of Elon taking over Twitter, the pressure to always weigh in and have an opinion on everything, knowing how much work goes into the content that is out there, balancing longevity with virality or immediate success, how everyone is in their own echo chamber, and why you shouldn't listen to her when it comes to politics. Check out her Substack Default Wisdom. Sponsor Links: * Patriot Gold - Call 888-614-9238 * Dr. Gundry Podcast - https://bit.ly/DrGundry-WiW * Pluto TV - https://bit.ly/WiWPlutoTVBridget Phetasy admires grit and authenticity. On Walk-Ins Welcome, she talks about the beautiful failures and frightening successes of her own life and the lives of her guests. She doesn't conduct interviews—she has conversations. Conversations with real people about the real struggle and will remind you that we can laugh in pain and cry in joy but there's no greater mistake than hiding from it all. By embracing it all, and celebrating it with the stories she'll bring listeners, she believes that our lowest moments can be the building blocks for our eventual fulfillment.Beyond Parody with Bridget Phetasy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.phetasy.com/subscribe

Katherine Dee returns to break down the overwhelming apathy many seemed to feel during 2023 and look ahead to what we might be facing in 2024. She and Bridget discuss her culture war burnout prediction, why the Zoomers feel like the internet belongs to them, the pressures of being a content creator, treating it like a business yet being unable to admit to other content creators that it is a business, kids who are growing up with their parents putting their lives online, the trick to being uncancellable, the effects of Elon taking over Twitter, the pressure to always weigh in and have an opinion on everything, knowing how much work goes into the content that is out there, balancing longevity with virality or immediate success, how everyone is in their own echo chamber, and why you shouldn't listen to her when it comes to politics. Check out her Substack Default Wisdom. Sponsor Links: Patriot Gold - Call 888-614-9238 Dr. Gundry Podcast - https://bit.ly/DrGundry-WiW Pluto TV - https://bit.ly/WiWPlutoTV

David Gornoski is joined by Katherine Dee for a fascinating conversation on how media is shaping the collective around us. What do we make of the Osama Bin Laden trend on TikTok? What do we make of Elon's reply to advertisers pulling out of X? Which social media company is driving the culture right now? Where do fandoms come from? Follow Katherine Dee on X here. Visit aneighborschoice.com for more

Katherine Dee is a writer, journalist, and internet culture reporter. A contributor to publications such as UnHerd, Tablet, and Blaze Media, she is also the proprietor of the Default Wisdom Substack, where she writes about a wide range of topics, including internet history and culture, digital communities, millennial nostalgia, and online fandom. Katherine joins the show to discuss why you're never leaving Twitter, how to escape the nostalgia trap, whether it's possible to heal our attention spans, and MUCH more! Important Links: Default Wisdom Why You're Never Leaving Twitter; by Katherine Dee Everything I Know About Elite America I Learned From ‘Fresh Prince' and ‘West Wing'; by Rob Henderson Show Notes: Origin Story Why You're Never Leaving Twitter Art & Journalism in the Attention Economy Class, Wealth & Status How to Heal Our Attention Span Escaping the Nostalgia Trap Technology, Cultural Lag & Barriers to Entry Astroturfing vs. Organic Momentum Katherine as Empress of the World MORE! Books Mentioned: The Status Game: On Human Life and How to Play It; by Will Storr Class: A Guide Through the American Status System; by Paul Fussell The novels of Donna Tartt The novels of Easton Ellis

Host Blaise Brosnan sits down with Substack writer and internet culture reporter Katherine Dee, to discuss the causes of sex negativity, the cultural landscapes of the digital ecosphere, and the underlying motivations of right-wing subcultures online.   References "The coming wave of sex negativity" by Katherine Dee, Default Wisdom "Among the Spiritual Psychotics" by Katherine Dee, Tablet "Self-Made: Creating Our Identities from Da Vinci to the Kardashians" by Tara Isabella Burton "Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made" by Katherine Dee, Contra "Who Does Saudi Better: Google or Reddit?" by Katherine Dee, Tablet

Vers and Lukas  drop by and talk about e-dating, e-girls, e-ating disorders, and secret political Facebook groups. 

On this episode of the Unsupervised Learning podcast, Razib talks to internet commentator formerly known as default friend who is perhaps better known today as the internet culture writer Katherine Dee. Dee is a regular contributor to Retvrn, The Washington Examiner, The American Mind, Tablet Magazine and UnHerd. She has also recently written a piece for Compact: Why You're Never Leaving Twitter.  But first, Razib and Dee discuss how they have known each other for nearly a decade, going back to 2015 on the site formerly known as Twitter, and more substantially as residents of Austin in the late teens. Since 2019 Dee's existence has been a peripatetic one; after leaving Texas and first moving to the Bay Area, she then lived in the Pacific Northwest, before finally settling in Chicago. Working in advertising, and then in big tech, Dee has finally settled on a career as a freelancer, with all the freedom and uncertainty that entails. Razib asks Dee whether there is today, in 2023, any culture that isn't somehow connected to the internet. She agrees about the pervasive nature of digital and social media, and how thickly it is interleaved into the lives of younger Millennials and Zoomers. And yet as a counterpoint to this conception of a revolution that has transmuted “IRL” life online, Razib argues that ‌social media is just an amplification of “bulletin board system” (BBS) culture which existed as early as the 1980's. Dee then reflects on her maturation as an observer of all things internet through Twitter and Discord, and the shadow-impact of more obscure platforms like Tumblr and 4chan on our broader culture, beneath the notice of the wider population of “normies,” while Razib reminds her how small Twitter's user base is compared to platforms like Facebook or YouTube (the latter are measured in billions, while Twitter retains some 450 million active users). In her piece, Why You're Never Leaving Twitter, Dee argues that the anemic showing of dozens of Twitter clones and pretenders in the last decade argues that the platform just isn't going to be dethroned from its central role in the media, and thereby wider American culture. From right-wing to left-wing imitators, or Facebook's Threads, every challenger has failed to eat into Twitter's critical position as a nexus in the media ecosystem, a central node in transmitting information throughout diverse subcultures. But Razib plays devil's advocate, musing whether Elon Musk's erratic tenure since assuming ownership of the platform, his change of its brand to X, his petty beefs with publishers like Substack and ex cathedra pronouncements of major feature changes, might actually spell the end of the platform. Though Dee seems skeptical that even Musk could destroy his new property, not seeing any replacement on the horizon, suggests to her that the age of a single central information switchboard for the internet may be ephemeral and one we look back on as a particular and unique moment in history, just as we do the age of three major television networks in the 20th century.

Discover the secrets to thriving in the aesthetic industry with an insightful episode of the Business of Aesthetics podcast. In this riveting conversation, Dr. Katherine Dee, a seasoned practitioner with nine years of experience, shares her invaluable insights into building a successful aesthetic practice. With candid anecdotes and expert advice, she delves into key strategies for making wise business decisions while maintaining medical integrity.

Katherine Dee (Default Friend) joins Geoff Schullenberger to discuss her latest Compact contribution "Why You're Never Leaving Twitter."

we met online. is a new show from Katherine Dee and Naama Kates. In this cross-posted episode, Naama and Katherine discuss cam girls: the history, business model, cultural context, and psychology of these digital entertainers. Listen here: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/we-met-onlineRegularly scheduled episodes of The Computer Room will resume next week.

Recorded April 23rd, 2023Katherine Dee returns to discuss her latest projects, her article "Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made", digital spirituality, Jonathan Franzen's Crossroads and much more.Matt TwitterKatherine TwitterKatherine Substack

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit wisdomofcrowds.liveAn anti-natalist subculture has flourished for years online. These days, it feels like it's taking hold in the real world.This week, writer and internet historian Katherine Dee and Editor-at-Large Christine Emba join Shadi and Damir to make sense of this underground phenomenon—and its broader implications for how we live today.Do people really believe that suffering makes life not worth experiencing? And what is the source of the breathtaking idea that one can and should spare the unborn the pain of existence?As the conversation continues, the Crowd starts to zero in on the source of the problem: there's something unhealthy about being online all the time. Katherine reveals her struggles with climate anxiety, and how she eventually snapped out of it.In the full episode (for paying subscribers only), the conversation turns to the identities we inhabit online and in-person, and how that causes us to lose our ethical moorings. Katherine points out that detachment and anonymity afforded by the internet breeds isolation and existential dread. Is there a remedy to this “psychosis”? Closing up, we hit on a cheeky solution.Required Reading:- “We Need to Talk About Extreme Anti-Natalism,” by Katherine Dee (Unherd).- “Can You Pair-Bond During Cybersex?” by Katherine Dee (Substack).- “Computer Love,” by Katherine Dee (Comment).- “Tumblr Transformed American Politics,” by Katherine Dee (American Conservative).- Rethinking Sex: AProvocation, by Christine Emba (Amazon).

we met online. is a new show from Katherine Dee and Naama Kates. On episode one, Katherine and Naama discuss 2011's seminal documentary, Catfish: the movie that started a show, a phenomenon, and a prolific career for its star, Nev Schulman.Listen here.Follow on Twitter: @wemetonline   

Katherine Dee is a writer, journalist, and internet historian.Steve and Katherine discuss:0:00 Introduction1:15 Katherine's early life and background21:52 Mass shootings, Manifestos, Nihilism, and Incels59:35 Trad values, Sex negativity vs Porn and Fleshlights1:28:54 Elon Musk's plans for Twitter1:33:00 TikTok1:41:41 Adderall1:44:07 AI/GPT impact on writers and journos1:49:30 Gen-X generation gap: are the kids alright?References:Katherine's Substack: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/“Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made”: https://contra.substack.com/p/mass-shootings-and-the-world-liberalismMusic used with permission from Blade Runner Blues Livestream improvisation by State Azure.--Steve Hsu is Professor of Theoretical Physics and of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering at Michigan State University. Previously, he was Senior Vice President for Research and Innovation at MSU and Director of the Institute of Theoretical Science at the University of Oregon. Hsu is a startup founder (SafeWeb, Genomic Prediction, Othram) and advisor to venture capital and other investment firms. He was educated at Caltech and Berkeley, was a Harvard Junior Fellow, and has held faculty positions at Yale, the University of Oregon, and MSU.Please send any questions or suggestions to manifold1podcast@gmail.com or Steve on Twitter @hsu_steve.

Is Chat-GPT sentient? What does it think about when you log off? Steff and Katherine explore new developments in AI, as only non-technical people can. 

Katherine Dee is a writer, journalist and internet historian. There are lots of male subcultures. Incels, RedPill, Pickup Artists, Soy Boys. But what are women getting up to? Trends like Hot Girls Have IBS. Hot Girls Eat Fish. And most well known, the girlboss meme. Katherine is here to explain just what is happening in the oestrogen-fuelled underbelly of the internet. Expect to learn why the girlboss meme came about, why there is a coming wave of sex-negativity, whether it really is possible to be hot while you have IBS, Katherine's biggest red flags when choosing a partner, whether it should be legal to pay to drug women so you can have sex with their lifeless bodies, why predictable is good when dating and much more... Sponsors: Get $100 discount on the best water filter on earth from AquaTru at https://bit.ly/drinkwisdom (discount automatically applied) Get 5 Free Travel Packs, Free Liquid Vitamin D and more from Athletic Greens at https://athleticgreens.com/modernwisdom (discount automatically applied) Get 15% discount on Mud/Wtr at http://mudwtr.com/modernwisdom (use code MODERNWISDOM) Extra Stuff: Follow Katherine on Twitter - https://twitter.com/default_friend Follow Katherine on Substack - https://defaultfriend.substack.com/  Get my free Reading List of 100 books to read before you die → https://chriswillx.com/books/ To support me on Patreon (thank you): https://www.patreon.com/modernwisdom - Get in touch. Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact/ 

My guest this week is journalist Katherine Dee. She's a culture reporter and writes an advice column at her Substack defaultfriend.substack.com. Her work can be found in the Washington Examiner, Tablet, UnHerd, and many other places. Katherine has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the internet: contemporary internet culture, the history of the internet, and the effect that it's having on society. We spoke about Katherine's theory on the political importance of Tumblr, the so-called ‘male-to-male transsexual' as a product of the internet age, why Chinese kids aren't allowed on TikTok, and much more. Katherine's essay ‘The coming wave of sex negativity' https://defaultfriend.substack.com/p/72-the-coming-wave-of-sex-negativity/commentsThe Case Against the Sexual Revolution by Louise Perry is available to buy here: https://amzn.to/3xLHJNd 1:10 The coming wave of sex negativity 5:11 Internet niches and mainstream culture8:25 ‘Tradwives' as an online trend 14:25 Should the MMM podcast move to OnlyFans? 22:23 Is AI going to replace OnlyFans? 26:17 The strongest argument in defence of porn 31:34 What weird porn does to people's brains 37:24 The male-to-male (and female-to-female) transsexual 38:53 Why women get obvious lip fillers 41:24 The link between Tumblr and the Great Awokening  47:14 Is wokeness bad for teenagers' mental health? 50:43 The origins of the term ‘latinx' 54:06 Gen Z online culture 1:00:07 How fashions are transmitted 1:05:12 Why is TikTok so popular?Follow Maiden Mother Matriarch on social media:Twitter: https://twitter.com/maiden_podcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/maiden_mother_matriarch/TikTok: tiktok.com/@maiden_podcast Keeper - Meet the person who meets your standards with the world's most advanced matchmaking solution. Driven by AI and relationship science. Guided by human care. Learn more at https://keeper.ai#LouisePerry # #MaidenMotherMatriarch This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.louiseperry.co.uk/subscribe

Katherine and Steff are joined by Perry Abbasi, a Chicago-based lawyer whose Twitter presence recently "made headlines" -- in other words, revealed just how reliant on Twitter modern-day journalists are. Katherine has also, once again, fucked with the theme. Someone help her.Pieces cited:Police district candidate's social media full of racist and misogynist postsHow the Online Right gave up on reality

Two of two in a series about Adam Lanza's digital footprint. This has some overlap with episode one, and they don't need to be listened to in order. Follow Gio on Twitter here and on YouTube here.Theme: Beehive Days by Locust Toybox

Katherine Dee, writer and internet historian, sits down with Bridget to discuss the strange corners of the internet she's explored and how she manages to predict coming trends in our culture. They talk about internet culture & internet history, whether you can really tell who someone is via Twitter, drunk Tweeting, the definition of a lolcow, feedback loops, the coming wave of sexual negativity, and how we don't truly appreciate how much AI might change things. They also cover the coming trend of middle and upper class women having babies younger and staying closer to home, how Twitter changed both of their lives, addicts who test their drugs for fentanyl, the real-life fallout of cancel culture, trying to pivot out of the culture war, trends on their way out, and why Katherine thinks the most disturbing thing she sees online is people's isolation, alienation, and loneliness. Check out Katherine's Substack at defaultfriend.substack.comBridget Phetasy admires grit and authenticity. On Walk-Ins Welcome, she talks about the beautiful failures and frightening successes of her own life and the lives of her guests. She doesn't conduct interviews—she has conversations. Conversations with real people about the real struggle and will remind you that we can laugh in pain and cry in joy but there's no greater mistake than hiding from it all. By embracing it all, and celebrating it with the stories she'll bring listeners, she believes that our lowest moments can be the building blocks for our eventual fulfillment.Beyond Parody with Bridget Phetasy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.phetasy.com/subscribe

Katherine Dee, writer and internet historian, sits down with Bridget to discuss the strange corners of the internet she's explored and how she manages to predict coming trends in our culture. They talk about internet culture & internet history, whether you can really tell who someone is via Twitter, drunk Tweeting, the definition of a lolcow, feedback loops, the coming wave of sexual negativity, and how we don't truly appreciate how much AI might change things. They also cover the coming trend of middle and upper class women having babies younger and staying closer to home, how Twitter changed both of their lives, addicts who test their drugs for fentanyl, the real-life fallout of cancel culture, trying to pivot out of the culture war, trends on their way out, and why Katherine thinks the most disturbing thing she sees online is people's isolation, alienation, and loneliness. Check out Katherine's Substack at defaultfriend.substack.com Sponsor Links: AG1 - https://bit.ly/AG1-WiW Congressional Dish podcast - https://bit.ly/WiWCongressDish Your Welcome podcast - https://bit.ly/WiW-YourWelcome Progressive Insurance - https://pgrs.in/3Dp5ZIW

Jesse's been off in Israel resolving and/or exacerbating tensions between the Israelis and Palestinians, FAR too busy to talk to some distant goy like Katie, so here's an interview he recently conducted with Katherine Dee, an extremely smart and perceptive writer and podcaster on internet culture. Topics include the very… *particular* nature of rationalist gatherings, the perils of parasocial relationships, and the question of what identity means when it's severed from any sort of embodied, real-world existence.Links:Aella comes on BARPod: Some of Dee's favorite articles that she has written:Tumblr Transformed American Politicshttps://theamericanconservative.com/tumblr-transformed-american-politics/ Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made Rise of the Female-to-Female Transsexual The Ghost of Adam Lanza, Pt. 1 The brief and wondrous life of a scene.The image is the ace pride flag: https://grpride.org/product/asexual-pride-flag/ This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.blockedandreported.org/subscribe

Very pleased to be joined by Katherine Dee aka default_friend for a conversation about the internet, online cliques and whether we can survive more of our lives moving online. Here is the link to her excellent school shooting piece I mentioned. https://contra.substack.com/p/mass-shootings-and-the-world-liberalism

I speak with Katherine about a bizarre, relatively new outgrowth of the American psyche, the phenomenon of the school shooter. Beyond the "we need fewer/more guns" debate, there is a numb silence about the worldview that fuels the actual motivations of these young men. They are labeled and put away in the monster pile. But could it be that, in some ways, they see further than we can? Katherine Dee is *the internet historian* bar none, and she's been doing some necessary spelunking in the neglected digital footprints of people like Adam Lanza, with startling results. You can find her work on her Substack at defaultfriend.substack.com and on her podcast, The Computer Room. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/aksubversive/message

What if Adam Lanza went to church? David Gornoski is joined by Katherine Dee, a.k.a. Default Friend; for a conversation on serial killers; how media depictions of violence influence us; how church can strengthen communities; how media serves as a "babysitter" to our children; Gospel media technology; the interplay between the work of Rene Girard and Marshall McLuhan; the lack of substance in modern movies; the American church's complacency on war; Art Bell, and more. Check out Katherine Dee's substack here. Visit A Neighbor's Choice website at aneighborschoice.com

In this episode, Helen chats with internet historian Katherine Dee about the rise and fall of the girlboss meme and what the future holds for online feminism.    Follow KD on Twitter: @default_friend  Subtrack: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/  

A tantric tease gave his buddy a long, erotic, boner-ifying massage which the caller describes as the best non-penetrative sex he has had…ever. But the dude is in a monogamous relationship, and because there was no penetration, never considered it cheating. Now the caller is panting with lust and wants more.  A woman's friend was dating a guy who claimed to be a recovering sex addict. But the caller discovered that he was concurrently dating another woman, telling both of them that they were his one and only. Having learned this, the friend is not quite ready to DTMFA. How can the caller help to get her there?  On the Magnum, Dan politely spars with Katherine Dee, an internet writer who has been following some key players in the “sex negativity movement.” How can we reconcile the promises of the sexual revolution with rising reports of female dissatisfaction? And here's something you've never heard on the Lovecast: “There's something wrong with you if you're into bondage.” Somehow, Dan keeps his cool.  And, a bi woman with a boyfriend negotiated an open relationship. She started dating a woman. But when he started sexting with a woman himself, she realized she wasn't quite ready for non-monogamy after all.  You ready? You sure? Q@Savage.Love 206-302-2064 This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. They make it easy to build a website or blog. Give it a whirl at Squarespace.com/Savage and if you want to buy it, use the code Savage for a 10% off your first purchase. This episode is brought to you by Helix Sleep-the best mattress for your individualized comfort. Right now, get up to $200 off ALL mattress orders at HelixSleep.com/SAVAGE. This episode is brought to you by Doordash. Get breakfast, lunch, dinner and more delivered from your favorite restaurants right to your doorstep with one easy click. To get 50% off your first order of up to $15 value, use promo code SAVAGE at checkout when you spend $12 or more. Terms apply. 

This week, my guest Katherine Dee and I discuss a couple of the topics that she has tackled in her writings over at her Default Friend blog. We discuss what she sees as a sexual counterrevolution coming our way. Katherine writes, "If there's one drum I've been beating for a minute now, it's that I believe the pendulum with sexuality is going to swing, big time. And seriously, if you guys remember me for anything, have it be this." We dive right into that, and I think it helps bridge us to our discussion on the dark nihilism that pervades our culture and leads to these terrible mass shootings we keep seeing. The Left likes to focus on guns because they understand it won't actually do any good. The Right, in reaction to that, wants the band-aid of arming teachers and/or providing more security. When nobody wants to discuss the rot within our culture, nothing will ever be done. Where does this empty nihilism come from? Katherine believes that it is the modern American enlightenment tradition of liberalism. For more from Katherine, check out her blog here: For her articles that we discuss, go here: ...and here: Sponsors: The GOP Mises Caucus: Paloma Verde CBD ( ): Enter code BUCK at checkout for 20% off your order! Visit my website: Donate to the show here: Audio Production by Podsworth Media: Leave us a review and rating on iTunes! Thanks!

Emmet sits Geoff Shullenberger (https://twitter.com/daily_barbarian) and Default Friend (https://twitter.com/default_friend) to talk about their respective articles on the Uvalde shooting, school shootings in general, "zeitgeist killers," the spiritual hole in our society, and more! "The Faith of Mass Shooters (https://compactmag.com/article/the-faith-of-mass-shooters)" by Geoff Shullenberger, Compact Magazine. "Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made (https://contra.substack.com/p/mass-shootings-and-the-world-liberalism)," by Katherine Dee, Contra Closing Song: Lowered by Greg Puciato ft. Reba Meyers. (https://gregpuciato.bandcamp.com/album/mirrorcell)

0:11 - Intro: Why is America producing more mass shooters? We take a look at Katherine Dee's piece on America's unique brand of Nihilism and how modern society's ultra-individualism may be leading to dark results.  14:50 - Political Scientist Wilfred Reilly joins Matt to discuss his recent Newsweek piece on Gun Control and "Targeted Solutions". We try to attack the issue of gun control and recently proposed legislation from all angles, as well as many of the myths around gun violence and recent related political/social movements. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Join Kara McKinney as she sits down with Katherine Dee, Dr. Sumantra Maitra, Michael Cloud, Matthew R.J. Brodsky, and E.J. Antoni to talk about the issues of the day.

Oliver and Katherine Dee talk about incels, truecels, volcels, sex, dating, and much more in this wide-ranging episode. To listen to the full 2-hour episode, become a patron at patreon.com/whatsleft

Jack Posobiec takes a look into the foreign blood money flooding Washington D.C. after the President of the Brookings Institute, General John Allen, resigns amid an FBI probe into illegal foreign lobbying for the government of Qatar. Three black men were arrested by the U.S. Marshals for beating a 17-year-old white boy to death outside of a Lebron James funded school in Ohio. Poso challenges Lebron James to stand up for human rights. Ten Republican Senators side with the Democrats on red flag laws and other sweeping gun reform bills. Jack Posobiec breaks down Katherine Dee's article “Mass Shootings and the World Liberalism Made” and analyzes how nihilism has destroyed the moral core of the country. Here's your Daily dose of Human Events with @JackPosobiec Save up to 65% on MyPillow products by going to MyPillow.com/POSO and use code POSODownload PublicSq for free at https://publicsq.com/welcome?path=/marketplace/online  

Today's episode is haute cuisine, the chef's special, a rare delicacy — well, hopefully, not too rare — with writer Katherine Dee (@default_friend), my content creation spirit animal. We've converged here thanks in no small part to a recent piece in the Atlantic entitled, What do Femcels Really Want? But we end up talking about all kinds of things, of course, from the class and geographic factors of the sexual marketplace, to hack journalism, to the odd allure of TikTok recipes, and much, much more. So buckle up for this extra special episode. “Sprout and the Bean” by Joanna Newsom (2004). Courtesy of Drag City Records. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Read Katherine's femcel piece (and check out her glorious substack) here: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/p/a-brain-dump-about-femcels-and-sex?s=r  —————————————————————— Please check out my all new Patreon for ad-free, uncensored episodes and weekly blogs! https://www.patreon.com/NaamaKates ——————————————————————— INCEL is created and produced by Naama Kates for Crawlspace Media. Music by Cyrus Melchor. —————————————————————— If you or someone you know is struggling emotionally, or having a hard time, please call someone, or contact one of the excellent resources provided below. —————————————————————— Suicide Prevention Lifeline w: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ t: 1.800.273.8255 —————————————————————— Samaritans Website: https://www.samaritans.org and telephone (UK): 116.123 —————————————————————— Please contact Naama at INCEL with any comments, inquiries, or just random thoughts: e: theincelproject@gmail.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/incel/support

Recorded 4/27/22Matt chats with Default Friend, AKA Katherine Dee, about the role of technology in our lives, the intersection between the internet and the occult, how her work compares and contrasts with Frog Twitter, her excellent new advice column with Delicious Tacos, and other topics.Default Friend TwitterMatt Pegas TwitterDan Baltic Twitter

As a raw milk drinker, I try to avoid pasteurized milk in my coffee. Oat milk so effectively replaced it, there had to be a catch. Indeed there was. Spin around a box of Oat Drink Barista Edition and you'll find it's made of rapeseed oil, AKA canola oil. Imagine guzzling canola oil straight from the bottle—totally disgusting, no matter how cute Oatly's copywriting might be. Originally developed as engine lubricants, seed oils like soybean oil, corn oil, rapeseed oil, grapeseed oil, cottonseed oil, safflower oil, sunflower oil are unhealthy for many reasons.Once you've been redpilled, the rabbit hole goes deep. At a bar in Athens a couple of years ago, I talked with a guy who sold industrial seed oil expellers. He explained that expellers are responsible for all the soy cake and seed oil that form the basis of globalist serf cuisine—“sustainable” meat and cheese replicas we're supposed to eat to show how much we care. Business was booming. The soy boy concept owes a lot to expeller pressed seed oils, as does “You WILL eat the bugs,” a mocking rallying cry against the World Economic Forum's apparent plan to preserve “our global resources”—like meat, oil, and land—so the elites can have more of them.Among the poison and propaganda, a hero arose. Last November, a young doctoral resident created a Twitter account. As a budding doctor already obsessed with the seed oil problem, he had toyed around with memes before. “I had made the decision for myself that seed oils were going to be my main intervention,” says Twitter influencer Seed Oil Disrespecter. “This is the most significant change in diet. This is the primary food change that has led to so much disease and this is what I need to do for myself and for my wife and my daughter. And then I saw it hit Twitter.”It was time to enter the fray. “A lot of people were making accounts saying, ‘Oh I'm a hiking enjoyer and I'm a nature respecter.' So I just married the two and wrote Seed Oil Disrespecter. And within the first 24 hours I had 1000 followers. I was like, ‘Oh wow, this is branding!'”As his meme-craft improved, Seed Oil Disrespecter's account grew past 40k followers. Vice, propaganda spreaders on behalf of those who want us to eat the bugs, of course painted him as a paranoid conspiracy theorist. Katherine Dee covered him in Unherd, and Killstream had him on as a guest. His wife built a following as Healthy Oil Respecter, offering a more normie-fied, mommy-blogger version of the same message. On Killstream, he admitted to being vaxxed and having heterodox politics, which disappointed some factions of his growing following. Rumors started that he was in fact a corporate shill; an astroturfer for Silicon-Valley-insider startup Zero Acre Farms. Zero Acre Farms— “Let's Give the World an Oil Change”—plans to disrupt big seed oil with creepy fermented oil of its own (the exact product details remain unclear). Did Seed Oil Disrespecter hijack the authentic anti-seed oil movement on behalf of the very corporate overlords it opposed?I ask about these accusations and much more during the second episode of The Carousel podcast. I will admit that the audio is worse than seed oils because I'm still working on my setup. So if you can't stand it and want to skip to the part where he talks about how to spread your message, it's at about 42:00. And here's his advice in easy-to-digest listicle form: How to spread your message according to Seed Oil Disrespecter!Hijack Humor. “What are people already laughing at? Be new and funny. The -er at the end of Disrespecter is kind of wrong. Having little mistakes here and there is funny [right now].”Move with the Memes. “Memes are punk rock. Make sure you're not too stale and always switch things up. I'm a meme guy, so what do I do? I just steal other memes and reword them. Or I think of something new. It's very simple stuff.”Use the In Between Times. “I do it in between things. You just look at your phone, I look at memes, I see one and I go, "Ooh, I can change that to a seed oil meme." I do it. I repost it. Done. It'll be minutes.”Save Raw Materials. “As a meme person, I always save raw materials. I'm always thinking, oh, I can use that later. You just download it and open it in the Photoshop Express app.”Make it Sticky. “Is it something that people remember? Does it stick to the wall? SeedOil Disrespect is a sticky name, it's funny. But the more you look into it, you're like, holy s**t, it's true. People around the world are saying, ‘Disrespecting seed oils,' and they might not even follow my account.”Build a Squad. “My wife knows nothing about Twitter, right? She's not a meme war veteran and she doesn't get Pepe. We're married a little over 15 years. That first year of marriage, we were like buying vegetarian Morning Star nuggets and trying all sorts of different stuff. But within a year or so we learned about paleo, right? So that first year of marriage, we made a lot of changes. So one of the big changes we made was changing the oils that we were eating, the fats. So I told her, I got this thing going on, right? My Twitter is exploding. I was like ‘Hey, I'm the Seed Oil Disrespecter.' She was always doing something on Instagram. Never anything too big. You know, you get 10 likes or whatever. Your bangers get 30. Because we were into this stuff, we're talking about this stuff, I was like, I'll make you an account. I said, Healthy Oil Respecter, but that was taken, or too long. So I was like, Real Oil Respecter. And it worked. So we both had these accounts, we're both doing it. And we just blew up.”Make Lists: “We have the simple six [good oils], which is tallow, butter, ghee, coconut oil, real avocado oil, and real olive oil.” Don't Gatekeep: “I'm getting messages from people that are like, ‘Hey, you know, I'm not right-wing, and I've seen that the people are associating this with that.' But you know, it's just food, right? And that's why I made posts today, like you can't gate keep this stuff.” Get full access to The Carousel at thecarousel.substack.com/subscribe

Welcome to the Convivial Society, a newsletter about technology, culture, and the moral life. In this installment you’ll find the audio version of the previous essay, “The Face Stares Back.” And along with the audio version you’ll also find an assortment of links and resources. Some of you will remember that such links used to be a regular feature of the newsletter. I’ve prioritized the essays, in part because of the information I have on click rates, but I know the links and resources are useful to more than a few of you. Moving forward, I think it makes sense to put out an occasional installment that contains just links and resources (with varying amounts of commentary from me). As always, thanks for reading and/or listening. Links and ResourcesLet’s start with a classic paper from 1965 by philosopher Hubert Dreyfus, “Alchemy and Artificial Intelligence.” The paper, prepared for the RAND Corporation, opens with a long epigraph from the 17th-century polymath Blaise Pascal on the difference between the mathematical mind and the perceptive mind. On “The Tyranny of Time”: “The more we synchronize ourselves with the time in clocks, the more we fall out of sync with our own bodies and the world around us.” More: “The Western separation of clock time from the rhythms of nature helped imperialists establish superiority over other cultures.”Relatedly, a well-documented case against Daylight Saving Time: “Farmers, Physiologists, and Daylight Saving Time”: “Fundamentally, their perspective is that we tend to do well when our body clock and social clock—the official time in our time zone—are in synch. That is, when noon on the social clock coincides with solar noon, the moment when the Sun reaches its highest point in the sky where we are. If the two clocks diverge, trouble ensues. Startling evidence for this has come from recent findings in geographical epidemiology—specifically, from mapping health outcomes within time zones.”Jasmine McNealy on “Framing and Language of Ethics: Technology, Persuasion, and Cultural Context.” Interesting forthcoming book by Kevin Driscoll: The Modem World: A Prehistory of Social Media.Great piece on Jacques Ellul by Samuel Matlack at The New Atlantis, “How Tech Despair Can Set You Free”: “But Ellul rejects it. He refuses to offer a prescription for social reform. He meticulously and often tediously presents a problem — but not a solution of the kind we expect. This is because he believed that the usual approach offers a false picture of human agency. It exaggerates our ability to plan and execute change to our fundamental social structures. It is utopian. To arrive at an honest view of human freedom, responsibility, and action, he believed, we must confront the fact that we are constrained in more ways than we like to think. Technique, says Ellul, is society’s tightest constraint on us, and we must feel the totality of its grip in order to find the freedom to act.”Evan Selinger on “The Gospel of the Metaverse.”Ryan Calo on “Modeling Through”: “The prospect that economic, physical, and even social forces could be modeled by machines confronts policymakers with a paradox. Society may expect policymakers to avail themselves of techniques already usefully deployed in other sectors, especially where statutes or executive orders require the agency to anticipate the impact of new rules on particular values. At the same time, “modeling through” holds novel perils that policymakers may be ill equipped to address. Concerns include privacy, brittleness, and automation bias, all of which law and technology scholars are keenly aware. They also include the extension and deepening of the quantifying turn in governance, a process that obscures normative judgments and recognizes only that which the machines can see. The water may be warm, but there are sharks in it.”“Why Christopher Alexander Still Matters”: “The places we love, the places that are most successful and most alive, have a wholeness about them that is lacking in too many contemporary environments, Alexander observed. This problem stems, he thought, from a deep misconception of what design really is, and what planning is.  It is not “creating from nothing”—or from our own mental abstractions—but rather, transforming existing wholes into new ones, and using our mental processes and our abstractions to guide this natural life-supporting process.” An interview with philosopher Shannon Vallor: “Re-envisioning Ethics in the Information Age”: “Instead of using the machines to liberate and enlarge our own lives, we are increasingly being asked to twist, to transform, and to constrain ourselves in order to strengthen the reach and power of the machines that we increasingly use to deliver our public services, to make the large-scale decisions that are needed in the financial realm, in health care, or in transportation. We are building a society where the control surfaces are increasingly automated systems and then we are asking humans to restrict their thinking patterns and to reshape their thinking patterns in ways that are amenable to this system. So what I wanted to do was to really reclaim some of the literature that described that process in the 20th century—from folks like Jacques Ellul, for example, or Herbert Marcuse—and then really talk about how this is happening to us today in the era of artificial intelligence and what we can do about it.”From Lance Strate in 2008: “Studying Media AS Media: McLuhan and the Media Ecology Approach.” Japan’s museum of rocks that look like faces.I recently had the pleasure of speaking with Katherine Dee for her podcast, which you can listen to here.I’ll leave you with an arresting line from Simone Weil’s notebooks: “You could not have wished to be born at a better time than this, when everything is lost.” Get full access to The Convivial Society at theconvivialsociety.substack.com/subscribe

If you dig this unlocked Patrons-FIRST episode, consider helping us grow by subscribing at Patreon.com/ThePopularPod. From the comedy of West Elm Caleb to the tragedy of an online antisemitism hunter: we reconvened with the Internet's finest anthropologist, Katherine Dee/Default Friend, to discuss how the dynamics of digital media code our personal lives and politics today. Our case studies are the mass TikTok call out of an undistinguished New York fuckboy, and the suicide of a well-liked Humanities lecturer whose online life had become a vigilante mission against Jeremy Corbyn's Left. PLUS how the Left and Right are responding to the problem of digital media ownership.

Jack Crum of 404Tales joins me for a conversation about internet ethnographies, the history of Tumblr, and what nobody had the balls to say about #GamerGate.Theme: The Great Fairy Fountain Etude

Happy New Years, Motherfuckers! For the first show of 2022, Adam, Will and reoccurring guest host Sandra are joined by writer Katherine Dee, aka Default Friend, specifically to discuss the limitations of the "dissident" branded publishers that have sprouted up throughout Covid in response to a renewed enthusiasm for anti-mainstream thought. Can there be genuine dissidence when art is tethered to political backing of any kind? Who the fuck knows. Whatever. We also talk about cinema and celebrity and plastic surgery and Zac Efron's fake jaw making him look like a mongoloid. Sorry for the hella fucked up audio on this one, the Chinese spy software wasn't functioning properly. This is a PREVIEW of the final episode, the full show is available to patrons only, which you can find here Soundtrack: Zoviet France “Something Spooked The Horses”  Brenoritvrezorkre “Borarp”  Ornette Coleman “Bird Food”  The Four Tops “Bernadette”  Walkingseeds “666 Squadron”  Butthole Surfers "Concubine"  Links: Katherine Dee at Twitter: @default_friend Katherine at Substack Katherine Dee "A Critique of Right Wing Art" Katherine Dee at Unherd

WARNING: This episode's audio quality is exceptionally, exceptionally bad. Special thanks to Will Kraus for cleaning it up. In future episodes, I'll be using a better mic.Is a journalist who reports on virtual events that happen in a virtual world still a journalist? If you choose to present yourself as a rabbit online, does that say anything meaningful about who you really are? I spoke with Peter Ludlow, founder of The Alphaville Herald about living your life—fully online.Referenced articles:Raking muck in "The Sims Online" by Farhad Manjoo (Salon, 2003)Evangeline: Interview with a Child cyber-Prostitute in TSO by Peter Ludlow (2003)A Real-Life Debate On Free Expression In a Cyberspace City by Amy Harmon (2004)

Somehow, we never posted this excellent episode. I think this might be the last episode that we recorded together before the hiatus. -- Default FriendThe birds are chirping, the Gchats are pinging, and Default Friend and the Personality Girl interview the inimitable Tao Lin. TPG and Tao talk glyphosate; DF mixes up Terence McKenna and Timothy Leary; the three reverse engineer themselves into accepting Traditionalism wholeheartedly.

TW: a bit of discussion of eating disorders! Hello, world and Happy Thanksgiving, America. On today's episode we talk to Katherine Dee, AKA @default_friend, about dating before apps, narrativizing our lives, pro-ana internet, sex positivity, porn, and of course, incels. Check out her substack: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/ and her podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/after-the-orgy/id1560522568 ——————————————————————— INCEL is created and produced by Naama Kates for Crawlspace Media. Music by Cyrus Melchor. —————————————————————— If you or someone you know is struggling emotionally, or having a hard time, please call someone, or contact one of the excellent resources provided below. —————————————————————— Suicide Prevention Lifeline w: https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ t: 1.800.273.8255 —————————————————————— Light Upon Light (with Parallel Networks) e: parallelnetworks@pnetworks.org t: 1.202.486.8633 —————————————————————— Please contact Naama at INCEL with any comments, inquiries, or just random thoughts: e: theincelproject@gmail.com --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/incel/support

In this episode, we talk with Katherine Dee aka Default Friend about how the marketplace of ideas is seeded by internet communities.. Specifically, the example of Tumblr feeding attitudes towards social justice on college campuses. We also talk about social atomization and the future of the internet. Katherine blogs at https://defaultfriend.substack.com/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=substack_profile

Sex Positivity / Banning Porn / Addiction / Religion CREW: CRK (@BLCKD_COM_PILLD) / SLAV (@TrustWorthySlav) / COH (@in_cohgnito) GUEST: Katherine Dee (@default_friend) PART 2 ON PATREON: www.patreon.com/posts/ep-76-bonus-feat-57102295 Recorded: 9/26/21

Katherine Dee is an internet historian and writer based in the Midwest. You might also know her as Default Friend on Twitter. Jordan Jensen is from upstate NY where she started started doing stand up then after a brief love affair with Nashville, she moved to Brooklyn where she was selected to be a new face of Just for Laughs Comedy Festival. She is a Comedy Cellar regular and opens for Louis CK. 

Katherine Dee is an internet historian and writer based in the Midwest. You might also know her as Default Friend on Twitter. Jordan Jensen is from upstate NY where she started started doing stand up then after a brief love affair with Nashville, she moved to Brooklyn where she was selected to be a new face of Just for Laughs Comedy Festival. She is a Comedy Cellar regular and opens for Louis CK. 

Cheaper than a pint - help us keep making this stuff by subscribing today at Patreon.com/ThePopularPod. Subcultural spaces associated with the far right - from GamerGate to 4Chan - have attracted endless analysis. But what about their radical liberal cousin? The guys kicked back with Katherine Dee to revisit Tumblr: Obama-era clickbait journalism's favourite source of anthropological adventures, as well as the laboratory for many mores around sex, identity, and politics today.

Kat is joined by Katherine Dee, a.k.a. Default Friend, for a conversation about Tumblr's discursive power and lesser-known internet subcultures .Katherine's work:Default WisdomTumblr U.Satire in the cityKatherine Dee (@default_friend)Advertising campaign for American Horror Story illustrating the tumblr-to-TV pipeline: 15 Times "AHS: Cult" Did It's Best To Make You TrypophobicTumblr's proto-#MeTooing of John Green: John Green Responded On Tumblr To Accusations Of Sexual AbuseA NYT essay from the creator of the "problematic fave" callout blog: I Was Your Fave Is Problematic See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit femchaospod.substack.com/subscribe

Kat is joined by Katherine Dee, a.k.a. Default Friend, for a conversation about Tumblr's discursive power and lesser-known internet subcultures .Katherine's work:Default WisdomTumblr U.Satire in the cityKatherine Dee (@default_friend)Advertising campaign for American Horror Story illustrating the tumblr-to-TV pipeline: 15 Times "AHS: Cult" Did It's Best To Make You TrypophobicTumblr's proto-#MeTooing of John Green: John Green Responded On Tumblr To Accusations Of Sexual AbuseA NYT essay from the creator of the "problematic fave" callout blog: I Was Your Fave Is Problematic See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Chase Geiser Is Joined By Katherine Dee. Katherine Dee (@default_friend) is a writer and the Co-host of "After The 0rgy". Episode Links: Chase's Twitter: @RealChaseGeiser Katherine's Twitter: @Default_Friend Katherine's Substack: https://defaultfriend.substack.com/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/oneamerican/support