The Buyer

I’ve been feeling awfully paralytic as of late. There is a black hole in my head that sucks up my ambition to do anything other than scroll Instagram reels. Craven cadres of highly paid, brilliant engineers and designers on both coasts are hard at work, tirelessly extracting every ounce of engagement from the atavistic, reactionary animal within us all. Alas, since nobody in America has any new ideas, the good people at Meta, Snap, and Alphabet have all decided to absorb the same attention-sucking interaction model. 

An element of grasping has always been within the American dream, but I think the advent of the the 401(k) and RSUs have given people a more sublimated way of quietly circling in place for years on end. When you get a secure gig, you grip onto that thing for dear life, damn everyone else who might want your place, and damn trying to disagree with whatever the instantaneous market moment is, however mercurial and myopic it might be. I can’t blame them for it.

The sensation of watching a line go up cannot be undersold. If I ever saw an engagement line of mine go up, I think I would ride that line far further than I might assume I would. It is the line that leads the entirety of humanity to do anything.

The Seller

In the writing and publishing world, there’s something known as “writing to market,” which is essentially a prerequisite to ascertaining any semblance of success. It makes sense—and on the face of it. Mold your writing based on what the market says it wants, and you are more likely to succeed and get your writing read. 

It’s the classic relationship between a buyer and a seller that has operated quite well for quite a while, for well-worn reasons. Indeed, having money in your pocket is one of the most powerful feelings of the human experience, surpassing even the sensation of watching a line go up. (A line going up means anything insofar as it correlates to the line in your bank account going up.) Another, almost equally captivating sensation is to own something shiny, something that makes your life easier, or something that lets you see an aspect of the world differently. 

In light of these observations, for something to succeed, it needs to be sold. I have previously rejected this notion, and a part of me still does. But there is a burgeoning, deeply tired element in me that understands that, at some point, if you never reach an audience, well, who’s the one really “quietly circling in place for years on end,” then?

And while misanthropy could be on the rise, it will never be something the whole market will want to buy. I wonder why.

A pivotal part of selling is giving the buyer what they want, which is often to feel better about themselves. I may not even agree with that, but it is broadly true. It is why the interaction design of Instagram Reels, YouTube Shorts, and TikTok is so ubiquitous. I might protest that I don’t want it afterward, but my actions indicate otherwise. Swiping is a salve for the tired soul. The algorithm is your personal liaison that curates and serves up delicious candied morsels on a platter during your lunch break between shifts consisting of eating shit for hours on end. Perhaps misanthropy is not in vogue, but paralysis might be—which might be why I’m writing this, even if the market won’t feed it into people’s endless feed.