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it’s bad that it increasingly feels like everyone has to be a TV host now if they want to stay gainfully employed

I’ve been thinking a lot about how the cultural freak-out over television rotting brains in the mid-20th-century (exemplified by Mike Teavee from Willy Wonka) was somewhat overblown at the time, but now seems disturbingly relevant to our current moment in 2026

I really need to carve out some time to sit down and review more 20th century cultural criticism of TV - as a kid in the 90s, I recall getting this message most vividly from Calvin and Hobbes. Calvin would, of course, be addicted to YouTube gamer/mascot horror slop if the strip was made today.

Naomi Klein’s Doppelganger wrestles pretty directly with these questions about personal brand in a terminally online world, if you haven’t checked it out