Welcome to The Internet—Bo Burnham
#365Songs: December 28th
Welcome to the internet
Have a look around
Anything that brain of yours can think of can be found
We’ve got mountains of content
Some better, some worse
If none of it’s of interest to you, you’d be the first
Welcome to the internet
Come and take a seat
Would you like to see the news or any famous women’s feet?
There’s no need to panic
This isn’t a test, haha
Just nod or shake your head and we’ll do the rest
The blank page doesn’t scare me anymore. What was once daunting is now exciting, an unencumbered ‘anything is possible’ feeling that opens me up to explore whatever’s on my mind.
Until now, a day when I’ve demanded of myself a hopeful essay about the next year.
“Do not obey in advance.” — Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny
I guess I’ll start here: I deactivated all but Substack and LinkedIn on the night of the election — and I’ve only kept the latter because it’s theoretically a place to network and find freelance work, though even that’s gotten toxic, political, and ineffective. What began as a way to connect, share photos, and inspire one another became algorithmic, exploitative ad platforms meant to reshape how we see ourselves in order to fit within profit models. But I knew that long ago, and I stayed anyway.
No, it’s deeper than that. I’ve also spent most of the past 15 years working within tech companies, a cog in the “we’re changing the world” machine — even as I, too, turned my eyes away from what was really going, even as I shut down my own inherent skepticism of capitalism. And we certainly changed the world, for the benefit of a few at the expense of all. Never has that been more clear than now.
But again, it’s even deeper than that. Despite all its flaws, even the most nefarious tech companies were once populated with some values-minded employees, and cultures were built to sustain open dialogue. At least for a while. That changed over time. I’ve never been quiet, whether on the inside or outside, about asking the tougher questions: what are the unintended consequences, is this decision aligned to the suggested company values, etc… During the first Trump years, I worked for a company that resisted his worst policies. Even before that, at Facebook, a weekly Q&A with Zuckerberg established an open forum where employees could challenge his decisions — for every nefarious initiative there was a vocal counterculture. Speaking up was seen as caring, not as disloyalty worthy of termination. They often didn’t listen, and did it anyway, but there was a sense that resistance was possible.
That was the first change I noticed, and experienced firsthand. Speak up and you’ll lose your job, thus burning down the ‘town square’ spirit that kept tech from delivering their most damaging ideas. Not to say that horrible decisions weren’t made during those more open culture days: Facebook and Instagram allowed viral misformation during the 2016 election, mishandled the pandemic, and ignored dire Instagram data about a teenage mental health crisis that they didn’t just create, but exploited — even as hundreds of employees pushed back in those same open sessions.
Then, the biggest red flag: tech founders began funding Trump’s campaign to serve their own interests, asking for deregulation in return, ensuring that all those terrifying but immensely profitable ideas come to life. And the apolitical founders, like Bezos and Zuckerberg, started throwing their own weight around — limiting the spread of real news in favor of viral falsehood, and halted meaningful endorsements to please the master. In the past month, they’ve all visited Mar a Lago, even promised money for the inaugural celebration.
And finally, when you dig into the numbers in cities like New York and San Francisco, you’ll see a sharp several-point turn towards Trump. Finance and tech hubs, filled with talent who’ll trade your rights for more pay.
And now there’s nobody left to resist.
Welcome to the internet
What would you prefer?
Would you like to fight for civil rights or tweet a racial slur?
Be happy
Be horny
Be bursting with rage
We got a million different ways to engage
Welcome to the internet
Put your cares aside
Here’s a tip for straining pasta
Here’s a nine-year-old who died
We got movies, and doctors, and fantasy sports
And a bunch of colored pencil drawings
Of all the different characters in Harry Potter fucking each other
Welcome to the internet
So you’re probably wondering where the hope lives in all of this… Yeah, I don’t know either, but I have a theory that an implosion is on the way. Here’s how.
1. Cognitive exhaustion. As soon as Trump is inaugurated, your feeds will be filled with chaos and backlash, and those first few mornings when the bad news floods one tweet, story, and post at time, boom boom boom, our collective PTSD will kick in, the “I can’t do this again” instincts will (hopefully) create a mass fleeing. Social media is meant to be a distraction, after all — from work, monotony, boredom, life — not a deeper dive into the doom spiral.
Trump, Musk, and his cronies want attention. When you don’t give it to them, they melt down. So it’s easy: tune them out.
2. Shark attacks. Trump’s mistake, this time, is that he filled his little pond with too many sharks. Narcissists can’t tolerate other narcissists, as there’s only so much oxygen in the room to steal. There’s already signs of a Musk / Trump implosion, and any sign that their questionable governing starts to impact quarterly earnings, the same tech leaders who just masturbated Trump’s campaign will turn on him so fast and create an all-out billionaire shark attack.
3. Reality. MAGA voters are already up in arms about Elon’s turn of phrase around immigration, that it’s okay to bring in “foreigners” for engineering jobs. Trump ran on an Americans-only message, and he’ll learn real fast that our entire food system, and manufacturing economy, is held up by the very people he proclaims to deport. The promise of tariffs, if realized, will raise inflation, lower the stock market, and make everything more expensive — which leads us back to the “Shark attacks” after the first earnings reports hit those billionaire bank accounts. And, when they roll back social programs that the poorest Americans (read: MAGA voters) rely on, whether they know it or not, and billionaires get even richer, they’ll begin asking the right questions for the first time in their lives. (Ok ok, I don’t buy that one, either.)
4. Violence. This is a dark point, and while I certainly hope it doesn’t happen, there are so many signs right now that Trump will, in fact, prosecute his enemies. That’ll likely lead to upheaval in the streets, which will lead Trump to honor his other promise: sending the military, and his militias, into cities. This will test some loyalties amongst Trump’s “he’s all talk, he’ll never do that” voters, particularly those who either live, or have family, in those cities. He’s also threatening takeovers of Panama, Greenland, and, uh, Canada, and he’ll put the most loyal military generals to the test. How far will they be willing? We’ll find out.
Hold on to your socks
’Cause a random guy just kindly sent you photos of his cock
They are grainy and off-putting
He just sent you more
Don’t act surprised, you know you like it, you whore
See a man beheaded
Get offended, see a shrink
Show us pictures of your children
Tell us every thought you think
Start a rumor, buy a broom
Or send a death threat to a boomer
Or DM a girl and groom her
Do a Zoom or find a tumor in your
Here’s a healthy breakfast option
You should kill your mom
Here’s why women never fuck you
Here’s how you can build a bomb
Which Power Ranger are you?
Take this quirky quiz
Obama sent the immigrants to vaccinate your kids
Resistance and counter-movements work in actual democracies, but become a whole lot bloodier and more dangerous under Facism or Dictatorial administrations. The Women’s Marches and Black Lives Matter rallies of the first Trump term won’t be possible this time, sadly. Peaceful organization is an echo chamber, and those who need to hear it most won’t hear the echo. And resistance messages on social media sites won’t be heard, because algorithms are approved by the same leaders who put their money on Trump.
And that leaves us with silence — though don’t mistake that for complicity.
I’ve never been an advocate for apathy, but I think the best resistance against Trump is to give him all the space he needs to blow himself up. He will go too far, many times, and his voters will feel the pain of their own vote. And it will be very, very painful, predominantly for the most vulnerable populations. That’s not to say we don’t create safe spaces, the best we can. But this isn’t 2017 or 2020, and this is not the same Donald Trump. The damage was done the moment he wasn’t prosecuted for insurrection, the moment he was allowed to run again, the moment 53% of Americans voted him back in. The pain is coming no matter what we do, but if we can find our safe spaces and hide away for a while, and Trump just does what Trump will inevitably do, he’ll find new and innovative ways to do what he does best: bankrupt himself at our expense.
And there will be art, lots and lots of art, and new leaders will rise from the ashes, somehow, and, if we allow Trump to be Trump, his great grift will finally be revealed: that of course he never gave a shit about his supporters, who he doesn’t need ever again. Those voters have nothing on Trump, and therefore Trump has no reason to give them anything at all. But the billionaires don’t hand out money for free, and when OUR quiet protests start losing THEM money, Trump will have no choice but to cater to them at the expense of everyone else.
Apathy’s a tragedy
And boredom is a crime
Anything and everything
All of the time
Could I interest you in everything?
All of the time?
A little bit of everything
All of the time
Apathy’s a tragedy
And boredom is a crime
Anything and everything
All of the time
You know, it wasn’t always like this
Ok, ok, ok. I’m a fiction writer who has spent the past year preparing for America’s decline into Fascism. You can’t expect me to suddenly have hope three weeks before a Fascist takes office. Do I think this scenario is possible, and that it’s enough, to save us from a free fall? Sure, but it’s unlikely. I suspect it’ll be a whole, whole lot worse. But hope lives within the plans you make for how you handle it, for who you rally around, for the actions you take to counter it, for the more vulnerable communities you support, for the art you make. That won’t happen on social media, but it’ll happen in bookstores and bars and homes and campuses and diners and wherever you choose to go. It’ll happen by choosing wisely where you spend your money, and your time, ensuring that those on the wrong side feel your resistance in the way they care most: corporate profits.
During his first presidency, everything was a surprise. This time, anything is possible. Last time, we had some power, the checks and balances were still in place, and civil disobedience was still a realistic way to resist. We burned that all down when we lost the Supreme Court, and again when we became the minority voter.
All I’ll say, if I’ve learned anything from my time in tech and the past two months living a more analog life: hope isn’t online, it’s offline, with real people in actual communities. I may sound old, but damn, life sure was better before the Internet.
Could I interest you in everything?
All of the time?
A little bit of everything
All of the time
Not very long ago
Just before your time
Right before the towers fell, circa ‘99
This was catalogs
Travel blogs
A chat room or two
We set our sights and spent our nights
Waiting
For you, you, insatiable you
Mommy let you use her iPad
You were barely two
And it did all the things
We designed it to do
Now look at you, oh
Look at you, you, you
Unstoppable, watchable
Your time is now
Your inside’s out
Honey, how you grew
And if we stick together
Who knows what we’ll do
It was always the plan
To put the world in your hand
Hahaha
Could I interest you in everything?
All of the time
A bit of everything
All of the time
Apathy’s a tragedy
And boredom is a crime
Anything and everything
All of the time
Could I interest you in everything?
All of the time
A little bit of everything
All of the time
Apathy’s a tragedy
And boredom is a crime
Anything and everything
And anything and everything
And anything and everything
And all of the time
~
Start following the #365Songs playlist today, and listen to each new song with each new article!
Follow me on Substack: https://thefogandthefury.substack.com/
