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It feels like an impossible task to describe the vibe of 2025. Gesturing broadly became a thing because how can you possibly sum up what’s happening, let alone how you feel about it, in a few words? Everything is happening, all at once, and it’s mostly bad (and indescribably stupid).
But Jia Tolentino put it all into words:
Fake images of real people, real images of fake people; fake stories about real things, real stories about fake things. Fake words creeping like kudzu into scientific papers and dating profiles and e-mails and text messages and news outlets and social feeds and job listings and job applications. Fake entities standing guard over chat boxes when we try to dispute a medical bill, waiting sphinxlike for us to crack the code that allows us to talk to a human. The words blur and the images blur and a permission structure is erected for us to detach from reality—first for a moment, then a day, a week, an election season, maybe a lifetime.