Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion

by Jia Tolentino

The I In the Internet

the internet determining, rather than reflecting, the worst of modern life

hashtag design has shaped so much of political discourse

The infinite scroll

it is essential that social media is mostly unsatisfying. that is what keeps us scrolling

no limit to the amount of misfortune a person could take in via the internet

Uniformity and streamlining and context collapse

no way to teach ourselves to separate the banal from the profound

Personal branding

We have to have our dark corners and the unexplained

online, your audience can hypothetically keep expanding forever, and the performance never has to end

actual selfhood embraces culpability, inconsistency, and insignificance

The assumption that speech has an impact

the assumption that speech has an impact, that it’s something like action; the assumption that it’s fine or helpful or even ideal to be constantly writing down what you think

people wrote about women “speaking out” with prayerful reverence, as if speech itself could bring women freedom — as if better policies and economic redistribution and true investment from men weren’t necessary, too.

the representation of an activity will vary in some degree from the activity itself and therefore inevitably misrepresent it

both-sides arguments like this are always appealing to people who wish to seem both contrarian and intellectually superior

Toxic and extremist internet communities

rather than work toward other forms of self-actualization, they established a group identity that centered on anti-woman virulence

credit women with a maximum of power that they did not actually possess

#yesallwomen not all men have made women fearful, but yes, all women have experienced fear because of men

feminist solidarity and shared vulnerability inextricable, as if we were incapable of building solidarity around anything else

Reality TV Me

ordinary personhood would seamlessly readjust itself around whatever within it would sell

too conscious of what “Jia” would do in this situation — that I’m in danger of becoming a “character to myself”

“I don’t want to get famous for this bullshit. I want to get famous for writing a book.”

Always Be Optimizing

the ideal woman always believes she came up with herself on her own >he needs to eat his twelve-dollar salad in ten minutes because he needs the extra time to keep functioning within the job that allows him to afford a regular twelve-dollar salad in the first place. he feels a physical need for this twelve-dollar salad as it’s the most reliable and convenient way to build up a vitamin barrier against the general malfunction that comes with his salad-requiring-and-enabling job

imagining beauty as a matter of hard work and entrepreneurship, the American Dream

the logic of beauty as an ethical ideal

Glossier — idealize beauty that appears to require almost no intervention

the default assumption is that it is politically important to designate everyone as beautiful

instead of trying to be more radiant for our husbands, we can now counsel one another to do all the same things but for ourselves

relentless self-improvement as natural, mandatory, and feminist — or just, without question, the best way to live

“enclothed cognition” clothes that come with cultural scripts can actually alter cognitive functions

the best way to instill a cultural value is to eroticize it

we pay too much for the things we think are precious, but we also start to believe things are precious if someone makes us pay too much

there are rewards for succeeding under capitalism and patriarchy

we have not “optimized” our wages, our childcare system, our political representation

it’s possible if we want it. but what do we want?

Pure Heroines

stories are episodic rather than accumulative, and so sadness and fear are rooms to be passed through, existing alongside mishap and indulgence and joy

a wedding signifies the end of individual desire

their desires evolve to fit their life

because the girls are not allowed to socialize, the boys observe them not as peers but as dolls in a display case — The Virgin Suicides

just because the question can be answered doesn’t mean that I ought to answer it, or that it ought to be asked. the interviewer’s question presumed that women should have children, and that a woman’s reproductive activities were naturally public business. more fundamentally, the question assumed that there was only one proper way for a woman to live.”

heroes are mostly unhappy for existential reasons; heroines suffer for social reasons, because of male power

Ecstasy

it’s hard to draw the line between taking pleasure in God’s purpose and aligning God’s purpose with what I take pleasure in

The Story of a Generation in Seven Scams

the basic idea here is that photogenic personal confidence is the key to unlocking the riches of the world

a feminism that prioritizes the individual will always, at its core, be at odds with a feminism that prioritizes the collective

whenever women and minorities are allowed to be their own Bezos, it will hardly be a victory for anyone at all

We Come from Old Virginia

would have cast doubts upon my masculinity

institutions, by definition, are not natural or primal. they are not just what happens when you let boys be boys. they are created and sustained for a reason. they do work.

The Cult of the Difficult Woman

“feminist coverage” = fair coverage

the line between valuing a woman in the face of mistreatment and valuing her because of that mistreatment is blurring, if it’s possible to praise a woman specifically because she is criticized

to argue against an ideology, you have to acknowledge and articulate it

their success is forever refracted through those obstacles

a displeasure at the lack of unruliness, at the disappointment of watching women adhere to the most predictable guidelines of what a woman should be

the freedom I want is located in a world where we wouldn’t need to love women

where female difficulty now seems perverse, the refusal of difficulty now seems perverse

I Thee Dread

weddings are frequently slanted as the most special day of her life, if not necessarily his

woman lies in wait

she becomes less happy than she would be if she was single

ring to signify male ownership

the person who will invest most in this process is the bride to be

what are we all ever doing except playing a part that fulfills a role at its appropriate time?

when I curled up to him in the mornings I felt like a baby sea lion climbing on a sunlit rock

careers taking priority over their spouse’s careers

we find it inappropriate for women to treat their names the way that men, by default, feel entitled to

a woman is allowed to assert her independence as long as it doesn’t affect anyone else

like any social construct, marriage is most flexible when it is new (gay couples)

I wonder if women would accept the unequal diminishment of their independence without their sense of self-importance being overinflated first

in the end, the safest conclusions may not actually be conclusions

I have always accommodated everything I wish I was opposed to

the beauty myth by naomi wolf

perfect me by heather widows

perelandra by c.s. lewis

the company he keeps by nicholas syrett

the book of the city of ladies by christine de pizan

marriage, a history by stephanie coontz