Tumblr is renowned for being the original hellsite. Most users on Tumblr call it so in an affectionate manner: a testament to how the site has become a strange comfort zone for users, one that grew on them like mold. While Tumblr has its tendency to grow on users, it is infamously known to be fairly dead. Despite that claim, however, the website does seem to be alive to some capacity. It is worth questioning: will this website ever actually die? By answering this, the website’s convoluted history reveals something crucial to shaping a site’s life and culture. A Cringe History Tumblr is distinct from many other forms of popular social media. As a microblogging platform, Tumblr relies heavily on users personalizing their blogs, creating new content for each of their interests, and interacting with one another as a social media platform. One of the big giants in delivering that engagement and content is fandom culture. Thus, fandoms have occupied a huge part of Tumblr from the start. Historically, Tumblr’s fandoms have had one main trend that has powered the website through the 2010s. Perhaps not so surprisingly, it is a meme of the ages. “Superwholock” was a large but brief phenomenon in the early 2010s. While Tumblr did not invent fandoms, Superwholock was one of the first crossover collaborations between fandoms that profoundly made an impact on internet culture. A mix of three large fandoms (Supernatural, Doctor Who, and BBC Sherlock), the trend was made almost universal on Tumblr. The popularity of this collaboration even led to several users complaining that there was no way to scroll through content without encountering at least one reference to it. This was peak fandom culture on Tumblr, fostered by creativity and connection. And yet the large movement fell apart in an instant in late 2014. Though there are many reasons as to why, one key event that broke Tumblr’s peak was the interference of the website staff, after Yahoo bought Tumblr during its peak period. Under the new management, the tagging system quickly spiraled out of order, along with the filtering system. More importantly, though, changes in the website coding caused reblogs to have more weight than likes in exposure. The unfortunate part about this change was that people did not reblog posts more than they liked them. Since the reblogs had an unskippable pop-up with the option of adding onto a post, users had to click twice to reblog anything (unlike X/Twitter, which has an immediate repost option). Liking was an easier alternative to show appreciation than reblogs, so users largely used likes to mark which posts they enjoyed. But since Tumblr was a website that functioned heavily on reblogs for user interaction, the visibility of posts was greatly affected. The imbalance between the ratio of likes and reblogs, compounded with the problem of reblogs being given more exposure weight destroyed the ability of Tumblr’s fandom audience to connect with each other. Yahoo’s NSFW (Not Safe For Work) content ban exacerbated matters. This change impeded interactions on the website because the ban turned out to be largely ineffectual: the ban flagged posts that were SFW as well. The ineptness of the embargo became such a large problem that it drove content creators off the website, regardless of whether they approved of the NSFW ban or not. With the platform’s ability of creating connections and encouraging creativity severely compromised, many users left the website. All in all, these changes made the creative culture of the community ultimately crumble—which meant that big collaborations such as Superwholock were no longer possible. The Perpetual(?) Cycle of TumblrTumblr was considered fairly dead by 2018. Despite this, the people who remained on Tumblr adapted to the new landscape. The community on Tumblr continues to thrive in the year of 2023. The vacuum left behind by Superwholock is filled by other fandoms, such as Homestuck, various anime fandoms, and most recently, Good Omens and Our Flag Means Death. The Tumblr culture continues to live on as it did in the 2010s with Superwholock—by continuously generating fandom content, interacting with others on the platform and collaborating on a smaller scale, and so on. The core components of what made Superwholock such a huge phenomenon have continued to power the website. The creativity of the users allows new content to be created, which in turn prompts others to join in. People can engage actively with the content and its creators, which in turn sparks creativity on both sides. The two components bouncing off of one another is what makes Tumblr a goldmine for fandom people—explaining how Superwholockians managed to become so widespread back in the day. This relay effect of creativity and connection on Tumblr is represented best in reblog chains. While ask boxes can offer one-on-one interaction with content creators, reblogs make up most of the connectivity on the platform. The chains often create richer content than simply posting a single image or fanfic. Various posts are often reblogged through many communities, with many people adding their own drawings and short writing. Thus, a whole new form of content is made via website-user collaboration. As such, the way creativity and connection can interact with each other on Tumblr is testament to how a website gains its value: through user engagement and an environment that can foster a culture that keeps users connected to one another. This is essentially how an online culture is created. By having many users actively participate in the cycle and by continuing efforts to maintain an environment that is appropriate for the key components of the platform culture, a website’s lifespan can be lengthened. The Inevitable EndAs productive as Tumblr’s creativity-connection cycle is, it is undeniable that it will also eventually come to an end. A website’s popularity will reach its peak, then eventually drop until it becomes obsolete. Tumblr is past its peak popularity; the culture as a whole lacks the momentum it had in the previous decade. Following the large exit of users in the 2010s, Tumblr’s user base has been in a decline. However, Tumblr is not quite dead yet as many claim. Rather, it is currently in a simmer period, or a time when the past peak point is powering the website for an extended period of time. Unfortunately, the website’s own management does not assist in continuing to foster the culture that made Tumblr so popular in its heyday. Tumblr’s major method of community engagement being reblogs is ineffective on a user base that is slowly shrinking. Compared to X, where likes can also have the potential to cause posts to pop up on a user’s dashboard, Tumblr’s reblog-based system is not that effective. The newer addition of post recommendations on a user’s dash (based on a user’s followed tags) is rather hit-or-miss with how engaging it is. Since users on Tumblr are not as actively involved as they were in the 2010s, people are less likely to reblog as rapidly as they used to. More than often, a post’s like to reblog ratio is unfortunately skewed towards the likes, which does not allow users to interact with a wider audience. That, coupled with the ineffective content embargos, has both ends of the creativity-connection cycle rapidly fraying. This can effectively cut the simmer period short, as it did for Tumblr’s peak period. Basically, Tumblr’s administrative efforts to mold it into something else was ill-suited to its user base. Though some adapted to the implemented changes, the damage has already been done. The coding is less user-interaction-friendly, and the implemented content bans not only cut off a type of creative outlet but also interfere with other types of content. The two components of Tumblr culture are effectively cut off, and ultimately foreshadow the website’s inevitable end. The Colors of TumblrX users flocking out of the website back to Tumblr has brought a moment of “Tumblr revival” talk, and it does look like Tumblr has become a tolerable form of social media compared to some other hellsites. But in the long run, the death of Tumblr is simply inescapable. Even with that peak moment acting as a backbone of the modern day Tumblr, Tumblr will most likely meet its end under a slowly malfunctioning cycle of creativity and connection. Based on this evidence, it can be seen that an online culture at its peak can easily crumble if the environment the culture stands in is forced to undergo changes that stifle the culture’s functioning. While exemplified best by Tumblr, the fact is that every website management has the risk of stifling a platform’s culture to the point of counterproductive management. Therefore, the most important part of theplatform managers’ part is to carefully examine the type of culture the website users cultivate and create something surrounding it. As such, while the age of Tumblr is now coming to an end, it is worth thinking about the lessons it can teach the future platforms that will replace it.

I was blessed with an opportunity to hike in the Karakoram range in Pakistan this summer. My friends and I trekked from Askole to the K2 Base Camp, over Gondogoro La pass, and finally to our last stop – Khaplu. We were a group of six, with a staff of 15—including a guide, cooks, porters and horsemen who accompanied us, or rather, enabled this trip to happen. It was an eye-opening and humbling experience because I was acutely reminded of my own smallness in the face of sublime nature, as well as people who were greater than me in body and heart. But one thing troubled me during the journey—the realization that I was so dependent on the people who came with us, yet hardly knew them. Desiring to reach the base camp and complete the journey without accident, the other people assisting us—however intimately—blended into oblivion as ‘background characters. ’ So immersed in my own thoughts and emotions, admittedly, through the difficulties of the hike, it didn’t even occur to me to find out the names of the porters who carried our bags for the whole trip. It was only after the 11 days of the trip, when I wanted to call out to them for a photograph together, that I realized I didn’t know the name of the assistant cook who had filled up our water bottles every morning and every night. I only knew him as “the cook’s brother” or “the guy who is younger than me”. The moment of realization was also a dawning moment of humiliation. In my pursuit, I had become so narrowly focused on a goal that I failed to consider and see that others were also on the same journey as I was. Actually, do we not all have this experience—especially in our travels—of people becoming a means of our own happiness?Travel problematicsIn A Small Place, Antiguan-American writer Jamaica Kincaid throws shade on tourists in her homeland of Antigua, and by extension, to tourists around the world. To Kincaid, tourists are ugly beings who derive pleasure from being plucked from the “banality” of their existence in their own homes, to be transported to a carefully constructed and barricaded land of their fantasies. Their destination is a place where they can escape the responsibilities of the place they come from, as well as to the place they are now. The tourists’ enjoyment lies in their ability to distance themselves from their location—the tourist is blind, ignorant, and willingly so, to the reality of life for the people around them. Enjoyment is contingent on the maintenance of this imagined fantasy land as a place that exists for the tourist and nothing else. Tensions between tourists and locals in Hawaii are a good case in point for the disconnect between the tourists and their destination. In August 2023, wildfires raged across Maui, one of the main islands of Hawaii, killing over 100 people and destroying over 2,200 structures, a tragedy that is expected to cost $5. 5 billion to rebuild. It was the worst natural disaster in Hawaii’s history, and the deadliest US wildfire in over a century. The disaster plunged the islands in mourning, trauma, and anger. A dilemma arose from the conundrum of what to do with the tourists. In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, Hawaiians took to social media to tell tourists to stay away. There was a public outcry as a snorkeling company continued its snorkeling tours in the name of raising funds for disaster relief, in the same waters where dead bodies were still being retrieved. The problem was the uncomfortable and contrasting picture of tourists blissfully holidaying right by the physical destruction and emotional devastation of the Hawaiians. Yet, the cry to keep tourists away was accompanied by another fear that they cannot keep tourists away—because tourism is Hawaii’s economic driver. Thus creating a situation where the economy is reliant on tourism, but the locals are uncomfortable with it. Such tensions have been long-standing in Hawaii, and the outbursts surrounding the recent disaster were a symptom, not a cause of it. Is travel all bad?Horror stories about tourists and scathingly disapproving views on tourism question our own implication in objectification, exploitation and voyeurism. Could the answer to the problematics of tourism—both on an individual and collective scale—be to stay at home at all costs, as Kincaid suggests? Could more good be done, both for the individual and for the world, if people simply stayed at home and did not travel at all? Yet voices from the very tourist destinations suggest otherwise. Just as the disconnect between tourists and the environment is the “problem” in tourism, things may be mended through a connection with the location again. John De Fries, the first Native Hawaiian leading the Tourism Authority of Hawaii, is not looking forward to eradicating tourism. In a 2022 interview with The New York Times (NYT), De Fries argues that Hawaii is not for Hawaiians, or at least, not just for Hawaiians. Rather, he points to the bidirectional relationship between tourists and locals—“local residents have a responsibility to host visitors in a way that is appropriate. Conversely, visitors have a responsibility to be aware that their destination is someone’s home, someone’s neighborhood, someone’s community. ” Likewise, in another 2020 interview with the NYT, Kyle Kajihiro, an activist and lecturer at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, lays out his intentions for tourists to think about for their stay: “Who are you in relation to this place? Are you bringing something that will be of value to the host, the people who live here? What will be your impact and your legacy be?”After all, the benefits of tourism cannot be denied as well. Tourism can help to preserve culture and heritage—by attracting traffic and attention to the very cultural sites that need preservation, thereby accumulating the financial resources required for cultural preservation. For the tourist, visiting these places provides a cultural understanding that transcends book knowledge—a moving of the heart that might not have happened if we stuck to our shores. In an article on dark tourism published in the National Geographic, journalist Robert Reid reflects that his most memorable travel experiences were to sites of macabre— concentration camps, sites of massacres, political assassinations, and battlefields. His experience in these places was a way for him to face the reality of the horrors of men which made history more real for him, and drove to the core of his heart an anti-war message that he would have already heard over and over again. To be harmless: Thoughtful and responsible tourismTourism boards and agencies are realizing that tourism, if it continues the way it is now, is not sustainable in the long run. An example is Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Renowned for its historical and cultural heritage and its beautiful waterways, Amsterdam has a strong tourism sector and has never had a shortage of visitors. Yet Amsterdam is the quintessential case of a victim of its own success. Problems of over tourism—including overcrowding, disrespectful behavior, and even the displacement of local people—have been a top concern for the city’s administrators for the past several years. However, Amsterdam sets itself apart for its active, and what could be considered severe, stance on tourism. In June 2021, it developed the “Tourism in Balance in Amsterdam” plan— a model of tourism designed for citizens and travelers to cohabit in symbiotic harmony, rather than an extractive relationship. And this vision has necessitated some boundaries and curbs on tourism, namely a maximum number of visitors. To maintain quality of life for residents, new tourist shops have been banned to maintain ‘shop diversity’. Holiday rentals are banned in 3 neighborhoods and large tour groups are also no longer allowed. The administration is also carrying out investigations on the tourism carrying capacity of the various districts of the city. The city also launched a “Stay Away” campaign to discourage visitors visiting Amsterdam from engaging in activities related to alcohol, drugs and sex. A digital advertisement shows ‘nuisance’ tourists being locked up with regret, with the blunt tagline reading “So coming to Amsterdam for a messy night? Stay Away”. These measures might seem harsh, but they are necessary boundaries to ensure that tourism is not at the expense of the locals, so that tourism can be sustainable in the long run. What could regulations, like that of Amsterdam to protect their residents from the detrimental effects of tourism, signal to us? Indeed, governments and corporations have the greatest power to enact change, but unlike in Amsterdam, decisions on tourism may not always be aligned to the welfare of local communities. As tourists, and accepting tourists in home countries ourselves, we can recognise that the locations we visit do not exist in a vacuum—existing solely to make us feel good about ourselves. The locations where we seek rest and leisure are homes to communities living their own lives on this earth; individuals and families work to gain a livelihood as we do, raise families as we do, with hopes, dreams and struggles as we do. Recognizing our common humanity would go a long way in making tourism empathic, responsible, and sustainable, because it introduces an attitude of care. Care for the places we visit and the people we meet. This attitude translates to a more thoughtful approach to traveling and more thought-out decisions whilst traveling: reading up on local laws and customs, checking attractions for human-rights records, choosing sustainable travel operators, making sure that the tourism dollar goes to local communities, avoiding contributing to over tourism and being intentional with photographs. For individuals and communities, it may be short-sighted to say that all globe-trotting is bad and harmful. Travel—even if not leisure travel—has brought benefits to individuals and communities: it can be a viable and sustainable means of income. Overall, cultural exchange has enlightened and broadened perspectives—for the betterness of the individual and the society. The problem could be boiled down to our attitudes and balance. How hosts and guests reap from the exchange depends on how they view each other. I remember one of my group members talking to our guide regarding the benefits of improving the infrastructure and regulations of the trekking tourism industry in Pakistan. As someone who had believed that tourism is inherently extractive (ironic, I admit), it did not occur to me that tourism could be a honorable and viable means of income to these regions. Measures, even severe ones, would need to be put in place to ensure that tourism does not amount to exploitation. Putting a cap on visitors, outlining trekking seasons, imposing fines and punishment for certain behaviors such as littering, and placing a firmer grip on trekking companies are some of the solutions to resolve harmful tourism practices that are already in place. Expectations of tourist behavior are also needed—just as tourists have expectations of their holiday experience. But if done correctly—through an emphasis on mutual respect and a vision of connectedness, tourism may avoid the tourist-centric trap, and be enriching and beneficial to both the hosts and visitors.

“Théâtre D’opéra Spatial” sounds like it is an 18th-century fancy French oil painting. It looks like an 18th-century fancy French oil painting. In reality, it is barely a year old. It is a piece of AI-generated artwork created by Jason M. Allen—which has won first prize in Colorado State Fair’s annual art competition, shocking people across the global art community. The fears have become reality: whether artists like it or not, AI art is slowly seeping its way into an industry once thought to be dominated by humans alone. One of the largest points of current contention in the art community concerns Artificial Intelligence. While barely a few months ago the differences between AI art and artist-drawn art were discernible, the differences are becoming rapidly non-existent. AI image generation has quickly surpassed expectations of generating random, funny images and has become sophisticated enough to create detailed art pieces. While AI-generated art may have been created for casual fun, it still has a significant impact on professional art. In fact, there is so much impact that people have very polarized opinions on the topic. One end of the spectrum argues that AI art is revolutionary. Kaloyan Chernev, the founder of Deep Dream Generator (a company specializing in AI), claims that AI is “rapidly approaching a level of sophistication and complexity that will allow it to generate highly realistic and nuanced images”. Chernev also suggests that AI-based content will not only assist in bettering the art field but also enable new forms of artistic expression. More neutral opinions put forth various ideas on the matter. One of the larger opinion groups suggests that AI, with a faster pace at creating images than artists, can be used in industries and companies that value maximal efficiency. Corporations would thus profit greatly in time and money by using algorithms over artists. While artists take hours to months to create a single piece, algorithms only take minutes to produce artwork with a few typed words. Thus, the production of artwork takes less time and in turn, allows more time to be used on other projects. Economic efficiency is achieved as well, as companies do not need to hire extra artists if they choose to use AI-produced art instead. Such predictions are not in the far future; they have already happened. Nestlé has utilized AI-generated art of Vemeer’s “The Milkmaid” to promote La Laitière yogurt, and large companies such as Google are jumping into the scene to create algorithms for the specific purpose of generating art. Some also suggest that AI art will not degrade or harm the industry of artist-drawn art since AI art will not be able to catch up to the level of works done by humans. Others still advocate the idea that AI art will become irrelevant in the future, just as NFTs have in a short time. On the other end of the spectrum, there are artists who strongly oppose the use of AI-generated images, claiming that it devalues the work of artists. Dapo Adeola, winner of the Illustrator of the Year at the 2022 British Book Awards, says that “the increasing use of AI will also lead to a devaluing of the work of artists”. As negative prejudice regarding creativity-focused industries already exists, “something like this reinforces an argument that what we do is easy and we shouldn’t be able to earn the money we command”. With the worries of artists on the rise, many solutions have been proposed to alleviate this anxiety. One such solution, a new tool for artists, was introduced on March 31, 2023. Glaze, created by a team of Chicago University students, professors, and professional artists, is designed to protect digitally drawn art from mimicry. Artists are suing algorithm companies for mimicking their art styles. Notably, late South Korean illustrator Kim Jung Gi’s art style was copied by an AI software, which was met with large disdain. Glaze was developed to prevent art style copying. Glaze works as follows: it uses a style-transfer AI to recreate the original image in the style of past artists. The styled images are then used as part of a computation, through which the end result maximizes patterns that algorithms will use instead of the original artist’s style. The result adds very small changes to an artist’s artwork before the art is posted online. While the changes are hardly able to be discerned by the human eye, the small details still effectively work as a "style cloak", preventing any algorithms from mimicking the artist’s style. The reactions to this program are starkly divided, with arguments over art-related AI, in general, becoming heightened. Artists who want their art protected from AI celebrate the introduction of such a tool. From their perspective, they are able to produce art without worrying about art theft, with minimal changes to their artwork. However, not all welcome Glaze. People who use AI to create art and develop their algorithms are angry that images that use Glaze, if added to the database, will muddy the results for their programs. What is more, is that the developers of Glaze admit that this tool can only be useful in the short term. According to the project website, "Unfortunately, Glaze is not a permanent solution against AI mimicry. AI evolves quickly, and systems like Glaze face an inherent challenge of being future-proof. Techniques we use to cloak artworks today might be overcome by a future countermeasure, possibly rendering previously protected art vulnerable". In other words, if the art community continues with polarized stances on AI, the future can easily lead to an endless race of algorithms finding new ways to use art for their database and tools being developed as countermeasures against them. With all this taken into consideration, the core issue of AI art is clear. In the process of trying to find a foothold in the art community, it is mainly trying to replace what currently-existing artists can do instead of forging an entirely new path in artistry. This forces the art community into an endless circle of protecting and overcoming instead of progressing in a new direction. AI art so far has been shown as a stepping stone to AI surpassing human abilities and thus replacing them. While not inherently bad from a technological perspective, this is a gross undermining of a technology that could have more potential. In that case, what comes next? The varying views in the AI art uproar show that there is clearly a divide in values of aesthetics that is strongly linked to artistic copyright in the creative community. Those who refuse to acknowledge AI art as part of creative work seem to value human creativity, process, and work put behind the end result. These people put high importance in giving credit where it is due in creative works. Those who support AI, or at least are neutral on the topic, seem to advocate the idea that all creative artwork is an amalgamation of all the knowledge the creator has collected in the past. Thus, they advocate for artistic democracy and everyone being able to participate in artistic creation. Should these two views continue to be polarized, there can be no real progress in artistry for AI. It can be easy to think that this divide in opinions is unable to be bridged. Certainly, the bridging process to come to an agreement can be long and will take a lot of effort. However, history claims that it still can be achieved. Philosophy has had its fair share of furious debates over what kind of purpose art has in life, where it comes from, and what kind of characteristics it has, ranging from Plato to Tolstoy. The most relevant argument to look at, however, is Walter Benjamin’s argument on aura. Benjamin argues that “[i]n principle a work of art has always been reproducible. Man-made artifacts could always be imitated by men…Mechanical reproduction of a work of art, however, represents something new”. He notably points out photography as one such example. Benjamin holds that “the situations into which the product of mechanical reproduction can be brought may not touch the actual work of art, yet the quality of its presence is always depreciated”. As such, the aura surrounding the original art piece disappears, since the art itself can be reproduced through mechanical means, and it can spread through the masses. This is not necessarily a bad thing; however, if anything, it furthered the democratization of art, allowing others to participate in creatives with ease. Some may argue that photography did not democratize art; it monopolized art by taking over portrait painting. Despite this, photography has continued to thrive, and not in the manner of replacing a specific art form. When Joseph Nicéphore Niépce took the first photograph in 1822 and later publicly announced in 1839 by Louis Daguerre, the public embraced the new medium. Ironically, the artistic movements in Europe before the 19th century had always been focused on realism. When photography took away the necessity for artists to depict realism, art movements slowly moved away from it, starting with Impressionism and moving on as far as Dadaism. In a way, artists have no reason to fear that AI art will cause artist-made art obsolete or devalued as a craft, as art has always found a way to survive and continue pursuing creativity throughout the years. More importantly, it is worth noting that photographers did not immediately assume photography to be a substitute for portraits and landscape paintings. They spent many years experimenting with the types of photos that could be taken and thinking of what kind of role this new technology would take in society. World War I and II did cement photography as a part of a medium. It solidified photography as a modern way to express culture and World War II photography showed the brutality of war. However, it was the work of photographers giving serious thought to the craft that resulted in photography being a widely respected form of media today. The artistic value clash in the present is an echo of a similar conflict in the past in the invention of a new art medium. Thus, the answers to solving the modern value clash can be found in the past as well. In other words, AI artistry must go through the same process as photography to be accepted as a mode of creating art. While Glaze and plagiarism protection tools to come will function as a necessary precaution, what is most needed in the AI art industry is for the artists to think about their craft. What purpose does their art serve in the industry and to society? What types of technology can be used to make AI art differ from other art forms? Instead of looking to take over the art industry as a whole or replace other media, AI-generated art should focus on its unique strengths to create a new medium, as many hope it will become. All in all, Artificial Intelligence may have come a long way in a short time to develop to the level it is now, but it still has a long way to go in order to be refined into a method of art that all people can accept. In order to break a potentially endless cycle of art-generating algorithms against protection algorithms, AI developers must turn to aesthetic values and forge a new path for their creations to walk.

“Crush culture makes me wanna spill my guts out…” This iconic line from Conan Gray’s song, Crush Culture, is exactly how I feel about our generation when it comes to love. We pine for love, we desire love, we feign love. But is this a fault? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not cynical of love—I’m cynical of people who instil the wrong idea of love into young people. As a generation, we have, and we are still being fed the misconception of love. Through our excessive use of social media, our ideals of love have become very superficial. With this fast-food approach to love, we begin to develop an unhealthy relationship with the instant gratification of ‘physical’ love. The ads on the streets are covered in images of what beauty should be like. TV shows only highlight the excitement of physical love. Social media forces us to compare ourselves with ‘perfect people. ' Beauty has become a thing we need to achieve, not something that already innately exists in each of us. Love has become something superficial. The music video of Crush Culture (dir. Conan Gray) begins with Conan Gray, who stars as “Bitter Boy” sitting with his supposed lover “Lollipop B****. " As Lollipop B**** stares intently at her phone, Bitter Boy receives less attention than the heart-shaped lollipop she is holding. Triggered by all the texts Lollipop B**** receives, Bitter Boy grabs her lollipop and smashes it to the ground in exasperation—hence the name “Lollipop B****” and “Bitter Boy. ” These scenes depict the reality of modern love where people have become too fixated on the idea of ‘being wanted’ and where our worth has been reduced to the number of texts we receive. We have chosen to be connected through the Internet, only to be disconnected in the real world. This explains Bitter Boy’s anger and frustration—we meet up with people only to become disconnected within the connected space of what used to be intimacy. Social media has caused us to place more importance displaying our relationships rather than living in the reality of our relationships. We have become more fixated on the idea of the images we can portray, rather than focusing on what already is. We have become reduced to mere instances, photos, and short videos. Bitter Boy continues to disrupt romantic moments between different couples. His lyrics explain that love has become an exclusive ‘culture’ which involves the “kissing cult” where they “kiss then forget you. ” A certain catharsis is achieved when Bitter Boy messes up these romantic moments. The constant overhype of love causes many insecurities. We draw up fantasies of love and when we are unable to achieve this goal, we begin to believe that there is something wrong with us. We brainwash ourselves to believe that we have to fit into certain ideals and change so that we can be loved by our ‘crushes. ’ The term ‘crush’ itself even suggests that this one-sided love can only end in a ‘crushing remorse,’ or that a ‘crushing’ of one’s original identity is needed to acquire this love. We either crush our identity to fit the other’s standards, or we crush the other’s authentic self in order to fit them into our ideals. The ‘Crush Culture’ of our generation entails the following: unrealistic expectations, the need to ‘show love,’ and self-centredness. These standards isolate us from the genuine meaning of love, making us crave it even more. Social media portrays unrealistic expectations of love—luxury brand gifts have become a sign of how much you love someone, and the size of your wedding dress train or the number of hearts or comments you get from your significant other has become a way of ‘proving’ love. Through this repeated culture of social media, the need to ‘show love’ has become prevalent, and a vicious cycle of unrealistic expectations and the showcasing of love has started to emerge. This creates fertile grounds for competition as we begin to visually accept the fact that some people are loved more than others, and this perpetuates loneliness and insecurities. We begin to believe that we lack certain aspects in the criteria of love which makes it impossible for us to be loved. Our generation’s ‘crush culture’ depends heavily on visual representation. However, when we start valuing others based on their physical appearance, we unconsciously simplify them into an ‘object of desire’ who has an obligation to fill our empty voids. Instant love disregards the truth that love is difficult. We tend to think that ‘real love’ is easy and that it all naturally plays out like in the movies: a damsel in distress, a knight in shining armour, or a villain who disturbs and ironically strengthens their love. This magical, fairy-tale element of romance films is not wrong, but it creates a dangerous, unrealistic image of love. Romance movies should not be condemned. We just need to learn to train ourselves to understand that love is not completed by the momentaneous ‘happy ending,’ but that there is a story after this point. Love requires time, patience, understanding, and sacrifice. The butterflies when we start loving someone don’t last forever, and we can’t expect it to last forever. This good feeling cannot continue if it is one-sided and self-centred. We must put in the work and effort in figuring the other person out. As my English teacher used to say, “love is a verb. ” Love is not simply an instant gift, given as a concrete noun – it is an ongoing action. Love is a verb, and this can be seen through the implementation of the five love languages. The five love languages are acts of service, physical touch, quality time, gifts, and words of affirmation. Each of the five love languages requires a ‘verb. ' Doing an errand, giving a hug, going on a date, buying flowers, giving a compliment. Love comes with actions, and we need to be willing to love. However, loving someone completely different from ourselves proves to be difficult as we have to learn to navigate the way we love through these differences. Even though these differences may feel like a barrier, they make us grow, as the joy of love comes from learning the differences of the people we love. By getting to know someone else deeply, we subconsciously start to learn more about ourselves. This helps us experience an authentic, richer love. While the media distorts the reality of love, movies depicting the reality of love do exist. (Incoming spoiler alert…) Waymond and Evelyn from Everything Everywhere All at Once are good examples of what real love looks like. At a glance, the middle-aged couple seems mundane, wrapped up in everyday ordeals of running a laundromat. There seems to be no passionate love between them, but rather a stagnant comfort. This dangerous comfort conceals the uncomfortable truths which are later revealed in the film when Evelyn is faced with Waymond’s divorce papers. This, however, is the reality of love (not divorce, the hardships). Passion can easily be outlived and the consequences of love amount to a reality of unwanted responsibilities and the essential sacrifices. The downfall of modern love tropes is that this transformation of love is not depicted after the ‘happy ending. ' While the quarrelling couple seem to suffocate each other, the realisation of love begins when Evelyn sees that Waymond chooses to be with Evelyn in every alternate lifetime. No matter how harsh or luxurious their lives are, Waymond chooses to love Evelyn, and this truth becomes a universal truth that binds them together with love. This is similar to the way the importance of love is portrayed in the Netflix series The Good Place. Chidi and Eleanor are characters with completely contrasting personalities who are mismatched as ‘soulmates’ after they die and end up in the good place, i. e. ‘heaven. ' However, they learn that “the Good Place” is not necessarily a good place, and with this realization, their memories are wiped out. As the plot goes on, it is revealed that in every simulation of ‘Operation Good Place’ where they are supposed to be tortured by each other’s presence, they end up falling in love. A love that penetrates all memory and time begins to formulate, and this becomes their ticket to ‘real heaven. ' No matter how much they fight and seemingly hate each other for their differences, Chidi and Eleanor end up being in love. Every time their memory is wiped, no matter how far apart they are, they end up together, face their insecurities, and become better people together. (No more spoilers from this point)Love only becomes complete when we start understanding each other’s imperfections. While crush culture focuses on the prospect of an already perfect person who will solve all our problems, the reality of love focuses on two people who are able to accept each other’s weaknesses and insecurities. We can only begin to love and be loved when we allow our differences to show. Additionally, love entails the element of ‘choice. ' Contrary to popular belief, while we cannot choose who we love, we can choose how we love. We need to choose to love, instead of waiting until we are chosen to be loved. With this choice comes sacrifices, unacknowledged services, and the need for patience; but all this becomes worth it in the face of the people we love. Unlike the instantaneous, passionate love we desire, real love takes time and requires patience and persistence. “All this love is suffocating, just let me be sad and lonely…” Conan Gray truthfully expresses the frustration of our generation when it comes to looking for love. However, in the final scene of the Crush Culture music video, we are betrayed by Bitter Boy as he lays motionless and unsatisfied on a bouquet of broken flowers, until he receives a text reading, “Hey. Wanna date?” We are left with Bitter Boy’s smile, which ironically leaves the single viewers to be “sad and lonely. " This shows how unfulfilling superficial love is, which is why when we love right, it is one of the best feelings in the world. Love is a human instinct, and it is natural to crave romantic relationships. How we view love, however, should not be tainted by what is shown in the media. Love is ironically one of the easiest yet hardest things we do.

People who previously spent money on luxury clothes and taxi fares for instant gratification are now drinking 2 liters of water a day and waking up at 7 a. m. for long-term self-improvement, and immersing themselves in the new lifestyle of gatsaeng. Rather than huge goals or significant achievements, gatsaeng’s aim is to feel a sense of accomplishment by starting with small actions that can be done right now. Most of these habits are trivial, like getting up early, working out, drinking two liters of water, and reading. Moreover, they do not forget to post these small practices on social media. Millions of hashtags have already been created, including #owoonwan, used to describe the completion of today’s workout, #miraclemorning, used to describe the practice of waking up early to maximize efficiency, and #gatsaengchallenge, used to describe creating a checklist of daily goals and carrying out these tasks. This emerging lifestyle not only brought about a change in people's mindset but also a change in people's consumption patterns. The millennial generation entered the workforce in the 2010s, a decade marked by a protracted recession. Despite having illustrious resumes, it was difficult for them to find employment. With house prices skyrocketing, it became challenging for individuals to buy their own houses. This phenomenon suggests that, unlike in the past, when how hard you worked directly correlated with the guarantee of home ownership, the effort you put in no longer promised stability and success. As a result, the millennial generation began to reevaluate what success and happiness really entailed. Rather than ambitiously seeking to amass a large fortune or find fame and delaying gratification for the future, they actively opened up their wallets for hobbies and vacations in search of instant satisfaction. In other words, rather than seeking happiness for an uncertain future, they turned their eyes to the happiness of “today”. In addition, YOLO (you only live once)’s motto—”let’s enjoy our one and only life without regret”—further fueled this notion. A life attitude that put today's enjoyment and fulfillment above everything started to take shape. Furthermore, this attitude resulted in a change in consumption patterns for fleeting pleasure. It was clear that the consumption of "useless but pretty goods" and "taxi fare as a reward for my tiring work day" were reasonable enough to lift the mood. COVID-19 has, however, made it impossible to maintain the previous way of life, as it had begun to invade our normal daily life. Even the modest and insignificant joys of life, like spending time with friends or taking a weekend trip, were no longer possible. In this status quo, the millennial generation, once again, started working hard to keep up with their daily lives. But what was significantly different from the past was that they began to concentrate on cultivating the driving force to live better day by day as opposed to transient and immediate satisfaction. Every day, they put effort into creating little but beneficial habits for themselves, repairing their disrupted routines to gain a sense of accomplishment and contentment that at least today had been well spent. In this way, the gatsaeng mindset was rapidly established, in which people set daily goals and carried them out for a productive day. gatsaeng is a neologism, a combination of “god” and “life”, and is used to describe those who attempt to live their life to the fullest and feel a small sense of accomplishment for their efforts. Even though it isn’t extravagant, “갓생” includes drinking more than 2 liters of water a day or waking up at 7 a. m. every morning, i. e. “miracle morning”. People started to value the work they put in to maintain a healthy lifestyle because doing so would eventually allow them to thrive in life. The attitudes of YOLO and gatsaeng in life have one thing in common: they both prioritize “myself" and "the present. " However, both have stark differences in how they define the “present”. “YOLO” identifies the “present” as a moment to enjoy without regret, while gatsaeng views the "present” as a part of the process of building good habits. The change of attitude from “YOLO” to gatsaeng also affects patterns of consumption. They started to value the pursuit of consumption that provides long-lasting satisfaction rather than transient and impulsive spending as they have had in the past. The criterion to judge whether or not something is a reasonable purchase depends on whether it could enhance personal value through consumption, especially one that has the utility that we can continue to benefit from. Likewise, the MZ generation has reached a conclusion that investing in oneself from a sustainable standpoint would be appropriate to live out their life full of enjoyment. The term "Meconomy," which combines the words "me" and "economy," refers to the current MZ generation’s consumption trends that spend all of their money on self-indulgent purchases. These "Meconomy" customers long for "Me me land," a lifestyle based on their own standards rather than those of other people. Based on a growing desire to take care of "myself," more and more people continue their consumption alone. Investing a little more in yourself, having a proper meal even if it is just one meal, and being rested and happy according to “my” liking have all become more important. In other words, in all facets of their lives, including their expenditures, the MZ generation places sustainable satisfaction above instant satisfaction. They have a tremendous desire to get better every day, which soon manifests as the consumption of knowledge and self-indulgence. If business leaders create business plans based on the traits of the MZ generation by analyzing the trend of 갓생, they will be closer to reaching their ultimate goal of maximizing profits. So do you currently consider yourself to be a member of the "Meconomy" who dreams of living in "Me me land"?