the world's latest hot take
I’m back for a late hot take.
You’ve all read Caroline Calloway’s friend’s manifesto on being the less confident friend, and read all the takes on the state of Instagram fame and debated whether Caroline was an evil narcissist or Natalie was in for a cash grab and a Netflix deal.
I have nothing to say that hasn’t been said, but I find the talk about this whole friend break up sexist. Some people are talking about how talking about it makes us shallow because we care about something as shallow as an Instagram influencer. I find this more interesting. Saying you don’t care about it some virtue signaling about taste and what people should actually be spending their time on. And something like Instagram celebs is devalued because it is feminized. Comic book arguments are SERIOUS because it’s masculinized.
In this fucked up cultural economy, social media fame is one area in which women can succeed, one of the only types of feminized social capital is actually…profitable. I’m not claiming that Caroline Calloway is an innocent victim and had no choice but to post her “adventuregrams” and procrastinate on her $500K book deal, but she was only following the incentives of a type of labor that gets the most profit in the shortest amount of time.
And then there’s Natalie. She is doing nothing different than what Caroline did. The market for confessional articles, the laying out of shame, is profitable.
But Natalie played herself.
She tried to beat Caroline at her own game, trying to make Caroline the villain. But Caroline doubled down, and because she has already bared everything on social media, shame no longer affects her. She’s reached some sort of social media nirvana, where everything is content at all costs.
I’m a Natalie. I have attached myself to charismatic friends hoping that the association would elevate my own self worth, only to be the one that ends up giving more than receiving in the friendship. It’s a compelling story. But if Natalie was trying to garner sympathy, there is a sense of ownership that needs to happen in a parasitic friendship like that. Natalie’s story was relateable but there doesn’t seem to be growth. It’s an airing of dirty laundry masquerading as a personal essay.
Despite the supposed Netflix deal she may have received, Natalie tried to play at Caroline’s game and lost.