Language evolves to be useful. A lot of initially-strange phrases make perfect sense because they’re filling an unused niche in the language.

This week’s case in point: mogging. This term has finally infiltrated my social circle, to the point that anybody could use it without anyone getting confused, although some people are much more likely to use it than others. Then I heard it on a YouTube video and, at first, didn’t even realize it was “Gen Z slang” — it just felt natural!

In particular, that YouTube video used it in a sentence like “this TV show completely mogs every other show out there.” What a perfect little turn of phrase! How else would you express that idea of “completely and obviously superior” as a verb in the English language? It “shows up” or “outclasses” the other shows? Perhaps, but that’s lacking the hint of aggression in “mog”. It “dominates” the other shows? That’s a bit too aggressive; it’s lacking the light irony of “mog”. There’s something so punchy about “mog” that it just feels, well, obvious — almost as obvious as “slop”. I am absolutely certain that in a decade we’ll all be using “mog” as a verb without thinking twice — it’s just fascinating to see that process in progress.

Also, if I recall correctly, the video was talking about Andor, which may have contributed to how natural the usage felt. I in fact agree that Andor mogs most other TV shows.

A stray thought I haven’t had a chance to fully explore yet: perhaps liberal democracy is breaking down because shame has stopped working, but perhaps shame stopped working because liberal democracy is functioning correctly.

:::aside{.note} Friendly reminder that I use “liberalism” in the political theory sense — think Rawls, not the Democrats. :::

To wit: Trump is successful (insofar as he is successful) because he’s utterly shameless. In a “reasonable” world, the sheer inanity of what he says would send most politicians fleeing to a comfortable retirement. The only thing stopping American presidents from misusing their powers is a.) constitutional mechanisms (which are clearly breaking down) b.) a deeply-ingrained sense of dignity and externally-enforced shame. But if you have someone totally shameless, in the sense of being unable to be shamed, the system just flops over.

But shamelessness is a feature of liberalism, broadly construed. Shame just is enforcing norms of behavior on another individual, which liberalism is not fond of. So a liberal society should be suspicious of shame as a tool, which has some really quite good side effects (LGBT rights!), but also makes them more likely to produce charismatically shameless individuals, who (especially in a top-heavy system like the United States) can do a lot of damage before being stopped.

Of course all this gets complicated when political theory meets political reality, but if anybody has references on this topic, I’d love to read them!

This week Apple Music’s suggestions came in use for perhaps the first time in history, as I discovered Sparks, or more specifically their 1974 breakout Kimono My House and their 2015 crossover with Franz Ferdinand, FFS.

The Sparks brothers are a beloved cult classic band — they’ve influenced bands from Pet Shop Boys to They Might Be Giants, and they even have an Edgar Wright-directed documentary — but despite being active continuously since the early ‘70s (!) I’ve literally never heard of them. That has now been corrected — their blend of jaunty electropop-meets-nonsense lyrics is, of course, right up my alley.