Journalist Taylor Lorenz starts out with the "someone's gotta do it" meme that has been going on on Tiktok, then winds the clock back to 2020 and goes over the cultural shifts that have been going on in the past 5 years to put that meme in context.
There are good points she makes along the way. Not many things in there that I would not co-sign, some enthusiastically, others less so. The thing that really stood out for me was her take on 2020, and how that was a brief moment in time when we came together as a nation, watched out for one another, helped each other, and the state stepped in and started protecting the interests of the common people, which both the right and the Democratic Party establishment were eager to snap back from to get back to our regular dysfunctional selves, but we did see what this nation could be when we really cared.
That was an interesting take that I had not considered before.
It's a half hour plus essay but I think it's worth a watch. At least it represents a particular point of view very well. One thing I would add is that all that she talks about builds on top of the cynicism that has already been put into motion by the economic crisis of 2008 and the Bernie episode in 2016.