Your Brand

[ghost]

I'm not saying it's not a status symbol anywhere—it surely still is for a certain strata of the middle classes—but the pendulum is definitively headed in the other direction. It looks the same, because it's still near the peak. But there's a certain clear change that's happened.

 

[WashYourHands]

Would you say access to psychedelics has enhanced the shift?

 

[sus]

I actually don't know anyone who does psychedelics, it's super weird

 

[sus]

I also don't know anyone who smokes pot though, so I either have a biased sample or my milieu is too anxious to touch either

 

[WashYourHands]

psychedelics are very west coast on-brand, particularly for SF

tweaked iterative branding I thought there was a thread here

 

[WashYourHands]

Macrodosing to micro

 

[other_life]

gus lol r u a lacanian. wash r u a jungian. Who is who?

 

[ghost]

I actually don't know anyone who does psychedelics, it's super weird

I'm not a frequent user, but mushrooms are pretty in my milieu. Very normal for someone to buy up a big pile at some kind of faux-religious mushroom church and hand them out like candy to friends. I've used them a few times and I think they're pretty positive as drugs go. Up there alongside ketamine as something I'd gladly recommend to a friend.

MDMA is probably the next most common, especially among the ravers, with LSD, DMT, 2-CB and synthetic psilocybin derivatives much more unusual but not unheard of.

 

[linebaugh]

linebaugh has decided i dont have a brand

Y2k internet esotericist, autisim circa adhd 2009

 

[linebaugh]

It seems like a status symbol over there, part of the self-improvement racket. You go to the gym, you go to therapy. You let other people know you go to the gym, you go to therapy.

Not sure the gym crowd and the therapy crowd have much overlap but yes

 

[linebaugh]

And not sure it was being used that way but therapy as a 'status symnol' isnt really accurate. More an 'in group signifier'

 

[linebaugh]

I also don't know anyone who smokes pot though, so I either have a biased sample or my milieu is too anxious to touch either

Everyone i know either does not smoke pot or smokes pot all day every and is constantly stoping startinf the habit with no middle ground

 

[linebaugh]

Is any dissensus user in therapy? Ive tried to go to therapy and while it didnt seem unhelpful it also seemed like a waste of time. I dont want to say therapy is only effective on stupid people, but somethings got to give

 

[linebaugh]

And Im not completely normal, ive had SSRIs pull me out of some deep pits and believe in them, but I guess im not sure exactly what therapy is supposed to do other than give you someone to talk to if you have no one else.

 

[linebaugh]

I also have great parents though so its hard to say. I imagine if I went to war i'd have to go to therapy

 

[other_life]

Y2k internet esotericist, autisim circa adhd 2009

yes.. much better... I've been identified and sorted

 

[ghost]

Is any dissensus user in therapy? Ive tried to go to therapy and while it didnt seem unhelpful it also seemed like a waste of time. I dont want to say therapy is only effective on stupid people, but somethings got to give

In general, my belief is that therapy only works beyond very basic problems if the person analyzing you is approximately as clever as you. The fact that most people of great brilliance do not decide to be therapists makes this into a tricky conundrum.

 

[Mr. Tea]

The bit about the race-faker is hilarious, I hadn't heard that one.

I get the sense from 70s discourse, films that psychoanalysis was a status symbol then. But for whatever reason, it doesn't feel that way to me now.



When I moved to New York from small town California one of the most striking things was that every girl I knew was either prescribed antidepressants + benzos, or else abused xannies recreationally. Often with copious drinking. If you know anything about drug combinations, these do not mix well. Frequent blackouts, reckless decision-making, unprotected sex. These were often the same girls that wanted to be hit and choked during their anonymous Tinder hookups. I found it really bleak and sad. They didn't know what they wanted; they didn't understand the structure of their desires; they found themselves constantly slipping into gender roles that bred self-contempt; they found themselves subsidizing behaviors that hurt them, etc.

Often, they have bad enough judgment / are confused enough that their relationships with their therapists become quite power-laden and problematic. They're advised to end relationships or cut out family members.

There's also a class of sensitive boy I know who has been fairly guarded his whole life, and sincerely wants to explore his emotions and his relationship to his parents or whatever. They aren't especially troubled; by most standards, well-adjusted; but they make good tech salaries and can easily afford it, and are curious, and end up find it rewarding for a time.

That's really quite desperately sad. If you had to guess why this was a particularly female phenomenon, what would you say?

I suppose it's one of those things that's equally good opinion-piece-fodder for progressives and conservatives: the former will say it's because feminism hasn't gone far enough, or that its gains have been reversed in recent decades, while the latter will say it's because the freedoms these girls' mothers and grandmothers fought for are making them miserable.

 

[craner]

Yes it's a masterpiece of personal branding and self deception performed in public

Definitely. Almost generation-defining.

 

[Mr. Tea]

The Lure of Divorce

Seven years into my marriage, I hit a breaking point. Since then, I’ve had to decide whether life would be better without my husband in it.

www.thecut.com

This is great. A peek into the world of someone who has both a therapist and a psychoanalyst. Someone for whom there are two types of people: writers and tech entrepreneurs.