Leftist men return to work at the content mines 🫡
The performative male reader to socio-political critic pipeline
Every once in a while it can be fun to unite with your opposition in pursuit of roasting a mutual target. It’s even fun just to be a spectator during those battles. We got one this week — a good one.
A woman wrote a post about her job search. The post is relatively benign and her resume is honestly deep. The fuck-up came here: “My dream is to work in policy or comms at a think tank that is center-left or center-right.”
It was a pile-on like I have never seen, from left, right, and center. It’s a reminder that there’s one thing people in our political climate don’t believe in … and it’s someone who believes in nothing.
Got a whole lot of beliefs to unpack below — the belief that SNAP should never bounce back, that Steve Bannon is always only joking, and that the responsibility of cultural criticism rests squarely on the shoulders of liberal men.
FROM THE RIGHT WING:
SNAP SHOTS: With SNAP funding about to run out, I noticed a new account pop up on the 27th — chumming the water for MAGA faithfuls dead set on making sure these benefits never come back to life. “EBT of TikTok” is a nod to the still-viral account that started policing the left in 2021, “Libs of TikTok.” Most of the attributions have been removed from the videos, but the feed is dominated by videos made by Black men and women (almost 3/4s of the posts). Posts about rioting and looting, warning grocery stores and law enforcement to look the other way, are generating the most amount of conservative fury.
Key voices are all running the “get a job!” line of offense. Ann Coulter urged 40M of the 42M Americans who will be affected to “get jobs.” (There are work requirements for many SNAP benefits). There’s Kim Kardashian-esque complaining that no one wants to work anymore. Influential political strategist and lawyer Mike Davis offered this: “Get off your fat, ghetto asses … Change your shitty culture.” The job angle is tough right now, considering our economy is hemorrhaging tens of thousands of jobs. Don’t worry though, there’s plenty of pivoting to blaming immigrants, after Newsmax misinterpreted recipient data on air.1
THIRD TIME’S THE HARM: Everyone pussyfooted around this Trump third term thing for a while. Until last week’s insistence that round three is (as Bannon has been saying) a go, forcing creators to finally weigh in. Admittedly, I think the timing is kind of weird considering Trump made his biggest concession on this to date, but their views are shockingly diverse. Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire spent 10 solid minutes explaining the intricacies of the elaborate joke Bannon is making that all of us pea brains are “so stupid” for not getting. It involved an argument as to why this — currently, right now — is actually his “real true third term” already. I have to be honest, I’m not finding “funny” in these weeds.
So on the more serious evaluations: Benny Johnson also found it chuckle-worthy … but he definitely doesn’t deny it’s a possibility. Tim Pool is “not buying it,” but then spends the next chunk of time exploring various ways Trump could delay or call off an election. Prolific video game streamer, who made a hard right turn, Asmongold, weighed in with the thought-provoking question: “What does ‘term’ really mean, right?” The question stumping experts everywhere …
FROM THE LEFT WING:
CULTURAL CAPITALISTS: Shhh, do you hear that? That’s the sound of young lefty men returning from abstention, enlisting for Discourse™️ Duty. In the era of men getting attention for reading performatively2 in public, I wondered how long they’d cede cultural tastemaking to the manosphere on the right. These liberal arts bros will not be silent anymore. I saw 1, 2, 3 different video essays from young men on racism proliferating in social content — or “Instagram Has an Alt-Right Problem,” as progressive YouTuber Saji Sharma put it. A takedown of MAGA rap (which I showed you last week) from Ju Almighty with 150k views. A liberal book critic unloading on Ben Shapiro playing film critic? The boys are soooo back.
Here’s the thing though: This immense burden is not just being borne by guys who look like they want to talk at you about Michel Foucault in a dive bar with missing toilet seats. No, no! A beefy redneck country artist dropped a chart-topping liberal anthem and a UFC fighter rescinded his support for the president, whose inauguration he attended, comparing him to the antichrist. Things are getting really interesting out there.
WORN OUT WELCOME: Here’s the follow up appointment to the diagnosis of Democrats’ ills we talked about the other day. Getting a second opinion pretty much always muddies the waters, and the lazy river the party is riding into 2026 is no exception. WelcomePAC is basically central command for moderate Democrats running for office. They just dropped a full evaluation of where the party stands and how it should move forward. A lot of the drama here is between nerds arguing about polling methodology. You have a life, I pretend I have one, so we’re not going down that road.
What believers are saying: “It’s the economy, stupid.” Less existential crisis about democracy, more emphasis on cost of living. But the buck doesn’t stop just at democracy — they want a full shift away from “cultural concerns” that make Dems “weak, woke, and weird,” as one contributor put it.
What doubters are saying: Many are rushing to point out less than ideal sources of funding for this project, aka the Murdoch family and a losing electoral track record from those running the show. Some of the Numbers Guys I follow here, Adam Bonica and G. Elliott Morris, have countered this continued attempt at moderation with some data analysis of their own. Worth reading.
LOOSE ENDS:
📰 Something you should read today: We Can’t Let Offensive Memes, Edgy Humor, And Nihilism Consume Young Men — The Federalist, Emily Jashinksy
“If you injure the reputation of your group or your office, you resign. You learn those jokes fall flat when brought out of your weird corner of Signal and into the daylight. And you grow up.”
🕵️ Someone you should know today: Rachel Riley, the 33-year-old former McKinsey partner and DOGE employee, who was just placed in charge of Naval research. Great scoop from Joe Perticone at The Bulwark.
🥹 Something to make you smile today: The Recount hosted our first ever trivia night — which you know, because I promoted it here multiple times. The winning team was operating as a strong unit from question one. Little did we know, the squad was made up of three separate pairs, none of whom knew each other when they arrived. How’s that for a little third place action? Shout out to my favorite place in NYC, The Bench, for hosting. Be back with more soon.
Performative male bio: “The performative male (or performative man) also sometimes called the matcha male, is an internet meme and term referring to an archetype of man which was popularized on social media in 2025. It generally involves displays of progressivism, feminism, as well as emotional sensitivity. Examples of such displays include reading books by feminist writers like All About Love by bell hooks, listening to female indie artists such as Clairo, drinking matcha lattes, and owning a Labubu. These displays are typically done as a means of superficially appealing to progressive women with the intent to romantically pursue them.”