Twitter

Lola Young

If you’ve been on Twitter in the past week, there’s a chance you’ve seen the video for Lola Young’s new song (which is bad by the way). Everyone at the Freelance Cultural Critic factory has an opinion on her for some reason. The number of opinions people have about Lola Young is directly inverse to how worth talking about she is. She’s another TikTok pop star whose lyrics leave something to be desired. I have never seen someone generate this kind of buzz. She’s not bad enough for this love to be ironic, nor good enough for it to be deserved nor popular enough to be discussed at this level. Everyone is bored, and Lola Young is our go-to punching bag. To make matters worse, everyone’s favorite payola mazzypopstar seems to be on the take. Every other post is Lola Young promotion. It's probably good that someone is in her corner, but it’s a shame it has to be Mazzy.

Men I Don’t Trust

Everyone wants to crack the code. There are some men (most) who are evil when it comes to dating and relationships. To better sift through the crowd, women decide on red flags that indicate true danger and red flags that indicate someone kind of annoying, that could lead to true danger. Lists like these try to create the perfect man by subtraction. If we can identify problematic traits, we can save ourselves and each other time. The problem is that while some of these are obvious indicators of right-wing politics and a general dislike or disinterest in women, sometimes men are just annoying about the things they like. They make the rest of us look bad. Any time Men like something too much, anyone else who likes that thing is lumped in with bad boyfriends past.

We want these lists to save people. To open the eyes of women just starting their dating or feminist journeys. The truth is we can’t. For every girl who knows you can’t trust a man who worships at the altar of Dave Portnoy, there are a thousand more willing to overlook it, or even like Barstool themselves. There are also men with perfect media consumption habits who could still cheat on you, or worse, break your heart. There’s just no way to know, despite all our best efforts.

TikTok

You Can Ask The Flowers

@brittanydixonartthis song makes me think of these paintings 🌷 #artist #painting

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As the seasons change, so do the songs that play in the background of miscellaneous TikToks. This is the worst one yet. I understand the appeal of a nice feel-good song from the ‘50s to signal a kind of timelessness. To both tie a video to the current moment, but let us know that it’s not about anything particularly current. However, we’ve gone through all the good ones and landed on the most cloying brain-dead one we could find. Summer is almost here, but we have to get this out of our systems before we pick our real song of the summer.

Sue Me

@ava_lizzy_Sushi I want to be wanted @Audrey Hobert thank you for this masterpiece #audreyhobert #newmusic #smallartist #gracieabrams#secretofus #malcomtodd #taylorswift #fyp #fangirl #lipsync #lyrics

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Now this? This could be a song of the summer. I haven’t heard a TikTok song this enjoyable in so long. The last song I said I liked? I was lying. This song doesn’t even need the qualifier of “TikTok song”. I like it as much as if I found it in the wild. It’s fun! It’s poppy! There’s even a little controversy. People on TikTok love to drum up nepo accusations and wait for the rest of us to take up arms. The artist responsible for Sue Me is Audrey Hobert, Gracie Abrams’ best friend. She’s been labeled a Nepo Friend, the first of hopefully many. Nepo Babies point to a problem in the entertainment industry as far as sourcing new talent. Nepo friends prove that a rising tide lifts all ships. If you aren’t born into nepotism, you can always create some. We can ignore the fact that she actually is a Nepo Baby for TV writing. That’s not the point. She’s on camera talent now!

Propaganda I’m Not Falling For

@laureiseThis is a fun one lol

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This would be so much more illuminating if I didn’t believe you were falling for every other type of propaganda. In modern society, it’s important to start from the angle “everything is fake” because almost all of it is. Sleeping in your contacts is fine. Collagen doesn’t work. All food is bad for you. Everything is propaganda, and knowing that it’s all bad allows me to divest from all of it if it's not working. Everyone thinks they’re so smart for catching the oatmilk dubai chocolate sonny angel propaganda, yet they still believe in elevated basics. It’s all propaganda, you just have to get while the getting is good.