Thank you for joining me in the Inner Parlour today. This is a subsection of my newsletter, Lilith’s Muse, where we’ll have deeper conversations in a smaller setting. So please, take a seat by the fire. You are in good company here.
In the future, I hope to use this space as an open dialogue. We’ll do Q+As, structured like a writing/publishing advice column. If you’d like to send in a question to get us started, feel free to reach out in the comments, or send an email to fromlilithsmuse@gmail.com. I’ll answer in a future newsletter post with a long-form letter like this one!
I remember the internet operating as a functional third space. As in, a public place where you could connect with people with common interests that was neither home nor work. But that was when the internet consisted of 2017 Tumblr arguments about hipsters, or Instagram’s debut in 2014 when celebrities posted random unedited snapshots of their day. Before giant corporations realized—before everyone realized—you could strike it rich if you mined this third space dry.
Every post feels like an ad today and all communities are consumable. Interests are blank-core, distilled into empty hashtags with a specific set of visuals but no soul. On the consumer end, the development and integration of a for-you page across platforms means people are no longer searching for things they enjoy—they’re blindly reacting to whatever stumbles across their vision. On the creator end, the necessity of having a unique “brand” to stand out, but similar enough to fit in, necessitates commodifying yourself and your interests to find success. In short, the internet has soured. Turned inauthentic. Or at least, that’s how I feel when I scroll.
The social media landscape has changed. Everything sounds like empty noise. An orchestra playing all at once, but every member is playing a different song. And their instruments are off tune besides.
How, then, does one make art, talk about art, and build an authentic artistic community within this landscape? Is it even possible anymore? And why does everything I post feel as if I’m only adding to the noise?