Dear reader,

Some say that we’re facing an “attention crisis,” with social media algorithms destroying Gen Z’s focus. Well screw that. I’m already bored.The educated older generation, unable to accept their own inability to regulate big tech, have perverted the valid fear of attention-fracking into a conversation that too readily falls into cultural paranoia. We’re reinventing our forms of literacy, restructuring our relationships with screens and words. Is that really such a big problem?

This week, Nass writers show that they can go fast and go slow. They jab us with striking poetry and witty vignettes on free will, reflect on the subliminal urges behind souvenirs, and report on changes in education funding. Yes, the ubiquity of phones and advertisements is turning our brains into mush. But when the conversation around “this generation’s attention-span” spills into alarmist ideas about our “work ethic” and “critical thinking abilities,” it might be valuable to ask: who is so afraid about Gen Z’s focus? And if not reels, what do they want us to concentrate on and why?

But hey, I’m boooored. Computer, give me ads, everywhere, and then give me paywalled fail compilations. Make the world so fast and so fun. Please, don’t ever let me slow down.

Xoxo,
Frankie Solinsky Duryea, co-EIC