22 Things With More Social Power Than Me

In no particular order.

Fisher Stevens as Hugo on Succession. See: Number 11. (Photo: Screenshot.)

My intrusive thought over the weekend was about the Ryan Gosling spooky rock band song “Pa Pa Power” but with the word “social” in front of it. “Burn the street, burn the cars / Social pa-pa power, Social pa-pa power” … and so on. I blame a 27 year old, which is my right to do now that I’m newly 28.

For background: after Amandla Stenberg privately DM’d a New York Times critic named Lena Wilson (the 27-year-old in question and yes I have read the DeuxMoi Reddit threads) about a line (“[the movie] doubles as a 95-minute advertisement for cleavage and Charli XCX’s latest single”) in her review of Bodies Bodies Bodies — fun movie! — Wilson said Stenberg was exercising the privilege of tapping Instagram approximately four times to privately reply to the review of social power. I discussed this in Friday’s newsletter, but the whole thing is so goofy: the line in question, Stenberg’s DM, Wilson sharing the DM, Stenberg’s explanation, Wilson’s TikTok defense, and on and on and on …

“Social power” — I could google it, but what would come from that? Instead, a list of 22 people/places/objects with more social power than me. I took this list very seriously; I thought, for example, “do I have more or less social power than J.Cole’s verse on Beyoncé’s ‘Party’” (less, and that’s unfortunate because that verse is a scourge on our community) and “I have more social power than Casey Affleck’s absence at the Bennifer wedding, if we’re being honest.” This list is not exhaustive.

1. Rita Wilson in Gloria Bell.

2. People who can type wearing acrylic nails.