You Can and Should Blame Young People When They Act Like Lazy Cheaters, Actually
fear of "old man yells at cloud" has become a culture-devouring virus
Culture
Freddie deBoer.
Media criticism, politics, and social commentary.
Recent essays
30 of 69LLMs Were Mostly (But Not Entirely) Useless at Extra-Textual Tasks Involved in the Composition of My Next Novel
"Claude, get me a contract with a healthy advance but not one so large that the book will surely fail to earn out, causing deep emotional pain and professional doom"
Why Pose Thought Experiments About Fake Versions of History?
it's true: if you misrepresent people's behavior, it's easier to defend that behavior
Raj Chetty's Just-So Stories
don't ever say I don't take reader requests
LLMs and the Library Card Fallacy
the LLM tutor story is the Khan Academy story is the MOOCs story
One More Time: The Average American K-12 Student is Doing Fine Relative to the International Baseline
and problems relative to the historical baseline are happening around the world
You Can't Defend a Policy By Getting Angry at the Suggestion That It's Benefitted People
progressive diversity programs are caught in a hellish hall of mirrors
Subscriber Writing, May 2026
Hello folks!
The Vicious, Potentially Fatal Anti-Public School Propaganda Cycle
The New York Times discusses the enrollment crisis that’s hitting American public schools.
It's Time For Some People to Let Me Go
set it free, guys, set it free
Call for Subscriber Writing, May 2026
NEW SUBMISSION FORM AND NEW LINK, PLEASE READ
Please Stop Making Reductive Claims About Economic Hardship and Mental Health
it doesn't help poor people and it doesn't help the mentally ill
The Consensus Draft Board Debate is Sports Culture War at Its Worst
the loud and uniformed vs the overconfident and aggravating
On Shoplifting as Radical Praxis
by request from many readers
We Are (Still) Living in the Long Boring
the "bits are easy, atoms are hard" barrier has not been breached
The School Reformer "Accountability Era" Narrative Simply Does Not Add Up
neither history nor international data supports their theories of decline
Why People Hate Lena Dunham
it's irrational, entirely unfair, and deeply human
What is Left of "Believe Women"?
from Rolling Stone's Jackie to Sam Altman's sister, the rules shift and definitions strain
Young Adult Novels, Starring Various Pundits, That I Made Up
Matt Yglesias & the Legend of Big Muggy. Everyone’s favorite contrarian blogger searches for a mythical giant turtle in the Amazon, risking life and limb in his quest to bring sensible centrism to cryptid zoology. Under assignment from a mysterious new thinkta…
Real Feelings for Fake Beauty
the desire to live in a beautiful built environment can't be snarked away
Perhaps There Are Options Other Than "Toxic Confidence" and Insecurity-as-Identity
everything that is not forbidden is compulsory
We Have to Hold the Line Against the Cruel Pseudoscience of Facilitated Communication
the New York Times seems hellbent on restoring public faith in the comprehensively discredited practice
Stephen Policoff's "A Ribbon For Your Hair"
not for the faint of heart
Subscriber Writing, March 2026
Hello folks!
When People Say They Want to Send Their Kid to a Good School, They Usually Mean Schools Without "Bad Kids"
parents intuitively understand that a school's "quality" is a product of how its student body was selected
Stat Inflation is Bigger Than Any of the NBA's (Many) Other Problems
who cares about a triple double anymore? who is thrilled by a 50 point game?
Great Writers "Tell" All the Time
there is no alternative, really
Overlearning
I largely agree with this piece by Maarten Boudry called “The Fallacy Fallacy.” The central insight is quite correct: the kind of fallacy hunting that’s become popular in the era of online forums and social media has a way of turning you into a specific kind o…
There Are Many Different Ways to Commodify Black Culture
white praise is still the white gaze
What People Want From Our Schools Has Never Been Accomplished, Anywhere, Ever
educating an entire society into prosperity is a radical modern fantasy, not "getting things back to normal"