https://spectator.us/american-cool-cringe-end/
Back in March, around 4,000 years ago, the world was ending. Plague swept in from the east like a horde. Clam-tight lockdowns, unthinkable even days before, were announced everywhere. Who could save us?
On March 18 our prayers were answered. An honor roll of Hollywood bluebloods took action. Assembled by Wonder Woman herself, Gal Gadot, they created a video montage cover of John Lennon’s masterpiece — yes! — ‘Imagine’, which she posted — thank goodness! — on Instagram. ‘We’re all in this together,’ said Gadot’s expensive oval face, and, in a sense, she was right. Will Ferrell and Mark Ruffalo, Sia and Zoë Kravitz, Norah Jones and Amy Adams: they were all in this big wet bathful of tears together. The stars were taking a forced break from riding their chariots through the clouds. They were just like you, just like me. ‘Imagine there’s no religion,’ they sang, as every church, mosque and synagogue in two hemispheres was padlocked and shuttered.
Now, on magazine paper, these were some of America’s coolest people. Tasteformers, platinum artists, red-carpeters — a glittering bunch. But this video, which quickly reached 10 million views, was mortifying. The global embarrassment it inflamed could’ve roasted the thigh fat off a regiment of sumo wrestlers. There was nothing to envy. It was tone-deaf, cheesy and, above all, cringe.
It wasn’t a one-off.
Somehow, being Cool blew up in America’s face. Cool became cringe, and cringe is everywhere you look. When the third millennium began, Tom Wolfe could write about ‘American superiority in all matters of science, economics, industry, politics, business, medicine, engineering, social life, social justice, and, of course , the military’.That superiority evaporated, leaving behind large, damp patches of awkwardness. Yes, America is still culturally hegemonic — no doubt there. But it’s limping along on anti-prestigious name recognition. Yes, through Netflix and Disney, Penguin Random House and Apple, Facebook and Twitter, and by a million other means, American mores are broadcast, published, disseminated; stubbornly world- dominating, ploddingly imitated. Yes, the United States still gives off a massive light. But it’s not the hopeful shine of a beacon on a hill. It’s the flickering glare of a dumpster fire.