Thread by @RadioFreeTom

This is a great piece about why nostalgia about that "better time" is bullshit. (Well, it's about more than that.) A few observations, and h/t @RuleandRuin
Why Is Every Young Person in America Watching ‘The Sopranos’?

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nytimes.com/2021/09/29/mag…

First, it's a great reflection on how nostalgia runs in regular and stupid cycles. The young people watching The Sopranos are nostalgic watching someone be nostalgic about the period before The Sopranos; nostalgia watching the 2000s while watching someone hating the 2000s. /2

Second, it's a warning that maybe we're now a lot more like Tony than we want to admit. I've said something like this is my recent book about the bored middle-class looking for meaning. That was Tony: Affluent, bored, somewhat self-hating, adrift and depressed. /3

Third, and most distressing, it's a reminder that admiring the world of The Sopranos is just a way to feel all woozy and dramatic about "How Hard Life Is," a feeling now increasingly held by people for whom life isn't all that hard at all. /4

If people are rediscovering The Sopranos, great. It's art. It's a television masterpiece. But if they're rediscovering it and *identifying* with it, that's deeply screwed-up. But not surprising (at least, to me). /5x