We should pay less attention to Current Thing-ism
In the Internet age, allegiance to the moral cause du jour can be transitory but criticism of it is often just as shallow
JEMIMA KELLY
LOVE him, loathe him or laugh scathingly at him, there can be no denying that when Elon Musk speaks — or tweets, usually — the world pays attention. And so in March, when the world’s richest man tweeted a meme showing a character waving a Ukraine flag with the slogan “I SUPPORT THE CURRENT THING” encircling him, it duly went viral.
The meme, whose featured protagonist is an “NPC” — a term from the gaming world that stands for “non-player character” and is used as a slur to mean someone who doesn’t think for themselves — was embraced enthusiastically by Musk’s fellow crypto-loving tech entrepreneur Marc Andreessen. He has tweeted about “The Current Thing” over 100 times.
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