On “How Trying Became Cool Again”

This week I watched How Trying Became Cool Again by Nathan Zed on youtube. Nathan’s video is 10 minuets, shorter than some of the things I usually watch, but I was surprised and really impressed at how solidly Nathan covered the topics of the change in aesthetics, dating, online culture, and the resurgence we’ve been seeing of popular artists bringing back “trying,” in only 10 minuets.

Rather than making an academic video on the exact reasons why this cultural trend has occurred, Nathan focuses on his own observations and thoughts about the state of authenticity and “doing too much.” I think this works in his favor. Nathan’s video has been out for 13 days at the time of writing this and has 1.5 million views. His video is fast paced and thought provoking, encouraging the viewer to consider their own observations, experiences, and opinions on how popular culture has changed for the better and for worse.

Nathan identifies the mid 2010s as when a shift occurred from vibrant, colorful, loud, expressive content with personality changed to boring, “effortless,” and simplified. He singles out The Life of Pablo by Kanye West album cover as exemplifying this shift and clips pop up of Kylee Jenner on instagram, modern architecture, logo redesigns, and popular movies. I was entering my preteens in the mid 2010s and while I think phasing out of early childhood comes with losing some vibrancy and magic regardless of the time you’re growing up in, I do remember things starting to look more polished and more minimalist around this time.

I grew up loving Lady Gaga music videos and dressing in bright colors, playing make believe, and emulating the characters I saw on Disney channel. Soon enough though, I realized my younger sister, around 5 and 6 at the time, was emulating youtubers, her make believe started to mimic hauls, unboxings, and challenges for the imaginary eye of an audience, and my peers became a lot more stressed about curating their social media/social media in general. This shift in culture occurred right around when my age group began entering puberty, becoming more socially conscious and self conscious, and trying to figure out what it meant to be cool and fit in. I wish we could have had more time to be kids without the pressure of comparing ourselves to the emerging “effortless,” polished, nonchalant version of cool that was emerging; all ideals nearly incompatible with the awkward messiness of growing up.

Nathan brings up being nonchalant in the context of dating. I’m reminded of several things I’ve heard about dating as young people, factoring in the involvement of online dating apps. There’s this tightrope of nonchalant-ness that it feels like everyone is trying to walk –– don’t come on too strong, being too genuine, too real, or too deep is a red flag, play it cool, make them wonder if you actually are interested…. At some point some of the advice I’ve heard people throw around starts sounding counter to the purpose of getting to know someone and dating. Who honestly wants to be with someone who isn’t really… trying, who doesn’t really care, who’s “not too much” when it comes down to it? Is that compatible for anything more than a date or two? Does that make for a fun date when you’ve learned next to nothing about the other person and what your connection could look like?

It’s a personal value of mine to be a genuine person and all of my closest relationships have been built on everyone bringing their whole genuine selves to the table and seeing how compatible we turn out to be. Trying to be nonchalant waters down what it’s like to like, dislike, love, and hate things. Having tastes, opinions, beliefs, and personality will never not be cool to me.

The artists Nathan brings up as having pushed past the recent trend of sameness and minimalism include Doechii, Tyler the Creator, Chappell Roan, Charlie xcx, and Kendrick Lamar. Images of artists including Sabrina Carpenter, Madonna, and Britney Spears appear as well. Nathan makes the point that pop is supposed to be elaborate, it feels better to root for creators who work hard and show the effort they put in, and that creators who have a love for their art form go far. And the music industry isn’t the only arena that has seen the success of things that don’t pretend to be “too cool.” Barbenheimer celebrated two very intentional, artistic, vibrant projects that so many people poured their passion into. Personally, I remember enjoying Barbenheimer’s moment because it felt like an uplifting of two great things without putting something else down, without toxic discourse, and the sense that there was a right way to consume the subject media.

Nathan brings up how AI has entered the game and creating projects, creating anything really, is now easier than ever. But the greatest things to ever have been created by humans are great because they are so human. Nathan predicts a return to form, a leaning into being more human from creators in response to AI. And I hope he’s right. In my view, to think and feel and create and experience is central to what makes us human, and no amount of ease that AI may bring will hold the same place in our cultural consciousness or our hearts, as corny as that is, as art and moments made by truly trying, risking failure, uncoolness, being cringe, and pushing past that fear to find a whole lot of human authenticity and realness.