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i was told there would be a house. specifically, a house with a yard where i could perhaps grow a singular heirloom tomato without paying three months’ rent for the privilege of dirt. instead, i’m sitting in a studio apartment that smells faintly of my neighbor’s air-fried salmon, scrolling through listings for literal sheds in the desert that cost more than my entire genetic lineage is worth. welcome to the dream. it’s a fever dream, and the thermostat is broken.
the american dream used to be a script we all agreed to follow: graduate, work a 9-to-5, buy a sedan, and die with a pension. now, the script has been shredded and fed to an ai that’s currently hallucinating a world where we all become rich by selling digital rocks to each other. it’s not that the dream is dead; it’s that it’s been commodified into a series of aesthetic rituals that none of us can actually afford to maintain.
The Great White Picket Fence Swindle
back when i was a lifestyle influencer, my entire job was to curate a version of the dream that felt accessible through a 10% discount code. i’d stand in front of houses i didn’t own, wearing clothes i had to return, telling people to ‘manifest their space.’ it was a performance of stability in a world that’s basically a giant game of jenga played on a vibrating plate. i quit because the irony started to taste like copper.
we’re the first generation to be hyper-aware that the ladder we’re supposed to climb is actually a treadmill. we’re running at full tilt just to stay in the same place, and the reward for all that effort is the opportunity to pay for five different streaming services while the biosphere collapses around us. it’s hard to care about a 401(k) when the map of the coastline is changing faster than my skincare routine.
Manifestation as a Coping Mechanism
the internet loves to tell us that if we just vibrate at a higher frequency, the universe will provide. this is just prosperity gospel for people who like crystals and overpriced matcha. it’s a way to blame ourselves for systemic failure. if i don’t have a house, it’s not because the housing market is a parasitic entity; it’s because i didn’t journal hard enough about my girl-boss intentions.
there’s something deeply funny about trying to ‘manifest’ a livable wage while billionaires are building rockets to escape the very atmosphere they’re currently incinerating. we’re told to have a growth mindset while the planet is literally signaling that it’s reached its limit. the cognitive dissonance is the only thing we actually produce in abundance anymore.
i see people my age leaning into the ‘soft life’ or ‘quiet quitting’ as if these are revolutionary acts. they’re just desperate attempts to claw back some semblance of humanity from a system that views us as data points to be harvested. we’re tired. we’re so incredibly tired of being told that our worth is tied to our productivity in a world that doesn’t even value the things we produce.
Subscription Services as a Personality Trait
since we can’t own property, we’ve decided to own ‘vibes.’ our identities are now built out of the various monthly fees we pay. i am the sum of my spotify wrapped, my meal kit preferences, and my storage cloud tier. ownership is a relic of the past; we are all just temporary tenants of our own lives, renting the tools of our existence until the next price hike.
this shift from owning to subscribing has turned us into a generation of ghosts. we leave no physical trace, just a trail of abandoned logins and expired credit card info. the american dream was about legacy, about building something that lasts. our legacy is a collection of high-resolution jpegs stored on a server in a cooling facility that’s drinking the last of the local groundwater.
the absurdity of it all is the only thing that keeps me sane. you have to laugh at the fact that we’re expected to build a career while simultaneously bracing for the water wars. i’m updating my resume and my ‘in case of emergency’ bag at the same time. one is for the corporate hellscape, the other is for the literal one. it’s called balance.
The Aesthetics of Decline
we’ve become obsessed with the ‘abandoned mall’ aesthetic or the ‘liminal space’ vibe because it mirrors our internal reality. we are living in the ruins of a future that never arrived. the gleaming cities and flying cars we were promised were swapped for gig-economy apps that allow us to deliver burgers to people who are also too depressed to leave their apartments.
the irony is that we’re the most connected generation in history, yet we’ve never been more isolated. our interactions are mediated by algorithms designed to keep us angry or envious. we’re screaming into a void that’s been monetized by people who don’t even like us. it’s a beautiful, neon-lit nightmare, and i can’t seem to find the exit.
every time i see a headline about ‘why gen-z is ruining the diamond industry’ or ‘why millennials aren’t buying cereal,’ i feel a tiny spark of joy. we’re not ruining these industries; we’re just too busy trying to afford antibiotics. the dream didn’t die—it was foreclosed on, and we’re the ones left standing on the sidewalk with a box of Participation Trophies.
even the way we protest feels like a simulation. we post black squares or change our profile pictures, then go back to scrolling for the next hit of dopamine. it’s performative because we’ve been taught that the only way to exist is to be perceived. if you don’t document your rage, did it even happen? if you don’t post your existential dread, are you even alive?
maybe the real american dream was the friends we made along the way—mostly because we have to share a two-bedroom apartment with four of them to make rent. there’s a certain grim camaraderie in knowing that none of us are going to ‘make it’ in the way our parents did. we’re all just drifting on the same iceberg, watching it melt in 4k ultra-hd.
i think about the 1950s suburbia propaganda often. the smiling families, the shiny appliances. it was all a lie built on top of a bigger lie, but at least it was a lie you could sleep in. our lies are digital. they don’t provide shelter; they just provide a blue-light glow that keeps us awake at 3 am wondering why we feel so empty despite having access to all the world’s information.
we’re told to find our passion, but passion doesn’t pay the electric bill. so we find a side hustle, and then a side hustle for our side hustle, until our entire existence is a series of transactions. we’ve monetized our hobbies, our friendships, and our downtime. there is no space left that hasn’t been colonized by the need to ‘optimize.’
is there a point to any of this? probably not. but there’s a certain freedom in accepting the collapse. when you stop trying to manifest a dream that was never meant for you, you can start appreciating the sheer, unadulterated weirdness of the present. we’re the house band on the titanic, and we might as well play something we actually like.
so, where’s my american fucking dream? it’s right here, in the comments section of a video about how to ferment your own cabbage because we can’t afford groceries. it’s in the memes we share to keep from crying. it’s in the collective realization that we are all being scammed, and that the only thing left to do is laugh at the audacity of the scammers.
i’m going to go stare at a wall now. not because i’m meditating, but because it’s the only thing in this apartment i don’t have to pay a monthly subscription for. yet. stay cynical, stay tired, and try not to manifest anything too expensive today. we don’t have the budget for it.
