#134: I Love My Squad
It's Monday! It's Monday.
CULTURE THING:
SQUADS HAVE EXISTED FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS as vital forms of social and economic organization. Thanks to group chats and a wave of private online social platforms, squads are reemerging today as a potent cultural force that rejects a strictly individualist market philosophy. Squads play a key role not only in internet community dynamics but in emerging economic networks.
The informal nature of these peer-to-peer institutions, often composed of neighbors and friends, reveals the central role that trust plays in squad logic. Whether housemates or friends sharing a Discord group, squads allow social currency and financial capital to inter-convert, creating opportunities and group resiliency that would have been impossible to achieve alone.Recent events have completely exposed the limits of individual agency, creating a powerful demand for squad-based forms of resiliency. The COVID-19 pandemic is the most recent of these social bonding agents: though we're physically distancing, emotionally we're getting closer. First priority when the virus dropped was securing your squad. The need for group coordination and decision-making soon followed.
But today's emerging culture of group cohesion is driven equally by the social and financial precarity of urban life. Family are those we share space and rent with. Priced out of tier-1 cities, individuals have banded together to survive a jobless market with no social safety net.
Squads are both a product of—and a response to—contemporary social atomization. The trope of "getting a place upstate" signifies young city-dwellers' desire for new kinds of squad-based homesteading. HOMESQUADING is a modern day back-to-the-land movement—swap Whole Earth-inspired post-war communes with post-internet surf clubs microblogging the virtues of cooperative housing, permaculture gardening, and solar-powered mesh networks.
Squad culture is the antithesis of neoliberal individualism. Millennials are healing from decades of irony poisoning, rediscovering what it's like to have generative, exploratory relationships with one another. Younger generations are already imbued with extremely powerful squad energy, equipped with formative experiences in Minecraft, DOTA 2, and Fortnite parties.
Military connotations aside, the arrival of group DMs ushers a new age of "SQUAD" discourse.
Whether bound together for survival or for lols, the squads formed by today's crisis will be resilient. Distance is no longer a barrier with the closeness of network space—soon vital culture will be predominantly enacted by fictive kin. Group collaboration is now the strong default, putting squads at the center of social, cultural, and economic life. To paraphrase Bill Bishop: today people are born as individuals, and have to find their squad.
The shift from individualism towards community-focused culture models is the biggest generational societal change we’re not talking about.
A reminder that every major cultural movement — from Motown to the Antwerp 6 — has come from a like-minded group seeking something better. Whether it be a private Slack or Discord community, the trolls of 8chan, groups like the Operation: Sports community that updates the NCAA 14 video game every year with modern coaches and rosters or just a group chat/Whatsapp stacked with major players, the future of creativity and business feels less like a rigid Associate -> Manager -> Senior manager -> Director -> VP-> C-suite hierarchal structure and more like a group project with a singular mission to Make Cool Shit that Sells.
Case in point:
More on this concept of squad equity and squad wealth to come.
Squad Wealth (Other Internet)
MUSIC THINGS:
August 24th, 1979 - Prince releases “I Wanna Be Your Lover”, the lead single from his second album, Prince. The song became Prince's first major U.S. hit single, topping out at number 11 on the Billboard Hot 100 on January 26, 1980.
Fun Fact: The above video is the approved and “official” version of the video. However, Prince shot an alternate version of the video that was never released. Some great human uploaded it but swapped out the vocals to avoid the Youtube Cops. For historical context, watch it below.
BONUS: Prince performing the song on American Bandstand and completely no-selling Dick Clark’s questions. If you love an awkward celeb interview, you’re in luck!
MARKETING THING:
I got this from Ryan Robinson, btw.
HOW TO HELP BLACK LIVES IN 30 MINS OR LESS:
When it comes to taking the steps needed to create a racially equal America, I’ve heard from many well-intentioned non-Black people over the last two months that one of the most daunting things for them is trying to figure out what they can personally do make things better.
Some folks see these massive issues as a significant problem that cannot be defeated, so they struggle to figure out what one person can do, which leads to them not doing much other than posting to IG. Some of that is not wanting to seem like you’re doing too much, some of that is fear your intentions will be misunderstood.
What if I told you that for only 30 minutes a week, you can help black lives no matter where you are or how much money you make? Here’s how:
Carve out 30 minutes in your calendar this week. Call it “Being A Better Person Time” or “Set a Good Example for my Kid” Time, whatever works.
Click a link and make a call or donate or sign a petition. Just do one thing in that 30 min window.
This weekend, share the above link with your three closest friends and say, “Hey, I’m (calling/donating/signing a petition). I’m worried about how things will be for future generations, so I’m doing something about it. If you’re interested, here’s the link!” If you have a group chat, drop it into your group chat!
Repeat the following week for as long as you can. Do it while you online shop, do it while you’re on an annoying call, hell, you can do it while you poop, I genuinely don’t care! Whatever it takes! It is the absolute least that you can do, but you’ll get a sense of accomplishment and the knowledge that you at least did SOMETHING to help. You have a vision of who you want to be, right? That ideal version of yourself that does the right thing when given a chance and leads by example? This is that chance. You can do it!
BONUS: You won’t have to lie to your kids or grandkids about being on the right side of history! You can be all like, “Children/Grandchildren, we don’t tolerate that racist shit in this house. If anyone says otherwise, send them to me.” and you’ll sound all tough and cool, and your kids or grandkids will respect and love you and not want to be racists…guess what? That means less racist people in the future!!!
Look at that. It turns out you had a bigger impact than you thought the whole time!
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Office Hours is written and created by Ernest Wilkins.
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