Flannery O’Connor once wrote that “there is no excuse for anyone to write fiction for public consumption unless he has been called to do so by the presence of a gift.” And yet Substack exists. Suddenly hundreds of thousands of people seem to have a gift.
I remember seeing one of the fashion girls I follow on TikTok post a video about overcoming the fear of calling herself a writer. I also remember my confusion — however mean and reductive that sounds, I didn’t believe that her weekly Substack post (titled “Feeling like a piece of bubblegum” and accompanied by a fashionably lower-case subheader) interspersed with reposted pictures of sourdough and workout sets makes her a writer.
Substack is the perfect playground for the recently emerged “thought daughters”. These days everyone wants to be a “thought daughter”; everyone is “literally” Sylvia Plath staring at the fig tree; everyone is misunderstood, but not in a Tumblr way — we are past that now — in an ironic, “I know I am performing the performative, and hence I am exempt from the notion of being performative” way. These days everyone wants to write. And what’s the point of putting in the effort to write anything if no one is going to read it? Enter Substack.
The subject matter of said writing is, hence, unfortunately, of secondary importance, because (to quote O’Connor again) “the idea of being a writer attracts a good many shiftless people, those who are merely burdened with poetic feelings or afflicted with sensibility.” These people would often do better talking to their friends or a therapist. Not everyone has to write. If they feel that they must, they should, and it’s nice that they have a platform to share their writing with. I am not trying to tell anyone not to use Substack; I’m just saying that Substack specifically comes with a whole attached aesthetic, and we cannot pretend to ignore that.
I believe that Instagram art accounts and Instagram poetry foreshadowed the rise of Substack. I will die on the hill that no one did more damage to the art of literature than Rupi Kaur. At some point, we started to consume art for the aesthetic of it. This was probably happening before social media as well, but platforms such as Pinterest, Instagram, and Tumblr allow us to repost work without any individual creation. It’s the reposting that constitutes most of the feed. Obviously, if you like something, the instinct is to share it. But people are using re-posting, re-stacking, pinning, etc. to perform a version of themselves. They want to be seen as someone who engages with a certain type of content. And, recently, there is a pressure for that content to be delivered in a manner that presents oneself as an intellectual — and Substack caters to this need perfectly.
Even worse, we also started to create art purely for the aesthetic of it. If someone actually posts original pieces, the notion of having a Substack, of being a writer, is more important than the actual content. Most people are interested in being a writer, not in writing. They are interested in seeing their names at the top of something printed; it matters not what (O’Connor). I’m not saying that all the writing on Substack is bad. Nevertheless, due to the sheer amount of it, the overwhelming majority is. Suddenly, everyone can be a writer, a poet, an artist. Everyone can have a Substack, an art account, their iPhone photography exhibited. We suffer from a deluge of content, and, I hate to say it, too many people are given a platform that serves as an excuse to label themselves as artists, as intellectuals, and as content-creators.
And what is the content that is being created? A “thought daughter” writes about being misunderstood, being Sylvia Plath, being Eve Babitz. She is observant; she is an intellectual in the increasingly anti-intellectual world; she reads poetry and has a grapefruit or fig tattoo on her collarbone. She writes about her deep feelings and how the matcha latte art she had for brunch stirred them. She writes poetry about her Hinge dates and wanted to be Effy Stonem when she was 14. Now, she wants to be Joan Didion. Well, actually, “Joan Didion would shoot you with a gun”, to quote a Substack article I recently read. She would not want to be connected to your Substack profile picture and your use of lowercase and acronyms.
The kind of original writing going on is predominantly of a reflective, not fictional, nature. “Thought daughters” share their thoughts and feelings on life, on the media they’ve consumed, the clothes and things they’ve acquired, their experiences, other people, regaining their “sparkle”, etc. This is precisely the kind of writing that would usually be contained to a journal or texts to friends, but Substack provides us with a platform to share it with the world, suggesting that the world is interested. And sometimes it is, which, I think, is an extension of a wider 21st-century phenomenon: suddenly, everywhere we look (social media), we are bombarded with what other people’s private lives are supposedly like. 40 years ago, you wouldn’t know what that one person you met at Hogan’s last week was doing on a Monday evening. You wouldn’t know what the one girl you saw posting her Substack link on her story thinks about “the concept of girlhood”. It’s not necessarily for better or worse. But why do we actually have to know, or want to know, what others do or think all the time? It’s performative — no one’s life can be summed up in a few Instagram pictures. We all know that by now, and Substack provides us with the illusion that it itself deviates from this schema, because it is intellectual, because it’s your original thoughts, your original writing — how can thoughts be performative? Well, they can, if they are shared publicly. Hence, I would argue that the motivation behind sharing them is largely the same as the one behind curating your monthly Instagram photo dump. Substack is the new and glorified Instagram note, and deep down we all know it.
Precisely because of that, posts such as “I’m torn between treating my Substack like a fun little side hobby and taking it as seriously as if I were running the New York Times” or “does getting 0 likes on substack mean im niche?” (5.9K likes, 605 re-stacks) exemplify the nature of the platform. For their own self-protection, the aesthetic embodied by Substack-posting “thought daughters” is one of ironic, self-conscious distance. If one talks loud enough about their writing being bad, about only writing for themself, no one will have the right to expect great results or to judge. But if it is bad, if it is indeed only meant for you and your diary, why share it with the world? I do not believe anyone would consciously share anything they believe to be of bad quality. So, if you do think it is good, stand proud and stop hiding behind this wall of performative irony.
Furthermore, a lot of people treat Substack as the child and heir of Tumblr. The similar layout, the “what’s on your mind” prompt, the re-stacking. Like Tumblr, it allows you to create an internet version of yourself, on a platform which is supposed to highlight your intellectualism — you can show people that you “write stories in order to live”. Yet the “about” page of Substack reveals the dark capitalist underbelly: “Make money doing the work you believe in. Old media models are broken. Substack is building a new one that puts writers, creators, and subscribers in charge.” Make money. First and foremost. Yes, you may be “doing the work you believe in”, but the platform is just there to give you an audience; it doesn’t actually help you write. It helps you monetise, if not literally, then metaphorically. This is what you hope for: if not for money or fame, then for recognition and appreciation.
When someone shares their art, they intend for it to be consumed and appreciated. If you post or publish something, you intend it to be read. There is a difference between sharing it with your closest friends or family and sharing it with the world. And even if your 17 subscribers are your immediate friends and family, the public nature of your Substack allows you the hope that someday someone will stumble upon it and discover the genius of your writing. You write for the drawer and hope that after you are dead, they will find the manuscripts and hail you as the new Franz Kafka.
I do believe a lot of people write for fun. Some of them are even conscious of the fact that they aren’t the new Joan Didion. But they choose to share their work anyways — they think people might find it interesting. A lot of people do. Substack perfectly fills this niche in the market. But girl, stop pretending that you don’t hope people are reading and perceiving you. In the Substack world, self-conscious, ironic, self-deprecating distance has become a cover-up for conceit.
