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Odd, literally the first time I even heard of Infinite Jest, it was a talking point of the Perfect Organism in his demented efforts to become maximally appealing to college-educated women. Since 2020, has Infinite Jest become badwrong, along with Teslas?
Freddie deBoer has a fun article about the recent vogue for hating on Infinite Jest, its author and the people who've read it.
Wait, it's hip to hate Infinite Jest now? I think I might need to start liking it...
It was certainly hip to hate on Infinite Jest on Twitter at the time of writing (pre-Elon takeover).
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Kind of. David Foster Wallace is considered "dude lit" (which is bad) and he was a complicated genius dude who didn't fit neatly into any ideological box but was not visibly pro-feminist, which means promoting him as an Important Writer is bad. Plus reading a complicated and notoriously difficult 1000-page novel is very male-coded (thus, bad). Basically, it appeals to the sort of nerdy, intellectual dude who might not be woke - hence, a "red flag "
(Disclaimer: I have not read Infinite Jest. I read one of DFW's other books and just didn't like it much.)
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