AJ Kay

I love it when words tinkle like piano keys and hit like bricks.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

Here’s the thing: When you tell emotionally-unstable, social-approval-dependent, weak-minded masses, in whom you have seeded chronic victim complexes, that their policial opponents are literal Nazis, you’re running the risk that few of them might take you seriously and act, not realizing that you’re just manipulating them and leveraging their fragility for … votes.

Something to consider.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

“Every company that does this deserves to go bankrupt.”

Agreed.

[Matt Walsh @MattWalshBlog]

Honestly I thought all these AI interview videos were a joke, and maybe this particular one actually is, but I looked it up and apparently this is a real and widely adopted thing? Companies are making you interview with bots? Absolutely dystopian. Dehumanizing. Every company that does this deserves to go bankrupt.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@ashafrazier @tomfgoodwin This. All day.

[el gato malo @boriquagato]

it's media driven reality modulation.

whatever story gets focused on and reported gets massively overblown and the sense of frequency and prevalence distorted.

"the summer of the shark" media was all about shark attacks. people thought it was some wild, scary outlier. it wasn't. it was actually a below average year for shark attacks

people tend to want to see this in terms of deliberate manipulation and "plots" and,to be sure, some of it may be, but a lot of it is just emergent, especially in an interactive online and social media environment where "attention" can be measured in real time.

modern media is not news, it's engagement maximization.

every time you click, it's a signal to "make more of this." so they do. so does social media. whatever is trending gets posted on. suddenly everyone is a lear jet expert or needs to opine about the latest violence.

the frequency of posts online bears no resemblance to the frequency of outcomes in the real world.

[Government Zombie @GovtZombie]

I'm a tiny platform and I never do this, but I'm asking the bigger platforms that sometimes interact with me to help spread this news. Bring it to @elonmusk @Skydance @60Minutes so it gets coverage. Please help these people.

@txsalth2o @justin_hart @JustineBateman @DataRepublican @data_republican @AJKayWriter @annbauerwriter @kristenmag @graciefacelove @GrumpyTechBro

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@GaryDeanThomas @spencerpratt Thanks, Gary!

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@brenda11831 @dilanesper Right? Seems pretty obvious to me.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

The truth must be pretty damn ugly for someone to conclude that deception is a better foundation for a relationship than honesty.

[Cassie @cassiemoans_]

Trans people DO NOT have to tell you they're trans unless they have romantic intentions with you..
That means if you, as a straight man ask me out on a date, I'm not obliged to tell you until AFTER the date when l've decided if I have romantic interest in you.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@KitsuraNines It says a lot about how objectively ugly the truth is when someone concludes that deception is a better foundation for a relationship than honesty.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

Standalone villains are just as rare as standalone heroes.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@wokeandwoofing It’s quite sad. 😔

[Seth Dillon @SethDillon]

Half the people here are shameless shapeshifters. You never know what they actually believe, or if they believe anything at all. They live by the motto, "Whatever is trending is true, and anyone who doesn't agree is my enemy."

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@transscribe It’s not a joke. It’s a performance that gets you off.

You fetishize helplessness and equate that with womanhood.

Women would never do that.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@vidotjpg Your terms are acceptable.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@Theo_TJ_Jordan Congrats! You earned that buzz! Well done!

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@MichaelFonda @PezeshkiCharles Your need to take cheap, baseless shots reeks of intellectual insecurity.

I hope you feel better soon.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@EmilyVBurns Xx 😘 💪

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@JustDeficient Correct. People don’t view men as women.

They are mutually exclusive categories.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@subwiredesire So people should prioritize your feelings over their reality?

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

@dkwillabus Only to a point. If Nikes started falling apart after a month, their brand would collapse.

[AJ Kay @AJKayWriter]

This is so depressingly misguided.

1.) Dude is not describing “branding.” At all. Branding relies on performance. The D’s haven’t mastered “branding” or “storytelling.” They have mastered moralization and identity politics. Not the same. At all.

2.) He says that R’s cannot have lost because of broken promises because D’s break promises all the time and people still vote for them. This completely misses the fact that D’s have created a world in which avoiding social or professional exile requires strict adherence to a political narrative. The narrative itself isn’t what is powerful. The power is having tapped into the psyche of people who so desperately *need* to be seen as “good” and “smart” that they will nod along with (almost) anything they are told to achieve it.

3.) Even moralization doesn’t beat credibility. That’s why Trump won in 2024. Enough people saw through the Left’s bullshit “storytelling” that they were willing to take a chance on Trump — a guy they were told was the worst of the worst — in the hopes he would actually do the things he said he would do. And when he didn’t — well, we all know what happened.

TLDR: Lying better than the liars is *not* the answer. Branding is closer to the answer but what Pratt describes is not branding. It’s bullshitting. And we’ve all had enough of that. Integrity is the answer. Rebuilding trust is the answer. Not being corrupt is the answer. Working for the people is the answer. Doing what you say you are going to do is the answer. Making things better is the answer.

Enough with the fucking lying.

[Spencer Pratt @spencerpratt]

We're in a new era of communication, and only one side seems to be living in it. The old guard consultant class is about to be relegated to the dustbin of history.

If you think that high prices lost the election for the right, you don't understand marketing. Humans have no problem paying a premium for a good quality brand. Notice the word "brand", not "product". Are Nikes better than New Balance? Nope. But the brand is better. And notice what happened when they tinkered with the brand and screwed their core narrative? Nike stock fell through the basement. Did the product change? Nope. The brand did.

It's not the product, it's the brand. Results don't sell the product, the storytelling does. Will these newly-elected commies lower prices? Of course not. Are they gonna get you free healthcare? No, your insurance is gonna get even worse, just like it did the last time they tried socialized medicine. They're not going to do anything they've sold you, but...like Saul Goodman said: if you're committed enough, you can make any story work.

The committed storytelling of a couple insane podcasters was enough to fracture an entire political coalition from their own side in less than 2 years...they have zero power, zero credibility, they've never actually governed anything nor produced any results, but...they're good storytellers, and that's all that matters. Are they telling a good story? No, it's atrocious, but they're telling their atrocious story effectively and compellingly.

It is 100% true that everything's too damn expensive, and we all know that inflated prices are always sticky. Does anyone know that it's entirely the result of shutting down the global economy over the flu and (both naive republicans and democrats) printing infinity dollars for several years? Nope...because nobody has effectively told that story, and it's an unsexy story to tell. "Free stuff!" is a VERY easy story to tell, and when everyone's gotta take out a second mortgage just to pay their insurance premiums, "free healthcare" is an unbeatable story. It doesn't matter that "free healthcare" doesn't exist and socialized medicine is a terrible product...it's not the product, it's the brand. And "FREE!" is a great brand.

You can't get mad at people for having the financial literacy of a 9 year old. I mean, you can, but they outnumber you a million to one, so it's not going to be productive. You need to figure out how to make an unsexy story sexy, or else the "free stuff!" crowd is going to eat your lunch every time. If you give people a choice between earning a six pack on a treadmill or taking Ozempic, they're gonna choose Ozempic...they don't care about the side effects. If you give people a choice between fiscal discipline or free stuff...guess what they'll pick? They don't care about the side effects.

With projected growth of 5%, the economy right now is stronger than it's been in generations. Is that the story you hear? Nope. Is that the vibe you feel? Absolutely not, especially when every time you fill up your gas tank, it feels like a diesel enema.

It's not the product, it's the brand. A great product can fall into oblivion with bad messaging...a single bad review from one effective storyteller can tank a restaurant. The "influencer economy" is lucrative for a reason; everybody inherently understands the importance of effective storytelling...except the right. Zohran Mamdani gets it...he has an army of influencers on staff. In a perfect metaphor of this transitional phase of old guard vs new wave political messaging, Zohran nuked the Vice President into oblivion with maybe the biggest ratio in the history of the internet. By simply posting the subway assistant meme, Mamdani got 2 MILLION likes, quoting a post from the VP that had only 10K likes. If you're reading that sentence thinking "this is fucking ridiculous, you're talking about social media likes as political analysis now?"...you are the problem.

Yes, this stuff matters. Rizz matters. The President did a masterful job of this kind of retail politics in his historic 2024 campaign...you can be angry that this is what politics has been reduced to, but you can either adapt or die.

"No the problem is, you didn't deliver enough for the American people!" Are you a moron? Since when does anybody care about that? What have democrats delivered for Californians in the last 20 years? Unmitigated wildfires, homeless drug zombies everywhere, roads that look like Fallujah in 2004...people don't care about results. They think they care about results. That want you to believe they care about results, just as Nike wants you to believe their shoes are better than New Balance...but at the end of the day, all people really care about is the swoosh.

Adapt or die.