Geertz’s theory of involution holds that a greater input (an increase in labor) does not yield proportional output (more crops and innovation). Instead, a society involutes. The Chinese term for involution, neijuan, which is made up of the characters for “inside”and “rolling,”suggests a process that curls inward, ensnaring its participants within what the anthropologist Xiang Biao has described as an “ endless cycle of self-flagellation.”Involution is “the experience of being locked in competition that one ultimately knows is meaningless,”Biao told me.

Suppose you’re a well-known journalists hosting a weekly rather left podcast around topics such as migration, the climate and criticism of right-wing frames in the media. And then suppose you let yourself get baited majorly by an American alt-right activist.

I can stop thinking about the Roman Empire, but this piece that draws an analogy between the Fall of the Romans and the End of Twitter is long overdue to be shared and still really good.