Like Me

by Hayley Phelan

That’s the thing about money. It insulates you from certain truths. If ignorance is bliss, then it’s also the greatest luxury money can buy.

I may not have personally done anything wrong, but my entire life, my very existence, had been built on the back of others’ sufferings. And that made me complicit. It is immoral to be rich; if being rich means having more money than you need, more money than you know what to do with, who do you think is paying that price?

It was the kind of thing brands had started posting recently, as if they were moral entities instead of capitalist enterprises, as if they had values beyond customer retention and profit margin.

As people began to think of themselves more and more as brands, brands started to feel more and more like people.

I’d been training for this, after all; every girl has. Why else do they teach us to hate our bodies, to treat them as expensive machines? Then it’s easy to do whatever you have to do, since you’re not really involved; everything’s happening on the outside, but inside you’re completely untouched.

“It’s a figment, Michaela,” he said, putting the fork down. “It’s just another gymnasium for the masses to exercise in, so they don’t become disgruntled and rebel against their overlords. It gives the appearance of power, but don’t be fooled, daughter of mine, there is no power there.”

though the Internet is endless, our memory and attention spans are embarrassingly finite.

That’s how fame works—it’s like love without the personal connection.