Can't Fight Against The Youth

It’s slowly dawning on people of import that the scroll is inevitable, destined to become the defining medium of our time and probably the next millennium. I myself published two recent pieces, one in American Mind and one in Tablet Magazine, both addressing the truth: “TikTok” isn’t some frivolous fad. It’s where the war will be fought and where the great men of our era will distinguish themselves. The battles are already underway.

In his fantastic piece “The Third Wave of Journalism,” Titus Techera makes a somewhat hopeful argument about the state of journalism. Sure, “real journalism” is dead, but “real journalism” was always a Boomer larp bookended by eras of pampleteering, a much more bold and honest form of public discourse. Now that “real journalists” have completely embarrassed themselves, we can get back to business.

“The secret of X is that for extraordinary Americans, they have a profile that gives them a roadmap for action. Their followers, impressions, and other statistics reflect an effort to assemble and motivate an audience, indeed an electorate. Every new achievement in popularity frees them from the vulgarity of the ordinary users, which becomes refined as a timeline curated by influential accounts, and also introduces them to similar accounts, a 1 percent of a 1 percent, where it becomes possible to associate for common purposes and thus to become representatives of a digital democracy. Success speaks for itself to a considerable extent, so major users can influence public sentiment instead of merely following it and, in some contentious moments, public opinion, by joining the people against elite media. Once they publish their opinions and publicly commit to supporting and opposing political activities, they also become publicly answerable, through community notes as well as ratios, and other mechanisms, and thus they will get the political education most of them missed when they turned to computers. America is the land of second chances, after all. Maybe we should think of the most famous X accounts as America’s true Congress, hidden in plain sight.”

If it’s true on Twitter, it’s true on Instagram and it’s true on TikTok and it’s true on YouTube, perhaps only at differing brow levels.

Andrew Callaghan is Gen Z’s favorite gonzo journalist; at least before he was canceled for “sexual misconduct.” He came up doing man-on-the-street videos on his “All Gas No Brakes” YouTube channel, now called Channel 5, where he still has 2.7 million followers. HBO premiered his last movie This Place Rules before his cancellation.

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But Callaghan isn’t your average man-on-the-streeter. He goes deeper, and further into “real life” than other YouTubers. He gets to the core of the action and right up close to shady characters—antifa foot soldiers, rioters, drug dealers, homeless people—that we rarely see up close. There’s something about Callaghan’s awkward, innocent, pimply-faced teenage demeanor that slices through barriers. He’s the opposite of Alex Jones, who is all libido, id, and agenda: concave. Callaghan takes it all in, he listens intently, doesn’t judge: convex. 

Then there’s his editorial genius. I love Werner Herzog documentaries because they’re about everything besides the subject. The camera always lingers a bit too long. The interviewee breaks character. Maybe something random occurs behind him. We see something we weren’t supposed to. These little ironies make the audience belly laugh, or they move us with great power. Strange synchronicities that make us feel less alone. 

The first act of Callaghan’s new documentary Dear Kelly is filled with these Herzog-ian moments, and the result is total gonzo brilliance. In the first scene, an onlooker seems to trip and fall at the exact moment a woke protestor offers a particularly grating answer. A tiny synchronicity that’s both astounding and hilarious—you can’t make this stuff up.

Callaghan has a tendency to interview subjects in bathrooms while drinking, a trend he keeps up throughout the movie. At one point and because reasons, he throws a big party at Chico State, where he gets many awesome drunk bathroom interviews. There, we witness a fist fight, which seems to genuinely excite Andrew; we, the audience, see his danger-seeking edge. But then within 15 rapid cuts of the fight, the two bloodied fighters drunkenly hug it out. We see this in Hollywood comedies, but very rarely do we see the real thing.

Dear Kelly is a short, immaculately edited feature length documentary about a man named Kelly J. Patriot, one of those sign waiving MAGA enthusiasts that you see in all the protest videos, and maybe the handsomest version of this archetype. His favorite flag pole can fit four flags on it.

In another synchronistic moment, Callaghan plays one of Kelly’s heart wrenching home videos from the 90s—from before Kellys’s life was consumed by obsession—and the camera freezes perfectly on a retro can of Bud Light. The audience immediately understood the reference and roared with laughter. In an interview, Kelly’s kids, lesbian daughter and White Boy Summer-coded son appear together. The son goes off on slight tangent “...not that I don’t love capitalism, but…” and his sister cringes, starts to interject, then stops herself. A beautiful sibling moment in 2024, reflective of the gendered political spectrum youth face today.

I saw the film at the Wiltern in Los Angeles on the last night of its 38 city premiere tour. I felt ancient amid what appeared to be a sold out crowd of 2,300 Zoomers in their casual Sunday Dodgers hats. My very-pregnant wife’s belly seemed to stick out another foot or so, garnering looks or intentional-look-aways from the sea of scuzzy kids. I haven’t seen so many “young people” in one place since last time I ended up at Tenants of the Trees, and it was a similar crowd. Everyone dressed like they’re in a Mackelmore video. Many seem non-binary. 

Touring a documentary like you would a concert, that is to say city-by-city, theater-by-theater, is a genius idea for a scroll star—a way to monetize your audience for its full value so the social platforms don’t drink your milkshake. Callaghan himself introduced the film, and certain elements were tweaked to be Los Angeles-specific. At the beginning of the screening, a Quicktime window reading “Dear Kelly LA Cut” was dragged across a desktop to the center of the screen. Callaghan said “we just exported the LA cut 15 minutes ago,” and the whole janky DIY vibe drew great cheers from the audience. At one point, the show stopped and a rapper named Uncle Bill, featured in the documentary, performed live on stage. Other clever “utility” plays included mystery bundles for sale on the website and a controlled Q&A with Callaghan after the show, which we couldn’t stay for cause we had to relieve the babysitter. 

The film opens on what the media has reported will be a White Lives Matter rally in Huntington Beach, where Callaghan encounters Kelly J. Patriot. It’s a truly incredible scene, epic in scale. Antifa “counter protestors” mob an intersection, waiting for the marching army of white supremacists who of course never show up because they don’t exist. The only person who does show up? Kelly J. Patriot, waiving his foursome of MAGA flags. Kelly doesn’t even know why he’s there, he’s just heard there’s a chance to protest, and Callaghan has to tell him it’s a White Lives Matter rally—another ironic moment that draws laughter. The counter protesters attack Kelly and beat him up; it’s one against a hundred. He’s bloody, but unbowed. You get the sense this is exactly what he came for. 

Callaghan lets this scene play out transparently—no spin. Thus the media comes off as culpable, and antifa, who are exactly the type of fat, mouth-frothing dysgenic freaks you’d expect, comes off as dangerous, disturbing bullies. Cops end up arresting Kelly, instead of antifa, for “wielding a weapon,” e.g. his giant flagpole, and the cops come off terrible too. Kelly looks like the hero. 

Furthermore, Callaghan explains in the early parts of the film that during the filming of his prior HBO movie This Place Rules, producers pressured him to give a heartfelt speech in support of Biden, which made him deeply uncomfortable. We see a clip of him attempting to do their bidding, which feels pure 1984. On top of that, the early publicity for Dear Kelly suggested that it was about Kelly J. Patriot “saving Callaghan’s life.” All this lead me to believe that it would be MAGA apologia, and that Callaghan, post-cancellation, would be coming out as based. Alas, this is not the case.

The plot is this: at the White Lives Matter cum antifa rally, Callaghan asks Kelly his usual open ended questions, but Kelly gives him a surprise answer. It’s not necessarily political fervor that drives him, but hatred of a predatory lender named Bill Joiner who screwed him over. Callaghan, smartly, seizes on this bit of information and investigates.

From there, he gets to know Kelly. Callaghan offers a thesis that provides the structure for the rest of the narrative—political obsessives like Kelly are actually driven by a past trauma that deprived them of their Maslowian needs, home, safety, family etc. Sure enough, Kelly lost his home and family to Bill Joiner, and he now obsessively stalks Joiner, and also obsessively goes to every MAGA street protest he can find to fight against what he sees as an evil regime. Bill Joiner isn’t exactly intermingled with “them” (e.g. the regime) in Kelly’s mind, but they are definitely related.

Callaghan and Kelly get to know each other, and become what you might call friends. Callaghan’s thesis is that Kelly’s beliefs are somewhat illegitimately painted over his trauma, but just to be sure, he begins investigating Joiner. And here is where Callaghan’s genius begins to give way to his youth. 

They try to find Bill Joiner. There’s a fun interlude of them dressing up in Ghillie Suits to approach Joiner’s home, but they can’t find him. This is a huge problem, because finding the guy is absolutely essential for the story. Without him, you really don’t have a film.

Callaghan, as a filmmaker, had three choices at this point: 1) admit you don’t have enough for a feature and move on to something else 2) pivot to make the documentary about how ridiculous it is that someone is able to use the legal system to evict someone from his home, yet be impossible to trace or contact, or 3) double down on your thesis: that it’s really all Kelly coping with his trauma.

He chooses number three, and the film falls apart. The quick, funny takes are replaced with long, boring speeches full of therapy speak. There’s almost nothing about Kelly saving Callaghan’s life, besides a quick reference to Kelly calling Callaghan after he was canceled. 

Yet Callaghan’s conclusion, ultimately, is that MAGA people like Kelly, at least the more Q-tarded ones, are driven by psychosis. Never mind that a mob of hundreds literally beat Kelly in the streets for waiving a flag. Nevermind he was then the one arrested by the police. Nevermind all this occurred due to fake fear mongering by the media. No, this is really all about his trauma! And trauma can be solved, if only you have enough therapy. 

And thus we see the confused beauty of this new Generation. At their core, they are what we’d call “Post Left,” which is what the Red Scare girls are. They’re bullshit resistant, and and very hungry for truth, which can trump “empathy” and “compassion.” They really dislike being told what to think and say, they have an adoration for truth tellers, with all their warts, that millennials completely lack. They don’t shy away from traditional displays of masculinity, like fights, or public brawls between political forces; unthinkable to your average Yuppy. 

However, all of this misbehavior is rooted in a latent softness. An extreme focus on “self work” and “self acceptance.” Yes, we may be ugly, we may be violent, we may believe the craziest shit and be willing to beat you up for it. It simply can’t be helped, you see, because of our trauma.

This hypocrisy may be incredibly irritating, even to me, a member of the most irritating generation of all time. But we must accept the truth that Callaghan’s therapy-tinged speechifying is what works on the scroll, and is certainly no worse than some of the odd behaviors that purvey clout over in our spheres on Twitter. Callaghan succeeds as a gonzo journalist in ways that basically nobody else does today. He fulfills the role of modern pamphleteering journalist-leader; a refreshing change from self-canonizing horseshit like Spotlight or The Post. Mostly, we should listen to him. Then maybe we can work on his politics.