The brief fictional account you're about to read takes place in the near future. I wrote it to highlight how easily social media, particularly social media "influencers," can shape the minds of young people.
While many factors contribute to what we are witnessing on college campuses and in our streets today, personality cults, a lack of critical thinking, and misdirected sexual energy can negatively impact not only the present but also the future of our already fragile democracy. I've discussed this issue of sexual energy with several people over the past few weeks, many of whom were either confused by my views or thought I was joking—which, if you know me, isn't unusual.
To explain, I used the analogy of the Chez Guevara T-shirts from the sixties and seventies. I began with these rhetorical questions: “Do you think that if Chez Guevara had been a squat, balding administrative type, young people would have flocked as easily as they had to purchase those T-shirts, and to wear them proudly upon their chests? And do you suppose if the symbolic item of clothing of the Palestinian people had closely resembled the white cloth bonnets that Amish women wear, young people on campuses would be wearing them today?”
Let’s face it. Keffeyas are cool. They can be worn around the neck and shoulders. They can hide faces, giving the wearer an air of mystique. And is it not easy to imagine that part of the allure of the Hitler Youth, and the Brown Shirt movement — and everything that made the Nazi ideology so appealing to so many young people was the refined aesthetic of the clothing, the banners, the symbols, and regalia of the Nazi movement? In a word — it was cool. And nothing is “cool” if it doesn’t purvey some sort of sexual appeal. Tragically, in both instances —the growing allegiances to radical Islam, and in the 30’s, the Nazi movement —what’s become cool is the hatred of Jews and the world’s only Jewish state. Simply put: For many, it is now sexy to hate Jews.
Have a look at this recent post on X from
. “Jewish Voice For Peace,” a ragtag collection of misguided, and Iranian funded Useful Idiots. They have very few actual Jews among their membership, and as you can see, they are are not as interested in peace as their name would suggest.The Minimizing: A Social Contagion
In the spring of 2026, renowned performance artist and social media influencer Suzanne D'Miola and her team filmed a groundbreaking ten-day experimental live event titled The Minimizing, marking a first in post-modern media history. During a subsequent investigation by the New York City police, D'Miola explained her motivation, expressing curiosity about how long it would take her followers to replicate her actions and what the broader implications might be for a society fixated on identity, fame, and social media.
Early Years
Suzanne D’Miola was born on May 8, 1996. Her parents, Arturo and Estelle, now deceased, were both scientists and educators. Arturo D’Miola, a professor of neurosurgery at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern, and Estelle Grausberg, a professor of Astrophysics at the University of Chicago.
By the age of six, D’Miola was said to have been reading at college level. A handful of years later, based on a series of well-researched essays, which D’Miola had written at age eleven —based on subjects ranging from the origins of the Turkish language to the influence of artificial intelligence on children’s mental health —D’Miola was accepted at the University of Chicago.
Education
After achieving summa cum laude at age thirteen from the University of Chicago, D’Miola began studying for a master’s in fine art at the Rhode Island School of Design. It was there that she began work on an art installation entitled, In Praise of The Americ*n Prairie, about which New York Times art critic, Collet Kara called, “A threshold-smashing, dystopic vision of a nation bereft of both its way and its moral will.”
At just 18, D'Miola began work on her debut novel, The Weighs of None, which was eventually acquired by HarperCollins for a reported advance exceeding $1 million. However, the book remained unpublished for several years due to its explicit sexual content and divisive political themes, which surfaced amid the rising tensions of the 2016 presidential election. A spokesperson for the imprint cited "concerns over the safety of HarperCollins employees" as the primary reason for the distribution delays
Influencer
In 2024, D'Miola ventured into the world of social media influencing, gaining swift traction through the promotion of her makeup line, E/Fequté. The brand's success, combined with D'Miola's vibrant personality and photogenic appeal, quickly propelled her following to over 750 million on Instagram. In a 2024 interview with Rolling Stone, D'Miola discussed her fascination with how rapidly young people embraced not only her beauty tips but also her manner of speaking and style of dress. "At first, it was great fun," she shared. "But as I watched how perfectly my followers mimicked my speech patterns and even my political views in their own posts, I don’t know, something darkly humored in me sort of took hold."
The Minimizing
On May 8, 2026, atop the roof of Suzanne D'Miola's Manhattan apartment, a three-person film crew prepared for what would become a landmark moment in pop culture history. With the majority of her world-wide followers tuned in, D'Miola calmly retrieved a freshly sharpened pair of garden shears from behind a small velvet curtain and, without hesitation, severed both the middle and ring fingers of her right hand. Displaying no sign of distress, she then addressed her viewers: “Are our bodies our identities, or are our bodies the prison cell of our identities?” D'Miola continued, now more animated. “I trust you E/Fequted motherf##kers know what to do next!” The video, running three minutes and thirty-two seconds, has since been viewed by an estimated two billion people worldwide.
The Aftermath
Data recently released by the CDC estimates that within the first 24 hours of Suzanne D'Miola's video being posted on Instagram, approximately 350,000 of her followers took the actions she had implied. Tragically, as a direct result of following D'Miola's alleged "suggestion," 28,610 people died from untreated or improperly treated infections caused by self-inflicted injuries. An additional 150,233 individuals are believed to have suffered permanent physical and psychological harm.
Despite widespread protests from various right-leaning writers and politicians, D'Miola's novel The Weighs of None was released to critical acclaim by HarperCollins in December 2026 and has already been optioned for a six-part miniseries, set to stream on Netflix in May 2027. Furthermore, her work In Praise of The Americn Prairie* is now part of the permanent collection at the Whitney Museum of Art in New York City.
D'Miola has also delivered a widely viewed TED Talk titled The Minimizing and has been a frequent guest at the White House, in addition to making several appearances on late-night television. "I know it’s a bit embarrassing to admit," D'Miola remarked recently on The Joe Rogan Experience, "but I really do feel that the world has become my oyster."
These future scenario short stories are fun to do. Social media was supposed to be about community but became a form of unwitting collectivism, now causing a mass psychosis, including otherwise high-functioning intelligent people--not clinically neurotic but collectively neurotic.
Recommended reading: Geek Love. Your story reminds me of this novel. Dystopian but not too far-fetched.