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Matthew Shen Goodman

Matthew Shen Goodman is the editor in chief of The Baffler.

The back of a yellow dog’s head, which is wearing a gray party hat, faces text that reads “After Words” backward on a gray backdrop.

Screen Sick

The history of literacy is a list of complaints. Critics reliably decry each new technological development as an attention-stealing toy. Before recent grousing about ChatGPT, protestations were uttered about the detrimental effects of the internet (fearing endless distraction, ...
A black gouache painting of an anthropomorphic pig wearing a top hat, suit, and tie with smoke emanating from him, and a white full moon hovering in the top right corner of the image.

Guy vs. Guy

Gauche, in my opinion, to settle a grudge worthy of the name with money. (Did you not nurse that grievance? Would you sell your child?) But when the payoff grows big enough, cooler heads prevail, or just ones more venal. From Sam Altman to Ted Cruz, political, corporate, and ...
A claymation still depicts five people in motion in a wrestling ring: a tanned female bodybuilder in a metallic green bikini standing on the ring’s ropes, holding a car with two men grappling in one hand, and a large dumbbell in the other. Within the ring, a light-skinned racecar driver in a gold suit is falling through the air to the ground with his helmut above him. To the right of him, a black boxer with red boxing gloves, assless black chaps, and black boots is falling face-forward onto the ring’s floor, which is littered with blood splatter, bowling pins, and a video game controller. There’s an audience surrounding the ring, and pink and blue lights in the rafters. Two large grids of spotlights are in the rafters, and an audience surrounds the ring. One audience member is holding up a sign that reads “I STEAL COPPER.”

Own Goals

“America first does not mean America alone,” said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on April 23, seeking to reassure the market three weeks after the president declared Liberation Day and tariffed the world. Spooked by turbulence in the bond market—or eager to discard the ...
An illustration of a floating window in a cloudy sky with purple petals floating toward the viewer.

Been There, Done That

Forty-Five has become 47, and Donald Trump is now the first president to serve two nonconsecutive terms since Grover Cleveland. With protective tariffs anathema to Uncle Jumbo, as Cleveland was known to family and friends, the two wouldn’t have agreed on all counts, but our ...
A digital collage of an abstract landscape with mountains, lighting, and sea has various digital post-its arranged on top of it. They include the names of cities, such as Berlin, Mexico City, Tokyo, Cartagena, Bangkok, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Abu Dhabi, Rio de Janeiro, and more.

At Home He’s a Tourist

On the morning of November 5, the day of the 2024 presidential election, the algorithm delivered me the promise of escape. Titled “Here’s How to Buy Citizenship in Another Country,” the article lamented the global character of climate change and the fact that “political ...
A photograph depicts the creation of the front cover on a work desk—the paper sculptures of stanchions standing along a red sheet of paper that fades from red to pink. Printed sheets of the sculptures before assembly—in 2–D—are taped to the wall, and glue sticks and scraps of paper are scattered across the desk.

On the Clock

Choose your precipice. The grist that makes modern life will run out at some point—when will we tap the last barrel of crude, blow through the remaining stocks of helium, deplete those rare metals only getting rarer? More pressing than bismuth and boron as I write this in ...
Purple, cartoonish, bloodshot eyes peek out of a cloud of smoke.

Just Say Yes

You can trace the liberalizing contours of the American public’s relationship to drugs by way of the last few presidents’ consumption habits. Clinton famously didn’t inhale, only willing to admit to touching reefer in England. Before his religious reawakening at forty, ...