At this point, if you haven’t watched Squid Game, chances are you’ve had it recommended to you countless times. The Korean drama is quickly becoming one of the most watched foreign language productions of all time and is currently the top show on Netflix in 90 countries. Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos has hypothesized that it might be their biggest show ever and a South Korean broadband firm has even sued Netflix after the intense traffic surge from the show.

So what is it about the gore-filled survival show – where cash-strapped contestants quite literally fight until death in childhood games for money while rich VIPs watch – that has captivated a gigantic audience globally? Perhaps it’s the fact that it’s barely fiction at all. Squid Game perfectly mirrors our social realities, exploring themes like class struggle and economic anxieties through one dramatic competition.

Squid Game follows a series of movies and television shows that have gained success recently for their critiques of capitalist society, including Korean smash-hit Parasite in 2019, co-written and directed by Bong Joon Ho. US satire Sorry to Bother You was also a critical success in 2018, proving a sustained thirst for anticapitalist entertainment. 

This comes as little surprise when considering the growing shift away from capitalism in recent years, exacerbated by the financial struggles that arose during the global pandemic. It’s why people like Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have risen to political stardom and socialism is officially part of the zeitgeist.

In an era where it’s cool to hate capitalism, the entertainment that critiques it has become cooler than ever. But does that amount to political progress? Anti-imperialist organizer Rhamier Balagoon for the Black Alliance for Peace says not. “Under capitalism, anything can become a commodity and ultimately de-radicalized,” they told Refinery29. “Hollywood, through corporate America, makes room for these performative gestures that allow people to romanticize the idea of resistance against a violent system.” 

Balagoon is yet to watch Squid Game but sees the rise of anticapitalist entertainment as a way for liberals to dip a toe into seemingly radical discourse without taking part in organizing. Billionaire Jeff Bezos recently proved this point with a tweet saying he “can’t wait” to watch the show. The irony is not lost on many that Bezos’ own workers operate in often unsafe and poor working conditions.

Another indication that the radically anticapitalist messaging of Squid Game has gone over the heads of people is that many viewers are walking away from the show with the notion that the characters in the game “chose to be there,” despite them all coming from a place of poverty and life-threatening debt. This captures just how far we are from breaking down the current illusion of free will in a capitalist society; one of the show’s beloved characters, Ji-yeong, reveals that she has just been released from prison for killing her abusive father before entering the game.

“The idea of free will has very effectively been weaponized by white supremacist capitalism to gaslight people into believing that they are responsible for the shitty circumstances that capitalism puts them in,” says Bobo Matjila, online philosopher and co-host of the Bobo and Flex podcast. “A society that believes in free will also implicitly believes that everyone is responsible for their circumstances and material conditions despite how much they’ve been marginalized and oppressed by said society.”

Balagoon agrees, saying that every person is still currently forced to participate in capitalism. “There’s no real way that we can opt out of it aside from a revolution that we can actually overturn the system,” they say. “You can be as anticapitalist as you want but at the end of the day you still need to wake up and go to work.” 

To give due credit to Squid Game writer and director Hwang Dong-hyuk (who wrote the show in 2009 but was rejected by studios for 10 years and had to sell his laptop at one point due to financial struggles), much of the anticapitalist messaging seems to have been watered down in the English translation. In a viral Tiktok, Youngmi Mayer, co-host of the Feeling Asian podcast, explains that English-language viewers lost many nuances in crucial scenes like the marble scene in episode six, titled “Gganbu.” In the current English translation, Oh Il-nam says: “We share everything.” In Korean he says: “There’s no ownership between me and you.” It’s worth also noting that many translators are underpaid and overworked, which is why Mayer says “it’s the fault of the producers.” 

Translation issues aside, the popularity of Squid Game, two years after Parasite, shows that anticapitalist entertainment is going nowhere, nor should it. New releases shouldn’t, however, be interpreted as progress that we haven’t yet made.

“As good as these shows are, I don’t think any of them are effective in shifting viewpoints because these shows are descriptive but not prescriptive,” says Matjila. “They do a great job of describing the horrors of existing under late-stage capitalism but they don’t do very much as far as prescribing a solution for these horrors.” As a result, Matjila says, we risk coming away from these shows feeling more politically active than we are. 

Simply put, we should all continue to enjoy Squid Game and other similar shows that follow. We’re largely enjoying them because they’re so relatable. However, we should also be aware that anticapitalism is being remarketed to us by the billionaires at Netflix. And really, by watching the show, are we any better than the VIPs who lap up the entertainment? Perhaps that’s the most disturbing twist of all.

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Over the past year, our lives have become increasingly digitalized in ways that were once hard to imagine. In-person meetings have been replaced by Zoom calls, we shop nearly exclusively online, and even learning has become virtual. It comes as little surprise then that digital fashion — which includes everything from live stream runway shows and 3-D collections to fashion you can buy in digital formats (in video games and crypto art) — has also accelerated. 

In 2018, Scandinavian retailer Carlings released its first digital clothing collection in which customers could buy the “clothes” by sending in a photo of themselves to be “digitally tailored.” Since then, Tommy Hilfiger has committed to digitally creating, developing, and selling samples starting next spring of 2022; emerging designer Hanifa hosted an innovative 3-D fashion show; and the first crypto-fashion week took place.

While years ago, all these would have seemed like nonsensical concepts, these digital expressions of fashion have widespread appeal these days. We’re now accustomed to virtual fashion influencers like Lil Miquela, who has over three million followers on Instagram, digital Fashion Month shows, and new collections that debut within video games (see: Balenciaga’s Afterworld: The Age of Tomorrow). If this trend continues, could parts of the fashion consumption process, from production to wear, become entirely digital, too?

Given fashion’s role in the environmental crisis — projections show that the industry could be responsible for a quarter of the earth’s carbon budget by 2050 if nothing changes — the digital-first method of production and consumption presents an interesting opportunity. With this in mind, the University for the Creative Arts announced the launch of its first digital-only fashion course earlier this year. “Digital fashion has three applications: virtual fashion, e-commerce, and the digitalization of production,” Jules Dagonet, the head of its school of fashion, tells Refinery29. “[When] sustainability and digital fashion go hand-in-hand, and everyone wins. For the brands, it’s faster to produce and you’re producing garments only when a customer needs it. It’s also better for the environment.” 

We produce almost twice the amount of clothing today compared to over 20 years ago. Dagonet believes that digitizing fashion production has a unique potential in addressing issues like overproduction. But, first, young designers need to be educated in these fields. “What’s keeping [companies] from embracing digital fashion technologies is the talent gap,” she explains. That’s where she says programs like UCA’s will have an important role to play. 

Stephy Fung, a 3-D designer based in London, agrees. Because of the lack of targeted educational programs, many of today’s digital fashion designers are self-taught. “Digital fashion is set to increase in the future, and we need to have places, institutions, or online courses which help to teach or nurture the younger talent,” she tells Refinery29. Fung began working in the digital fashion space because of the possibilities it offered — “The fact that you can create something out of nothing really intrigues me” — and confirms that digital fashion has the potential to be more sustainable than physical fashion. “We do not need to source fabrics for testing, we don’t need to have fabrics to be made or to be sampled.” This, she says, allows designers to change cuts, colors, or fabrics without waste. 

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And while it can seem that digital-exclusive fashion — the kind of “clothing” that you can only enjoy via a screen — is only a consumer novelty, social media habits say otherwise. In an era of one-off social media “‘fit pics,” in which users sometimes only wear an item once for an Instagram post, retailers like DressX believe that here’s a market for clothing that doesn’t need to be produced at all. The company currently carries 200 digital items by 25 designers. Shoppers buy looks, which DressX then superimposes on an uploaded photo of the person.

Obviously, this process is greener than typical manufacturing. While compiling a report, DressX owners Daria Shapovalova and Natalia Modenova found that the production of their digital garments emits 97% less CO2 than physical garment. They also found that a digital garment, on average, saves 3300 liters of water per item.

The duo feels hopeful of the role that digital fashion can play in addressing the industry’s responsibility to the climate crisis, and believes that more brands will adopt the practices. “We are in the very early days of digital fashion but there is this curve of adoption,” Modenova told Refinery29. “Digital fashion is opening a big category that every brand will eventually have in their line.” 

Though the environmental benefits are clear — most digital-only models require no manufacturing, packaging, delivery vehicles, or use of natural resources — Céline Semaan, the executive director of Slow Factory Foundation, points out that data itself can leave a carbon footprint. The rise in NFT art sales has spotlit how incredibly energy-consuming and ecologically destructive blockchain technology can be. “Digital is not necessarily always less impactful on the environment,” says Semaan.

According to Semaan, going digital also doesn’t help solve fashion’s sustainability problem: “We are producing far more than we actually need, and producing more digitally does not resolve that issue.” According to her, fundamental change can only be achieved by producing less.

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2020 has been a devastating year — more than 1.7 million people have died from COVID-19, millions are out of work and struggling to pay their bills, and, running through it all, there were record-breaking natural disasters fueled by climate change. Understandably, that has created a number of complex emotions, and, as result, existentialist musings — some of which fashion is now (quite literally) wearing on its sleeve. 

At the start of this year, Korean fashion brand Harlan + Holden opened an “Existential retail” experience in Seoul, urging customers to spend less time shopping and more time pondering “what truly matters,” while Marine Serre showed a dystopian Fall 2020 collection that simultaneously tackled death and love of life. In March, Parisian vegan footwear brand Rombaut released a collection that depicted apocalyptic-style climate imagery. Rick Owens and Balenciaga also got dark for Spring 2021. On the product side, there are now Online Ceramic’s “We’re all going to die” tees and stickers, as well as Jiwinaia’s “Numb” earrings. The fashion industry, it seems, is taking inspiration from the existentialist movement — that flourished in Europe in the 1940s and 1950s and was popularized as self-description by thinkers such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Martin Heidegger, and Gabriel Marcel — and is more interested in exploring death and, ultimately, the meaning of life.

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Iva Paska, Ph.D., a sociologist from the University North in Croatia and founder of Existentia, a website born from Paska’s own existential questions and research, views this as little surprise. “Times like these invite us to rediscover the teachings of existentialism,” she says. “Within current circumstances, it seems as if all these things that we usually take for granted are called into question. As if the rug of existential weaving that holds our everyday life is now being pulled under our feet and we are starting to see beneath it… death, illness, aloneness.”

Mirroring that sentiment, Mats Rombaut, founder and creative director of Rombaut, says the Spring-Summer 2020 dystopian imagery was inspired by reflection about the current state of the world. “[And] not just the recent pandemic either, which is just a consequence of how we have mistreated this planet for a long time,” he tells Refinery29. “I think everyone had to think in an existentialist way during these uncertain times.”

From experience, Rombaut says existentialism can prompt a fashion brand to evaluate its future, asking questions like: Where do we go from here? Does it make economic sense to continue? Does it make sense for humanity to continue like this? If not, how can we change? He predicts that the “real existentialism still has to show” with more brands closing down.

This is already taking place as chain retailers, department stores, and small designers alike struggle to stay afloat, with 2020 bringing a consecutive list of closures, including Century 21, Sies Marjan, Totokaelo, and Need Supply. It’s also evident through brands like Gucci, Saint Laurent, and more leaving the archaic Fashion Month calendar that encourages brands to produce collections at lightning speed that leaves little room for creativity and creates more clothing than we can ever wear in our lifetime. Amongst the mass layoffs of retail workers, and the cancellation of roughly $1.5 billion worth of orders from an industry that relies on more than 150 million underpaid workers in lower-income countries (predominantly BIPOC women), the pandemic has poked enough holes in the fashion industry’s unsustainable production model that it’s becoming increasingly impossible for people to ignore. Naturally, this leads to an existential reevaluation of fashion’s entire purpose.

Rombaut’s latest collection, “Next Life,” centers around the human struggle for survival. “The personal mental struggles humans go through, the general mood of depression, and current health of the planet,” he adds. “These were themes already present in the collection and in the Rombaut narrative before the pandemic hit.” These themes have also previously been explored by brands like Collina Strada, a label that has long highlighted the issue of climate change while sending messages of hope and optimism. This is also Rombaut’s approach, too, asking questions like: Will the next generation do better?

Marilynn H. Johnson, Ph.D., Assistant Professor at the University of San Diego’s philosophy department — who is currently working on a book that explores the philosophical meaning of bodily adornment, including clothing — notes that it’s not uncommon for existential thoughts, brought on as a result of an unprecedented event, to eventually take a turn for the positive and inspire people to appreciate life.  

“As you look throughout history at the time after people have been controlled, there’s a big boom in terms of fashion and people living it up,” she says. Think, for example, the Roaring Twenties, with its celebratory flapper aesthetic, following WWI. Or the upbeat tie-dye and psychedelic prints of the ’60s that people wore as they expressed their opposition to the Vietnam War and support for the Civil Rights Movement. “People will get sick of feeling numb, and there’ll be a backlash in the other direction,” says Johnson. 

Ian Olasov, Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Brooklyn College and Medgar Evers College and author of Ask a Philosopher, says it’s easy to understand the connection between fashion and existentialist messaging. “It’s not hard to see people’s relationships to their own mortality growing with existential threats. The type of fashion trends you’re talking about are invitations for some sort of authentic connection with other people,” he says. “I could imagine people wearing ‘numb’ earrings ironically, but I could also imagine it as a sort of sincere bid for connection.” 

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While fashion has a looser definition of it, Olasov reminds us not to always associate existential thinking with morbidity, and not to confuse it with nihilism. While existentialism suggests that we can construct our own meaning within a world that has none, nihilism is the belief that not only is there no intrinsic meaning in the universe and it’s pointless to even try to construct our own.

“Existential means different things to different people so, for some people, it’s orienting your life around mortality or morbidity,” he says. “But in some existential philosophy, there’s a connection between authenticity being in light of your mortality. That kind of honesty about the facts of the situations you find yourself in and the honesty about your own freedom and responsibility in dealing with them.” This concept of authenticity is something, he explains, is currently appealing to a lot of people. He also points to stoicism — a concept that encourages living in accordance with nature — which he’s seen an increasing interest in, as offering people a way to deal with intense emotions. 

While it’s evident that the rise in existentialist thought as a result of the pandemic is seeping its way into our fashion choices (and no doubt will continue to rear its head across T-shirts, new shopping experiences, and sneaker campaigns as we enter the new year), it doesn’t mean that we’re caught in a negative spiral with no way out. Instead, it may be indicating a desire for connection and a growing interest in questioning why things and outdated systems still exist. This could be particularly important for the future of an industry that has long excluded people and encouraged overproduction and overconsumption over sustainability — and needs to change.

As Sartre put it, “Life begins on the other side of despair.” If fashion is currently in despair, it means that new life, designs, and ideas are on their way.

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I have a distinct memory of my dad telling me a certain boyfriend “wasn’t worth it”. I was 16. It had been my first love, and we’d just broken up. “You’re a beautiful girl, Laura,” my dad said to me, while driving. “You’re smart and you don’t have to put up with someone that makes you sad.” It’s simple advice, but it stuck. I reminded myself of his words often in the following years, usually following a breakup.

But when my longest relationship ended late last year, my dad was no longer able to give me the same speech. The breakup unfortunately coincided with the gradual loss of my father to dementia. It was a horrible experience: I found out that my boyfriend of five years had cheated on me while I was visiting my parents in New Zealand. My dad’s health was rapidly deteriorating and my mum feared it would be the last time I saw him, so I attempted to hide my heartbreak. 

I flew back to New York, where my partner and I lived together, to find myself single for the first time since college. After the official split, one of the first places my mind went to was that conversation I had as a teenager with my dad. While my ex-boyfriend packed his bags and moved out, the memory of those words was my only source of comfort. 

Very quickly, I entered the dating world — for all the wrong reasons. My ex had started seeing someone in Paris, parading her to places we had visited only a few months prior, on an anniversary trip no less. My natural reaction was to enter the unspoken game of who cares less. I developed a routine: Go out on a date that I wasn’t ready for, come home alone to a house that felt empty, check my ex’s Instagram stories, then message or call my mother to ask how my father was doing in the dementia home he had just moved into back in New Zealand. 

During this time, it’s no surprise that the connections I made weren’t healthy. I downplayed the heartbreak I felt over my ex and completely avoided talking about the nightmare happening at home. I accepted treatment that I otherwise wouldn’t have, grew tired of people quickly, and ended things with anyone who was remotely “too nice” to me. “You’re just too happy, and I’m really not,” is an excuse I’m ashamed to admit I used. 

I was grieving the slow loss of my father and the abrupt loss of my relationship. My ex-boyfriend had become like family to me, and I was living far away from our home in New Zealand. In that state, my search for a new partner was getting confused with a search for a sense of security. But I quickly learned that forcing intimacy with someone I wasn’t entirely into left me feeling worse than I did alone. I’d often leave dates wishing I liked the person, giving them a second or third date in the hopes that I eventually would, then starting over with someone new when I realized I was ultimately uninterested.

By luck, I ended up on a date with someone who soon became my best friend. Though we were both unavailable for a romantic relationship, we went to events together, had movie nights, and scheduled dinners every week, in a dynamic that felt comforting and loving. He was also a writer, and we’d read each other’s work and have lengthy discussions about our concerns around romance. Slowly, I began to open up to him about my father. While he moved away during the pandemic, in hindsight, I can see how our interactions gave me insight into how a less traditional partnership could take shape, creating something that’s sustainable, and enjoyable, for the more long-term future. We’re still building on our relationship everyday. 

My father passed away a few months ago, in August. By then, I found myself in a place where dating was the lowest thing on my priority list — and instead of reaching out to a new partner, I was immediately surrounded by love and support from true friends. While I’d already decided to be more intentional with dating, my dad’s words to me as a teenager took on a new importance. They became a guiding force, encouraging me to cut ties with anyone who wasn’t adding value to my life and to unlearn the societal pressure that teaches us that our worth as humans comes from how desirable other people find us to be. For me, this looks like speaking to fewer people, saying no more often, and putting more energy into friendships and self-development. 

I put this into practice during my first dating experience since my father’s passing. During dinner, I noticed that I wasn’t feeling supported. My date spoke over me while I discussed my work and made subtle jokes about my interests, even though he had very few of his own. However good he seemed on paper and however faint the orange flags may have been, my father’s advice inspired me to opt out of seeing what the next date would bring. While this may seem like a small step, it felt empowering to choose to be single rather than pursuing the wrong relationship for the sake of being in one. 

Three months since my dad’s death, that ongoing work has led to me being the most happily single I’ve ever been. Without my dad to look out for me, I’ve found myself more eager to look out for myself. I’ve also made the decision to keep my family name if I ever decide to get married (something I’m very much on the fence about). While there have been moments where the loss has left me feeling the urge to make more connections, I’ve built a complete life outside of dating that I hope will only be complemented (not made) by anyone I choose romantically. 

I doubt my father had any idea that a car conversation we had about a teenage boyfriend would become my go-to principal through dating as an adult. But his advice rings true for all of us. Too often the pressure to feel desirable or not be alone, especially for female-identifying people, leads us into romantic situations that are just not “worth it.” Interrogating that idea has led me to a healthier outlook on being single. Guided by father’s wisdom, deprioritizing romance during this time has been more fulfilling than I ever expected. Which is why it’s also my plan moving forward. For my dad’s sake, I intend to advocate for myself as strongly as I know he would, if he was still alive. 

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The news that my father had passed came in the form of a phone call on a Monday afternoon in August. While I’d been waiting for the call for months — he was terminally ill — I wasn’t prepared for the feeling of waking up with a father and hanging up the phone without one. Among the many initial feelings I felt, all overwhelmed with a sense of numbness, I had the strong urge to find and put on the only thing I had from him with me: a bucket hat, sitting in my bottom drawer. I sat on my bed for the rest of the day with the hat on my head, confused about what to do next. That night, I slept with it beside me. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed what it looks like to lose a loved one for many. While my father didn’t die of COVID, the restrictions in his dementia facility made it difficult and, for months, impossible for my family to visit him in his final months. The mandatory quarantine and travel restrictions in New Zealand, where my family is based, meant flying home from the U.S. for the funeral wasn’t an option. Instead, I watched the funeral over FaceTime, his hat in my hand.

During the first month after his death, the only consistent thing about my grieving was the bucket hat. Surrounded by friends that had never met him and unable to hold family, his hat sat on my desk while I attempted to get back to work, went with me on my walks or trips to the beach, and slept next to me in bed. While recording my speech for his funeral, I spoke it to his hat just behind my laptop camera, in an attempt to feel closer to the funeral and, ultimately, to him. 

I wasn’t alone in using an article of clothing to help grieve. While on a walk with my friend Zach, who also lost his father during this time, I noticed that he was wearing a hat I’ve never seen before. When he explained that it was also his father’s cap, we shared a moment in laughing at ourselves for wearing our “dead dad hats.”

Dr. Alan Wolfelt, grief counselor and Director of the Center for Loss and Life Transition, calls these “linking objects.” “They help link us to the physical presence of the person who died,” he explains. “They’re sort of temporary stand-ins for the person, and they help us feel closer to them, as well as access and express all of our normal grief emotions.” With hundreds of thousands of people losing loved ones from a distance during this time, and being unable to say goodbye due to the safety protocols or travel restrictions in place, Dr. Wolfelt says these objects have become a common response in the grieving process.

“With COVID, we can’t get together, so we’re struggling. We’re still grieving but can’t lean on all the mourning rituals that help us move through our early grief,” he explains. “Without that structure, we tend to feel lost and adrift. In addition to Zoom calls and phone calls, we’re relying more on linking objects and photos.” He notes that while these physical objects are helpful in the grief process, they can’t replace gathering in person to mourn someone. (For this reason, he suggests planning multiple ceremonies, using at-home rituals, and postponing, rather than canceling, in-person gatherings until it’s safe.) 

Anyone that met my dad would not be surprised that the “linking object” I felt naturally drawn to was a hat. A practical and kind man of few words and of few possessions, he would often be seen in it while out in the garden, growing beans and mowing the lawn. In speaking with Zach, I discovered his father’s hat was just one in the pile of items he had put aside, including bowling and work shirts, a stuntman’s hat, and keepsakes from his work in the TV and film, an industry in which Zach works also. 

“The day after my dad passed, the first thing my mom wanted to do was clear out his closet and purge everything so that’s what we did the entire first day,” he said. “A couple of weeks later, my sister and my mom were like, ‘Why did we do that?’” Zach said that he was grateful that he’d put aside some of the items his dad wore when he was his age. “He was probably doing the same thing at my age,” he said. “And I think seeing him and myself in the same clothing was a reminder of that.” 

Dr. Ajita M. Robinson, grief and trauma expert and author of The Gift of Grief, says searching for reminders through objects is normal, noting that the separation caused by the pandemic might have exacerbated the need for a physical or symbolic connection. “For any of us who are visual and need those cues, it helps ground us in the reality of what we’ve lost,” she says. “Although the physical relationship has ended, the spiritual or personal doesn’t ever end.” Physical objects can also help people through one of the biggest fears that arise during the grieving process — that you’ll forget details about your loved one as time passes.

Personally, wearing the hat helped me to confront the grief head-on, something which Dr. Robinson says is important in the long-term. She says that the pandemic has resulted in a “breeding ground for complex grief and trauma,” with not just the death of loved ones impacting our mental health, but also the number of deaths happening as a result of COVID, combined with the symbolic losses that we’re all feeling, such as loss of routine, loss of safety, and loss of normality. “If we’re not able to name the grief or recognize it, it means that it’s just accumulating without resolve,” she explains. “We’re not moving through the grief process, we’re stuck and frozen.”

In this time of collective grief, both Dr. Wolfelt and Dr. Robinson stress the importance of finding personal rituals and connections with communities in order to move through the grieving process. Like all grief, this will look different for everyone. While Dr. Robinson recommends support groups and creative rituals like journaling, my early grieving involved wearing the bucket hat. More recently, I’ve found writing to be more helpful, compiling a list of things I loved about my dad and noting down stories. 

As I continue to come to terms with the immense loss across the other side of the world from my family, the hat, that I no longer wear every day, isn’t going anywhere. Firmly planted on the desk beside my bed, it now serves as a reminder of the goodbye I wish I could have said in person to the man I wish I never had to say goodbye to.

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