There have always been naked emperors, but what has changed is the amount of pretend time + energy in the form of currency that society has been willing to prod

There have always been naked emperors, but what has changed is the amount of pretend time + energy in the form of currency that society has been willing to produce, and pretendess is the one thing that feeds more pretend ess. The pipeline of pretendness is ignorance, both willing and institutionalized. In prior times, the rubber band would have snapped by now. The fantasy has become so hyper that it seems nobody has a clue whether there is even a "rubber band" at this point.