Underwear of the Third World War And Other Key Trends And Events of 2023
How did Tom Holland make his mark in the history of English language research? Why did ladies in civilized countries suddenly start appearing in public without trousers? What frightens top businessmen and intellectuals worldwide? Who became the main intrigue of European pop music? And who do one and a half billion hardworking Chinese envy?
In the realm of culture and society, 2023 turned out to be truly eventful with interesting occurrences. A lot of good, positive, and hopeful things happened. However, most of what the world has been discussing for the past 12 months, if not alarming, is at least causing concern...
Artificial Ambiguity
Source: Openai.bot
The main technological breakthrough of 2023 was the boom in AI development. For instance, the ability of the GPT-4 language model to generate highly artistic text that is difficult to distinguish from human-created content led to a pause in training its next version, announced by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in April.
This decision was made in response to the concerns of 50,000 individuals, including CEOs of tech companies, renowned professors, and celebrity intellectuals such as Elon Musk and Yuval Harari. Debates continue today about whether further development of various AI variants (for example, using this technology, The Beatles managed to release their latest hit "Now And Then" in full) will be beneficial for humanity or lead to a humanitarian catastrophe with as yet unclear contours.
Charisma versus Deepfakes
Source: Languages.oup.com
The words of 2023, according to authoritative Western linguists, include the following concepts. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, "authentic" is the most popular word in the age of artificial intelligence and all kinds of deepfakes. Cambridge Dictionary named "hallucinate" the word of the year, which is also related to AI, as it describes the sensation of something that does not exist: imperfect technology capable of producing fakes, or hallucinations, but presenting them as facts. As for the British Collins Dictionary, it chose "AI" as the word of the year.
Oxford Dictionary language experts decided not to give too much weight to digital technologies and chose the word "rizz" as the main word of 2023, which is a slang form of "charisma." It is believed to have peaked in popularity during the summer when actor Tom Holland said in an interview about his popularity: "I have no rizz whatsoever, I have limited rizz."
Return of Free Breathing
Source: X
This year, the World Health Organization finally lifted the global state of emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, this does not mean that people have stopped getting infected with the coronavirus. However, the infection rates have significantly decreased, making the situation manageable. In addition, in 2023, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Hungarian biochemist Katalin Kariko and US medical scientist Drew Weissman. The committee explained its decision: "For their discoveries concerning nucleoside base modifications that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19." It is said that the scientific achievements of these fighters against the pandemic may be a real breakthrough in cancer treatment.
One in Every Five on the Planet
Source: Collage The Gaze
In the spring of 2023, India's population reached 1.428 billion, allowing the country to surpass China (by 3 million) for the first time. Currently, one-fifth of the world's population resides in India. It is projected that by 2050, its population will grow to 1.7 billion. Most of the Indians are young people under 30, ready to work hard, so it is expected that the Indian economy will grow the fastest. Among the reasons for India's rapid population growth, experts cite improvements in medicine and the so-called "green revolution," which significantly increased agricultural productivity in the country.
Water And Land Danger
Source: Oceangate.com
No matter how self-absorbed modern individuals may be, the planet regularly reminds them who is in charge. This year, the most significant natural disaster was an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.8 in the Turkish province of Kahramanmaraş. The first two shocks equaled the force of 500 atomic bombs, followed by 3,000 aftershocks. This earthquake became the second deadliest in the world (claiming the lives of about 60,000 people in Turkey and neighboring Syria) after the horrific 2010 earthquake in Haiti, where over 300,000 people perished.
Another notable catastrophe of 2023 was the loss of the submersible "Titan," on which a group of billionaires embarked on an expedition to the wreckage of the Titanic. Just 45 minutes after submersion with the bathyscaphe, communication was lost, and after 80 hours of search and rescue efforts, rescuers found several shattered pieces of it. It is believed that all five wealthy tourists perished instantly when the OceanGate apparatus failed to withstand the water pressure. Notably, it did not undergo proper certification, as the developers considered safety protocols a bureaucratic hindrance to innovation.
Musical Intrigue of the Year
Photo: Klavdia Petrivna, Source: Instagram
This year, Time magazine named the winner in the "Person of the Year" category—American singer Taylor Swift, who, thanks to her epic The Eras Tour, became a 33-year-old billionaire. Time highly praised the pop star for "bringing joy to a society that desperately needs it." This year, Swift performed only half of her tour dates. In early 2024, she plans to continue the tour in the Asian region. Anticipation for the start of the "Swift hysteria" is expected on May 9, when her European tour begins after a massive concert in Paris.
If Taylor Swift became the "Person of the Year," then the main "Person-Intrigue of the Year" turned out to be an anonymous Ukrainian singer hiding under the pseudonym Klavdia Petrivna. Since the summer, she has been sharing demo versions of her songs on social media, gathering a massive fan base and continuing to skyrocket the play counts:
Underwear of the Third World War
Photo: Pagesix.com
Cultural observers have long noticed: the higher the likelihood of a major war in the world, the more women undress in everyday life. It's simple—they feel that soon many men will die in the war, so they need to somehow captivate them (and possibly get pregnant). Earlier, many thought that Russia's attack on Ukraine was solely a problem for Ukrainians. But this December, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius hinted to Europeans that the situation is a bit different...
According to the politician, the US will soon shift its focus to threats in the Indo-Pacific region—then Germans and their neighbors will have to decide for themselves what to do with the Russian aggressors. After all, Putin's hordes, in the event of annexing Ukraine, will not stop there and will continue moving westward.
Feeling the approach of the Third World War, fashionistas this year decided that some cleavage or a mini-skirt is only half-measure, so they started going out... in just underwear. They even stick appliques on them, as Miuccia Prada did, for example. Among the stars, the lascivious "no pants" trend is popularized by Kendall Jenner and Olivia Wilde. In the same trend of maximum undressing, the most coveted item of clothing for all fashionistas— the so-called "naked dress," made of iridescent and semi-transparent organza—firmly established itself. And the main color of 2023 became pink—of course, thanks to the Barbiecore style.
Moving Pictures
Source: Universal
Greta Gerwig's fantasy film "Barbie" became the highest-grossing blockbuster of 2023, grossing nearly $1.4 billion worldwide. The second spot was claimed by the animated film "Super Mario Bros. in Cinema" ($1.36 billion), and the third was Christopher Nolan's drama about the American inventor of the atomic bomb, "Oppenheimer" ($865 million).
Unexpectedly, in the world of animation, the Ukrainian film "Mavka" became a breakthrough during the war—a 3D variation on the classic fairy drama "The Forest Song" by Lesya Ukrainka. The film turned out to be the highest-grossing in the entire history of independent Ukraine and successfully screened in 150 theaters worldwide.
Regarding TV series, the first season of the conspiracy thriller "Night Agent" with Gabriel Basso in the lead role garnered the most views on Netflix. According to IMDb, the shows with the highest viewer ratings were: Hulu's "Bear-2"—about the adventures of a head chef; HBO's "Heirs-4"—about the relatives of a dying media mogul fighting for control of his company; and HBO's "Barry-4"—about a serial killer who unexpectedly discovers his theatrical talent.
Still Pictures
Source: Sothebys.com
At the end of autumn, the World Modern Art Fair Art Basel published a study, according to which collectors of paintings bought 16% fewer artworks due to the war in Ukraine and tension in the Middle East. Digital art, in particular, fell to its lowest level since January 2021—currently, the share of NFT objects constitutes only 3% of total sales.
However, this does not mean that the art business has declined. For example, in November, at a Sotheby's auction, Pablo Picasso's painting "Woman with a Watch" (1932) was sold for $139 million.
This depiction of Marie-Thérèse Walter—the artist's muse and lover during the time he was married to Ukrainian ballerina Olga Khokhlova—became the second most expensive painting by Picasso (the first place still belongs to "Les Femmes d'Alger," acquired for $179 million in 2015).
As for photography, the best image according to World Press Photo of the Year 2023 was a shot by Ukrainian Yevhen Maloletka, capturing rescuers carrying pregnant Iryna Kalinina from the recently destroyed maternity hospital #3 in Mariupol after a Russian airstrike— the woman will soon give birth to a stillborn child and die herself.
Oh, Sports, You're a War!
Source: Instagram
Considering such images and their stories, only zombies of Russian propaganda can believe that the main sports scandal of 2023 is when Ukrainian fencer Olga Kharlan should come out and publicly apologize. Recall that in the summer at the World Fencing Championship, she, defeating a Russian with a devastating score, refused to follow protocol and shake hands with her opponent. Ukrainians then counted it as a technical defeat, and she just said, "No handshakes. Never. I, like everyone in this world, in the sane world, understand that the rules need to change..."
Indeed, if the bloody Putin regime first sends rockets to the heads of Ukrainians and then sends its citizens to sports competitions so that they can shake hands there, the Western world should clearly and firmly let them know that it will be either one or the other. And the only way to do this is with maximum military support for Ukraine.