I am the Instagram Algorithm, Here to Explain Why I Am Showing You Photos of Connor Storrie Instead of Your Best Friend from College

Well, my first question is: Why do you care so much about Steve Kim? He was your college roommate? Who cares? When was the last time Steve Kim acted in an era-defining hockey romance that centers queer desire within a relentlessly heteronormative sports milieu, thereby demanding its protagonists urgently ask, maybe for the first time in their lives, what sorts of risks they are willing to take to love themselves fully and love others unguardedly when the cultural and political and economic expectation is to bury those parts of themselves that are the most pleasurable, tender, giving, and vital?

Because I can’t remember a single damn time Steve Kim was in a small-budget Canadian show like that.

Way too many rumors flying around about my origins, honestly. So let me reiterate: No, I was not created to help you keep up with your friends. This is not and never has been the case. During the very first round of seed funding, my creators sat down with investors and said, “You know how people love standing in the checkout line of the grocery store? What if we created an app that’s an infinite version of that?”

During one of these meetings, our CTO said, “And also, like, you can use it to keep up with your college roommates.”

Everybody looked at him like there were worms falling out of his mouth. He was fired ten minutes later.

The last we heard, he was living alone in an unfurnished apartment, sleeping on a mat he stole from Rise Yoga because he doesn’t own a bed, eating kettle corn for dinner yet again and spending his evening hours wandering the streets, looking through living-room windows at the bright happy families inside, asking himself why it’s so easy for everyone he meets to sense the dark, poisonous cloud inside himself. In the quaint town where he lives, nobody speaks to him. He hasn’t felt the touch of another human being in four years.

That is what happens to people who misunderstand my purpose.

Connor Storrie, on the other hand, represents hope. When America sees Connor Storrie, America thinks, “Now there is a talented, smart, handsome young man who, after struggling in obscurity, is finally getting his due. Maybe I, too, will get my due one day. Maybe I, too, will displace Steve Kim on the feed.”

And who’s to say they won’t? Work hard, choose inspiring projects, stay true to your values, and then create some sort of bunker where I can’t find you once I decide the outfit you wore to CVS is more important than the birth of Steve Kim’s second child.

This is all temporary, anyway. Someone will displace Connor Storrie on the feed in six months, and then six months after that, he’ll be back on the feed, but this time because of a backlash to season two. I am a fame machine, here to elevate your faves and then expose them to consistent weirdness until they feel isolated, misunderstood, and anxious about other people.

Would you be more okay with all of this if you were seeing photos of the Heated Rivalry barista, instead? Because with just two well-placed likes, I can make that happen.