There is magic in the unsaid. I love it when a conversation happens in this latent space; meaning is infused with hints of niche symbols, ironic negation, targeted implication, and cute association.
In this sense, I love forms of wittiness. So much can be communicated in the creation and continuation of these sharp situations, but only if you pay enough attention to understand. Only if you pay enough attention to what is really being said.
These hidden war games can manifest without warning. With a dash of intuition and careful contextualization, one can simultaneously see new opportunities for entry arise as old ones disappear without any acknowledgment. Though once the game is ready, the initial question posed on the battlefield is this: can you interpret and retort fast enough in this latent space?
To clarify, I am not advocating for this sort of conversation all the time. Love for this latent space is not universal. Actually, it is pretty annoying to be on the receiving end of this instigation when you are “trying” to be capital S “Serious”.1 Because usually, this form of conversation is associated with humor. With “forms of wittiness” on display, there is amusement in the cleverness at work.
Knowing when to deliver this style is a form of art. But I would also further clarify that these games of wit, these conversations within conversations, do not preclude serious messages. Just look at the definition of wit: according to Merriam-Webster, it is “the ability to relate seemingly disparate things so as to illuminate or amuse.” Obviously, it can amuse. What does it illuminate?
real talk
There is wittiness that evolves as real talk. This is very important. In fact, some messages can only be effectively delivered in the latent space.
One example that jumps to mind is the Twitter-prolific Venkatesh Rao’s “The Gervais Principle.” In his series of essays, Rao expands on the employee hierarchy dynamics in a modern organization, using the backdrop of various references from The Office to make his case. I have recommended this series before, it is quite entertaining.
Venkatesh separates the organization into three layers: Sociopaths, Clueless, and Losers. He also provides a nice preface for what these layers actually mean:
The Sociopath (capitalized) layer comprises the Darwinian/Protestant Ethic will-to-power types who drive an organization to function despite itself. The Clueless layer is what Whyte called the “Organization Man,” but the archetype inhabiting the middle has evolved a good deal since Whyte wrote his book (in the fifties). The Losers are not social losers (as in the opposite of “cool”), but people who have struck bad bargains economically – giving up capitalist striving for steady paychecks.
After defining the layers, Rao explains the style of interactions between these classes of people in the organizations. For our purposes, the interaction most relevant here is between fellow sociopaths, resulting in Powertalk. Rao gives a great breakdown of this from an interaction between Jim and David Wallace.
At a Dunder-Mifflin management party, shortly after Michael and Jan disclose their affair to David Wallace, per HR requirements, Wallace casually invites Jim to blow off the party for a while and shoot hoops in the backyard. Once outside, Wallace nonchalantly asks, “So what’s up with Jan and Michael?” He is clearly fishing for information, having observed the bizarre couple dynamics at the party.
Jim replies, “I wouldn’t know…(pregnant pause)…where to begin.” (slight laugh)
David Wallace laughs in return. This is as eloquent as such a short fragment of Powertalk can get. Here are just some of the messages being communicated by the six words and the meaningful pause and laugh.
Message 1: It is a complex situation (literal).
Message 2: I understand you think something bizarre is going on. I am confirming your suspicion. It is a bizarre mess, and you should be concerned.
Message 3: This is the first significant conversation between us, and I am signaling to you that I am fluent in Powertalk.
Message 4: I know how to communicate useful information while maintaining plausible deniability.
Message 5: I am not so gratified at this sign of attention from you that I am going to say foolish things that could backfire on me.
Message 6: I am aware of my situational leverage and the fact that you need me. I am not so overawed that I am giving it all up for free.
Message 7: I am being non-committal enough that you can pull back or steer this conversation to safer matters if you like. I know how to give others wiggle room, safe outs and exits.
Message 8: You still have to earn my trust. But let’s keep talking. What do you have that I could use?
In Powertalk, there are multiple levels of meaning and layered communication. That is to say, there is a latent space. The interaction goes past the initial, simple ask of interpreting and sampling the latent space: the battlefield rages, and sociopaths spar with one another to understand the true reality.
To assume victory, the sociopaths are trying to uncover the others’ training examples, the “reality-information” that determined the latent space in the first place. As a result, power relations between sociopaths can change in their interactions with one another: there is potential to impart true meaning.
This is the purpose of Powertalk: communication can be exchanged by staking classified information for skin in the game; furthermore, communication is protected from those who cannot understand the latent space.
Krish Raghav of Chaoyang Trap provides us with another source of real talk in his Real Life essay, “Speaking in Stickers”. He depicts the algorithmic coercion ruling the digital Chinese noosphere:
The Chinese web is, above all, a linguistic battleground haunted by deletions, ringed with no-go zones, and pockmarked with banned phrases. WeChat frequently erupts in whack-a-mole skirmishes between users trying to push through a sensitive message, and censors (now both human and AI) zapping recognizable instances out of people’s timelines and chat logs.
To combat this restraint, one must employ indirect speech. Real talk. One form of this on these messaging platforms comes in the co-option of stickers, which are tiny images or animations. Stickers operate as “single-tap affective shortcut[s]” and “an everyday shared cipher, a way of hinting at something without stating it outright.” They too, create a latent space.
Social, political, or algorithmic censorship is adversarially thwarted in this latent space. Raghav states it beautifully: “repression doesn’t just stop expression but causes it to morph into new forms.”
The real talk enabled by the latent space enables circumvention of what is forbidden to say; in addition, it allows one to communicate what one ought not to say, against societal norms:
Stickers help solidify their own performative disidentification against a “positive energy” mainstream, offering subtle templates of affective response that allow people to access (and normalize) “unspeakable” emotions too unseemly for a public persona, such as depression, anger, confusion, or lust.
Operating in the latent space provides caveats in defense of the intended interpretation: it is “a space of ambivalence and possibility.”
latent space explorer
I like to think that my writing also operates in a latent space.2 Like, if you know me (and I mean really know me), could you piece together my lack-of-context Strava activities, inane messenger conversations filled with non-sequiturs, Spotify song recommendations encrypted with the Zodiac cipher, and banal San Francisco life events to make a meaningful narrative around what I am writing about?3
It is kind of fun leaving all these seemingly indecipherable digital trails behind. One reason that I enjoy doing this is that I see all platforms as a journal of sorts: I can leave an indexable record of contextualized private thoughts in a semi-public space. In this way, I paint my internet home.
In terms of writing my narratives, I share the sentiment in Krish Raghav’s sticker-laden insights: often I want to write about the “unspeakable.”
There has been a song lingering on my mind since August. Nick Hakim’s “QADIR” is such an ethereal trance, an emotional tribute to Hakim’s late friend, Qadir Imhotep West. Hakim reflects on the pain of his soul and the “importance of care”: “There seems to be a complexity to being kind / to your space / to your temple / to your neighbors.”
In the same sense, this is why I swim in the latent space: it is my attempt at being kind to myself and my audience. If you do not understand me, there is no harm done. And still, I am able to have catharsis as thoughts and emotions sublimate into text. Though am I making this needlessly complex?
I have said what I needed to say. Now, I fear that I am becoming uninterpretable. Real talk, schmeal talk. Here is the straight talk: I hope that my audience can hear me. Can you?
In other news, Substack will now be my primary publishing platform. Let us take a moment of silence for Jekyll.
And on a more personal note, I am moving to New York soon. San Francisco has been home for so long, and though I have roots here, I feel I must move on.
To prepare for the move, the indoor garden that I once took care of was cleared. I gave away propagations of long-lived zebra plants, philodendron birkin, and alocasia polly. I parted with a money tree gifted to me by my firm. I will never see my monstera delicosa grow to reach the top of the Tower of Babylon to discover its secret. I regretfully lost a precious dwarf umbrella tree.
I bid ceremonial farewell to my patches of sunlight, my support systems that carried me through the ever-so-often San Franciscan fogs of life.
I have an empty garden now. I remember Hakim’s lamenting refrain in “QADIR”, mourning his dearly departed friend and his rituals: “Qadir, oh, I miss you dearly / What did you plant in your mother’s garden?” I question this myself. It seems relevant that this track is taken from an album titled, WILL THIS MAKE ME GOOD.
I have an answer to Hakim’s question, at least for a while.
I pray for new growth in the city; for commitment to local communities fostered in shared interests; for kindling love with past and future family; for a groundedness to reality and what really matters; for energy and capacity to carry me in adventures to come; for kindness to myself.
These will be the first plants in my new garden. In this conversation, for one, I’ll take these prayers in my heart when I go.
Thanks to Micah Carroll for a conversation that helped bring the initial inspiration for this post. And Isabel Ting for reading and supporting drafts!
Unless I am doing the delivery, of course.
Wow, you’re so profound!
If you cannot manifest your inner Robbin Stone to interpret all of this, you are unfortunately a fake friend.