'OK Doomer' Jessica Wildfire not so OK, part 1 — background

I have broken what was originally going to be just one piece about the "OK Doomer" of Substack, Jessica Wildfire / Jessica Lexicus, into two. The background reason is the same; her thin-skinned, IMO, blocking me from commenting on OK Doomer after I basically called out some ... uh, "wrongness" to be charitable, and then didn't like the snide condescension of her reply when banning me. 

I will talk about that in detail in part 2. 

My goggling (sic, Rainbow Satan, and Duck Duck Go sucks worse by the day) on her background led me to enough thoughts that I realized I needed to split into two. So, here's part 1. 

I had seen Jessica Wildfire's Substack several months ago, I think after I first saw her on Medium, and eventually clicked to get it.

A solidly middle-class, maybe even upper middle class, married or partnered woman with, I think, one child or two, per this interview of her, and a GenXer by age, not Millennial, at first appeared to have some smart left-liberal takes on the world.

Then, I realized otherwise, and her most recent hot take on "we're running out of food" shows why, as her main internal link contradicts herself. (That's what we'll take up in detail in part 2.)

But, let's get to her academic background. I first thought she was a college prof, per the "interview" link, then thought she was a K-12 teacher, probably high school. Yeh, she calls herself an "unfluencer" on Twitter, but ... given the amount of hustles she runs, c'mon. She rants — probably rightly — about the kids of MAGAts in this piece. On the third hand, in that piece, she claims kids are actually bringing guns into her class. For a MAGA-sizes snark? I bigly doubt that.

No, seriously. I quote:

I’m teaching online now, but that can’t last forever. I might get to teach online in the spring, but eventually I’ll get sent back into the classroom, where my state allows them to carry guns. 

Let me repeat that last part. My state allows my anti-masking, anti-vaxxing students to bring guns to class. I’m supposed to evaluate these students and give them grades they might not like.

Really? Name the state. She doesn't, of course. But, she is actually right, contra wingnuts.

Well, wait. No, she's not a "teacher" after all, maybe? But, instead, as I first thought, a professor. See this piece, and I quote:

The shortages have started hitting colleges so hard that, once again, they’re talking about increasing class sizes and upping our loads.

Note the "Our." She goes on to reference "Mr. Holland's Opus," which is of course about college, not K-12.

But, still. What state lets college students bring guns into the classroom? NOT New York State. But, per her MuckRack? Among places where she has written is "NYU Local." Yes, that's a student blog. But, if she went to teach at a red state university? That was a choice. Or, even if it's student run, they post pieces by faculty. (The latest from her is a Medium piece dated last year. BUT, if you notice on a search, you'll see two versions of her name, one with an exclamation point after the first name. See part 2 for more.)

Back to the gunz, though. Whatever state it is, a bit more goggling said it's "somewhere in the Southeast." And, per the gunz? It's most likely Georgia. Note this Wiki piece and per footnote 14, note this from Georgia.

Anyway, I digress. If she's been a professor or instructor for a decade, she's got a husband making money enough to allow her to do that as an adjunct. If not an adjunct?

Well, here in Tex-ass (since it sounds like she's in a red state) an assistant professor on a tenure track does pretty nicely. No, they're not doing "side hustles." If you ARE still an adjunct after 10 years? I feel sorry, but, at the same time, but still holding on to the "Impossible Dream" that you someday won't be an adjunct, you are part of the problem, in that you're enabling Big University to be Big Biz. And, given that she's self-published two books, and has both a Substack and TWO Medium accounts (see more on that in Part Two) that counts as "side hustles." She's an adjunct, and at a decade-plus, enabling the system even as she talks about leaving it.

Nope, not an adjunct after all. In another piece, she talks about chasing tenure. And, the rest of that piece is clearly a tenure-track faculty member's hot takes on other faculty, with a touch of snideness. (See part 2.) OTOH, given the way she conflates stuff, this could be yes another piece where "we" isn't actually what you would think.

Meanwhile, going back to the first teaching piece. "We" do NOT have "superintendents" and "school boards" if we're college folks. "We" do have deans, etc., but ... K-12 teachers don't. Conflating teaching college with teaching K-12 looks deliberate. Willful. Semi-lying. And unsurprising.

As for her college teaching? I first thought maybe marketing or something. Would tie with being an apparent "influencer." Then I thought again about her Twitter "handle," which is "@jessicalexicus." And, the back half of that became light bulb: English and/or creative writing. (That said, marketing communications could certainly be part of that teaching.) Anyway, between that, other biographical tidbits and such, she's upper middle-class on both the socio and the economic halves from what I can tell. The "chasing tenure" piece confirms. She mentions a creative writing teacher in her grad program. The "somewhere in the Southeast" confirmed more. She's an English prof. (The creative writing part? It makes me wonder how much else of her Mediums and Substack is really, ahem, "creative writing.")

And, with that, my goggling is done. (And, it wasn't bad!) Go to Part 2.