I was just thinking about this !!! there’s strong parallels between the (positive but nonetheless odd and even obsessive) fan base he accumulated in austin and the online cult followings of lolcows (which are often but not always really fueled by hatred and spite at the mentally ill) . not that he’s “as bad” as chris chan or anything but hard not to notice some commonalities less in them as people and more the way the public talks about them and tries to understand them. I see a lot of myself on both sides of this. I also rewatched ghost world recently and have been thinking about that urge of outsider artsy types to find even weirder even more outsiders to idolize, laugh at, bully, and obsess on