For the month of May, I’ll be publishing a piece of writing, audio, dispatch from the Dolphin Religion, or case study every day. I’ll send it out to paywalled subscribers first and then send an email digest with everything published to free subscribers starting Friday, May 9, 2025. Free subscribers — I know you’ve received three emails in a row from me this week. I promise it won’t be like this every day!! An edited version of this piece was originally published in UnHerd on August 30, 2023. In the thirty-something-odd years old world of digital folklore—urban legends shared by chain mail, creepypastas, NoSleep stories from Reddit, scary mods or original games gone viral, and now, spooky TikToks—there is one theme that comes up again and again: the mimic. Mimics are paranormal entities, like doppelgangers or skinwalkers, that disguise themselves as something or someone you trust. In Navajo legend, skinwalkers are witches who shapeshift into animals, like deers or coyotes; doppelgangers, on the other hand, increasingly are said to appear as family members. Each expression of the mimic has its own nuances, but they all tap into the same fear. Looks can be deceiving. Though the mimic has always been an ambient trend–they are frightening, after all–recently, they’ve become more prominent. At the beginning of the year, there was the “doppelganger trend” on TikTok, where people made videos, usually 30-second skits, around a voice clip that said, “If you see another person that looks identical to you, run away and hide.” Though this format has come and gone in the trend cycle, scroll TikTok long enough these days, and you’re just as likely to run into a story about a a-dad-who-wasn’t-actually-a-dad or a husband-who-wasn’t-a-husband as you are a viral recipe. Everyone has a story about how they were sure they were absolutely certain they were talking to someone–only to find out they’d been duped by the spirit realm. The connection between mimics and digitally native ghost stories is an intuitive one. On one level, the Internet blows the world wide open. Not only is replication easier than it ever had been before, it brings into sharp relief how none of us are unique. What does it mean to call someone a skinwalker, which is also a slang term for “copycat,” in the digital age? How do we know who originated what? What does ownership mean, especially when it comes to something as nebulous as one’s sense of self, when you can instantly find a hundred replacements? The fear of the Mimic reveals that we are not as unique as we thought we were–even in a world where many of us desperately are searching for ways to differentiate ourselves. On another level, the Internet has always, and rightfully so, sparked fears about being deceived in some way. Old school chatroom stranger danger, a sentient or, at least, too convincing chat bot, catfishing, scams—all of these very real fears are downstream of danger being obfuscated by technology. Arguably, this has always been a fear with communications technology: once we were able to communicate instantaneously and without having to see one another, a whole world of possibility opened up around deception. And not just lying to one another, but receiving messages from other realms. There’s a reason that Spiritualists were so attracted to the telegraph, which they believed connected them to an “electronic elsewhere,” or the “etheric ocean.” All communication technology–a computer, a telegraph, a telephone–can be a ouija board if you squint hard enough. This year, this fear took on new salience, and a new evolution. Not only can we not see who’s on the other end, what reassurance we had that we were communicating with who we thought we were was completley obliterated. The danger of artificial intelligence became more tangible than ever. No longer merely a matter of if and when, AI became accessible to anyone who wanted to use it. Just this week, the New York Times published a startling article titled, Voice Deepfakes Are Coming for your Bank Balance, something that almost felt like an urban legend itself, when relayed on social media, like in this TikTok from CBCNews. And with this technology, the mimic trended once more: you think you know who it is, but you don’t. It’s something else, and you don’t know what it is, and you don’t know how it works, but it’s dangerous. What is the fear of a mimic if not the sublimated fear of technology? Invite your friends and earn rewardsIf you enjoy default.blog, share it with your friends and earn rewards when they subscribe.
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2025/05/02
Beware the Digital Mimic
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