MORALITY PLOY.

Shorter Jonah Goldberg: Y'ever notice there are no real heroes on TV or in comics anymore? Not like when you were a kid? Hello? Hello, anyone still there? Farrrt frt frt farrrrt....

In other words, all the young'uns are friggin' and fruggin' and doin' their own thing, baby, and "it’s impossible to predict what Integrity 2.0 will yield — because no society in the history of Western civilization has so energetically and deliberately torn down its classical ideal and replaced it with do-it-yourself morality." Stop the presses! Apparently everyone in the media just recently discovered Nietzche, perhaps in a viral clip from Adult Swim.

Really, that's pretty much it. The essay's other distinguishing feature is a higher-than-usual count of intentional jokes, most of which sound like P.J. O'Rourke failing a competency hearing.

Oh, there is one telling bit -- Goldberg mentions the internet trolls who, not yet having a gamergate to rally 'round, focused their misogynistic rage on Anna Gunn during the run of Breaking Bad:

It got to the point where the actress (Anna Gunn) who portrayed the poor, beleaguered Mrs. White wrote an op-ed for the New York Times complaining about the tsunami of hate aimed at her character, which had spilled onto her in real life as well. In liberal pop culture, this was the equivalent of yelling “I’m telling!” and running to the principal’s office.

?

Gunn blamed the whole thing on sexism. Her complaint may have some marginal merit, but it’s also really, really, really boring. The more interesting explanation (i.e., my explanation) is that “purely formal” integrity is just about the only kind of integrity our popular culture celebrates anymore...

Somebody actually got hurt but tscha, let's get back to the real evil, namely the questionable morality of Game of Thrones characters.