Matt Bernstein: A Little Bit Fruity
City Winery
990 Filbert St.
Philadelphia
March 15, 2025
“We’re twinning!” I gushed to my favorite podcaster, Matt Bernstein, after a post-show meet-and-greet to which I wore shimmery blue powder smeared across my eyelids. Bernstein, who hosts the podcast A Little Bit Fruity, is known for his signature icy blue eyeshadow; copying his look made me feel like an Eagles fan donning their signature green jersey at a tailgate.
Bernstein’s show, which revolves around the intersection of U.S. politics and pop culture, gets hundreds of thousands of views on Youtube. By recording himself, often in his room, speaking casually about mainstream culture, Bernstein makes the audience feel like they’re hanging out with a fun friend while simultaneously going deep into the dark histories of today’s polarizing political realities. He’s recently reviewed the “Celebrity Ozempidemic,” interviewed Elon Musk’s estranged daughter, and analyzed how the White House is attempting to sway more women to reproduce.
In his touring live show, which I caught at City Winery last week, Bernstein zeroes in on how influencers are aestheticizing their on-screen lives in order to spread conservative values. He also offers his usual listeners a chance to convene in-person while talking about the absurd and sometimes very scary world of social media.
With 1.8 million Instagram followers, Bernstein has developed a down-to-earth approach to combating anti-intellectualism and the spread of misinformation. In the midst of a tsunami of fake news, I see Bernstein as a lighthouse; he fact-checks and breaks down confusing cultural and political conflicts with integrity, not to mention a sense of humor.
His live show kicked off by showcasing memorable political advertisements from 2016, including the viral video of Kendall Jenner solving racism with one can of Pepsi. Typically, we doom scroll these videos and memes in silence as our mental health atrophies. Inside City Winery, however, Bernstein turned doom scrolling into a laughter-packed group stroll down memory lane.
Bernstein argued that around 2021, conservative pundits helped undo the excessive monetization of progressive social politics online by accusing Hollywood and the media of becoming “too woke,” channeling more listeners to their own “independent” talk shows and echo chambers. At the same time, Bernstein observed a rise in the number of ostensibly apolitical social media stars rising in popularity for filming their loaded daily routines and offering so-called “life coaching.”
Ashton Hall, for example, gained millions of Tik Tok followers overnight after posting his heavily curated “morning routine” video where he wakes up at 4 a.m. while some woman’s disembodied hands make his breakfast. In Bernstein’s company, we cracked up at the pointless intensity of Hall’s over-the-top self-care strategies; but we also collectively paid attention to how such a video reveals certain male fantasies about mainstream success.
Matt Bernstein mocks these influencers by turning their words into his own content. Bernstein’s merch includes, for example, a white muscle shirt that says “I tanned my testicles to increase my testosterone levels and all I got was this lousy shirt,” referencing Tucker Carlson's insane recommendations for combating crises of masculinity. As a gay man himself, Bernstein unapologetically presents an alternative (and more realistic) expression of masculinity that shatters the gender essentialist lifestyles many influencers want to promote.
Bernstein also draws attention to the parallels seen among prominent female lifestyle influencers, like Ballerina Farm, a brand founded by Utah Mormon Hannah Neeleman.
Women like Neeleman have won their success in part by cashing in on the same “girl boss” branding popularized by their feminist counterparts less than a decade ago. But these women call on others to return to their “natural roles” as helpmeets[2] serving their husbands in the kitchen and raising children.
Ballerina Farm showcases Neeleman’s life raising eight children and living off the land. Her curated content and media profiles sugarcoat the glaring reality that she and her billionaire husband (the Jet Blue Airlines heir) rely on a full-service staff to do virtually all of the farming for them.
Neeleman became a business woman after giving up a successful dance career in New York City the second her husband proposed to her on an airplane owned by his family. She may live on a farm that her husband bought, but she is really a careerist selling the idea of traditional homemaking to women on the wrong side of the Internet.
The further fetishization of “trad (traditional) wives” by youth on the left uncovers a performance of conservatism that borders on cosplay. Fashion trends like “quiet luxury, “clean girl,” or even the return to a preppy minimalism portray an image of affluence and purity indicative of authoritarian movements.
Consequently, buying into these visual ideals, whether ironically or aspirationally, normalizes traditionalist values inextricably tied up with old-school oppression.
The success of these platforms should not be understated. “Traditional” lifestyle influencers lure the masses in with anti-establishment-coded messaging that stands in opposition to the social programs that actually benefit marginalized people. Fascists obfuscate their incompetence and authoritarian politics by leveraging cultural movements that they’ve spent decades manufacturing. The only thing new about these internet and social media trends is the technology that made them accessible in the first place.
At the end of the show, Bernstein summarized his take on how to break the power of online icons: “The way to take back the culture from the conservatives is to make these people look like freaks.” Ironically, the conservatives always want to push that narrative against queer people, the trans community, cat ladies, and supposed outsiders who don’t fit their ethno-centric patriarchal agenda. We joyfully push back against their ideas of how things should be by doing them our own way; that’s why, for example, Bernstein’s blue eyeshadow goes so hard.
The right’s strong grasp on alternative and increasingly mainstream media has contributed to the conservative norm-core takeover of the country. Even as we mock these lifestyle influencers, content creators on the left have been nowhere near as successful at using modern technology to attract an ideologically aligned audience in a way that translates to decisive political opposition. But watching Bernstein diss a bunch of people who stand for everything I hate did do something for me, if not for my political party; his platform provides me with the kind of self-affirming entertainment we’re all looking for when we go online.
Unlike Ashton Hall or Hannah Neeleman, Matt Bernstein is not a lifestyle preacher. His blue eyeshadow is, like his videos, a reaction against prevailing and prejudicial ideas of how we’re meant to live. Bernstein and his colleagues help us understand the politics that underlie so much of the seemingly absurd and apolitical content we take in, subconsciously or not, everyday.
[1] This type of content has also been called “edutainment.”
[2] Helpmeet is what evangelical Christians say a woman should be to her husband. It means “a helpful companion.”
