November 21, 2025
Ian Bremmer responds to a viral backlash over his weekend photo joking about a “breadline” in New York City. Actually, a line of happy people waiting outside an artisanal bagel shop.
Many commenters erupted, some with humor and others with intense political anger. Ian walks through the most colorful reactions, why satire triggered so many people, and why he posted it in the first place.
Drawing on his early career studying the Soviet Union, where real breadlines and real repression existed, Ian argues that humor is essential in a healthy democracy: “If Soviet citizens under true political control could still laugh, surely we can too.”
He closes with an apology to those who were genuinely upset, and a promise that the humor isn’t going anywhere.
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