What are you gatekeeping? Shania Twain was accused of gatekeeping Harry Styles’s phone number. High Times denounced “stoner gatekeeping,” and racing fans pledged not to gatekeep Formula 1. On TikTok, if you gatekeep where you bought that vintage skirt or which drugstore moisturizer you use or or what’s the best martini in the city or how you’re making money from selling feet pics, you’ll be chastised.

Gatekeeping used to refer to people with their hands on the levers of institutional power. Said keepers were the media execs and political leaders who decide which voices are heard, what issues deserve attention, and where money flows. The term has undergone a rapid expansion since it found new prominence as the middle of the 2021 neoliberal-feminist cocktail “gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss.” Now gatekeeping — Vogue’s 2022 “word of the year” — has come to refer to anyone holding back any information, even if that info is of dubious or microniche value. And yet for all the discourse about girlbossing (she’s dead!) and gaslighting (you know it when you feel it!), there has been very little reckoning with gatekeeping even though it has so far proved to have the most staying power of the three. We’re more than halfway through 2023, and TikTok is still peppered with captions like “should i gatekeep this?” and the New York Times is using the word to describe the behavior of nü-metal fans.

Can you tell the difference between a freaky-looking fake animal and a freaky-looking real one? Morocco defender Nouhaila Benzina has made history as the first player to wear a hijab at a World Cup match. There are more Trader Joe’s recalls to be aware of (seriously, how do rocks end up in so many different foods?!). Welcome back, King Otis! There are no more hobbies, just side hustles. Frenchies sure are cute, but they weren’t built for this heat. And Biden’s new student-debt repayment plan is open. Here’s how to enroll.

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