Somewhere in the clutter of my early
2000s music collection sat an old CD by 4 Non Blondes, with a title that
never quite left me: Bigger, Better, Faster, More. I didn’t think much
of it at first. It was a catchy phrase, a product of its time. But years later,
it would resurface in my mind and strike me as something more than a pop
culture slogan. It felt like a diagnosis. A summary of modern human behavior. And
perhaps even a warning.
Years before that moment, I had
noticed a pattern in the way people react to change — a kind of built-in
restlessness. We adapt quickly to new realities, normalize them, and soon feel
dissatisfied again. What once felt like progress becomes the new baseline. And
then we want more. Then more again. And again. I was proud of this observation,
until I stumbled upon a psychological concept that had already existed for
decades: the hedonic treadmill.
That moment of disappointment passed
quickly. Because if anything, the existence of such a concept only validated
what I had seen. The hedonic treadmill — the idea that people return to a
stable level of happiness regardless of positive or negative events — is
well-documented in psychological research. Brickman and Campbell’s original
formulation in the 1970s, followed by studies in affective neuroscience,
confirmed that our emotional systems adapt quickly to changes in fortune. We
chase happiness, but it slips back to “normal.” It’s not just consumer
behavior; it’s a structural feature of the human condition.
But then came the deeper question. Where
does this chasing end? And what happens when it doesn’t?
The
Line Between Progress and Obsession
We like to tell ourselves that
progress is inherently good. That the arc of history bends toward justice,
health, wisdom. But what if progress, when unexamined, becomes a runaway train?
What if our instinct to improve turns toxic — not because of bad intentions,
but because we don’t know how to stop?
To explore this, I looked at three
modern movements: feminism, vegetarianism, and the ideology commonly labeled as
"woke." Each of these began with legitimate, even noble, goals. Each
was a response to real harm. But each, I argue, has been distorted by the
“bigger, better, faster, more” instinct — to the point where their original
missions are now tangled in excess, dogma, or unintended consequences.
Feminism:
From Equality to Estrangement
Feminism began as a fight for rights
that should never have been denied in the first place — the right to vote, to
own property, to access education. The first wave was about legal equality. The
second wave tackled social and reproductive rights. These were hard-won gains
that helped redefine womanhood on women's own terms.
But in more recent waves, something
shifted. As feminism merged with identity politics and academic theory, the
focus moved from equality to power — and eventually, in some
corners, to dominance or separatism. The noble fight for respect
mutated into slogans like “the future is female,” while social media
gave rise to what Christina Hoff Sommers has called “gender war feminism.”
Sommers and others, including Camille Paglia, have warned for years that this
new brand of feminism alienates not only men, but also many women who don’t
feel seen in its increasingly narrow (and sometimes contradictory) definitions
of empowerment.
It’s not that feminism is inherently
flawed — it’s that the engine behind it couldn’t shut down once it reached its
goalposts. “More” became “too much.” In a 2015 Pew Research study, while 61% of
American women said feminism had helped their lives, only 18% described
themselves as feminists. That gap says something.
Vegetarianism:
From Health to Hysteria
I grew up thinking of vegetarianism
as a personal choice — often a noble one. It was about health, compassion for
animals, or environmental concern. These are reasonable goals, and many have
benefited from a more plant-based lifestyle. Flexitarianism, Mediterranean
diets, even moderate veganism — all have a place in the conversation about
responsible eating.
But the movement didn’t stop there.
Raw veganism, fruitarianism,
alkaline diets, detoxes, and juice cleanses — these trends, often championed
online by influencers with no scientific training, began to replace reason with
zeal. What started as a life-enhancing choice became, for some, an identity —
and a restrictive, even dangerous one.
Nutritionists have been sounding the
alarm. Harvard Health warns of deficiencies in B12, iron, and omega-3s among
strict vegans who don’t supplement properly. The National Eating Disorders
Association recognizes a condition called orthorexia — an obsession with
"clean" or "pure" food that can lead to anxiety,
malnutrition, and social isolation.
Again, the trajectory is clear: a
good idea becomes a mandate, which becomes a trap.
Woke
Ideology: From Awareness to Censorship
The word woke once meant
being alert to injustice — particularly racial injustice. In that sense, it was
a virtue. Movements like Black Lives Matter emerged to challenge very real
structural problems, and they sparked necessary conversations about privilege,
access, and equity.
But once again, “more” got the
better of us.
When awareness turns into dogma, and
dogma turns into censorship, something goes wrong. In recent years, we’ve seen
books pulled from schools, language policed to extremes, and people publicly
shamed or fired for stepping outside of ever-shifting ideological lines. The
scholar Jonathan Haidt has spoken at length about the intellectual fragility
this has produced, especially on college campuses, where free speech has
increasingly come into conflict with what some call “emotional safety.”
We now see activists calling for the
banning of To Kill a Mockingbird and Of Mice and Men — books once
praised for their critique of racism. When purity becomes more important than
intent or context, even allies are seen as enemies.
The pursuit of justice, like all
human pursuits, needs a governor — a speed limit — or it risks flipping into
tyranny.
The
Pattern Behind the Pattern
These are just three examples, but
the pattern repeats elsewhere:
- Environmentalism
turning into eco-anxiety and apocalyptic fatalism.
- Body positivity
veering into denial of health risks.
- Self-help culture
becoming a pressure cooker of toxic positivity.
- Tech innovation
evolving into addiction and surveillance.
What links them all is that none of
these ideas were born in malice. They emerged from care — for people, the
planet, the self. But the machinery of “bigger, better, faster, more” doesn’t
know when to stop. It’s built into our psychology, yes, but it’s also
reinforced by capitalism, social media algorithms, and the performative nature
of modern morality.
In moral communities — especially
online — virtue signaling can lead to purity spirals. A term coined by
journalist Rob Henderson, a purity spiral occurs when people try to outdo each
other in their commitment to a cause, resulting in ever-more extreme behavior
until dissent becomes heresy.
Is
There a Way Out?
I think so. But it begins with
recognizing the trap.
We must learn to spot when good
ideas harden into rigid ideologies. We must develop the courage to say, “That’s
enough,” even when our tribe is asking for more. We must resist the false
choice between enthusiasm and extremism.
And maybe — just maybe — we must
re-learn the forgotten art of moderation.
Progress is good. Unchecked growth
is not. As in ecosystems, balance is more sustainable than acceleration. We
don’t need to renounce feminism, vegetarianism, or justice. We need to return
to their roots — and resist the pressure to climb higher once we’ve reached the
summit.
Final
Thoughts
I don’t remember the lyrics of that 4
Non Blondes album. But the title still echoes in my mind like a cultural
mirror. Bigger, Better, Faster, More.
It could be a promise. It could be a
prophecy.
Either way, it’s up to us to decide
when enough is enough.
