Another Friday. Another batch of headlines that feel like America accidentally left the television on while the country wandered into the kitchen looking for aspirin.
This week gave us UFO footage over Michigan, Stephen Colbert’s farewell tour, Democrats discussing bathrooms again, ancient Stonehenge rivalry theories, and New York nightlife trying to convince everybody cocaine and poor decisions are somehow “back.”
So naturally, it’s time for another Side-Eye Friday.
Stephen Colbert Finally Signs Off
Apparently, America survived eleven straight years of nightly lectures disguised as comedy. Who knew.
The New York Post review of Stephen Colbert’s final Late Show episode described it as not funny, not emotional, and pretty much representative of his entire run.
That sounds harsh until you remember late-night television slowly transformed from goofy entertainment into MSNBC with celebrity guests and applause signs.
🚨 Stephen Colbert Epic Meltdown in 3 Parts:
• Hyped Biden’s “win”
• Cried when Trump won
• Late Show hemorrhaged $40M a year and gets canceledThis is what total losing looks like. pic.twitter.com/AgCkFNfJeg
— Alec Lace (@AlecLace) May 21, 2026
There was a time when late-night hosts mocked everybody. Politicians. Celebrities. The media. The public. Nobody was safe. Then somewhere along the way, half the hosts started sounding like disappointed HR managers giving diversity seminars to exhausted Americans trying to fold laundry at 11:30 p.m.
Even the farewell coverage felt weirdly split between critics insisting Colbert lost the plot years ago and loyal fans treating his departure like the fall of democracy itself.
The truth is probably simpler.
Most Americans just stopped watching.
The funniest thing about modern late-night may be watching millionaire comedians insist they are rebellious resistance fighters while broadcasting from billion-dollar corporations.
Links:
NY Post on Colbert’s finale
The Government Dropped UFO Videos Again
Nothing captures modern America better than the Pentagon casually releasing UFO footage while everybody scrolls past it arguing about grocery prices and biological reality.
This week brought newly declassified footage showing a U.S. fighter jet shooting down a mysterious object over Lake Huron back in 2023.
And somehow the public reaction was basically:
“Huh. Weird.”
keeps eating sandwich
In the newly published U.S. UFO files, a video has emerged in which an American F-16 fighter jet allegedly shoots down an unidentified flying object over Lake Huron in February 2023. pic.twitter.com/LX8NqVne7t
— Sprinter Press Agency (@SprinterPress) May 22, 2026
Maybe Americans are emotionally exhausted. Maybe decades of alien movies desensitized everybody. Or maybe people simply assume if extraterrestrials were smart enough to cross galaxies, they would avoid Earth entirely after five minutes on social media.
Either way, the government keeps dropping these files like it’s the season finale of The X-Files while the public reacts like somebody posted another software update notice.
At this point, an actual alien could land in Times Square and people would just ask whether it had a podcast.
Links:
NY Post UFO footage story
Rahm Emanuel Thinks Democrats Spend Too Much Time Talking About Bathrooms
Well.
That might be the first correct political observation Democrats have made in a while.
Rahm Emanuel reportedly warned Democrats they have become “too comfortable in the bathroom” while positioning himself for a possible 2028 run. The comment was clearly aimed at the party’s endless obsession with gender politics and identity activism.
The funniest part is Democrats now seem shocked voters noticed.
Why Rahm Emanuel says Democrats have gotten ‘too comfortable in the bathroom’ as he mulls 2028 White House bid https://t.co/FMvl3YydCK pic.twitter.com/OTYCYJL82Z
— New York Post (@nypost) May 22, 2026
For years Americans were told biological sex was basically an outdated social construct while schools, corporations, sports leagues, advertisers, and politicians all aggressively pushed the same messaging at once. Then Democrats lost ground with normal working-class voters and suddenly party strategists are sitting around conference tables wondering what happened.
Maybe Americans simply got tired of being told common sense was hateful.
Maybe voters wanted cheaper groceries more than another seminar on gender theory.
Or maybe regular people just do not enjoy being scolded twenty-four hours a day by activists who act like reality itself is offensive.
Wild theory, I know.
Links:
Rahm Emanuel bathroom comments
Scientists Think Stonehenge May Have Been Built Out of Ancient Competition
I mean really, this feels believable.
Scientists now think Stonehenge may have partly resulted from ancient competition between groups trying to outdo each other.
Which means humanity has apparently spent thousands of years saying:
“Oh yeah? Well watch THIS.”
Civilization changes. Human behavior really doesn’t.
Today, people fight for attention with Instagram activism and podcast microphones. Ancient humans dragged giant rocks across fields to flex on neighboring tribes.
Different century. Same species.
Links:
Stonehenge competition theory
Cats: The Jellicle Ball
I am officially old because I just read about Cats: The Jellicle Ball and my first reaction was not “How innovative.” It was, “What in the Broadway fever dream is happening over there?”
Apparently Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats has now been reimagined through New York ballroom culture with voguing, runway battles, queer club aesthetics, and what critics are describing as a “euphoric” reinvention.
And look, theater people seem to genuinely love it. Critics are raving. Audiences are apparently throwing themselves into the experience like it’s Studio 54 for theater kids.
But somewhere deep inside me, the original Cats fan from the 1980s is sitting quietly in the corner whispering:
“We really couldn’t just leave the weird singing cats alone?”
Modern entertainment has developed a fascinating inability to simply revive anything normally. Everything now requires a complete cultural rewrite, a conceptual reinterpretation, or somebody explaining why the original material was secretly problematic all along.
At this point, I fully expect Oklahoma! to return next year as an immersive cryptocurrency experience performed inside a vape lounge.
Still, I cannot completely side-eye this one because honestly? The photos look kind of amazing. The costumes are wild. The energy looks chaotic in a fun way. And apparently audiences are eating it up.
Which leaves America exactly where it always ends up:
half the country yelling “THIS IS CULTURAL DEGENERATION”
while the other half is buying tickets immediately.
Honestly, that may be the most Jellicle thing of all.
Cannes Women Continue Their Annual Struggle Against Wearing Clothes
Every year Cannes pretends it is hosting a prestigious international film festival, and every year half the headlines become:
“Celebrity Arrives Nearly Naked.”
The Cannes Film Festival banned naked dresses, but these stars don’t care https://t.co/MVUF58vqtW pic.twitter.com/1lgGKR1LRQ
— New York Post (@nypost) May 22, 2026
This year organizers reportedly tried cracking down on excessive nudity, which apparently only encouraged celebrities to treat the dress code like a personal challenge.
The entire Cannes red carpet now feels less like classic Hollywood glamour and more like wealthy influencers competing in an Olympic event called How Little Fabric Can Legally Remain Attached To The Body.
When did celebrity culture stop trying to look beautiful and start trying to go viral? Nobody even talks about the movies anymore. The actual films now feel like background noise behind twelve straight days of professionally photographed nipples.
Old Hollywood stars used to arrive looking polished, glamorous, and mysterious.
Now, everybody looks one strong breeze away from a federal indecency charge.
And that wraps another Side-Eye Friday, where the headlines somehow keep getting stranger while Americans quietly develop the survival instincts of exhausted people standing in a grocery-store checkout line wondering how UFOs, naked celebrities, ballroom cats, and political bathroom debates all ended up happening in the same civilization at the exact same time.
Feature Image: AI-generated illustration.
