Gracie Abrams and the Myth of Meritocracy

Why do so many people aspire to fame, and why do the children of celebrities—like Gracie Abrams—so often become the center of a media frenzy? Recently, the 26-year-old daughter of Hollywood titan J.J. Abrams expressed her teenage domestic rebellion in an introspective, 16-track album titled Daughter from Hell. As covered by Hello! magazine, she even took to the airwaves to offer a very public apology for taking “years” off the lives of her famous parents. And she treated The New York Times’s podcast, Popcast, as a secular confessional booth for discussing the difficulties of inherited privilege.