as I have gotten older I have seen my childhood cannibalized and resold to me as a cheaper, shitty, nostalgic commodity

I think this leaves out how the experiences of one's childhood were largely cheap, shitty, and commercialized already -- we were just kids and it was all new (to us) and cool, so we didn't notice.

I also want to invoke the ghost of McLuhan, who said that each new media acts as a container of the old. I.e. TV was a container for film. We can read into this further and ask how does new media (like new music, movies, apps, whatever) act as containers for the old. Instagram uses filters that replicate the “film” look, and through this is deeply insincere. Its a facade of “nostalgia” for something that never existed in the first place, a simulation of a referent that doesnt exist

This makes incredible sense to me, since the new container is specifically made for or at least while the old media is pervasive.

Read Jameson, Lyotard, and Baudrillard

Thanks, will add them to my list

the thesis that the left has accepted “the end of history” as a given and refuse to use their political imagination (I.e. not be anticommunist) is correct

I'm under the impression that he himself is very much included in that