Overview of Is the World Getting Uglier?
In this New York Times Opinion conversation, Ezra Klein talks with designer and host Debbie Millman about whether the world is actually getting uglier—or whether it is becoming more drab, vulgar, and standardized. Their discussion moves from cars, buildings, coffee shops, and fashion to branding, public space, market logic, and the politics of beauty. Millman argues that design is always a deliberate expression of intention, and that what we often call “ugly” may really be a mix of bad proportion, disrespect, overreach, or attention-seeking. The episode also explores how the right has embraced a politics of beauty, while the left has struggled to articulate its own vision.
Main Ideas and Takeaways
Ugliness vs. drabness vs. vulgarity
- Millman distinguishes between:
- Ugly: may still be intentional or even stylish in retrospect.
- Drab: bland, inoffensive, and emotionally empty.
- Vulgar: aggressive, out of proportion, and lacking intention or care.
- Klein suggests much of the modern built environment feels less ugly than flattened and lifeless.
- Both agree that many objects and spaces today seem designed to avoid offense, but end up feeling soulless.
Design as intention
- Millman defines design as a deliberate expression of intention and brand as manufactured meaning.
- Good design, for her:
- Makes the user feel better.
- Improves the world.
- Respects people’s experience.
- Bad design is disrespectful, greedy, or immoral.
Proportion, feeling, and human response
- Millman argues that proportion matters deeply and is often intuitively felt even without mathematical knowledge.
- She emphasizes that objects and environments affect us emotionally, whether consciously or not.
- The discussion returns often to the idea that design shapes how we feel, behave, and identify ourselves.
Topics Discussed
Examples of “ugly” or overbearing design
- Cybertruck: seen as intentionally imposing and attention-grabbing.
- Oversized homes / bloviated housing: houses built too close to property lines, crowding the surrounding space.
- Gen Z fashion: cited as an example of style that may be expressive but not permanent.
- Trump’s White House changes: discussed as garish, power-driven aesthetics.
- Air conditioning units: used as an example of functional but boring or intrusive design.
Why so much modern design looks the same
- Klein raises the argument that sameness comes from:
- Aerodynamics
- Safety standards
- Energy efficiency
- Mass production
- Optimization for resale and convenience
- Millman acknowledges these constraints but thinks beauty will eventually reassert itself as the next stage after functionality.
Convenience vs. individuality
- A central tension in the episode is between:
- Convenience, frictionlessness, and mass efficiency
- Individuality, soul, memory, and tactile experience
- Examples:
- Vinyl records vs. Spotify
- Physical books vs. Kindle
- Family furniture vs. cheap, replaceable furniture
- Millman values objects that require care and create a physical relationship.
Market logic and the loss of public space
- Klein argues that market logic increasingly shapes spaces that should be communal or non-commercial.
- They discuss:
- Subway ads
- Billboards
- Commercialization of public space
- Logos and branding everywhere, even on everyday objects
- Millman notes that repeated exposure can make even ugly branding beloved, but Klein worries the market has taken over too much of the visual environment.
Politics of Beauty
The right’s clearer aesthetics
- The conversation turns to the modern right’s explicit interest in beauty:
- Classical architecture
- Roman columns
- Gold ornamentation
- “Mar-a-Lago” style
- Klein argues the right has been more willing to make beauty a public political value.
- Millman responds that this often reflects power, not just beauty.
What the left struggles with
- Klein suggests the left often hesitates to define beauty because it fears imposing a single standard.
- Millman agrees beauty is not binary and cannot be universally fixed.
- Still, both seem to agree there is a lack of an equally compelling left-leaning aesthetic vision.
Beauty as power
- Millman repeatedly returns to the idea that visual style often communicates status, tribe, and power.
- She sees many aesthetic choices—fashion, architecture, branding, cosmetic surgery—as ways of signaling identity and belonging.
Notable Examples and Observations
- iPod and white earbuds: used to show how design can signal belonging and exclusivity.
- Old subway ads for Dr. Zimor: ugly but memorable and eventually beloved because they were consistent and felt personal rather than bureaucratic.
- Gray homes / “color recession”: an example of how marketability can flatten individuality.
- Sao Paulo billboard ban: cited as a rare case where removing advertising changed the visual environment for the better.
- Public transit art and poetry: offered as a hopeful alternative to commercial saturation.
Final Thoughts
The episode’s core argument is that the modern world may not simply be “getting uglier” in a straightforward sense. Instead, it is increasingly shaped by:
- optimization
- commercial logic
- attention economies
- overemphasis on convenience
- loss of distinctive public and personal expression
At the same time, the episode suggests a countercurrent: people still crave beauty, meaning, and objects that feel human. The challenge is whether contemporary culture—especially the left—can articulate a vision of beauty that is not just reactionary, elitist, or power-coded.
Books Debbie Millman Recommended
- The Voice That Is Great Within Us — Hayden Carruth
- Love in the Time of Cholera — Gabriel García Márquez
- Ulysses — James Joyce
- Hunger — Roxane Gay, which she said changed her life