Lately, I have been putting an embarrassing amount of thought into notions like jinxes and knocking on wood. The polls for US Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden look good, but this year, any hint of optimism feels dangerously naive, and my brain has been working overtime in search of potential doom.

I have become consumed with an alarming possibility: that neither the polls nor the actual outcome of the election really matters, because to a great many Americans, digital communication has already rendered empirical, observable reality beside the point.