Can a lump of coal ever be … cute?
It’s a question no one was thinking about until last Thursday, when Interior Secretary Doug Burgum posted a cartoon of himself on X kneeling next to “Coalie” — a combustible lump with giant eyes, an open-mouthed grin, and yellow boots, almost like a carbon-heavy Japanese video game character.
It might seem like a strange mascot to promote what Burgum calls the “American Energy Dominance Agenda.”
“Especially for this administration, I would have expected a little bit more macho twist to it,” said Joshua Paul Dale, a professor of literature and culture at Chuo University in Tokyo, and the author of Irresistible: How Cuteness Wired Our Brains and Conquered the World.
In Japan, Dale said, seemingly everything gets a cute character attached to it — not just in TV shows and games, but also as part of government public relations efforts. This ultra-adorable aesthetic, associated wi... Read more
