EAST VANCOUVER – In the midst of a global pandemic, the government is scrambling to assist those who are struggling financially. While Canadians are trying to cope with losing their jobs, hipster Travis Gambardella is reminding everyone that he was unemployed before it was cool.

“I liked the government of Canada’s earlier work,” Gambardella said about the newest policies, “Employment Insurance had such nuance to it, CERB is now popularized and mainstream… Frankly it’s pedestrian and tacky.”

Gambardella, a self-proclaimed cultural critic who studies the semiotics of Much Music’s BIG SHINY TUNES album covers, has been living off of Employment Insurance for the past five years. He has recently been trying to make it as a stick n’ poke tattoo artist, finding the majority of his clients in the thrash-folk section of record stores. He sends screenshots of their conversations to Service Canada to prove he’s been actively looking for a job.

This was not the first time Gambardella has bragged about being ahead of the curve. He notes that he was listening to Neutral Milk Hotel before In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, watching Wes Anderson before The Royal Tenenbaums, and getting dreadlocks before white women like Kylie Jenner.

While claiming to be focused on his own work, Gambardella still had time to reflect on society as a whole.

“It’s the decline of humanity,” said Gambardella, “Not because of the pandemic or anything, it’s because people are being depressed and making bread when they really should be depressed and reading the seminal works of Haruki Murakami. Get your priorities straight people!”

Despite his changed opinions due to the popularization of Employment Insurance, Gambardella continues to promote obscure policies such as fair wages for frontline workers, universal health care including dental, and eating the rich.