This song follows on from “Are You Happy?”, the last song from Burnham’s 2016 special Make Happy, in which he rhetorically asks the audience if they are happy with the show, but the questions becomes more about himself. Arriving immediately after a brief intermission, “Don’t Wanna Know” asks similar questions related to why he is making content and how people are engaging with it.

Burnham is interested in what people will think as he writes and develops the songs. But once the song is finalized and released, it becomes part of his identity as an artist, and he might take any criticism of it personally. This creates an awkward relationship between the one who writes the song (past him), and the one who has to hear what other people think of it (future him). One wants to know and one doesn’t. In the song, he might be expressing his desire to create without people seeking him out to tell him their thoughts on what he’s doing; an idea that’s already come up in past performances, like in “Can’t Handle This (Kanye Rant)” from the Make Happy special:

I want to give you the night out that you deserve
But I want to say what I think and not care what you think about it