Post by Admin on May 5, 2021 6:18:29 GMT
The magical thinking of guys who love logic
theoutline.com/post/7083/the-magical-thinking-of-guys-who-love-logic
Ian Danskin, who makes videos under the moniker Innuendo Studios, has made a name for himself on the internet for his YouTube series on the techniques and beliefs of the alt-right. His most recent video, “The Card Says Moops,” is worth watching in full, but there was one particular line in it that struck me. Danskin points out that, even when their beliefs skew towards the bizarre and conspiratorial, people on the online right often identify as “rationalists.”
This will be unsurprising to those who often engage with the wider online right, whether it is with someone who identifies as alt-right, libertarian, conservative, as a fan of the “Intellectual Dark Web,” or even “moderate” or “centrist” (turns out a lot of people online are self-identifying as moderate while also believing in conspiracies about “white genocide”). Although their beliefs may not be identical, there are common, distinct patterns in the way they speak (or type) that one can’t help but notice.
Specifically, these guys — and they are usually guys — love using terms like “logic.” They will tell you, over and over, how they love to use logic, and how the people they follow online also use logic. They are also massive fans of declaring that they have “facts,” that their analysis is “unbiased,” that they only use “‘reason” and “logic” and not “emotions” to make decisions. The hosts of the popular leftist podcast Chapo Trap House even titled their book The Chapo Guide to Revolution: A Manifesto Against Logic, Facts and Reason as a wink and nod to this tendency.
These words are usually used interchangeably and without regard to their proper usage, squished together in a vague Play-Doh ball of smug superiority, to be thrown wherever possible at their “emotional” and “irrational” enemies: feminists, Marxists, liberals, SJWs, and definitely the feminist Marxist liberal SJWs. You could call these men’s way of viewing the world in simple “me smart, you dumb” dichotomies Manichean, or even Derridean, if you really want to upset them by referencing a philosopher that they’ve heard is very bad.
A good illustration of this phenomenon recently appeared in a piece for MEL magazine about an increasingly disturbing trend — women whose once-promising romantic relationships implode after their boyfriends become “redpilled.” For the benefit of the blissfully uninitiated: to be “redpilled” means to internalize a set of misogynistic far-right beliefs popular with certain corners of the internet; the product of a noxious blend of junk science, conspiracy theory, and a pathological fear of social progress.
theoutline.com/post/7083/the-magical-thinking-of-guys-who-love-logic
Ian Danskin, who makes videos under the moniker Innuendo Studios, has made a name for himself on the internet for his YouTube series on the techniques and beliefs of the alt-right. His most recent video, “The Card Says Moops,” is worth watching in full, but there was one particular line in it that struck me. Danskin points out that, even when their beliefs skew towards the bizarre and conspiratorial, people on the online right often identify as “rationalists.”
This will be unsurprising to those who often engage with the wider online right, whether it is with someone who identifies as alt-right, libertarian, conservative, as a fan of the “Intellectual Dark Web,” or even “moderate” or “centrist” (turns out a lot of people online are self-identifying as moderate while also believing in conspiracies about “white genocide”). Although their beliefs may not be identical, there are common, distinct patterns in the way they speak (or type) that one can’t help but notice.
Specifically, these guys — and they are usually guys — love using terms like “logic.” They will tell you, over and over, how they love to use logic, and how the people they follow online also use logic. They are also massive fans of declaring that they have “facts,” that their analysis is “unbiased,” that they only use “‘reason” and “logic” and not “emotions” to make decisions. The hosts of the popular leftist podcast Chapo Trap House even titled their book The Chapo Guide to Revolution: A Manifesto Against Logic, Facts and Reason as a wink and nod to this tendency.
These words are usually used interchangeably and without regard to their proper usage, squished together in a vague Play-Doh ball of smug superiority, to be thrown wherever possible at their “emotional” and “irrational” enemies: feminists, Marxists, liberals, SJWs, and definitely the feminist Marxist liberal SJWs. You could call these men’s way of viewing the world in simple “me smart, you dumb” dichotomies Manichean, or even Derridean, if you really want to upset them by referencing a philosopher that they’ve heard is very bad.
A good illustration of this phenomenon recently appeared in a piece for MEL magazine about an increasingly disturbing trend — women whose once-promising romantic relationships implode after their boyfriends become “redpilled.” For the benefit of the blissfully uninitiated: to be “redpilled” means to internalize a set of misogynistic far-right beliefs popular with certain corners of the internet; the product of a noxious blend of junk science, conspiracy theory, and a pathological fear of social progress.