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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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It's worth noting this goes both ways- the chapo trap house listener complaining about landlords and capitalists and the fourchan poster complaining about jews are, perhaps not literally the same person, but they differ mostly in their bogeyman of choice. Neither wants to consider that getting off his ass and doing things will solve his problems, or at least make them manageable.

Watch the twitter DR freak out about the suggestion that managing a panda express is a good job- it appears to be actually true! But exercising agency isn't what they want. They complain about DEI and affirmative action but they don't bother to consider that they can probably get that state flagship spot after two years of community college- the DEI admits will wash out and you can transfer in to take their place. They complain about high housing prices in growing metros, and it's not even that housing prices in growing metros aren't high, it's that these guys don't want to hear 'derelicts are still affordable, you can fix it up as money comes in'(and in the sun belt this is largely true). He complains about modern women but doesn't ask girls out. These people complain jobs are hard to come by because HR filters out candidates but don't want to hear 'call the hiring manager's extension and inquire'.

This stuff is just the inverse of the priestly class.

Neither wants to consider that getting off his ass and doing things will solve his problems, or at least make them manageable.

Seems like doing both that and addressing whatever seems to be a larger problem is possible, and in fact, laudible? Yes many people ignore their own problems too much while ineffectually preening about global problems, but I guess I'd also hate the world where no one had the impulse for public service. OTOH, now that I think about it, that might look like a libertarian paradise if there were still kickstarter-like coordination mechanisms.

I dont think that means it "goes both ways" as much as it's just two different people who are both going the same way.

The Philadelphia Eagles and the Kansas City Chiefs may each view the other as a bitter rival, but from a 10,000 foot view, both are NFL teams, both are playing in the superbowl, and both have (or had) a star player with the surname Kelce whos mother's name is Donna, so how different can they really be?

I posit that both lavors of freak-out (Chapo and 4chan) come from the same psychological space/impulse, because I think you are correct that, exercising agency is not what they want. Exercising agency is uncomfortable, it means accepting risks, and owning consequences. By the nature of the roles they play, the working caste and the merchant/buisiness caste are both forced to be intimately aware of risk and consequence. The priestly caste on the other hand...

I do not think that what you are describing is "the inverse of the priestly caste" so much as what happens to members (or prospective members) of the priestly caste who "wash-out" or otherwise can't keep up with the pack. At the risk of psychologizing my opponents i think that a lot of the ire directed towards the Elon Musks and Panda Express Managers of the world boils down class resentment. Both the Chapo-listener and the 4channer like to imagine themselves as being in a class above, and so when they see "a normie" or "a pleb" who is manifestly more successful and/or influential than they are, it pisses them off.

I think this aptly explains both "Trump Derangement Syndrome" and the much of the wailing and gnashing of teeth surrounding mis/disinformation. The priestly caste just can't handle the idea that more people are getting thier news from Joe Rogan than they are CNN or the New York Times.

To be clear, 4chan/brocialism was an analogy intended to illustrate a point clearly- I think the DR twitterati are the inverse of what you're calling the priestly class, not terminally online porn addicted NEETs.