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PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   3637 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 2, 2025

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Mean girls, how do they work?

@RobHenderson tweeted this:

wokeness...is much more popular with women (specifically young women)...using tools that we are all by now familiar with: social ostracisation, name calling, rumour mongering, and other 'you can’t sit with us' mean girl behaviour

Which I think is a common and accurate statement.

But how exactly do mean girls arrive at consensus? Is it through one queen bee like Regina George? And, if so, how is that queen bee chosen?

To me, as a man, it is mystifying. Men tend to automatically arrange themselves in hierarchies, with "rule by the best" being the standard organizing principle. By default, best equals size and strength. But, depending on the activity, the hierarchy might be based on charisma, intelligence, wealth, musical ability, etc...

With women, this doesn't seem to happen. In fact, in female social hierarchies, the tall poppies are often ostracized leading to women constantly downplaying their abilities. Women who draw credit to themselves get shot down. So who, then rules, the roost? Is it a person who is uniquely able to play the false modesty game? Or is consensus arrived at organically, with a hive mind deciding who is "in" and who is "out".

Let me say that I'm glad to not have to play these games.

Women take social cues from the women around them. When they perceive a thing to be common in their little sub-society they start doing it. Status comes from a lot of things(including being in a good situation by whatever metric- economically, relationship-wise, etc), but correctly predicting what will become common is a big source(yes, this is a self fulfilling prophecy).

So yes there's a hivemind, and wokeness is good at gaming the hivemind. Think about the woke articles along the lines of so-and-so did X and people on twitter are saying Y. It's stupid but it's creating the illusion of commonality for these beliefs. Or the woke ostracism and cancellation campaigns- when you can signal boost early adopters hard enough you can get people to think they're late adopters and they'll jump on the bandwagon hard.

When they perceive a thing to be common in their little sub-society they start doing it.

You just described the entire nation of Japan.

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