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Notes -
Academia vs. racist memes
A new paper in Evolutionary Human Sciences has been making rounds.
Memeing Scientific Racism: The Digital Reframing of Racialist Ideologies – “examines how racialised memes circulating on X revive scientific racism”.
The most intriguing feature of the paper is the way its subject of study is presented. Though the aim is to dissect bigoted memes online with Science, the author deemed it inappropriate to grant her readers direct access to the offending material. The four case-study memes are “presented exclusively through schematic reconstructions created using standard image-editing tools, including limited AI-assisted transformations”, bringing to mind some SCP Foundation containment protocol for high-caliber memetic hazards.
I’m certain that the author believes she is doing genuine research investigating a pressing problem, so that’s the angle I'll consider it from. As far as its scientific value goes, my feelings are mixed. Though the author clearly did a lot of legwork collecting nearly 70 memes, and namedrops things from the Dark Enlightenment and human biodiversity to effective altruism, and genuinely attempts to figure out what makes memes compelling and facilitates their spread, the analysis of the memes seems incomplete.
One of the case studies, a meme that was circulating since 2018, originally features a crude outline of a man drawn in soyjack tradition saying:
The rhetorical thrust, as I see it, is to contrast some of the more shallow sounding supposed benefits of mass migration with its most lurid observed effects.
(In February this year a big account, owned by an actual left winger with real-life clout and bearing a striking resemblance to the meme character made this post:
Which is an interesting case of prophetic hyperstition)
" Ethically modified" version of the meme in the paper turns the man into a simpler, more friendly looking figure changing the text to:
And here's what the author has to say about it:
Though this goes in the right direction, nothing reflects comprehension of the joke, of what the meme tries to convey.
Refraining from including the original memes is a serious self-imposed limitation. She could talk about how the slovenly scribbled caricature serves to dehumanize open border supporters, and a grotesque crime is juxtaposed to a relatively marginal example of benefits of mass migration (which are, of course, countless) as a tool of propaganda.
Though the image of the author frowning and making notes as she browses racist jokes on Twitter brings me joy, this paper appears methodologically limited, and more research into the threat of racist memes online is likely required.
The progressive would never admit to being a scientific racists. But this is scientific racism: “ “The migration policies of Reform and Restore Britain would destroy football throughout the UK”
I don’t think it’s a big leap to go from “some population groups run faster” to “some population groups do management/science better”.
Twitter went off yesterday about how all the African countries suck at football despite having far more genetic stock of football talent. France is the lead country in producing World Cup players (around 100 players). African teams have a lot of African players born in Europe. But they can’t develop players in their own country. A lot like the resource curse which only applies to certain countries.
It's also not a big leap from "men are significantly stronger than women" to "and this is almost certainly paired with related psychological differences" and yet it's resisted valiantly. Even while feminists also say - correctly - that men are the dominant major suppliers of violence.
You don't have to have a coherent position. You just have to have a position that isn't on the side of racists. You can't deny that men are stronger (well, mostly not; the trans stuff has been sidling up to that position and suffering predictable consequences) or some people are better at sprinting. You have to deny that some races are smarter. Just always pick the pro-migration position.
Ah, but that's easy enough to blame on society and culture.
I've seen it claimed -- in complete seriousness -- that men are only stronger/better at sports due to training and nutrition from an early age.
I dated a girl who believed this.
Did she really believe it truly or did she claim it?
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Did she have an eating disorder and did she ever do sports?
The only way I think in the US a woman might think that boys systematically get better nutrition than girls is if they have an eating disorder which they justify to themselves as "everyone does it."
People believe all sorts of dumb things, and Americans in general believe a lot of dumb things about nutrition in particular. ‘Boys get better nutrition than girls’ is mostly false, but when the two sexes start to choose their eating patterns there is a difference, and a few female specific nutrient deficiencies(mostly iron) do hang on in the modern US(although no one is stopping women from eating steak).
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She was Indian. To the best of my knowledge she never had an eating disorder, nor was particularly sporty.
Oh that makes more sense. If she was raised in certain parts of India I could see that being a real thing.
Yeah most of the women I know with such takes were the ones socialized to have essentially zero exposure to sports and doubly zero to co-ed sports.
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I think you're underestimating the extent to which US education (all education?) involves telling students, "Who are you going to believe, the trusted experts or your lying eyes?"
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This belief, objectively far more deluded and delusionary than literal flat earthism, is not so uncommon, and not only among not very bright and curious people who learn about the world they live in only by random watching of TV and tiktok.
See this giga self own of aspiring rationalist from last year.
"Children Believe Every Lie" and "How To Believe False Things" should be required reading for any rationalist.
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