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Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 4, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Who is Andrew Tate and whose icon is he? How these people reflect on him using multiple women, even if his subscribers become all hypermasculine, multiple women would be still possible only for men near top.

Just to insert an emetic to the stream of praise Tate seems to be getting from the throwaway account, I would suggest Tate seems to be the 'icon' of disaffected pubescent males, which isn't a new phenomenon. I remember reading The Game years ago and some of Tate's schtick reminds me of Neil Strauss, if Strauss were a sadistic psychopath.

Narcissistic, Machiavellian, sadistic, psychopathic, Tate seems to exhibit all of these traits and revel in the reaction to them, which is again not surprising in the least.

Regarding "multiple women," sure, it's not every day you see a guy manipulating simultaneously numerous women to debase themselves for his own financial gain. I wonder if the folks at Guinness Book keep records of that sort of thing. Reminds me of Charles Manson, though without the guitar or swastika in the forehead. Or luxurious head of hair.

And like Manson in his day, Tate is a tedious reminder of the stupid times we live in. Also like Manson, at times what he says has a ring of truth, but then gets distorted into extremist, paranoiac ranting. Then when backed into a corner that might prove disadvantageous, Tate says things like "It's just me playing a character." Textbook.

He's not unlike Jordan Peterson. Both likely have Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Low empathy. Emotionally dysregulated at times. Delusions of grandeur. Paranoid. Both think "they" are out to get them, to silence them. Peterson thinks he's a prophet of sorts and has a politically conservative, Christian-ish agenda. Tate's more of a hedonistic grifter who plays the "top g" character. Both are very theatrical. Very performative. Clownish at times. Not unlike Trump.

And yet, at times, they've delivered far more truthful statements than the vast majority of adults in my life personally.

Would I want to hang out with Tate or have my sister date him? Hell no. But I view him like gore websites. Not particularly healthy to view, but offers a closer depiction of reality than MSNBC, CNN, or Fox News. And even gore videos can have agendas (America bad! Ukraine bad! Russia bad! China bad!). But the bias is out in the open. And you can take what's truthful (human nature) and discard the agendas (political or religious or financial or whatever).

Tate strikes me as mostly destructive-- less of a useful, enlightening iconoclast and more an opportunistic showman whose sole interest is in using people and teaching those same people how to use others. I can't speak to whether Peterson has any, most, or all of the flaws you mention, but at least so far I haven't seen him posing in sunglasses with his shirt off.

I would also argue that gore websites (if I understand correctly what those are, and I am not entirely sure that I do, having successfully avoided that genre) don't pull back the veil of Isis (only the first letter capitalized) any more than does hard-core porn. Does grim reality exist? Sure. People die in violent accidents, and some take it up all orifices at once That doesn't mean this is some sort of truth more meaningful than a story off the broadcast news. (Full disclosure: I don't watch any of the MSM sources you listed, not out of any principled stance but because they're not that accessible here without taking time and trouble. Neither of which I take to seek them out.