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In between blogging about fursuit collections, former motte moderator TracingWoodgrains has started to blow up on twitter after wading into an ongoing feud between Steve Sailer and propagandist Will Stancil.
Something in the replies must have really upset him (possibly interactions with a number of replyguys making not-so-veiled threats about what happens to people who associate with bigots or question "lying for the pursuit of good aims"), because he suddenly got really invested in proving that the recent FAA-DEI scandal is real.
After giving up on conservative journalists and deciding to do the legwork himself, he's now posting PACER documents from the recent FAA lawsuit, proving that the FAA HR department sent black applicants a list of resume buzzwords that would get their applications fast-tracked, via the National Black Coalition of Federal Aviation Employees.
A few hours ago this got the attention of Elon Musk, and Tracing is promising a follow-up, somehow trying to juggle 1L coursework with doing more investigative journalism than the entire conservative media put together. Obviously one of these things takes more time than the other, but I'm sure he'll have a coffee break free for the journalism bit.
One reason I think this could be important is that it's going to paint a huge target on Tracing's back. Propagandists have been claiming that the FAA DEI story was fake, the test designed to favor black applicants never existed, etc. They're going to get very angry at this evidence becoming widely known, and tracing is in a unique position to spread it outside the right wing news ghetto that prevents most liberals from ever encountering facts like these.
I'm not saying it's certain they're going to go after his law school, but he's in a uniquely vulnerable position right now, with very few allies in a position to help him (and probably a number who will suddenly decide he's on the enemy side of the fiend-enemy distinction.) So if anyone is in the position to help if he needs it, maybe start reaching out early.
Unfortunately all of this is getting difficult to follow without a twitter account (I even have one, but they're not letting me log in right now for no apparent reason). It's going to get even harder as Nitter instances die off. If anyone has a reliable account and would be willing to make screenshots, I'd love if you could take over covering the story as it develops.
Edit: his effortpost is now out on twitter and at his blog. I'll copy it into a reply below in case the nitter instance goes down again.
Just a note, this has obvious parallels to colleges letting DEI departments screen out the 80% of applicants before any objective hiring process begins:
It's a very effective method of manipulating procedural outcomes, isn't it?
When NY Times starts investigating this page and wants to interview me as the one sympathetic-to-their-audience 'progressive' venturing into the lions den, I promise to tell them y'all are just misguided victims of radicalizing social media algorithms. Probably the best I can do.
This is actually a debate space to make progressives better at debunking alt-right trolls. TheMotte plays a critical part in deprogramming radicals.
(this isn't even necessarily untrue)
It is untrue because there are no progressives here…
My best guess is Christianity/traditionalism are popular arguments here, mainly because they act as a foil for progressivism -- the benefits of radically different systems put the costs of progressivism into sharper relief.
I suspect the vast majority of our community would have been against white nationalism/Christianity/traditionalism before the 1960s, and would be against it today if it actually regressed to that point. I think they'd change their tune quite quickly once millions of Mexicans were living in tents across the border, or teachers were telling their kids they have to believe in God or they'll go to hell, or their daughters weren't allowed to go to college.
Whether they don't bring this up because those scenarios are so unlikely they're not worth mentioning, or because it ruins their catharsis while railing against leftists, is probably more a narrative question than a factual one, but I really doubt the readers here were pro-Christian when Christians were more influential and (e.g.) trying to stop Evolution from being taught in schools.
In that sense, it's probably more true to say that this forum hates ideologies that are currently messing with their lives (Progressivism is seen as the primary culprit today), rather than that it hates Progressivism or likes Christianity specifically.
There do seem to be a fair number of genuine Christians here. I've made a few posts here before in which I wondered why Christianity usually doesn't get the same kind of merciless skepticism here that progressivism does. It seems to me that it is basically because:
(This is basically what you already said above) Most people on The Motte live in parts of the world where Christianity has little power, so they do not feel much of an urge to criticize it.
Christians on The Motte rarely try to argue that Christianity is literally true. When they do, they usually do actually get a lot of pushback.
Christianity as a cultural influence aligns decently well with the mild social conservatism of what seems to be the average Motte poster.
Regarding 2, I see Christians perhaps not arguing, but casually stating that Christianity is literally true, quite often. In fact, the two groups I observe here are the church-as-pragmatic-social-grouping folks and the Jesus-is-king folks. None of the "casual Christians" who basically believe in all the same generic good things a generic atheist believes in, but call it God.
Christ the King Sunday will be 24th November this year, mark your calendars!
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