domain:kvetch.substack.com
CrispyFriedBarnacles
27m ago
There's a specific critique I've seen about smart people on the left, which is something like there's this overabundance of book smart people who have extreme problems modeling second order social effects.
That critique definitely rings true for me with what I've watched up close and personal the last 15 years (being off and on quite close to a lot of professors, grad students, and professional class people especially).
To make an analogy, I think most of us would recognize that when parents get together to talk about their children, you would avoid discussion about whose children are objectively smart, and whose children are objectively homely, for example. You wouldn't do this because it would be impossible to make this case; you would do this because you would have enough theory of mind to recognize that no good can come of such a discussion. Other people are invested in their kids because their kids are theirs, and it is entirely reasonable for parents to be partisans of their kids. I don't think this means embracing a kind of relativism, exactly. You can recognize that some kids are just brighter than other kids, for example. But it's about a recognition of something like a theory of mind. There's a large social system you're a part of, that has iterated cause and effect, and that has certain needs to remain stable and functional.
But a lot of smart professors, grad students, and professional class people I know seem to be totally incapable of a similar line of thought when it comes to politics and larger groups in society. There's this stance I run into a lot which has the general tone of "Those people are dogs who have shit on the floor, and our job is to loudly and performatively rub their nose in it". It's people acting like they're Jesus whipping the money changers out of the temple. And even if you skip over the amount of completely unjustified arrogance and ignorance is often lurking behind the scenes (I know a lot of people who are very smart about a narrow band of specialist knowledge and then extrapolate from there to everything else in the world that someone might know), it's just intensely counterproductive, particularly when waved around in public... but honestly, even in more limited contexts, it's really counterproductive there too.
I think this is especially so when it comes to these theories about oppressor-oppressed dynamics. The public assertion "black people can't be racist" fundamentally doesn't work in game theory terms, if you want "racist" to continue being a powerful social sin and taboo. And that's because of second order dynamics. But the stance I've run into by the kinds of people I'm critiquing is that it is "true", as a universal intellectual matter, that black people can't be racist... just like gravity exists and the earth is round. So other people need to be made to accept that "fact". They need to be called out.
And I feel like that kind of deformed reasoning lurks behind observations like "the oppressed have a right to violent resist their oppressors" and "we should provocatively publicly celebrate violence against our enemies who are still part of the same polity". It's treated as something like a dogma and a provocative "truth". But as far as I am concerned, it betrays a total, pathological collapse of theory of mind.
shamgar
28m ago
This is not how you win political victories, which makes me think that the goal isn't actually political victory, but some kind of LARP/ in-group signaling game.
It might be something darker than that. Consider this book review of "Demons" by Dostoevsky. The book review aspect isn't important for the present discussion, but the discussion of political radicalism, which is the main theme of the book being reviewed, is. (Dostoevsky books are all character development and philosophy anyway and no plot, so nobody has to be scared of spoilers either). The situation in America is obviously not as dark as the Dostoevsky novel nor the period leading up to the Russian revolution discussed in the book review. As somebody who is not from the USA it is hard to get a clear view of the situation on the ground. I'm probably getting an overly pessimistic view from experiencing the situation pretty much exclusively through the internet, but the hatred and bitterness in American political discourse of recent years, which only seems to be getting worse with every passing year, genuinely has me worried sometimes.
thejdizzler
28m ago
Re your last point: oh I know. I've always been an anti-idpol leftist, and the past 12 years have been frustrating to say the least.
Also see my second point. Leftists did this to themselves.
gattsuru
29m ago
There's also a bit of a magic trick where the professional will move the scope of the discussion to a field they've prepared heavily as part of their opening gambit. It's not limited to these sort of public oral debates, but once you catch the trick it's hard to miss how common it is, even if the actual slight-of-hand is pretty hard to imitate.
Primaprimaprima
Aliquid stat pro aliquo
32m ago
A couple things came to mind while I was reading this.
First: on a purely limbic/affective level, I am quite unphased by the fact that leftists who are getting fired over their Kirk posts are now getting to experience a small taste of what they have visited upon rightists for the last decade. I'd be lying if I said I didn't derive some satisfaction from it. The fact that all your PI could muster up was "this is a dangerous environment to be posting this kind of thing" shows that he didn't particularly disapprove of the post in question, nor did he nor the lab member in question feel any particular remorse over the post, and the totality of these facts does absolutely nothing to endear me to their cause.
Nonetheless. I am in fact capable of distinguishing my own personal emotional biases from my higher order propositional beliefs. I know that my own emotional instincts are in fact not a reliable guide to what is virtuous and just. I actually believe in freedom of expression as a principle, unlike my enemies. And so, if it were in my power to do so, I would ensure that no one is fired for statements that mock Charlie Kirk or celebrate his death, and I would immediately reinstate the positions of anyone who has been fired for making such statements. You should be free to say whatever you want about Charlie Kirk; and freedom of speech actually does mean freedom from consequences.
Someone will inevitably reply to this comment and say, "well it's nice that you think that, but what about all the other rightists who don't think that?" And you're right. I have nothing to say about what other people think or do. I can only speak for myself. Take it or leave it, do with it what you will.
It feels like we rapidly are descending into an authoritarian anti-free speech environment
I would implore you to reflect on the fact that this is how rightists have felt for the last 10 years.
thejdizzler
32m ago
You gotta read the next sentence. Even if they advocating for this, it's stupid. The right has more guns. In tit for tat, we lose.
Destiny, of course is now legendary for getting cucked HARD by his wife (they did have an "open relationship", but holy shit), having a teen son who hates him, and possibly having chatted sexually with a minor, and STILL possessing explicit sexual material of said minor.
Intellectual consistency to the point of self-destruction, it seems. I had him, among others, in mind when I spoke of public figures being "outed as sex pests, pervs, frauds, and generally slimy people..."
Anyway, he isn't necessarily intellectually inconsistent or cowardly, but not someone you'd really want to honor as a paragon of your side's virtues.
daguerrean
33m ago
Do you want more vigilante killings?
They are openly saying yes, they love vigilante assassinations. Your colleagues are stating explicitly that they support murders and you are perhaps too emotionally invested in the uprightness of your tribe that you’re unwilling to take them seriously.
WandererintheWilderness
35m ago
the nature of logical identity is that if there is a God, they're all the same god
While this works in practice I don't think it's a question of logical identity. Every major religious movement that believes in a single God also tends to ascribe some overlapping characteristics and roles to that figure, but that's more of an observation about the sorts of gods people want to believe in, or indeed, if you're spiritually-minded, about what the real elephant is probably like.
If there were a religion who believed in a single deity that's radically unlike the Abrahamic God in all particulars - didn't create the world or humanity, isn't benevolent, isn't the source of morality, is not absolutely in charge of the cosmos, isn't anything close to omnipotent - I don't think it would make sense to talk about them as worshiping "the same God" as Christians and Muslims and even Zoroastrians. If there are non-ironic Satanists who believe that Satan exists but God doesn't, does their horned fiery guy count as an analogue to the Christian Devil, or the Christian God? I think the answer to that is fairly obvious.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
35m ago
Maybe as a case of big fish small pond? I guearantee you most people never heard of it, and to the extent they did the chart I linked below speaks for itself.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
38m ago
The lefties who are cheering for his death would not have seen him as a moderate,
This is the issue. Who is a moderate in the eyes of these people? If Kirk doesn't qualify, it means to most conservtive you can be, is a liberal.
TheAntipopulist
Formerly Ben___Garrison
38m ago
Bluesky is not representative of liberals as a whole, and especially not top Dem leaders (with perhaps the exception of Ilhan Omar).
Quantumfreakonomics
38m ago
I was just reading a bunch of threads of people screenshotting Kirk shooting social media posts and sending them to the subject's employers. Legitimately fascinating to hear of the back-end effects so soon.
Objectively, I think the left's reaction to the Charlie Kirk shooting is less extreme than the left's reaction to the Trump assasination attempt or the Brian Thompson shooting, but the backlash to the reaction to the shooting seems a lot more intense this time. I wondered why, then reading your post it hit me; "Trump is president now." Right-wing cancel culture is now backed up by the implicit threat of government sanction. Employers don't inherently care about their employees' personal lives. For better or for worse, they are being made to care.
TheAntipopulist
Formerly Ben___Garrison
40m ago
I don't see how Milo was such a piece of shit relative to Kirk, unless we're judging specifically by how much we personally agree with their political opinions. Milo was also successful, for a time, until he crashed out by ending up on the wrong side of the right-wing pedo craze if my memory serves correctly.
Catsnakes_
41m ago
What kind of criticism is relevant to him getting shot that shouldn't be understood by the right as saying "and so he deserved it"? With regards to Floyd, rightists were clearly saying he had brought it on himself and that was the entire point.
Throwaway05
41m ago
I'd assert that categorically right leaning oppression is superior to left leaning oppression - the right in the last one hundred years when malformed wants you to obey or die, with the notable exception of some regimes going after minority targets. The left when malformed wants you to believe or die, with frequent spastic targeting of nearly everyone. Cultural immune system aside, Russia, China, and Cambodia were all worse than WWII Germany.
This remains true for the religious right and woke power politics, the latter is far worse and more antithetical to healthy society. While it is true that some of this is probably true because of new social technologies generated by things like social media, it was safer in the religious days with the possible exception of a few minorities.
And I think that last bit is the point - in a democracy you can oppress a minority (and ya know, usually shouldn't?) but if that minority grows powerful, influential, and numerous...it stops. And that's what happened the religious right. Society changed, they became smaller and more moderate and more open and intensely effective advocacy changed things.
In contrast these days you have a much, much, MUCH larger group of society that is being oppressed...or at least feels that way.
It isn't necessarily an accurate thing, but it is INTENSELY more destabilizing.
One example is what has happened to young white men - totally vilified, not given any support, and also the group most likely to commit violence.
daguerrean
42m ago
The argument I’m seeing from the left that he was actually a Groyper and all the antifascist slogans were ironic has an amusing resemblance to Holocaust denial. By this I mean the old “It didn’t happen but if it did happen it would’ve been a good thing.” As in, “He wasn’t killed by a leftist but we leftists think killing him is a good thing.” Which is what makes it seem so absurd, if your ideology leads you to support his assassination, is it really so surprising someone sharing your ideology did it?
IGI-111
God was a dream of good government.
42m ago
It's one of the most popular political songs of all time. I like Casa de Papel, but come on.
WandererintheWilderness
42m ago
The lefties who found their way into this space, (Anyone remember Darwin?) they haven't fared well when pressed on their ideas without the ability to falsify a popular consensus.
I'd like to think I've fared pretty well, for the admittedly limited time I've been here!
faceh
43m ago
Nobody ever 'admits they were wrong' in a standard internet-style debate.
The point is, as ever, to provide something persuasive to the onlookers.
And I think his main strength was simply demonstrating to College students, who otherwise feel like they're surrounded by peers who believe one thing and are pressured to play along, that there are in fact people who think like they do and thus relieve that pressure and contradict the appearance of consensus.
It helps that most college students are in fact pretty stupid about why they hold their beliefs and thus its pretty easy to pull 'gotchas' on them.
And ironically he had a Groyper problem for a while, where guys who were further right than him would try to point out how his positions were inconsistent. And they were much better at tripping him up than the average college student.
That... is not what Sacha Baron Cohen is achieving with his work.
Spookykou
43m ago
Are you honestly not familiar with how clipping is used to take what people say out of context to villainize them?
NullHypothesis
44m ago
At the same time, the time and place event is posted online, so students have time to do research and prepare their points of view. I don't think asking students at colleges and universities to come prepared for a discussion is too much.
If they aren't even capable of that, they shouldn't even be attending said universities, or at the very least willingly stepping up to the mic. The problem is, a lot of students come up to the mic convinced in their beliefs with little to no reasoning, so they get stumped at the slightest bit of questioning. A simple acknowledgement of "hmm, I don't know, I guess I'll look into it more" would paint them in a less embarrassing light. But because they're not approaching with the intent of conversation so much as wanting to oppose Kirk, they inevitably come off as foolish.
Also, the format is more along the lines of a conversation and less of an actual structured formal debate. Kirk has done actual formal structured debate. So yea, he's not engaging in a debate, he's engaging in conversation.
TheAntipopulist
Formerly Ben___Garrison
44m ago
Because it's relevant? I'm sure some leftists claimed that Floyd's drug habits were beyond the scope of the discussion, but they would have been wrong given whether he had fentanyl in his system could have been very, very important in how he died.
Do any of the students look at this guy's website? This reminds me of "A Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy," where the Vogons place theif notice to demolish Eartj on Alpha Centauri and blame humans for not looking at it. It seems like these are just regular collegs kids walking by with no advance notice or experience in this kind of "public argumentative conversation"
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