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posted by janrinok on Sunday May 13 2018, @03:39AM   Printer-friendly
from the I-don't-agree-with-it,-but-I-will-defend-your-right-to-say-it dept.

[janrinok] For those of you who do not want to read about the 'extremes' of US politics (alt-right or left-wing) I suggest that you skip this story and wait for the next one. If you feel that we shouldn't publish any story that does not accord with your own, probably less extreme, views then perhaps you should remind yourself that we try to give everyone in our community the benefit of free speech and we do not intentionally censor or promote any particular view or political leaning. Of course, you are welcome to contribute your own comments in the subsequent discussion that will follow.

This MSNBC Guest Just Showed Why The Intellectual Dark Web Exists

On Tuesday, The New York Times’ Bari Weiss appeared on MSNBC’s Morning Joe to discuss her new in-depth piece on the so-called Intellectual Dark Web – an agglomeration of thinkers from all sides of the political aisle who have been cast out by political correctness and now converse with one another regularly and publicly (full disclosure: I’m a charter member, along with friends including Sam Harris, Eric Weinstein, Joe Rogan, Jordan Peterson, and others). The entire premise of the IDW is that many on the Left refuse to acknowledge good-natured disagreement; instead, all disagreement must be due to nefarious evil on the part of those who disagree.

Proving the point on MSNBC was guest Eddie Glaude Jr., chair at the Center for African-American Studies at Princeton. When Weiss cited the discussions between me and Sam as evidence for the diversity of the movement, Glaude responded, “What allows you to describe these folks as intellectuals of sort? Let me say it differently. They’re connected intellectually by what common commitments? So you might have different ideological spaces, but when you talk about Sam Harris and Ben Shapiro in one sentence, I can see the connection between those two.” Weiss responded, logically enough, “Which is?” And Glaude explained:

Having something to do with how they think about race, having something to do with how they think about diversity in the country and the ways in which diversity is talked about, right? The way in which they think about political correctness. Weiss responded, “Yeah, they’re anti-identity politics, for sure.”

To which Glaude launched into a full defense of identity politics: “Identity politics is a phrase that kind of is a red herring. Identity politics is just simply questions of justice, right?”

At this point, Joe Scarborough jumped in and hit the nail directly on the head:

Eddie, you have just made Bari Weiss's point, that you disagree with the way Bari Weiss views the world, so you're going to help her view the world more the way you view the world. The entire purpose of the exercise is to have honest conversations with people, and to not question their morality, or their wisdom just because they don't view the world exactly the same way that you do.

The "Intellectual Dark Web," Explained: What Jordan Peterson has in Common with the Alt-Right

Bari Weiss, an opinion writer and editor at the New York Times, created a stir this week with a long article on a group that calls itself the "Intellectual Dark Web." The coinage referred to a loose collective of intellectuals and media personalities who believe they are "locked out" of mainstream media, in Weiss's words, and who are building their own ways to communicate with readers.

The thinkers profiled included the neuroscientist and prominent atheist writer Sam Harris, the podcaster Dave Rubin, and University of Toronto psychologist and Chaos Dragon maven Jordan Peterson.

Some assertions in the piece deserved the ridicule. But Weiss accurately captured a genuine perception among the people she is writing about (and, perhaps, for). They do feel isolated and marginalized, and with some justification. However, the reasons are quite different from those suggested by Weiss. She asserts that they have been marginalized because of their willingness to take on all topics and their determination not to "[parrot] what's politically convenient."

The truth is rather that dark web intellectuals, like Donald Trump supporters and the online alt-right, have experienced a sharp decline in their relative status over time. This is leading them to frustration and resentment.

[janrinok] And another contribution from Ari reviews Amanda Marcotte's new book:

Birth of a "Troll Nation": Amanda Marcotte on How and Why Conservatives Embraced the Dark Side

Interview at Salon with author Amanda Marcotte:

I had no role in editing Amanda Marcotte's new book, which bears the amusing and highly appropriate title, "Troll Nation: How the Right Became Trump-Worshipping Monsters Set on Rat-F*cking Liberals, America, and Truth Itself." None of it previously appeared in Salon, to be clear;

But "Troll Nation" is not about the election of Donald Trump. Amanda and I have certain areas of cheerfully-expressed political disagreement, but I think we share the view that Trump was the culmination of a long process, or is the most visible symptom of a widespread infection. Amanda's analysis is, as always, calm, sharp-witted and clearly focused on available evidence. American conservatives, she says, used to make rational arguments and used to present a positive social vision. Did those arguments make sense, in the end? Did that "Morning in America" vision of the Reagan years conceal a vibrant undercurrent of bigotry?

[...] How we got from the supercilious, upper-crust conservatism of William F. Buckley Jr., the dictionary definition of an elitist -- the dude could read and write Latin, for God's sake -- to the delusional ignorance of Alex Jones and #Pizzagate, the small-minded hatred of Charlottesville and the unquenchable thirst for "liberal tears" is one of the darkest mysteries of our time. It's also the story of "Troll Nation."


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  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 13 2018, @02:16PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 13 2018, @02:16PM (#679188)

    What is strange to me is the altering of these children's stories so to prove some point of government wants to kill kids. Adding in pure lies or leaving out subtle truths. Both with an end goal. The state wants to harm us.

    All the while guns in America are killing children with far less complicated health issues. Most of them healthy enough to be killed at school.

    But just like the left can't give an inch in abortion the right can't give an inch on guns. And so we get these weird twists in truth.

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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by hemocyanin on Sunday May 13 2018, @05:07PM (1 child)

    by hemocyanin (186) on Sunday May 13 2018, @05:07PM (#679227) Journal

    I'm a lefty and Pro2A. Leaving aside the actual statistical rarity of being killed by a rifle in America, I always find it shocking that virtually every gun control measure has exceptions for police and national guard (rooted in a collective 2A worldview no doubt) when these groups have ever been the tools of oligarchy. Only 100 years ago, Rockefeller Jr was paying the Colorado NG troops' salaries when they burned down a miners' encampment (the miners had been evicted from the Company Town) and in the process incinerated 11 kids and 2 women. They fired machine guns at the encampment. They shot the leader of the miners in the back during a negotiating session after beating him over the head with a rifle so severely the rifle stock broke.

    Please explain how it is a progressive value to ebsyre that the tools of oligarchy are the only group who should have access to self-defense when most often, those Tools use those weapons offensively.

    On the Ludlow Massacre: https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-ludlow-massacre-still-matters [newyorker.com]