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PaperclipPerfector  10d ago (text post)   35714 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 20, 2025

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I would like for it to spend less time on what it perceives as unfortunate truths that I was reading about a decade ago. So much has changed! Despite the changes many interests, nature of power, and fundamental aspects of our systems have not. There's no new mechanism to work around the Unfortunate Realities. Unless I have the wrong impression, much of what I do read from this sphere explains why you probably can't work around them. "90%" of the nominal followers, along with the leaders they look to, are committed to slop production instead of the advancement of interests.

Important issues have remained important for more than a decade. Highlighting things that remain relevant is good. Sure there are unproductive elements in how the dissident right approaches power but your critique is too total and leads nowhere and instead leads us to avoid the substance of specific issues and gets us sidetracked.

90%" of the nominal followers, along with the leaders they look to, are committed to slop production instead of the advancement of interests.

After being hostile to him, are you using AA for your attack on the dissident right?

Tangential, but if the dissenters must remain independent of the system they criticize to remain credible then must they not participate? Philosophy dudes can correct me, but this seems elementary. Of course not. This would be self-defeating for any serious attempt to advance interests if those interests include practical changes and engagement. One can retain sufficient autonomy inside or beside a system to be credible, so long as those judging him can agree. For conflict theorists, realists, ruffians, outlaws and purists in this milieu this looks like a continual sticking point.

Yes, I think people who want to change a system should participate in it. There is a tension between being integrated into the system and losing your purpose, or not participating.

AA does seem to be someone who doesn't want to be an activist and to to act as more of a scholar.

The whole shebang begins to look more like an art collective than anything else. For Pavini, I have no idea if this is fair. I will try to read more of his links recommended in this thread below. Since you mentioned him, then Kulak for sure is a candidate for the title of artist more than advocate or organizer. He can find success in performing in other venues, because of the ecosystem that Pavini identifies as problematic. Tens of thousands of hobbitses clamoring for more doom posts, more black pills, and more performance. Everyone wants to feed from their own slop trough. That appears to be a major motivation of this lamentation.

Not sure about what thread you were referring. I wasn't recommending anyone. I was just saying that leaving the motte and dealing with right wingers lead to them being more successful, getting more appreciation and far less hate and their ideas were explored more commonly in good faith and in an intellectual manner. Even when people disagreed with their ideas. And it was good personally for these right wingers to filter liberals whose rhetoric tends to be anti intellectual dismissals in general, or just trying to damage their reputation.

Yes Kulak has an element of over the top exaggeration that can be criticized. But he also brings valid points.

What you say about all it being black pills, slop, is just uncharitable inaccurate exaggerated overly dismissive assertion. You use Pavini here against the disident.

To quote Pavini much of rhetoric is bulshit, bulshit, bulshit, therefore we rule. Some of your rhetoric here isn't even wrong you are just making assertions after assertions that are overly dismissive without saying much that is concrete.

Yes, much of the rhetoric promoted by people isn't the same as concrete action but might be influencing politics. Just like the existence of plenty of liberals promoting their agenda is influencing the world.

This statement:

I agree I am more likely to disregard dissent I don't like.

I think this is happening.

If you contrast your criticisms with Pavini's, he criticizes specific sub groups in a manner that makes much more sense. That politicians listen to donors and powerful groups like zionists over voters and people engaged on twitter. He also posted something more optimistic after Trump doing some more promising things than expected and how there is some room for cautious optimism. Even his criticisms of slop is not just a line that is thrown there but makes sense in the context of what AA has been pushing. I don't necessarily agree with how far he pushes it though.

Nobody died and made Pavini infallible anyway. But he makes a point that makes sense and some claims that might be more questionable and your rhetoric about blackpillers, about refusal to participate in politics, slop, gas spinning its tiers in the mud, doesn't make sense. Rather you seem to be trying to overly dismiss the right here.

Regarding friendliness: I don't agree this is a fair characterization. It's not the lack of friendliness that triggers me. I am not easily shocked from most writing and definitely not by the dissident's manifesto. My critique was that it is redundant, tired, or even unproductive. My interests don't restrict myself to read only nice, friendly writers. I'm friendly, and I'm boring. Being non-friendly and critical can be authentic. It's not a prerequisite to honesty though. It's a style, choice, or result of feelings, not a measure of authenticity. Of Kulak's writing that I have appreciated (I have read and appreciated plenty of it, though less in past couple years) not much of it can be called friendly. Cocytarchy was fun, although a novel sort of topic. Some of his critical, unfriendly writing appears inauthentic to me. That's the rub.

I am just saying that a minimum of friendly intentions is a prerequisite for intellectual honesty. There can exist some fair minded people who can be relatively on firm ground even when dealing with people they are hostile too. And this can exist even among people who aren't aligned of course but much less likely with some ideological groups. Liberals tend to be lacking this minimum when dealing with right wingers..

Honestly, you can like or dislike what you like. I am not going to try to convince you that this dude or the other dude, has X article that you will enjoy reading since what you like is going to be based on your preferences.

Pavini still made a valid point about the fact that there hasn't been a good track record for those who have been trusting the plan with the pro zionist establishment right.

I may be wrong to pump out 6 paragraphs to cry about an essay from an author I'm not near familiar enough to pattern match. But I recognize what appear to be thousands of hobbitses learning to pattern-match aesthetics to truth or authenticity. Which creates problems that Pavini, after I've criticized for being Not Entertaining Enough, also recognizes?

What do you mean when you refer to hobbitses?

Trump might be better than other likely alternatives on the right, which could have tangible power and the online right might had some influence and so Pavini's claims might had been too strong. So the associations with aesthetics in this case might have some more validity than the usual politician that right wingers align with. Trump still would be more loyal to a base that have expectations on him, rather than merely blindly following.

Or under Trump they give some small victories but the warnings about Trump and tech oligarchs are true and they continue the path of the surveillance state through private public partnership of the state, intelligence services and private collaborating organizations like Palantir, and the big silicon valley corporations.

critique is too total and leads nowhere and instead leads us to avoid the substance of specific issues and gets us sidetracked.

My critique is not meant to be total. We would need to accept that the value of the DR is limited to irascibility. I don't think this is true. My question was, in the context of this post being shared, is why should I read this type of post?

You mention Zionists twice, but they're not mentioned in the linked piece at all. When I read it, I assumed interests of Jews to be a part of, but not the totality, his model for the "system [that] has successfully neutered and tamed what was once something that alarmed them." Maybe that's obvious missing context due to not being a reader. If he considers Zionist synonymous for the elite, the Cathedral, and all else that oppresses him that's good to know.

After being hostile to him, are you using AA for your attack on the dissident right?

I don't feel very hostile, but if I were then what's the problem using his impression of the ecosystem he is apart of? It is common to use or express hostility under the cover of truth telling-- truthful or not. This very piece could be described as hostile. I repeated throughout I am not that familiar and used him as a proxy. I don't think I'm asking dissidents to stop dissenting or to give up their beliefs. Although I don't agree with many of them. I am attacking a category of writing that prioritizes style over substance in an Angry Screed. Dissidents have a penchant for it though not a monopoly. Dissidents write plenty of interesting stuff.

Hostility is a good word to attach to my intolerance. Hostility has been overused and lost its affect. Hostility is normal. We should expect hostility to come naturally to the disaffected dissident. It can used in be a true reflection, a contrived narrative, or a rote, slop-producing process. Who is to say which is which? De gustibus.

Overly nice, pleasant dissident. There's an unfilled niche.

I am just saying that a minimum of friendly intentions is a prerequisite for intellectual honesty. There can exist some fair minded people who can be relatively on firm ground even when dealing with people they are hostile too. And this can exist even among people who aren't aligned of course but much less likely with some ideological groups. Liberals tend to be lacking this minimum when dealing with right wingers... getting more appreciation and far less hate and their ideas were explored more commonly in good faith and in an intellectual manner.

We may differ on what 'friendly intentions' means and to what degree people engage honestly. In support of your case, I think something like the recent NYT interview with Yarvin is an example. Lomez over Nathan Robinson, and so on. I don't think the DR, in its popular form represented by frogmen and anime gurus, is without sin when it comes to intellectual honesty.

I have severe suspicion of the suggestion that one can more honestly engage with ideas by bowing out of spaces with resistance. More easily and more lucrative, yes. Better to find comfort of like-minded individuals and build on your beliefs without those silly distractions? This sounds preposterous to me with a reference to The Motte. Sharing a space with like-minded people can be easier for development of consensus, making friends, and leisure. It can easily be worse for honestly engaging with ideas, especially those you don't share. I highly recommend everyone adopts some form of this suspicion lest they be misled.

Practically speaking if one wants to get paid to write they need to limit how much and where they write for free. I hope everyone on the right does not need to leave The Motte to engage honestly with their ideas or build upon them.

What do you mean when you refer to hobbitses?

My understanding of this analogy: elves are elites of the regime, and hobbits are used as a general stand-in for people, proles, non-sentient useful idiots, populist agents of change, or useless hedonists. Whatever else you need people to be in a sentence. I remembered Dark elves as some counter-elite. The analogy can describe a populist surge, or it can describe middling, politically engaged plebs that need to get out of the way so the Real Men can do work.

Or under Trump they give some small victories but the warnings about Trump and tech oligarchs are true and they continue the path of the surveillance state through private public partnership of the state, intelligence services and private collaborating organizations like Palantir, and the big silicon valley corporations.

I like it. De gustibus.

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