<
https://www.salon.com/2022/02/23/the-problem-with-the-populists-free-thinkers--they-are-just-lazy/>
"There are few things so terrible that a white man can do that the media won't
still find a way to romanticize him. Even Ted Bundy and David Koresh got the
Hollywood treatment that portrays them as glamorous and sexy. In an environment
where even murderous sexual predators get romanticized, I suppose it's no
surprise that the standard-issue American dirtbag is getting a media glow-up,
reframed as daring rebels because they stand up for the millennia-long
tradition of letting men skate by with the bare minimum of effort. And yet,
it's still annoying.
"Populist flamethrowers rock media," blares a headline at Axios. The text
describes "Joe Rogan, Elon Musk, Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy," as well
as Substack writer Bari Weiss and comedian Dave Chappelle as people who "brand
themselves 'free thinkers' untethered to political dogma." The piece goes on to
quote Saagar Enjeti, a supposedly "anti-establishment" YouTuber: "They
explicitly say: 'Screw you.' ... I would say that is the heart of a lot of
their appeal." Weiss, in a particularly goofy bit of self-congratulation,
describes herself as committed "Wrongthink," even though her newsletter is
largely dedicated to conservative nostalgia for the days when one's dumbest
prejudices could be expressed without discomfort.
Even in our bullshit-heavy era, this Axios article is truly off the charts.
Repeated self-assertions of rebellion from these figures does not change the
basic fact that they are, in reality, the opposite of freethinkers, rebels, or
any of the other self-aggrandizing terms they may apply to themselves. On the
contrary, the appeal of Rogan, Weiss, Musk, and others to their fanboy base is
simple: They are selling validation to a lazy, incurious men who fear change.
They are soothing figures, stroking the heads of their D student audiences,
telling them that they are in the right to react to any intellectual challenge
or threat of social change with a childish tantrum. My god, Weiss wants to
start a fake university, so tender-minded conservatives can get an "education"
without ever having to grapple with an uncomfortable idea. Not exactly a
profile in courage, there."
Via
libramoon@pluspora.com.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
