Social Media Outrage/Cancel Culture

[swampfrog]

One of my favorite reads in recent days.

The Orwelexicon: Neologisms for Bias and Dysfunctions in Academia, or the DSM 666

Originally posted as a blog entry on Psychology Today--taken down with 24 hours.

Orwelexicon: Twisting the meaning of words in order to advance a political or policy agenda.

Emotional imperialism: The strange belief that your feelings should dictate someone else’s behavior.

Identity colonialism. The delusional presumption that just because you believe you have the best interests of some group at heart (including your own), you actually have the slightest idea what other members of that group think or want and that your views represent anyone’s but yours.

[swampfrog]

for the engineers, here's a great metaphor for Social Justice Theory (which underlies the outrage).

Copied the whole thread below.

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Critical theories (like Social Justice) and the paperclip maximizer problem, a thread:
In philosophy regarding AI, there's what's known as the "paperclip maximizer problem." It's that a low-level AI that maximizes the number of paperclips in the environment/universe is a danger.

The point of the paperclip-maximizer thought experiment is that even a really dumb/low-level AI that is programmed only to do one simple thing, maximize paperclips, could cause an apocalypse by diverting ever more resources to its one task without knowing to stop.

Critical theories like Critical Social Justice are actually the paperclip maximizer in social philosophy and activism form. Because they are imbued with critical methods at their heart, all they do is critique ("ruthlessly," per Marx), and they divert all resources to the task.

Critical methods like Critical Social Justice only really know how to do one thing: complain for "change" and "justice." The people involved are ultimately just tools of the "justice"-maximizing meme. They can say they want more justice, but critical methods mean it's never found.

So, Critical Social Justice can propose a solution to something, like an MLK essay for all students or more representation or whatever, and then it will problematize the solution because that's literally all it does: problematize systems. It doesn't know how to build or stop.

Eventually, it will divert more and more resources to achieving "justice" through problematizing everything, including it's own solutions (to wit: "people of color" as an idea is now being problematized as an invention of whiteness that allows whites privilege to ignore race).

In the paperclip-maximizer problem, philosophers speculate that a just-barely sufficiently smart AI will, in the effort to maximize paperclips, learn to resist all attempts to stop it or turn it off (as they're against its one goal). Amazing how well that maps onto Theory.

In my reading of Theory, which is getting pretty broad now, one of the most heavily Theorized general concepts is ways that attempting to criticize or stop Theory are all part of the problem Theory is trying to solve. It really is a just-smart-enough paperclip optimizer.

[jay santos]

I think that comparison is useful. The "all means necessary" approach is the problem. It hyperfocuses on a cause (which could be a good cause) and ignores any consequences or collateral damage that occurs as part of the solution.

[swampfrog]

I think that comparison is useful. The "all means necessary" approach is the problem. It hyperfocuses on a cause (which could be a good cause) and ignores any consequences or collateral damage that occurs as part of the solution.

Yes, but his last point is the one that scares me. Any messaging that the movement receives that the task is sufficiently complete or nearing completion is received as a threat to its singular mission. Therefore that messaging must be rejected. The standard rhetoric is to use a Kafka trap, the messaging of completeness is itself evidence of how much work there is to do.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Joe Rogan interviews Andrew Doyle - the british comedian behind the Titania McGrath twitter account. Highly recommended.

[swampfrog]

Joe Rogan interviews Andrew Doyle - the british comedian behind the Titania McGrath twitter account. Highly recommended.

I'm about half way through that, started on Friday and haven't had time to finish. Doyle's fantastic, didn't realize he co-wrote the Jonathan Pie character. He's been doing some touring with James Lindsay (the author of the twitter thread above). James and crew (Peter Boghossian, Helen Pluckrose) are the perpetrators behind the grievance studies hoax and are all great reads (multiple articles) on understanding where the roots of the Social Justice movement are. James and Helen have a book coming out this Spring.

https://www.amazon.com/Cynical-Theor.../dp/1634312023

One of these days I'll get around to ordering and reading Douglas Murray's The Madness of Crowds.

[swampfrog]

I'm about half way through that, started on Friday and haven't had time to finish. Doyle's fantastic, didn't realize he co-wrote the Jonathan Pie character. He's been doing some touring with James Lindsay (the author of the twitter thread above). James and crew (Peter Boghossian, Helen Pluckrose) are the perpetrators behind the grievance studies hoax and are all great reads (multiple articles) on understanding where the roots of the Social Justice movement are. James and Helen have a book coming out this Spring.

https://www.amazon.com/Cynical-Theor.../dp/1634312023

One of these days I'll get around to ordering and reading Douglas Murray's The Madness of Crowds.

Finished the podcast, they cover a lot of ground. One or Rogan's best IMO.

[swampfrog]

Jonathan Pie calling out cancel culture. Substitute Brexit for Trump and it exactly describes the same phenomena in the US. It's Jonathan Pie, so NSFW.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Jonathan Pie calling out cancel culture. Substitute Brexit for Trump and it exactly describes the same phenomena in the US. It's Jonathan Pie, so NSFW.

That was great.

[MartyFunkhouser]

"When we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop, and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to our environment. Now I’ve been a scoundrel. I’ve been selfish, I’ve been cruel at times and hard to work with. And so many of you have given me a second chance. That is when we are at our best, when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow, when we educate each other, when we guide each other toward redemption. That is the best of humanity."

- Joaquin Phoenix

[Jeff Lebowski]

"When we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop, and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to our environment. Now I’ve been a scoundrel. I’ve been selfish, I’ve been cruel at times and hard to work with. And so many of you have given me a second chance. That is when we are at our best, when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow, when we educate each other, when we guide each other toward redemption. That is the best of humanity."

- Joaquin Phoenix

That is a great quote. He should focus more on this and less on veganism.

[Bo Diddley]

"When we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop, and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to our environment. Now I’ve been a scoundrel. I’ve been selfish, I’ve been cruel at times and hard to work with. And so many of you have given me a second chance. That is when we are at our best, when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow, when we educate each other, when we guide each other toward redemption. That is the best of humanity."

- Joaquin Phoenix

I like it!

[MartyFunkhouser]

That is a great quote. He should focus more on this and less on veganism.

Agreed. We just keep on agreeing these days. I don't know what is happening.

[swampfrog]

"When we use love and compassion as our guiding principles, we can create, develop, and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and to our environment. Now I’ve been a scoundrel. I’ve been selfish, I’ve been cruel at times and hard to work with. And so many of you have given me a second chance. That is when we are at our best, when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow, when we educate each other, when we guide each other toward redemption. That is the best of humanity."

- Joaquin Phoenix

Yes, that's one of the main problems with the new Woke religion. It doesn't believe in forgiveness nor moral progress. Just constant repentance. You're never done. It isn't that you oppressed, it's that you are an oppressor. Male = oppressor, White = oppressor.

This is my favorite reduction:

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And how it manifests politically:

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[swampfrog]

And for anyone thinking people are just making this stuff up.

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