Way back in the early days of the internet, those already on-line could not help but notice that the media was hilariously ignorant, but supremely confident, of this revolutionary new thing called the internet. On television, the people who claimed it was their job to keep the rest of us informed clearly knew nothing about this new “internet thing” or the people signing up for accounts. The print side of the media barely knew the internet existed and had no interest in it at all.
In those early days it was a glimpse into the weird combination of ignorance, insulation and confidence that defined the mass media. Television and radio are pure carnival acts, selecting for people who fit a role. The print side, the people engaged in “serious journalism”, are stenographers and cheerleaders, hoping to one day be noticed by the carnival operators so they can get on television. The whole thing is part of a large scale agitation campaign on behalf of the ruling class.
This is what makes the collapse of Twitter so amusing. The agitation machine that is the modern mass media was invited onto Twitter in the early days as a way to promote the product over the alternatives. Twitter was custom built for the slow-witted, but supremely confident people who make up mass media. All they needed to do is download an app, open it up and begin typing. Limiting it to short messages reduced the odds of them exposing their stupidity.
It did not take long before the mouth breathers of the Left followed the media onto the platform and it became an echo chamber. Of course, it did not take long before the enemies of this unholy alliance of the confidently stupid joined Twitter to mock and ridicule these people. For a short while it was amusing to see someone, probably posting from the john, wrecking the day of sanctimonious simpletons like David French or Max Boot, with mockery and irreverence.
Of course, that is why the whole thing was doomed. The agitation machine we call the media can only exist when the people inside of it are sure they are the intellectual vanguard, the cutting edge of history. That only works when they are not exposed to reality, which is what happened when they went on-line. It has been forgotten but the great censorship campaign began in the comment sections first and then spread to the rest of the internet. Twitter was late to the intolerance party.
Now the party is over. Contrary to the pained howling by conspiracy theorists like ADL leader Jonathan Greenblatt, Elon Musk did not buy Twitter as part of some five cushion bank shot plan to bring back you know who. Musk bought the company because he thinks you can have a successful platform that allows open debate with limited moderation. Elon Musk is a civic nationalist who still believes all the old liberal ideals about the marketplace of ideas.
Of course, we live in a post liberal age. The people with real power no longer hold those old liberal ideals. They see themselves as guardians of humanity who must carefully manage the choices of the people. They are the elite of the managerial system and as the elite, their job is not only to set the direction for humanity, but to make sure the rules are properly enforced. All of their chanting about democracy aside, theirs is a totalitarian dictatorship of the managerial elite.
This is why Musk’s project is doomed. For starters, the agitation machine known as the media cannot exist on a platform which allows criticism of the media. That risks holding a mirror up to them. The dimwitted scolds that follow them around demanding censorship of imaginary things like hate speech cannot exist on a platform that does not provide them protection. This is why they avoid Gab. If they start demanding censorship there, the response is mockery.
This why the media are threatening to stomp off in a huff to the Mastodon, the federated system of independently created nodes. Because they are stupid and do not know how anything works, they think that there is a trust and safety team there waiting for them to arrive from Twitter. These people are so insulated they just assume the internet works by magic, rather than people. Just wait until they learn that Gab is a node on the Mastodon system. That will be a fun day.
The bigger problem for the Musk project is that the people with real power, like the duopoly that controls the mobile device market, will make sure he is never able to create his civic nationalist paradise. Apple is preparing to remove Twitter from the Apple ecosystem and you can be sure Google is doing the same. After all, both companies work closely to prevent competition. They have long ago worked out how to cooperate on censorship issues.
Then there are the advertisers and purchasers of Twitter data. The main source of revenue for Twitter and all internet firms is the sale of user data. They sell this in packages to companies, market researchers, political campaigns and the many intelligence services tracking our moves. All of the people running these outfits strongly believe in the dictatorship of the managerial elite. They see the Musk project as a direct challenge to the system, so they will oppose it.
Even if Musk was not walking headlong into the civilizational abattoir known as managerialism, large scale social media was always doomed. The reason is people self-segregate and they do this because they do not enjoy conflict. It is only the spiteful mutants who enjoy constant turmoil. The other 80% of humanity just want to talk about their stuff with other likeminded people. This is why all previous large scale social media projects eventually disaggregated.
While the whole thing is amusing, it should also serve as a reminder to dissidents that this abomination we call modernity is unnatural. Projects like Twitter that were supposed to control the culture run counter to human nature. Mother Nature is undefeated in this area, which is why the graveyard of intellectual thought is littered with the ideas that challenged human nature. Musk will fail for the same reason the ghouls before him failed with Twitter. It runs contrary to our nature.
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[…] An Unnatural Death […]
One of my favorite TV of all time was the episode from “The IT Crowd” where they tech guys convinced their supervisor that this little black box was “the internet.” British humor at its finest.
Musk is a rich fuck, same as Trump, playing a role for hebrew moneymen. Masons doing as they’re told, not grasping their heads come off first when the deed is done. We’re ruled by traitors who’ve turned their backs on their own people…good luck facing that when Death comes knocking.
Its a lot more than just Twitter. Bob Chapek is out at Disney, fired suddenly and Bob Iger brought back. But Disney cannot survive with its legacy, high cost 20th Century Mass Machine any more than the CW could. It has been released that one of the reasons that Discovery/Warners sold the CW is that it LOST $300-500 million EVERY YEAR of its existence. By contrast Fox Broadcasting is estimated to add $1 billion to the Murdoch empire and Fox News another $1 billion in net revenue every year. That pays down their heavy debt load. Midnight’s Edge has the… Read more »
Good post – my question is, do companies like Disney operate like this because they are true believers or because they think that this is what the majority wants? Or is it both? For instance, take the NFL. I was as big of an NFL fan as you could possibly imagine. I was a long time Sunday Ticket subscriber, I spent my entire Sundays watching the games from the early to late, etc. I would go to games. In an instant, after 39 years of maniacal fandom, the NFL lost me once they started the worshipping of the criminal race.… Read more »
[…] ZMan passes the popcorn. […]
It has been forgotten but the great censorship campaign began in the comment sections first Before Trump’s win, commenting on even NYT’s, WaPo’s, TheGuardian’s, pieces was quite free of censorship. All of that turned with Trump’s win in the USA, and with Brexit in Western Europe. Facebook and Twitter came later to that party, as you say. Covid and the “vax” issue gave the opportunity to boost censorship further, this time both in the USA and Western Europe (as well as, I think, Australia and NZ). Basically, when and insofar as possible, their choice was to give the illusion of… Read more »
Before Trump, repression was manual, personal, and, for “repressed” anti-free-speech liberals like Steve Sailer and Scott Alexander, sexual (or as close as they can get to sex). 2016-17 is when it was all made algorithmic and immortal.
See the Last Psychiatrist’s last post, from almost ten years ago:
https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2014/05/cyberbll.html
He was *very late* to these observations.
It’s been a while since I’ve ventured back but at that time, for me, TLP was the best BEST writer on the internet
Thanks for the reminder
Z don’t deny Musk his Victory. A defeat was inflicted on the machine of degeneracy, degradation and a key information and influence node destroyed. Moreover many scum lost their jobs and the enforcement scum aren’t insignificant to the regime. Whether or not its rebuilt into a CivNat paradise or not A Battle, Campaign actually was won by Musk and unlike Trump out of pocket. Not to mention the DEI and Woke police have been served a Taylor Notice their unproductivity is noted and they are disposable instruments. It is my considered judgment (not wish) that Musk is the start of… Read more »
That was me Vxxc
Agreed. Whatever we think of Musk and whether he will succeed or not, we can thank him for making so many liberal heads explode. In that way, he is similar to Trump: probably doomed to failure, but providing a great deal of entertainment.
Twitter excels as a peer to peer breaking news service. Long form blogs don’t fill that niche.
“Twitter excels as a peer to peer breaking [rumor] service.”
FTFY.
Gringo: “Long form blogs don’t fill that niche.” Z just taught me about “Mastodon”, and of course Mastodon’s founder, Eugen Rochko, immediately proved to be very strongly “Early-Lifed”. That would explain why the Gab architecture is such a filthy steaming stinking pile of swine manure. Every time I try to re-center my browser’s focus on a piece of information which I am trying to parse at Gab, I end up clicking on some forbidden screen-zone real-estate, and I get whisked off, like Dorothy & Toto in the tornado, to some completely different cyber-space geography, and I find myself utterly lost,… Read more »
Elon’s plan for Twitter is to turn it into his original concept for “X.com”, which was before the merger with PayPal and its eventual departure from his dream. “X.com” is suppose to be like WeChat for the western world, where you can pay for things, watch videos, and call/text/message people. I highly doubt this is possible because the simple fact is that WeChat exists in China because the CCP wants something like that (a single source to control all information). Twitter cannot become that because they #1. Don’t trust Musk because he is not one of them. #2. There are… Read more »
Japan has an app like WeChat even though it is not pushed by the gov’t. It’s called LINE. It combines text chats, video calls, audio calls, digital payment system, news feeds, something like TikTok, and also regular internet browsing. Because of network effects, almost everyone under the age of 50 uses it, despite the fact that it is a dumpster fire of an app. Although it is mostly used in Japan and S Korea, it can be downloaded and used anywhere. If that’s really what Musk wanted, he should have bought LINE and just pushed it into the American context.… Read more »
There’s long been a cottage industry of predicting Musk’s downfall. I will say that those who criticize Tesla overlook the essential feature of the car, that it is great fun to drive. Those who criticize his Twitter overlook the same thing. I have never enjoyed social media like I enjoy Gab and now Twitter. Other than Zman and a few things on Unz, I don’t usually feel like reading essays to get the news.
Musk just won.
Surly to deny him such.
People like Musk have been running a three ring circus using ultra-cheap money for years. Everything he touches usually gets some green subsidy of some kind. He’s the pinnacle of fraudulent and deceptive marketing. However, every so often, he’ll eviscerate some politician like Pocahontas instead of playing nice. This is what will do him in. Musk’s inability to play nice with stupid, vain politicians the way Bezos does will end him. Investigations are launched, warrants are signed, documents are seized, etc. In a way, Trump is in the same exact boat. If you look at the nuts and bolts of… Read more »
At the end of the day, Musk is a con man who mostly cons people I hate anyway. That he does so in service of his own goals makes him no different than any other con man, but his ambition can be captivating when he talks about it (also like a good con man). Ultimately, he’s more useful than not, that’s the long and short of it.
Great comment JR. Accurate.
Walrus, Musk is king con. Seriously, it’s amazing what he’s gotten away with over the decades. For instance, making people think he’s articulate and charismatic. He isn’t. But we do have that impression. Partly because he looks exotic and has an intelligent-sounding accent. And partly because the media hype him as a God. (Prior to Twitter purchase). Anyway, you should look further into Musk. There are YouTube channels devoted to examining him.
But yes, it’s cool when he (or whoever writes his lines for him) slams certain people or orgs.
I forgive Musk a great deal because he treats government as just one more mark.
“In those early days it was a glimpse into the weird combination of ignorance, insulation and confidence that defined the mass media” Oh man, if you’ve never worked in TV news before, you may not even realize just how bad this is. They truly are dumb as stumps. It’s sad really, because back when I started in that field (technical, behind-the-camera stuff), there were still a few good people left on air; the occasional weather-guy who actually knew stuff, the political reporters who’s knowledge came from many years experience covering it, etc. By the time I left TV, all the… Read more »
You are completely correct about the inevitable failure of the project, but I would add a further point: Musk has done a HUGE service to the Democratic vote stealing machine. Most evenings, I briefly peruse Twitter. I use it only to follow a couple people (mainly old rockers with no PR machine), and a few conservative groups. I have never posted. What struck me last night, like a rock, is how much the conservatives on the platform are giving each other reach arounds in complementing how much they have just won and how great each of them are and how… Read more »
It’s not that no one cares about the recent election “irregularities”, it’s (here in AZ) that there is opposition to reform from both sides of the uniparty. Of course, the winners in this corrupt process—the Dems—like things the way they are, but the old guard Reps (read: RINO’s) don’t want to change the system either. They are happy in their sinecures and retaining the position of “loyal opposition”—just as long as they are re-elected in their safe districts all is good. The dirt people (White) have been trying to vote them (RINO’s) out via the primaries, and were successful, however… Read more »
Completely agree with you (and fantastic word: “sincecure”). But I find the laudatory tone of major twitter conservatives to be at odds with the outrage they should be expressing; that is my point. Nothing about the populace or general sentiment, but the bellwethers, such as they are, continue to congratulate themselves.
The word is fantastic, but only if you type it right.
It’s “sinecure”, a word which has its origins in Latin.
Yeah – I am on my phone. I also misused one for won. It happens on the distraction device.
AZ isn’t a done deal yet. Lake hasn’t conceded and several counties are delaying certification.
Hillary Clinton never conceded either in 2016. The system is moving forward with Hobbs.
It’s a done deal. If your hope is with the courts, you’ll be disappointed. Judicial system is always hesitant to involve itself in over turning elections. Once in awhile, they’ll take a official or office on, but a State-wide election?
Besides, there is an exculpatory explanation for the “problems” that greeted voters at the polling places on Election Day. The Courts will entertain this excuse in lieu of demonstrable fraud—which is more of a case of circumstantial/statistical evidence.
We’ll see. I live here and am familiar with the BS Maricopa county and to a lesser extent Pima shove down the the rest of the state’s throat. However, I don’t recall multiple counties refusing to certify the results. A successful challenge such as this may be the first bit of snow that triggers an avalanche. Quite possibly not, but like I said, we’ll see.
Compsci: But you, at least, see and understand this clearly. Most putative ‘conservatives’ will just continue to vote harder – I believe you said your wife was one such.
While I fully realize seeing Clown World clearly is a black pill in and of itself, what’s even worse is accepting that most people won’t ever notice or accept its reality.
Courage, brother.
Yes, indeed. Those who read here will know I’m not one of the millions disenfranchised/fooled last Nov 7. But I do hear and watch what goes on in this State. And as you have noted, I’ve “caught wise” to the scam.
My posting is only to clarify what out-of-staters commenting/reading might not hear from their sources—not to cry, “I’ve been robbed”—and certainly not to urge that we lick our wounds, regroup, and try harder next time.
I am in this world, not of it. 😉
What WAS Twitter10 years ago? – Sort of a usenet group discussion board for the smart/snarky set who weren’t into the technical aspects of following boards What was Twitter Pre-ELON? – Information supression and narrative control. Arguably no longer necessary now that mail in balloting is secure and the necessary votes will always be found. What WILL BE Twitter Post-ELON? – MySpace used to be cool (I’m told). Then it was swarmed by a new group. Became totally uncool. MySpace was for the Blacks, everyone else left. Now Twitter is for everyone, and everyone is just not that interesting. That’s… Read more »
The benefit of Twitter was we could flame and lampoon the elites and watch it ruin their day. I also was excited to get a reply from Charles Murray or Peter ZEihan on some of my ideas. However the consequence of Twitter was the politicians actually thought it was a cross section into the average American voter. It certainly was not. The politicians started crafting messages and bills for extremist commies who work in coffee shops at 45 years old. Also As an online advertiser, Twitter ad space was a laughable failure, because literally no one would purchase from our… Read more »
” However the consequence of Twitter was the politicians actually thought it was a cross section into the average American voter. ” This is a stretch, I think. They couldn’t care less what we think on any subject. There is actually a negative correlation between what the masses say they want and vote for and the policies we get. Maybe this encourages them too much, but they were always still going to do whatever it was they wanted to do whether or not we approved of it. Voting leaves us with the false impression that we can affect policy. We… Read more »
“….. large scale social media was always doomed. The reason is people self-segregate and they do this because they do not enjoy conflict. It is only the spiteful mutants who enjoy constant turmoil. The other 80% of humanity just want to talk about their stuff with other likeminded people. This is why all previous large scale social media projects eventually disaggregated. While the whole thing is amusing, it should also serve as a reminder to dissidents that this abomination we call modernity is unnatural. Projects like Twitter that were supposed to control the culture run counter to human nature. Mother… Read more »
I believe it was put by someone (I can’t remember who) way smarter than me some time ago: ‘…we used to agree on where we as a nation was headed (more or less we had common goals), we only disagreed as to how best to achieve such. Now we are a nation that no longer has common goals.’ As Bill has astutely observed, all that is left is “conflict”. The problem with the unknown author of the above, and most of the people agreeing with him, is that they fail to see the reason for our lack of national consensus—race… Read more »
Twitter is a big upside for our people in.my opinion. Everyone puts social media down. But we’re now able to pounce on issues with a speed never before possible. We have direct communication between various pundits, like Tucker Carlson, and the masses. He regularly picks up on stories that were percolating on Twitter for just a few days. In olden days, it would have taken months or years. If ever. I also disagree that rating the comment sections didn’t do a lot of good. You guys destroyed the social credibility of the National Review. Believe me you did. It’s true… Read more »
“All of their chanting about democracy aside, theirs is a totalitarian dictatorship of the managerial elite… “Projects like Twitter that were supposed to control the culture run counter to human nature. Mother Nature is undefeated in this area, which is why the graveyard of intellectual thought is littered with the ideas that challenged human nature. Musk will fail for the same reason the ghouls before him failed with Twitter. It runs contrary to our nature.” Therein lies the ultimate white pill. Putin and Xi may humiliate the Global American Empire but nature ultimately will destroy and end it. We are… Read more »
Jack,
You had me at “the first Cloud will be assassinated”…
The best possible thing would be for Apple and Google to remove Twitter from their app stores. This will get most companies, large and small, off the platform, because the “PR” people who run their Twitter feeds are most likely tweeting from a phone. (The reason Twitter is so appealing is because it is super mobile friendly). None of these people want to mess with the clunky browser versions of the app or tweet from a computer. Antifa, BLM, journalists, and cat lady activists love using Twitter to harass employers of people they don’t like. Twitter has been their playground.… Read more »
I never used Twitter enough to notice if they did it too, but back when I used Facebook I noticed that they intentionally munged their mobile web interface to force people on to their app. At this point in the web technology cycle there is no reason that information consumption has to be routed through a proprietary app.
Twitter BECAME the playground of the hard left a few years ago. But prior to that the alt-right was all over it. It gave birth to Donald Trump. A free and open Twitter has a lot of advantages for our people. The cat ladies get to speak anyway on every other forum. Having some space where we can talk and be heard by the general public is a blessing.
Hrrrrrmmmmm….I may well be full of beans… but I think you may be premature with that Z. Elon Musk seeks balance. Politically he is a centrist. He is also a carny and knows his customers. Holding a vote to bring back Donald Trump? Sheer marketing genius. Did it no set a record or something for the most popular thread in Twitter history? The left were in flames over it, and rejoined Twitter in droves just to vote on it. The Yesterday Men, normie-cons, and MAGA types saw it as manna from Heaven. Of course, the poll was all for show;… Read more »
“CBS bailed out first – apparently they are back again in less than 24 hours.”
CBS flounced and crawled back? That’s hilarious. It also is rich that, so far, Trump has not returned. That is the ultimate crapping on the Regime’s face.
Social media is a cancer and is to be avoided at all costs, though. It can’t die quickly enough.
I like Musk: he does seem wonderfully normal for someone of his accomplishments— unprepossessing, not all full of himself, not an arrogant egomaniac, but not pretending a false humility either. He had the balls to smoke a joint with Joe Rogan on Rogan’s podcast, and didn’t worry about the damage to his reputation. That speaks well of him. And he’s also a genius. If anyone can pull it off— can construct a site where all viewpoints are freely heard— I think he’s got as good a chance as anybody. And I can’t believe he hasn’t anticipated all the difficulties which… Read more »
An open marketplace of ideas would be okay. Much better would be Musk grinding all Leftist speech under heel as the Left has been doing to us this past 40 years. Give the felons, freeloaders and fruit loops something to really howl about.
“ Give the felons, freeloaders and fruit loops something to really howl about.”
That’s just it. Those ff&f’s can only howl. Talk is cheap. Musk has an empire to run and ideas he has not even begun to explore. He can’t spend the time to entertain a moronic mob as he is actually a creative person with ability.
(The reason is people self-segregate and they do this because they do not enjoy conflict) I was walking around in a huge cemetery in SoCal over the weekend and noticed that all the tombstones in the section were Asian. Then they were Armenian, then they were Spanish. No markings or signage above ground indicating any of this. Only in death can people self segregate in modern day America came to my mind. Kind of like old America. I guess if you have enough money you could move to Vermont. The whole Twitter thing is right up there with all the… Read more »
Yep: after all the effort and energy spent in compelling “desegregated” housing, we find today that housing is “re-segregating” all by itself: it turns out that when given the choice, most Black people would rather live among their own.
Imagine that!
“…most Black people would rather live among their own.”
Might be even more realistic that most non-black people would prefer to not live among blacks. Sure, if you’re a young, idealistic liberal, you might think it is cool to live around blacks, but that feeling tends to wear off fairly quickly. Hell, the sheer volume when blacks get together is enough to drive most non-blacks away.
Panzernutter: You raise a point I hadn’t actually considered much before. While the juice were endlessly whinging about quotas capping their Ivy League presence and not being invited to join the best Protestant country clubs, they were busy setting up all their own cemeteries. What, no demand for equal access and endless integration in death and unto eternity? Tsk, tsk. And, as you note, various other races and ethnicities self-segregate in death as well (except all our vibrant subcons, who pollute waterways in state parks with their ashes and offerings). One of the benefits I’m anticipating from owning our own… Read more »
It’s been amusing to see these tools avoid Gab because it’s “full of Nazis” and hop on Fediverse/Mastadon instead, a network of instances full of people who left Gab because it wasn’t spicy enough.
(Also, rumor is that Truth Social runs on top of Fedi software as well, though like Gab it runs in it’s own isolated silo.)
Oh, they ARE on Gab. Count on it. They are just lurking. Their echo chambers are drearily boring and you can bet they want to know what life is like beyond them…
Greenblat and the ADL were having kiniptions about Kitler that gave me laughing cramps.
If you are ever forced to say Kitler with a straight face, you’ve already lost the argument. After so many years of edgy anon accounts, it ‘s amazing they haven’t figured that out yet.
Sometimes wonder if the guys behind these accounts were always skilled social media rabble-rousers whose ascension was inevitable, or whether they had a few bangers that, through some luck, elevated them beyond their wildest dreams and they just ran with the schtick.
Yeah fediverse is where it’s at. We had a bunch of retarded journos create an instance for themselves, only to find out that when they tried to report users on my instance for crime think the mods on our instance agree with them and generally DGAF. Then our mods share the screenshots of the reports with the rest of us on the instance so we can laugh at them. Then we start posting redpills, dank memes, hate speech, slurs and lewd anime girls at them until they freak out and defederate us completely so we don’t have to interact with… Read more »
I’m 41 and have no social medias and no cable tv (and a job that doesn’t require email). We are reliant on social interaction from family and friends, mostly from church. This was how it was meant to be. If lefty wants to sensor us they’ll have to send agents out in overcoats in order to ease drop on our conversations like in some Cold War spy movie. Just yesterday I had an interesting conversation with a fella at church who grew up in the south and admired General Lee; I acting enraged and demanded he be “cast into the… Read more »
I’m in my early 40s, from Texas, and to see the evisceration of General Lee’s reputation and standing is another sign of the times. As with most narratives told, inconvenient parts are either minimized or gotten rid of altogether.
Lincoln asking Lee to lead the Union army usually gets glossed over, as it contradicts the myth that the Civil War was fought entirely as some moral crusade to abolish slavery.
Plus, it is easily forgotten that General Lee was striving to live up to the values and virtues of a true gentleman, in much the same way as the not-as-maligned George Washington did. And Lee was motivated to restore the reputation and dignity of the Lee family, that was tarnished by his father’s impulsive mistakes.
Both Washington and Lee succeeded in being gentlemen, and Clown World AINO hates the White aristocratic man of virtue and discretion
Yes, Lee was a great man. Even his opponents recognized that fact. Here’s what Eisenhower said about him: “General Robert E. Lee was, in my estimation, one of the supremely gifted men produced by our Nation. He believed unswervingly in the Constitutional validity of his cause which until 1865 was still an arguable question in America; he was a poised and inspiring leader, true to the high trust reposed in him by millions of his fellow citizens; he was thoughtful yet demanding of his officers and men, forbearing with captured enemies but ingenious, unrelenting and personally courageous in battle, and… Read more »
“…our society is removing statues of Lee, and replacing them with statues of George Floyd…”
That’s just it Bill…it’s not our society. It’s not yours and it’s not mine. Just because we dwell here does not make us responsible for, or a part of, this alien society we find ourselves within. Can’t speak for you, but my society disappeared a couple generations ago while ai was busy doing non-important things of my youth.
Robert E Lee was a great man. But perhaps he was a bit too stuck on civilized warfare. A lot of people wanted a more guerrilla style resistance. And he always opposed that because it wasn’t Christian or something. I believe he later regretted that.
He believed unswervingly in the Constitutional validity of his cause which until 1865 was still an arguable question in America
Legally, it still is. Militarily, not so much. Practically, it may once again be.
But Robert E Lee’s striving to live up to values or whatever, doesn’t that give you a width of Mike Pence? Robert e Lee was great, but we can’t sacrifice a victory for someone’s moral vanity. This is important to think through for the future.
“This was how it was meant to be. If lefty wants to sensor us they’ll have to send agents out in overcoats in order to ease drop on our conversations like in some Cold War spy movie.”
Do you use a mobile phone in any way, shape, or form? If the answer is yes you are being monitored already.
Not to rain on your parade, you are minimizing your digital footprint and that is great but the primary surveillance tool used by The Machine® are smartphones.
I don’t see how anyone can ignore modern technology and modern social reality and expect to thrive. I keep hearing people who say they ain’t got no tv, ain’t got no twitter, but somehow they’re on the internet posting! Posting about how much they don’t need technology.
It’s great to have a small group of people you know personally. But that’s not a complete solution. What’s happening in the larger political/social world matters a lot for your children and grandchildren. And a lot of these isolated communities just dry up and die over time.
Not a defense of Twitter, but what I do like about the platform is the ability to converse with people one would not interact with in real life. Authors, political pundits, and other figures are somewhat accessible on Twitter. Being a member of Generation X, the Internet started taking off while I was in my teens. At that time, it was exciting to log on and have so much knowledge available at one’s fingertips. Libraries, science papers, and personal websites that offered a cornucopia of information. Flash forward to the present, and I find myself explaining to my teenage son… Read more »
When I was in my twenties, mid-90’s, I was coming back from a run and there was a young female reporter and a camera crew on my street looking to talk to someone. I was the only one around so she asked me and I just said no I’m not interested I look bad and she said no you look great and I said I’m not interested again and she said “you can be on tv!” and i said still not interested and she looked at me like I was an alien. Telling me I could be on TV was… Read more »
One of my cousins tried to get into show business, with her rich father funding a lot of the endeavor. She tried doing through normal music gigs, but failed to get momentum so tried being a former-Catholic pro-gay advocate in the hopes of ZOG elevating her. Unfortunately for her, that schtick was already stale and she was mostly ignored. She ended marrying a broadway guy and is barren at 40 and has pretty much aged out of any chance at stardom. The sad part is, even now, a multitude of her relatives essentially live vicariously through her, as seeing her… Read more »
I’ve never been able to understand the reverence paid to actors, musicians and sportsball players. Almost all of them are treated like fountains of wisdom. Even Mike Tyson has this going on. The guy is/was a friggin pyscho (and an EXTREMELY overrated boxer). He was committing violent crimes at 12.
Technology has given these clowns a level of wealth and influence they were never meant to have. The only probable solution is to pull a China and repeatedly raid the carny trash to make sure they’re kept in their place.
Because the media machine bestows status visibility.
That is all the retards respond to.
The Romans considered actors lower than prostitutes. They had the right idea.
That was true pretty much up to the spread of mass cinema.
For some reason a giant screen hijacked everyone’s brain.
This is only half the story. It’s not just actors, it’s actors and journalists were considered the two scummy professions that you needed to keep away from polite society and they colluded together in the middle of the last century to promote each other. Journalist wrote panegyrics about actors and actors made movies about heroic journalists and it changed everyone’s mind about them both. But the truth it’s the same as it’s always been
You can observe that bloodlust for fame set in in real time in that video where one of the Sandy Hook fathers immediately brightens up when he ascends to the dais and starts talking about his feelings for his child who was murdered only hours before. Many people have seen this video and said they were actors. They are not, and Sandy Hook was not a staged event. These are the real people in our sick society. The chance to be on TV was like winning the lottery for him, even though his child had to die for him to… Read more »
“I love my dead, gay son!”
Heathers! I love when the cop realized the ballplayers were gay. It wasn’t the copy of Stud Puppy magazine or the Joan Crawford photos. No, the dead giveaway was the bottle of Perrier.
Can that be true?
I don’t want to watch that. I am at the in-laws. Here is another coffee table magazine story. I arrive and on the coffee table is, “Millenium”, magazine. It sports a full page closeup head shot of the step father-in-law. I knew he had done this. This meaning, he was sent a mailer by the, “Who’s Who of America”, organization. For however many thousands of dollars he could pay to be put in the book. About a year ago when he got the mail, he was bragging to everyone about how he was chosen to be in a magazine as… Read more »
I think this is the real reason that the likes of Alex Jones believed these people to be crisis actors. To people with souls watching family members ascent the podium right after such personal carnage is unbelievable.
When I had watched tv and local news in particular it amazed me that anyone would talk to the media right after the murder of their family member. I couldn’t fathom it as many of us would tell them to eff off.
David Wright: I remember, even as a kid/teen, watching people on tv and news reports mobbed by reporters and even then wondering why on earth they talked to them instead of pushing through the crowd, or at the very least standing close-mouthed in the face of shouted questions. I will never understand that desire for fame and attention.
Of all my lack of understanding, the desire for one’s proverbial “15 minutes of fame” is the greatest.
It is said that empathy/understanding requires a bit of common experience, but for the life of me I can’t ever remember wanting others to notice me, to receive some of notoriety or adulation from others. I guess something’s just broken upstairs.
Bingo. Being on TV has been the goal of nearly every American since WW2. Being on TV makes you someone. Makes you immortal. Even if you are on TV simply to be slandered, still…you’re on TV!
There was only one time, ever, that being on TV was worthwhile for our people. And this is it:
https://youtu.be/VdwSJIbomAw
My brother-in-law grew up in the old First Ward, what was a Polish and Irish haven. At one time he probably had the same thoughts as the upstanding gentleman in this video, unfortunately my sister has turned him into a squish.
LOL! Based Giga-Chad.
You can tell that clip is 10 years old because it was a different time even that recently. Had he made this same statement since about 2015 or more recently he’d be on every major news website and charged for hate crimes just for uttering those Red Pill truths. That is how fast this has moved.
‘Why are you saying these things?’ Credit to the channel for airing this and giving the man a forum to air his grievances in such a cool, articulate, sensible manner. But agreed with Apex, this is not allowed without much shaming in today’s world.
We are ruled by managerial simpletons with fancy college degrees who couldn’t pass an introductory calculus course to save their lives…The countries with leaders who could and often did acquire degrees in science or engineering are going to rule, and they have little need for the Twitteratti…
“We are ruled by managerial simpletons.” Yet they defeated our forefathers and have us on our knees.
I think you make an important point, but it is also important to remember that these rulers inherited their power and they inherited a compliant people. It is is not as if the current crop of elites conquered us. They simply gamed a system that has been in decline for longer than we realize. So yeah, let’s not pretend it is all going to take care of itself because the people at the top are incompetnat, but let us also be honest about what we are facing.
It’s an interesting dichotomy: our elite managerial ruling class got where they are, in part, by agreeing with a certain liberal/progressive/egalitarian/”antiracist” narrative.
We dissidents can see the flaws in that narrative, the places where it’s assumptions simply don’t align with reality, or with human nature.
So if a prerequisite for entering the elite managerial class is to believe that certain sacred falsehoods are true: wouldn’t that factor alone be guaranteed to render them somewhat incompetent?
Have you seen Larry Romanoff’s latest, on the richest families in the world?
That’s what traditional America, and the slices of the world still holding onto some sovereignty, are “facing”.
It’s that whole “hard times make hard men” cycle thing. We are due to be recycled.
Because our women are helping them.
Yeah, the war bride thing is real. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_bride
As Rich Cooper says, “Women don’t care about your struggles. They hang around the finish line and flirt with the winners.”
Women going bad appear to be a leading not a lagging indicator of great societal stressors, tensions and a marker throughout deep history of turmoil and pending collapse. May be a topic for Ed Dutton to explore. Living in Southern Utah, gifted with abundant curiosity and surrounded by deep history has led me to noodling about exploring along many trails, one in particular the Hopi way. Hopi oral history has many accounts of tales of destruction laying waste to Hopi villages. Women figure centrally in all Hopi narratives of destruction, either as objects of desire who lead men to corruption,… Read more »
Range! Long time! Best to you as well.
Range Front Fault: “Women going bad appear to be a leading not a lagging indicator of great societal stressors, tensions and a marker throughout deep history of turmoil and pending collapse.”
This past Sunday, the UK Guardian ran a piece about the chi-chi dating scene in London:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/nov/20/the-rise-and-fall-of-dating-apps
Pace the Pueblo [no pun intended], the English [with help from a Tiny Hat sodomite whose pronoun is “they”] seem to be choosing the “whimper” rather the “bang”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hollow_Men
Indonesia is run by a technocrat with an engineering degree.
They’re one of the few remaining, “jab to enter,” countries at present.
Some of the spiteful mutants who enjoy constant turmoil might find themselves unwelcome among the leftist managerial class and start looking at this side of the great divide. Resentment arising from rejection is a powerful motivator.
Let’s hope not, but it seems possible. Used to like lefty in spite of the wacky ideas because of my contrarian streak. It was the Bush years, too, so if you weren’t with us, you were with them. Now she’s the borg, so here I am, much more at home. Spiteful mutants seem quite a bit more than contrarian, driven by hatred of humanity because they’ll never fit in or be able to relate. I’ll admit, post-covid I understand them better, which is a little worrying. Not sympathetically, so just a little lol. If they end up over here, it’s… Read more »
‘Spiteful mutants’ always makes me think of the eugenics and population bomb crowds. I think they’re missing something, and they’re angry about it. Kind of like Darwinism, which is related. Never bothered to formulate strong arguments against it because to my mind that would be like formulating strong arguments against 2+2=5. Of all possible explanations of life, dumb algorithms lucking into survival seems the most absurd. Hard to believe it ever became dominant. Or maybe I’m the one missing something. Life knows how to take care of itself. Most of the problems we discuss here are the result of people… Read more »
I don’t want them. They just bring their need for constant turmoil with them and expect us to accept it.
The Salem witch trials take on a different interpretation…although death by fire seems extreme when exile was an option. I guess they wanted to solve their problems decisively.
They assumed that a final solution was the best solution.
And unlike many ‘progressive’ Christians today, they actually believed what their scriptures— in this case, Exodus 22:18— were telling them:
“You shall not allow a sorceress to live.”
They didn’t have the technical knowledge or capabilities to implement a final solution. Our children will have this though.
> On television, the people who claimed it was their job to keep the rest of us informed clearly knew nothing about this new “internet thing” or the people signing up for accounts. There was this lady on CNN who was asking, in complete sincerity, “who is this 4chan?”, at the time when most of the great memes floating up from the sewer that is that site to mainstream culture. > This is why all previous large scale social media projects eventually disaggregated. Eventually Twitter will probably do the same as what Facebook does, where features will be created to… Read more »
The current system is also increasingly resembling a palace economy, and Musk became a favored courtier during the Obama years. Whatever talent Musk has, pales in significance to the government favors he was a recipient of. Success went to his head and now he has offended the King. His reversal of his initial free speech policy happened as Musk was made to realize his true place and that he was on the cusp of cancellation. He will eat the total loss of his investment in twitter in order to maintain his other operation. The status symbol of owning a Tesla… Read more »
One of my best friends is an old school liberal whose world view is entirely managed by NPR and Colbert. For decades, Elon Musk has been one of his heroes because of Musk’s work with electric cars.
Now that Musk has gone rogue, my friend is confused. His firmware update that says that Musk is bad is not installing smoothly.
As intelligent and successful as my friend is, he simply can’t understand why Elon has stepped away from the hive. It troubles him. People like him get such continual confirmation of their beliefs that a defection suggests disconfirmation.
Musk is a strange and rare character, a hereditary oligarch with a slight mental resemblance to and sympathy for normal men. He’s actually done a couple of their “If I had a billion dollars, I’d [fill in the blank]” things. The only other living billionaire who’s done that is Trump.
Gates and Soros (e.g.) are conspicuously monstrous and inhuman. Trump and Musk are two rich guys. They represent the possibility of permeability in the barriers between Them and Us. They’re ants in the house. Hence the mass-murderous rage.
You forgot Richard Branson, who also did a few “if I had a billion dollars” things. Actually, I think he was an influential predecessor to Musk. I also always liked his style.
How can you be friends with some one who is obviously an NPC mix of retarded and insane?
One of my best friends has succumbed to many of the recent Regime fads too. (Most recently he was decrying Georgia Meloni’s Italy.) I would call him a liberal, but prior to Trump and all the derangement he brought, he was a normal centrist…”economically conservative, socially liberal” (ECSL) as the cool kids said. The true lefties now think Musk is Satan, but the old ECSL crowd is having a tough time with Musk. On one hand, he’s a paradigm-shifting immigrant visionary entrepreneur that centrists love. On the other hand…he’s irreverent, in an age that demands reverence. Musk reminds me of… Read more »
Spot on Bugman Raid. ZMan’s reasons for Twitters difficult position were good. I think you raise the other – Musk’s entire fortune is dependent upon government subsidies and the fiat money regime where inflation assymetrically flows into stocks that are the new shiny thing and debt is liquidated by selling more stock to the next round of greater fools. That can be taken away, as can SpaceX which exists on government money. It has been amusing to see who at work is piling on to Musk on slack channels. It is its own built in NPC detector needed when work… Read more »
I’m not so sure. It’s a lot like elections — there’s no point anymore, as the “fortification” has for the most part been legalized via ballot harvesting and whatnot, and whatever else might be needed will be done freelance. And yet, there will still be elections. Not just because they need to keep Griller and Normie (and their “Left” equivalents onside), but because “voting” is our opportunity to express our love and gratitude to Dear Leader. Now that the “fortification” is de facto legal and voter turnout is falling off a cliff — as you noted — I’d bet that… Read more »
Yes this is actually going to become a problem for those of us who never did it. When I was a hipster, all my friends were on friendster pre Facebook and relentlessly peer pressured me into joining but because I’m a natural rebel I refused, which is also the same reason I don’t have any tattoos, and so by the time Facebook came along I was immune and have never had any social media. One day this is going to make me, and people like me, very obvious to the people that hate us.
“the same reason I don’t have any tattoos”
It was amusing and disconcerting in the 90s when all the rebels got tattoos to show that they don’t follow trends.
I can deal with tattoos on dudes although with some suspicion. I cannot deal with tattoos on women at all. My fear is that the otherwise perfect woman for me has a sleeve or a trampstamp on her ass.
I remember standing in a circle six or so people at party or gallery opening or something, one of whom was the queen of the cool kids, she got a tattoo on her chest it was a stupid symbol that she made up, and we started talking about tattoos and it turned out that three of us didn’t have any and I could see all the tattooed people wilt ever so slightly, it dawned on them that we were cooler than them, there was a shift right there in the energy, it was very strange
I’ve never used twitter or any of the other social media tard-a-thons, either. A cursory glance or two tells one all you need to know about the jerkoffs that populate those places. Nothing but gay global american empire echo chambers.
Over what seems a few short years, responses from peers to my “Contra” status has gone from “God Bless – not even LinkedIn – what?” to pregnant pauses and eye aversion.
Even my “pureblood status,” which was briefly held in esteem, is now becoming seen as something “suspect”.
Severian: Off topic – but I occasionally lurk at your site – and last night I happened upon a YT video of some 20-ish guy extolling the virtues of occasionally ditching his phone and using a pen and little 3″x4″ marble notebook. “Like, I’m not immediately distracted by that firehose of information. I can, like, write my thoughts or forget about it for weeks at a time, and it doesn’t care!” Perfectly encapsulated, for me, the intractable generational divide you wrote about between those of us who remember the world pre-internet and those whose earliest memories are playing with their… Read more »
I sometimes wonder if the “real world” actually exists anymore. It seems every news story I read, every podcast I listen to, revolves around who said what on Twitter. It’s as if Twitter has superseded the real world, and anything that actually happens is happening on Twitter. We in the cheap seats are just the observers.