I will never understand the mental gymnastics it must take to believe in an evil ultra-powerful shadowy left-wing Cabal pulling all the strings that let Trump become President twice
Given his approach to Israel and Ukraine, i don't think it's a left wing conspiracy, i think he cut a deal with the centrist blob to be allowed to retake power if he didn't screw up the blob's core foreign policy interests. I'm betting on strikes on Iran + a more hawkish outcome on Ukraine that he is currently signaling.
Sure, that's how they are posturing. What matters is what the policy outcomes are, not the constant noise and distraction thrown off by Trump. It's not gymnastics to ignore what Trump says and instead pay attention to what the admin actually does - Trump deliberately shapes the media cycle to distract both his base and his opposition, hence all the static on Greenland and Canada when he's been pushing through a bunch of cabinet appointees.
On Israel, for me it's hard to see any meaningful daylight between the Biden and Trump approach to Israel given Biden ratified the embassy moving to Jerusalem and kept arming Israel during their efforts to dismantle Hamas, but I'm not saying that in an argumentative or assertive way - what differences do you see?
I have a hard time blaming Trump for killing the two-state solution - my view is that it died because Arafat rejected it, which happened bc Hamas would have murdered him if he accepted it. That's also why it was rejected in 2008 post-Arafat when Barak made a second offer. Palestinians were very anti-Oslo even before 10/7: https://www.pcpsr.org/en/node/955
Lori Lightfoot was the president of my law school class and she definitely exudes main character energy. I didn't love her as mayor, but she is freaking smart and driven and always was nice to talk to.
Thank you for reporting the sh*thole named X - and I increasingly feel like X (and online rightwing/manosphere space) has become the marketplace for grifts and cons.
And Sunday morning brain led me to a conclusion that this is one sad example of “What’s wrong with Boys”… (i.e. resentment and struggle in the education are soooo conducive to being fraud/grift I think…)
Politico just put out an article about how Dems have fallen way behind Republicans in social media spaces (which is true) but most of the article cited X subscriber numbers and I'm like "pretty sure Twitter/X isn't where one can grab the pulse of the electorate anymore", especially with the infiltration of foreign bots.
Yeah, the reason it was so influential is because the entire fourth estate was on it. It’s not *not* going to have influence now, but it’s not going to be the same. I think about how Fox has massive influence but is also pretty clearly not “where it’s at.”
100%. and in a sense, I feel like Elon is prob representing very weird faction of online right - like not necessarily where “the cool kids are” but where bots, sickos and wackos are. In this sense, I think it’s prob very compatible with “we have to replace the elite with our elite” type of online right, which frankly is so wacky more than anything
Totally agree - I think a lot of journalists are still trapped in the mental model of Twitter = representative social media while the true issue is prob around YouTube/Podcast/TikTok
Someone else made this point recently and it makes so much sense. Circa 2020, journalists (and a big chunk of the Democratic Party/Dem consultants) saw how lefty Twitter had gotten, so they assumed there was a massive public groundswell for abolishing police and reparations and that almost nobody was bigoted against trans people. Now Twitter has become X, the Nazi Bar, and journalists think the average American is a nazi.
There also was MASSIVE support, if not for the policies supported by the protestors, at least the protest themselves and their rhetorical framing of the issue of police brutality. Whether this was because of genuine, if shallow, support, the Bradley effect, or something, the numbers did back it up, and it wasn't insane for people at the time to call it "a reckoning."
There's something of a chicken/egg phenomenon there. Media sees super lefty opinions on Twitter, covers protests sympathetically, public opinion moves in that direction. I would argue that the same thing has been happening since Musk took over Twitter, just toward nazis.
Obviously people were also influenced by actual events in 2020. I'm not saying the whole thing is a media invention. But I do think that both journalists and Dem consultants looked at Twitter in 2020 and incorrectly thought that the public was super duper lefty and should be pandered to with super lefty policies, and obviously the guy who ended up winning was Biden, who firmly positioned himself in that centrist lane from the start.
Yeah I agree w that - I think the way the media cover per se is prob less sympathetic as those nazi takes are not what a lot of journalists(most of them left of center) find agreeable unlike defund the police. That said, I think they treat it to be more popular than it actually is.
Also, I think Elon being the center figure of it def plays a role - he has more attention/influence than any other single figure on far left side.
Besides, there is symbiotic feedback loop between Elon and those groypers/nazis - like I felt like Elon started to lurk rightward around trans issues(his relationship w his kids) but he has embraced all those nazi/groyper stuff since then.
(I personally think this Elon stuff is a tragedy for everyone including him but he also is a great electoral asset for Democrats)
And while I think vibe shift is prob real to an extent but the “vibe shift” on twitter is very much manufactured.
And by the same token, I’d imagine a lot of GOP staffers and consultants make the same mistake… (esp considering a lot of them are prob actual groypers😇)
And while I think vibe shift is prob real to an extent but the “vibe shift” on twitter is very much manufactured.
Not really, it’s a product of libs/left leaving because they don’t like people having even a modicum of free speech - previously, Twitter (just like with Reddit, Youtube, TikTok, etc), the state of discourse was manufactured through mass censorship, which is easily evidenced by the “hate speech” rules.
It’s so depressing for me, as someone who prefers reading stuff to videos or podcasts, that Twitter does seem like the last bastion of written content online.
And this i think circles back to "what's wrong with the boys" - like 33% of American kids are below grade level for reading at eighth grade and that goes up to 40% for fourth grade.
And considering the academic disparity between genders, I would imagine those numbers are even worse for boys...
My timeline has been absolutely flooded with catfish tradwife and Elon babymama drama, so I am grateful for this hahaha. The Pickle Rick tweet had me chortling bc i am apparently a Reddit neckbeard from 2016.
Rick and Morty fans are the perfect amorphous blob of "people you hate." It's the guy with a neck tattoo at the vape shop, it's the fat neckbeard, it's the spooky kid at Hot Topic shopping for a personality, it's Elon Musk. It's like the new furries.
The show is actually quite funny and the meme is still great.
Think I saw someone on twitter describe Musk’s absent-billionaire-father-maxxing strategy as perfectly designed to produce a supervillain, that still seems right to me.
Aella honestly fascinates me. In the Whatever segment, she's clearly intelligent and knowledgeable but does seem to throw off some "on the spectrum" vibes. Whereas in her video from Hereticon she comes off as a polished if maybe casual presenter. I can't quite figure out which is more the public persona vs the authentic self. Also possible that the different environments lead to different expressions, of course.
My impression of reading her is that she’s smart but not a genius. But being above average intelligence and familiar with statistical concepts and adept and experienced at live media means she probably runs circles around guys who make a living yelling at only fans models
Agreed. Honestly if she wasn't a hot sex worker but instead an average nerdy guy who otherwise posted the same quality of writing and takes, she'd probably have a tenth (or even fewer) as many followers. A lot of what she says is pretty standard in rationalist/libertarian/contrarian discourse, but it's novel coming from a hot woman.
She says she wasn’t crying because she was traumatized. She was crying because she couldn’t provide a better experience for the men, each of whom only got five minutes with her.
In other words, she’s a submissive who cares more about her man than herself. Every wannabe Chad-trad-dad’s dream girl.
I really can’t tell if what you’re saying is satire? Cause damn “I cried because I couldn’t provide a better experience for the men” is such an obvious coping mechanism for someone in her position
I saw on Twitter that Ashley is actually married? And her husband is supportive of her having Elon's baby, apparently. So the Right Wingers are not only supportive of out of wedlock babies (if you are white) they are supportive of husbands being cucks (if the bady daddy is rich and they want their lives subsidized). WWJD indeed.
Going after someone whose twitter handle is "Patriarchy Hannah" is no more bullying than going after people whose handle is "White supremacy Patrick". She was spreading blatantly sexist ideology. She had no way of knowing how hard it *actually* is to give birth to 13 kids and home school them because she doesn't have kids.
Reading this roundup I always come away feeling out of the Twitter world but with a few smiles and a little bit of Twitter knowledge that admittedly has a half life that's pretty short. Thank you.
I’m so genuinely confused and concerned about the women around Musk. Grimes had THREE kids in about as many years - and they were at least actually together! I can’t fathom the experience of St. Claire. Why is everyone so (apparently) eager to get pregnant?
I guess when you’re at a certain level of money and power the way you look at the world is just beyond plebs but idgi.
It just seems like there's a (likely small) minority of women who really, deeply want to have sex with extremely powerful men and bear their children, and will set aside all other values to do so.
But from what I've read about Musk, yeah I'd also be concerned that he pressured these women (to the point of emotional abuse) to have so many kids so quickly. His pre-Grimes partners have described him as selfish and toxic.
It's one of those things which I can imagine as a sort of semi-conscious urge which, coupled w/ a certain personality and situation, can lead to weird behavior. Like one could say a reason I have an addictive personality is partly bc ADHD, and "not being satiated/always seeking more of The Experience" is probably a more helpful trait as a hunter gatherer - but like ultimately that's not how I conceptualized my decision to get another beer or w/e
Yeah Elon could probably throw tens of millions at you without a second thought, which would negate a lot of the downsides of being a single mom (you could not work or hire a nanny, send your kid to fancy tutors, etc).
Yeah it'd make sense to me if someone was the post-trad-wife that believes that Genghis Khan'ing it is good for the Race, that sort of ideological commitment I can grasp.
I think I just don't have enough experience with money, maybe. I can't imagine going through pregnancy and single motherhood for that, esp. when I'm already doing fine.
I will never understand the mental gymnastics it must take to believe in an evil ultra-powerful shadowy left-wing Cabal pulling all the strings that let Trump become President twice
most retarded take ever when God is on your side, loser.
Given his approach to Israel and Ukraine, i don't think it's a left wing conspiracy, i think he cut a deal with the centrist blob to be allowed to retake power if he didn't screw up the blob's core foreign policy interests. I'm betting on strikes on Iran + a more hawkish outcome on Ukraine that he is currently signaling.
No but let's hope I'm wrong re: Iran
Sure, that's how they are posturing. What matters is what the policy outcomes are, not the constant noise and distraction thrown off by Trump. It's not gymnastics to ignore what Trump says and instead pay attention to what the admin actually does - Trump deliberately shapes the media cycle to distract both his base and his opposition, hence all the static on Greenland and Canada when he's been pushing through a bunch of cabinet appointees.
On Israel, for me it's hard to see any meaningful daylight between the Biden and Trump approach to Israel given Biden ratified the embassy moving to Jerusalem and kept arming Israel during their efforts to dismantle Hamas, but I'm not saying that in an argumentative or assertive way - what differences do you see?
I have a hard time blaming Trump for killing the two-state solution - my view is that it died because Arafat rejected it, which happened bc Hamas would have murdered him if he accepted it. That's also why it was rejected in 2008 post-Arafat when Barak made a second offer. Palestinians were very anti-Oslo even before 10/7: https://www.pcpsr.org/en/node/955
Lori Lightfoot was the president of my law school class and she definitely exudes main character energy. I didn't love her as mayor, but she is freaking smart and driven and always was nice to talk to.
Thank you for reporting the sh*thole named X - and I increasingly feel like X (and online rightwing/manosphere space) has become the marketplace for grifts and cons.
And Sunday morning brain led me to a conclusion that this is one sad example of “What’s wrong with Boys”… (i.e. resentment and struggle in the education are soooo conducive to being fraud/grift I think…)
Politico just put out an article about how Dems have fallen way behind Republicans in social media spaces (which is true) but most of the article cited X subscriber numbers and I'm like "pretty sure Twitter/X isn't where one can grab the pulse of the electorate anymore", especially with the infiltration of foreign bots.
Yeah, the reason it was so influential is because the entire fourth estate was on it. It’s not *not* going to have influence now, but it’s not going to be the same. I think about how Fox has massive influence but is also pretty clearly not “where it’s at.”
100%. and in a sense, I feel like Elon is prob representing very weird faction of online right - like not necessarily where “the cool kids are” but where bots, sickos and wackos are. In this sense, I think it’s prob very compatible with “we have to replace the elite with our elite” type of online right, which frankly is so wacky more than anything
Totally agree - I think a lot of journalists are still trapped in the mental model of Twitter = representative social media while the true issue is prob around YouTube/Podcast/TikTok
Someone else made this point recently and it makes so much sense. Circa 2020, journalists (and a big chunk of the Democratic Party/Dem consultants) saw how lefty Twitter had gotten, so they assumed there was a massive public groundswell for abolishing police and reparations and that almost nobody was bigoted against trans people. Now Twitter has become X, the Nazi Bar, and journalists think the average American is a nazi.
There also was MASSIVE support, if not for the policies supported by the protestors, at least the protest themselves and their rhetorical framing of the issue of police brutality. Whether this was because of genuine, if shallow, support, the Bradley effect, or something, the numbers did back it up, and it wasn't insane for people at the time to call it "a reckoning."
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/05/us/politics/polling-george-floyd-protests-racism.html
There's something of a chicken/egg phenomenon there. Media sees super lefty opinions on Twitter, covers protests sympathetically, public opinion moves in that direction. I would argue that the same thing has been happening since Musk took over Twitter, just toward nazis.
Obviously people were also influenced by actual events in 2020. I'm not saying the whole thing is a media invention. But I do think that both journalists and Dem consultants looked at Twitter in 2020 and incorrectly thought that the public was super duper lefty and should be pandered to with super lefty policies, and obviously the guy who ended up winning was Biden, who firmly positioned himself in that centrist lane from the start.
Yeah I agree w that - I think the way the media cover per se is prob less sympathetic as those nazi takes are not what a lot of journalists(most of them left of center) find agreeable unlike defund the police. That said, I think they treat it to be more popular than it actually is.
Also, I think Elon being the center figure of it def plays a role - he has more attention/influence than any other single figure on far left side.
Besides, there is symbiotic feedback loop between Elon and those groypers/nazis - like I felt like Elon started to lurk rightward around trans issues(his relationship w his kids) but he has embraced all those nazi/groyper stuff since then.
(I personally think this Elon stuff is a tragedy for everyone including him but he also is a great electoral asset for Democrats)
Yeah exactly.
And while I think vibe shift is prob real to an extent but the “vibe shift” on twitter is very much manufactured.
And by the same token, I’d imagine a lot of GOP staffers and consultants make the same mistake… (esp considering a lot of them are prob actual groypers😇)
I do, at some point, expect a "that's not what we voted for" backlash, even if the Dems seem determined to mount zero effective opposition.
Yeah I think this is already taking shape - I think what Lakshya Jain said were like
1. Musk’s support is already underwater and deteriorating very quickly
2. Electorally savvy politicians adopted “we didn’t elect this nut job billionaire to slash Medicare”
Trump’s support itself is also going down even if it’s not as rapid as Musk’s
And while I think vibe shift is prob real to an extent but the “vibe shift” on twitter is very much manufactured.
Not really, it’s a product of libs/left leaving because they don’t like people having even a modicum of free speech - previously, Twitter (just like with Reddit, Youtube, TikTok, etc), the state of discourse was manufactured through mass censorship, which is easily evidenced by the “hate speech” rules.
It’s so depressing for me, as someone who prefers reading stuff to videos or podcasts, that Twitter does seem like the last bastion of written content online.
Isn't this place now the last bastion of written content?
Ah, but Twitter is the last bastion of free written content!
Any ideas about why videos and podcasts seem so much less likely to be paywalled? Are ads more profitable there?
yeah...
I am in the same boat...
And this i think circles back to "what's wrong with the boys" - like 33% of American kids are below grade level for reading at eighth grade and that goes up to 40% for fourth grade.
And considering the academic disparity between genders, I would imagine those numbers are even worse for boys...
No wonder they prefer podcasts or videos...
My timeline has been absolutely flooded with catfish tradwife and Elon babymama drama, so I am grateful for this hahaha. The Pickle Rick tweet had me chortling bc i am apparently a Reddit neckbeard from 2016.
Pickle Rick was funny and people were haters
Rick and Morty fans are the perfect amorphous blob of "people you hate." It's the guy with a neck tattoo at the vape shop, it's the fat neckbeard, it's the spooky kid at Hot Topic shopping for a personality, it's Elon Musk. It's like the new furries.
The show is actually quite funny and the meme is still great.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ESN9DNcWoAAlz7v.jpg
Think I saw someone on twitter describe Musk’s absent-billionaire-father-maxxing strategy as perfectly designed to produce a supervillain, that still seems right to me.
Aella honestly fascinates me. In the Whatever segment, she's clearly intelligent and knowledgeable but does seem to throw off some "on the spectrum" vibes. Whereas in her video from Hereticon she comes off as a polished if maybe casual presenter. I can't quite figure out which is more the public persona vs the authentic self. Also possible that the different environments lead to different expressions, of course.
My impression of reading her is that she’s smart but not a genius. But being above average intelligence and familiar with statistical concepts and adept and experienced at live media means she probably runs circles around guys who make a living yelling at only fans models
Agreed. Honestly if she wasn't a hot sex worker but instead an average nerdy guy who otherwise posted the same quality of writing and takes, she'd probably have a tenth (or even fewer) as many followers. A lot of what she says is pretty standard in rationalist/libertarian/contrarian discourse, but it's novel coming from a hot woman.
Aella has been quite open about her autism, and says it might explain why she cares less about cultural taboos than most people.
In case anyone is curious about Lily Phillips, here is a recent interview where she pushed back on claims she is damaged.
https://youtu.be/LmMR53J8SAY?si=cDokF9DMbtszO_G_
She says she wasn’t crying because she was traumatized. She was crying because she couldn’t provide a better experience for the men, each of whom only got five minutes with her.
In other words, she’s a submissive who cares more about her man than herself. Every wannabe Chad-trad-dad’s dream girl.
I really can’t tell if what you’re saying is satire? Cause damn “I cried because I couldn’t provide a better experience for the men” is such an obvious coping mechanism for someone in her position
I’m just reporting what she said.
I saw on Twitter that Ashley is actually married? And her husband is supportive of her having Elon's baby, apparently. So the Right Wingers are not only supportive of out of wedlock babies (if you are white) they are supportive of husbands being cucks (if the bady daddy is rich and they want their lives subsidized). WWJD indeed.
Going after someone whose twitter handle is "Patriarchy Hannah" is no more bullying than going after people whose handle is "White supremacy Patrick". She was spreading blatantly sexist ideology. She had no way of knowing how hard it *actually* is to give birth to 13 kids and home school them because she doesn't have kids.
Aella is disgusting though
Love when Elon has another baby and everyone starts posting Extremely Normal about IVF. Feels really cool and good and not bad at all.
Update on the Ashley St. Clair situation - https://www.reddit.com/r/MarkMyWords/comments/1ir1h6e/mmw_ashley_st_clair_will_cause_a_massive_pr/
“Objectively the best sperm”??
I am a little surprised this didn't make the cut: an X thread comparing Musk's baby mama's to historical imperial Chinese concubines: https://x.com/AngelicaOung/status/1890976518748467682
Reading this roundup I always come away feeling out of the Twitter world but with a few smiles and a little bit of Twitter knowledge that admittedly has a half life that's pretty short. Thank you.
I’m so genuinely confused and concerned about the women around Musk. Grimes had THREE kids in about as many years - and they were at least actually together! I can’t fathom the experience of St. Claire. Why is everyone so (apparently) eager to get pregnant?
I guess when you’re at a certain level of money and power the way you look at the world is just beyond plebs but idgi.
It just seems like there's a (likely small) minority of women who really, deeply want to have sex with extremely powerful men and bear their children, and will set aside all other values to do so.
But from what I've read about Musk, yeah I'd also be concerned that he pressured these women (to the point of emotional abuse) to have so many kids so quickly. His pre-Grimes partners have described him as selfish and toxic.
It's one of those things which I can imagine as a sort of semi-conscious urge which, coupled w/ a certain personality and situation, can lead to weird behavior. Like one could say a reason I have an addictive personality is partly bc ADHD, and "not being satiated/always seeking more of The Experience" is probably a more helpful trait as a hunter gatherer - but like ultimately that's not how I conceptualized my decision to get another beer or w/e
Child support payments from the richest man in the world? “Smart genes” if you believe in that sort of thing?
This, I don't understand why people don't understand. Women do this with pro athletes constantly.
Yeah Elon could probably throw tens of millions at you without a second thought, which would negate a lot of the downsides of being a single mom (you could not work or hire a nanny, send your kid to fancy tutors, etc).
I obviously have no idea, but I would imagine any deal for a large sum wouldn’t be public.
Yeah it'd make sense to me if someone was the post-trad-wife that believes that Genghis Khan'ing it is good for the Race, that sort of ideological commitment I can grasp.
I think I just don't have enough experience with money, maybe. I can't imagine going through pregnancy and single motherhood for that, esp. when I'm already doing fine.