What if the FBI is as woke as it appears? By the Z-Man. Hits the really big nail firmly on the head.
One of the questions no one in the media plans to ask is why the FBI was so deeply involved in the Twitter disinformation campaigns? …
Presumably, the FBI was not just involved with Twitter, but with all of the big social media companies. … Victor Davis Hanson took a stab at cataloging some of their activity. He does not get into their plots to entrap people in various capers like the Gretchen Whitmer case. Then there is their involvement in the January 6 protests at the Capitol.
This is a massive effort, but to what end?
The standard conservative explanation doesn’t cut it:
Paul Gottfried suggests the primary motivation is power politics. “I’m still trying to figure out where the close alliance between surveillance agencies and the woke Left, which has been evident since at least the Obama Administration, may lead. I have no doubt this friendship is based more on power considerations than ideological affinity.” The assumption here is that the FBI does not really believe the crazy things they are saying.
Gottfried’s position is the standard conservative position that has been the default for more than half a century when dealing with the Left. Conservatives assume that there is no way these people believe what they are saying. Instead, they are motivated by a more sensible reason like money or power. Conservatives tend to be practical people, so they assume people are motivated by practical reasons. They cannot accept that these people genuinely believe what they are saying.
What if they believe it, because of ideological tribalism?
What if the FBI is as woke as it appears? What if the people at the top of the military, the people pushing the DIE agenda throughout the ranks, really are as antiwhite and generally insane as they sound? Talk to anyone in the services and they will tell you that the officer corps makes corporate America look old fashioned. Every FBI agent is sent to the ADL for brainwashing, so the selection pressure strongly favors the sorts of people who believe in the woke conspiracy theories. …
What if the managerial class, having become self-aware at the end of the Cold War, has simply landed on what we call wokeness as its binding agent? What if adherence to one of these illogical and unnatural fads is simply the way people inside signal their status and commitment to others? Many, if not most, do not honestly believe this stuff, but as social animals they do what they believe is necessary to be in the group and enhance their status opportunities in the group. …
They do it for all the reasons ambitious people do things. They want to increase their status. …
That means no amount of facts and reason could change their minds, because they assume that everyone around them is genuinely woke on the latest things.
In fact, knowing the truth, so to speak, makes life more dangerous for them in their social milieu.
Explains the fanaticism:
This would explain the fanaticism of these people. If they were cocksure of their beliefs, they would have little reason to proselytize. The obviousness of their claims would be enough, so there would be no need for enforcement.
On the other hand, if these people are riddled with doubt, but sure most around them are true believers, then stamping out all contrary opinion and the people who present those contrary opinions is the most rational way of defending themselves within the group.
The “group belief” option seems to comport with observation. The people policing the borders for dissent always frame their actions in terms of self-defense. The Twitter censors were “protecting” fellow believers from “misinformation” and “stochastic violence” on the platform. When what others think you believe determines membership in the whole, it is not a big leap from there to believing that anything that causes doubt or questions belief is a threat to your existence.
Explains the changing of direction like a school of fish:
The other thing the group belief option does is explain how easily these people flit from one set of beliefs to another. The people bellowing “my body, my choice!” quickly shifted to bellowing “take the vax bigot” during Covid. Not only did they not see the irrationality of both positions, but they were blind to the contradictions. The reason is the content in these slogans is not what matters. In fact, it is meaningless. What matters is what the slogans signal to the person’s social environment.
Explains the cultish behavior from otherwise capable people:
This approach answers the “woke buddy” question. Everyone has at least one person in their life who is smart and capable, but he subscribes to the latest madness from the cult of modern liberalism. You can explain it to him and he will nod a long, but then go right back to spouting the latest madness.
The answer is that these noises are just group identification. Like a cult member facing deprogramming, he says what he must to break free, but remains in the mental space of the cult. …
Not really about facts and logic, is it?
This may be why conservatives are loathe to consider the possibility that these people really believe this stuff. If that becomes clear, then the conservatives with the charts and graphs lose their value.
So postmodern. Truth doesn’t matter, merit is a social handicap, and the great mass of midwits set the direction. Today’s political environment has all the hallmarks of a leftist virtue-signalling spiral, set against a backdrop of gradually dropping average IQ and the re-emergence of tribalism. It is unsustainable.
