Toxoplasmosis of Rage :: Analysis of the activism of lies
December 28, 2014 at 7:40 pm
(This post was last modified: December 28, 2014 at 9:56 pm by Autumnlicious.)
I was forwarded this by a friend of mine and I found it most enlightening.
It is called "Toxoplasmosis of Rage"
http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the...a-of-rage/
One thing I've found persistently horrendous about people who believe similarly to myself is the proclivity to outrage and stupidity, as well as the tendency in general for people to close ranks at the drop of a hat.
A powerful example would be over the seriousness of rape and the cause to investigate it as fully as one can. Most, if not the overwhelming majority, of Americans believe that rape is a crime. However, given a small set of conditions and we can split the majority into disparate camps.
Consider the rape allegations shamefully put forth by Rolling Stone, illustrating a dubious (and long-cold) case of campus sexual battery and reshaping it into a narrative of conspiracy, improper procedures with the boogeymen many people hate: "fraternities".
As it happens, "Jackie" (the name of the woman puppeteered by Rolling Stone) changes her story from time to time and her close friends (who have come forth) are outraged and hurt. They dispute her claims heavily. And as the facts of the case came out, it becomes increasingly unlikely that the narrative cannot be -- there was no fraternity event, the claimed assailant was not part of said fraternity or even near the place at the date of the alleged crime, etc,.
Here, the spectre is raised that it may all be a fraud. With increasingly weak evidence and claims, the general public should pull back from conclusions. After all, in the lack of evidence, even ordinary claims cannot be considered credible.
That didn't happen, and predictably polarization set in.
I wondered why. Why didn't Rolling Stone, if they were so serious about tackling rape, pick a more credible person? Granted, many rapes, like most crime, aren't full of drama and conspiracy, but they still deserve justice.
Slate Star Codex puts forth the metaphor of Moloch, an anthropomorphic representation of division and chaotic interactions between groups.
Given the discussion being had on "privilege" (such a hard to define word...), I figured this may better shed light onto:
1. Why we get this polarizing shitfests
2. Why Tumblr sucks by design
3. Why our political system and civil discourse is punctuated by fabrications instead of banal but illustrative cases of injustice
It is called "Toxoplasmosis of Rage"
http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/12/17/the...a-of-rage/
One thing I've found persistently horrendous about people who believe similarly to myself is the proclivity to outrage and stupidity, as well as the tendency in general for people to close ranks at the drop of a hat.
A powerful example would be over the seriousness of rape and the cause to investigate it as fully as one can. Most, if not the overwhelming majority, of Americans believe that rape is a crime. However, given a small set of conditions and we can split the majority into disparate camps.
Consider the rape allegations shamefully put forth by Rolling Stone, illustrating a dubious (and long-cold) case of campus sexual battery and reshaping it into a narrative of conspiracy, improper procedures with the boogeymen many people hate: "fraternities".
As it happens, "Jackie" (the name of the woman puppeteered by Rolling Stone) changes her story from time to time and her close friends (who have come forth) are outraged and hurt. They dispute her claims heavily. And as the facts of the case came out, it becomes increasingly unlikely that the narrative cannot be -- there was no fraternity event, the claimed assailant was not part of said fraternity or even near the place at the date of the alleged crime, etc,.
Here, the spectre is raised that it may all be a fraud. With increasingly weak evidence and claims, the general public should pull back from conclusions. After all, in the lack of evidence, even ordinary claims cannot be considered credible.
That didn't happen, and predictably polarization set in.
I wondered why. Why didn't Rolling Stone, if they were so serious about tackling rape, pick a more credible person? Granted, many rapes, like most crime, aren't full of drama and conspiracy, but they still deserve justice.
Slate Star Codex puts forth the metaphor of Moloch, an anthropomorphic representation of division and chaotic interactions between groups.
Quote:Under Moloch, everyone is irresistably incentivized to ignore the things that unite us in favor of forever picking at the things that divide us in exactly the way that is most likely to make them more divisive. Race relations are at historic lows not because white people and black people disagree on very much, but because the media absolutely worked its tuchus off to find the single issue that white people and black people disagreed over the most and ensure that it was the only issue anybody would talk about. Men’s rights activists and feminists hate each other not because there’s a huge divide in how people of different genders think, but because only the most extreme examples of either side will ever gain traction, and those only when they are framed as attacks on the other side.
Given the discussion being had on "privilege" (such a hard to define word...), I figured this may better shed light onto:
1. Why we get this polarizing shitfests
2. Why Tumblr sucks by design
3. Why our political system and civil discourse is punctuated by fabrications instead of banal but illustrative cases of injustice
Slave to the Patriarchy no more
