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Theory as to the root cause of the Great Awokening


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2020 Jun 15, 4:03pm   826 views  7 comments

by Hircus   ➕follow (1)   💰tip   ignore  

These past 10-20 years in America have been very "odd", and for a while I've suspected that social media and general internet connectedness contributed greatly to it. Mainly, because I feel like people look to their peers for values, morals, opinions, and validation of opinions, and social media has greatly changed our "group of peers".

Today I found a relevant story about some psychological tactics used by China long ago, that happen to draw strong parallels to what might be going on here. He's not implicating China.

It's about ~25 tweets long.
https://twitter.com/0x49fa98/status/1272180537541656577

edit - heres an easier to read format: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1272180537541656577.html


TLDR - Humans goto GREAT lengths to make sure their words and actions are consistent with what they've said and done in the past. Virtue signaling on social media broadcasts to large audiences, creating a feedback loop of ever increasing virtue signaling to remain consistent with the growing number of documented and easily searched statements one has made in the past. The effectiveness is not from peer pressure, but rather, the author truly believes their own metamorphosis.

Comments 1 - 7 of 7        Search these comments

1   stereotomy   2020 Jun 15, 5:39pm  

Very interesting. I've always been cautious about being publicly identified on the web. That article cements my suspicions, in the sense that once your (now unfashionable) comments are pubic record, they are prima facie evidence for "thought crimes" in your future show trial.

Thanks for that insight.
2   MisdemeanorRebel   2020 Jun 15, 5:57pm  

I have never used my real name on the web, or in the BBS days.
3   ignoreme   2020 Jun 15, 7:08pm  

There’s other forces at play. You rarely see anti abortion posts on Facebook but can find anti cop posts everywhere now. Whatever it is, saying abortion is murder gets you shamed but saying cops are racists gets you praised. Somebody is pulling the strings.
4   GreaterNYCDude   2020 Jun 15, 7:13pm  

Interesting. Psychological warfare is most devious when the target doesn't realize he's being manipulated until its too late... if ever.
5   PeopleUnited   2020 Jun 15, 7:14pm  

Some of the things they force kids to write in school are just like what is described in pow camps.
6   Ceffer   2020 Jun 15, 7:53pm  

I don't think this would work on women. They flip back and forth and change their minds all the time.
7   Patrick   2020 Jun 15, 8:59pm  

Damn, that is a good essay.


The big things to understand here are
1) when you see yourself doing something, you change your self-image to include "I am a person who does that thing"
2) when you think others see you a certain way, the same.
3) you will act in ways that are consistent with your self-image
So in light of that, please consider how being a user of Social Media, especially real-name social media, is structurally identical to being a prisoner in a Chinese POW camp during the Korean war.
When you endorse a cause on social media, the rewards are worthless. Tiny rewards mean that you will not perceive your statements as being coerced, you will own them. And yet, the public eye puts pressure on you to say things that are pro-social in a very particular way
Most people want to appear compassionate. A political slogan, a bleeding heart story, these things that you spread virally, they change your self-image. And they leave you with evidence, public evidence, that you are the kind of person who speaks out about "systemic oppression"
Social media created the feedback loop that drove everyone mad with social justice. Just like in the Chinese camp, the subtle but constant pressure to make cheap moralistic statements resulted in mass conversions. I believe this is the true cause of the "great awokening"

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