I have since I was a kid been reading articles about "brainwashing." There have been some famous movies about it, such as The Manchurian Candidate or funnier ones such as The President's Analyst.
Some people apparently want to be brainwashed, otherwise we wouldn't have all these psycho "religious" cults. What did people get out these things? Community, meaning, purpose, certainty - even if they are Dwellers in the Mirage.
There is an old saying: "The map is not the terrain." The maps in our heads - the ideas in our heads - are not reality. The closer the ideas are to reality, the better they work. The worse they are, the worse they work.
I am a critic of the Manosphere, and have found the fanatics (who appear to be in their 20s and naive) think the ideas in the Manosphere are reality. In reality they're ideas imposed on reality.
Believers really think Alphas and Betas really exist, or shit tests, or the rest of that nonsense, and when opposing ideas are introduced, their minds shut up tighter than clams. This is called Cognitive Dissonance, and it hurts. Since their beliefs are false, they only have two defenses: ad hominem and rationalization.
The hallucinations are getting even weirder - "lower Betas," "upper Betas." They quite literally are hallucinations because they don't exist in reality. Greek letters describing reality?
They know nothing of what the Bible, a repository of great wisdom about men and women, says about them. They know nothing of Marcus Aurelius, or Rudyard Kipling, or St. Augustine, or Thomas Aquinas, or Julius Evola. Nothing.
How did these happen? They were never taught how men are supposed to act, they were never allowed to be boys, they were never allowed to play the way boys are supposed to play.
They were raised without fathers and by stupid women who didn't know shit. I've seen this many times.
They're clueless, lost and wandering, and when they run across the simplistic, easy-to-understand ideas in the Manosphere, they fall for them, since they never developed any analytical abilities - just like most women. Instead they get hysterical and insulting - just like women. They engage in herd behavior - just like women.
It is as clear as can be that the vast majority of those who believe the ideas in the Manosphere and think they have found the Keys to the Kingdom were raised with weak/nonexistent fathers, single mothers who didn't know what they hell they were doing, public schools run by dipshit women, a society that denigrates boys and elevates girls - and I have seen this many times.
When you're raised like that, you end up paranoid, thinking everyone is out to get you - just like the movie clip above.
"Fanatic narcissist (including paranoid features) - An individual whose self-esteem was severely arrested during childhood, who usually displays major paranoid tendencies, and who holds on to an illusion of omnipotence. These people are fighting delusions of insignificance and lost value, and trying to re-establish their self-esteem through grandiose fantasies and self-reinforcement." - Wikipedia
19 comments:
Well I think the 'sphere is going to collapse in on itself under the weight of its own stupidity, eventually. I had an awesome debate yesterday with Vox Day about the perils of immunization! He seems to think it is an attack on freedom and the individual's body and a health HAZARD - and that there is a conspiracy to hush it all up by the entire medical profession. HAR HAR HAR! I was told that if I wanted to debate the issue I was not allowed to refer to established science, (it was all corrupt and untrustworthy) and that if I did I would be banned! I'm still laughing about it. On Voice For Men some fuggin paki was saying the shooting of that feral chimp in Ferguson by the white cop - was an attack on all men! When I called that for the stupidity it was, some anorexic female mod took me to task, and then another elderly hippy with a goatee told me that they discuss a wide variety of issues there and if I didn't agree I could just get the eff out! I left, chuckling to myself. A Voice For Idiots would be a more apt title for that one. The manosphere IS a great source for high comedy and no bones about it!
I suppose we should be happy about a couple things though. These poseurs and poltroons, the bloviates and blusterers...they all at least realize that we DO have a serious problem - both with our men AND our women. Our society and culture is ill too - one only need to look at the piece of crap in the Whitehouse.
They will get there, Bob. They were not raised by better people in better times as we were. They will have to make their mistakes and learn from them just as we did.
So what's the answer, Bob? Where are guys supposed to learn this stuff? Who is going to teach them? How are they supposed to learn it?
Men who are around 10 to 30 years younger than you (you're around 55 or so) didn't get formed up properly. Okaaaay. How, and where, and through what, are they supposed to learn it?
They're not going to learn from much of the Manosphere. I've said many times before someone like Roissy is a wimp and a liar. And a nihilist and a hedonist. I know his kind (read the Memoirs of Casanova to see how the dynamics work). And yet his site is enormous. Because he's seen as a mentor and because his readers are seduced by his style.
Same with Roosh. Same with Krauser.
Answers are meaningless if no one listens.
Yes, there is good advice in the Manosphere. The problem is to sift the good from the bad. And that will never happen with a closed mind.
Sooner or later the problems will sort themselves out. They always do, and there is always some pain involved.
I know this from personal experience.
So, the answer is....
Just get it, just figure it out for yourself?
I was told that if I wanted to debate the issue I was not allowed to refer to established science, (it was all corrupt and untrustworthy) and that if I did I would be banned!
I read that conversation, Glen, and you're exactly the type of person Bob is talking about. All emotion, no facts. You should actually read the studies you cite, btw.
Yes, Glen, you're right. Like Franklin said, "Experience keeps a dear school, yet Fools will learn in no other."
Good advice is there, but it just goes in one ear and out the other.
They'd rather pretend they're Alphas spinning plates.
So.. you don't like the PUA wing of the Manosphere. The funny thing about this is that PUAs are the ones who have catalogued and codified much of the current understanding of modern day female conduct -- everything from the kinds of men women find attractive, to the kinds of men they date, to the kinds of men they marry, to their conduct in marriage, to women's various social and sexual pathologies. Nearly all of that has come from PUAs, and has been adapted for use in LTRs and marriages.
Yes, it is true that none of this is new. It's all been said before -- The Bible, Schopenhauer, Kipling, Aquinas. Ok, fine. Perhaps these should be used as source material, then. But what the PUAs have codified and set out is better than what we have now, which is as you said -- moms who don't know shit, weak/nonexistent fathers, and public schools that relentlessly pussify and degrade boys. Would you agree?
They're not going to learn from much of the Manosphere.
I disagree. You can learn a lot from the manosphere. But, it's like any other type of education. There's theory and there's practice. Some people like to stay in the relative comfort of theory. Everything is so certain there. It's safe. Unassailable. It's especially comforting after having your entire world turned upside down in regards to gender relations. But we all have to leave the nest sometime to put what we learn into practice. See what works, see what doesn't and synthesize our own insights. Then return to the manosphere and pass those insights on to others.
Deti,
No one figures it out by themselves. That is impossible. There is good advice, but many don't listen.
And yes, I know what women are like, for good and bad. And men, too.
These days, women are worse. I ceased caring what most think a long time ago.
I tell them I don't exist to serve them. The exist to serve and support men. And some smile and accept that because they know it's true.
Others will try to destroy men for saying such a thing. But I have found that comment separates the wheat from the chaff.
Bob, I get that you think they're not going to learn it in the Manosphere.
Then WHERE? Should they read the Bible, Schopenhauer, Kipling and Aquinas? Then once they read that, then what? Just get it? Just figure it out for themselves?
so.... you're saying that men need to tell women that they're there to serve men? They just need to "man up"?
I know YOU understand how women are. I know YOU get that. That's my point -- most men DON'T understand it. I keep asking this. Where are they supposed to learn it? If not from the manosphere, then from where? And who else other than in the sphere is out there teaching it? Who is going to show them, if, as you concede, "No one figures it out by themselves. That is impossible."?
You said: "There is good advice, but many don't listen." WHERE is that good advice? Where can one avail himself of that "good advice" that no one is listening to?
Who is dispensing that "good advice" that no one is listening to?
"See what works, see what doesn't and synthesize our own insights. Then return to the manosphere and pass those insights on to others."
Exactly. There is no way to avoid the pain. But it passes.
Again, separate the wheat from the chaff. Between what makes your life worse and what makes it better.
Who's dispensing the advice few listen to? Since this is the West, I suggest people read the Bible, since there is an enormous amount of accumulated wisdom about the worst and best of people. And yet I get many comments about "books written by cave dwellers" other such things. Their loss, I tell them.
"separate the wheat from the chaff. Between what makes your life worse and what makes it better."
So.... Just get it, just figure it out for yourself?
Look, I'm asking this in good faith here. You're a critic of the Manosphere. You say there's good and bad; that some is OK and some is crap. But when I get all the way down to what you're saying, it's "figure it out for yourself".
If that's the answer, then that's the answer, and that's fine. I want to make sure I understand where you're coming from with your criticisms.
Frankly, Bob, guys in the manosphere ARE doing what you're saying -- trying to "figure it out for themselves". They're there because what they HAD been doing, what society and everyone else TOLD them to do -- pedestalize, supplicate, "Just be Nice", "Just be Yourself" -- wasn't working, and they knew it wasn't working. They read. They write. They exchange information. They learn, they change, they apply, they give reports on what is better and what is worse.
What more can one expect them to do? What more can ANYONE expect them to do? What more are they supposed to do?
Frankly, Bob, guys in the manosphere ARE doing what you're saying
Exactly. My argument supports the idea that the manosphere is necessary because, right now, there's no other place to get that information. If it were to disappear tomorrow, the "wheat" would be drowned out by the chaff of mainstream culture. The sources Bob cites are good ones, but humans are hard wired to prefer recent information over old. Even if it's just the old information told in a slightly different way (ie: the 49 laws of power is just a retelling of machiavelli) it captures more attention.
Deti,
Whether or not you believe it, you have become a mentor.I get it in real life, too. A lot. So, one must be careful about what one says, because people will believe you.
Let's put it this way: what would you teach your boys? Would you use Manosphere concepts and terminology? Or would you try it another way?
Bob:
I'm not a mentor. I'm just a guy who has opinions based on what I've read and based on what I've experienced in life, looking back over the long arc of it.
Whether I'd use Manosphere terminology is one thing. The concepts are mostly sound, being based on human nature and extensive observation, in my view.
As of right now, no one understands actual ground conditions, actual existing market conditions, better than the PUA/player and Christomanosphere wings. But that's just my opinion. Should the Bible be used as source material? You bet. Same for your other sources.
Is there whining in the manosphere? Sure. That's the "pain" you're talking about. What you are seeing there are men going through the pain of growing up. They're enduring a process that should have been complete by age 18, but as you've pointed out, they're going through it now because they never learned it as boys.
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