CuriousCat Archive Page 195 of 202

  1. That's a boring question, but how much did you like The Beginner's Guide? I know you did an entire video on the game, but I'm curious to know your more... "subjective" feelings on it.

    I sum up my emotional response to The Beginner's Guide in the end of the video, where I say I had a strong emotional reaction because it reminded me of a close friendship that went sour. It's hard to put that feeling into terms of liking or disliking it. I don't know that I enjoy having painful memories evoked, but it was a valuable experience, and I generally recommend playing the game to people who seem like it'd be their jam.

  2. Earlier you defined "Nazi" loosely as:

    "Anyone who works towards the creation of a white ethnostate"

    Yet, answering a different question about why assaulting "Nazis" is compatible with civil libertarianism you said: "Nazis don't believe in freedom of speech for anyone but Nazis"

    You must admit that it's at least hypothetically possible for Israel to exist without trampling on the rights of native palestinians? If white people all moved to the northeast, seceded from the union and just started paying nonwhites to leave, why would that require people's civil rights to be thrown aside? Are strong freedom of speech protections and advocacy for a white ethnostate not two completely compatible positions? Or maybe you just think it's practically implausible?

    You're hypothesizing a scenario where the Northeast could secede from the Union without violence, where tens of millions of non-white citizens could be displaced without violence, where enough money to pay tens of millions of people enough to move could be acquired without violence, and where a new all-white nation could open trade routes with the rest of the world and have a seat at the UN without getting violent.

    The things you are describing have never happened in all of recorded history and go against every shred of reliable data collected about white nationalists, so, yeah, I'd say it's implausible.

    What do you think happens to the Black folks in the Northeast who don't want to move? Do you think the white nationalists just say "oh well, guess we won't have our ethnostate now?" Do you think they just keep adding zeroes to the check until the Black folks say yes? Or do you think they just pay their police force to remove people forcibly, which is faster and cheaper?

  3. The prior answer you gave about nazipunching demands an obvious follow up question: Doesn't that justify punching all authoritarians, not just fascists? There is an entire socialists' club at my university. I have openly communist professors, who believe (at least ideologically) in the direct overthrow of our democracy and a repeal of most civil liberties. Nationwide, 18% of social science professors are poll as marxists, which is more than even poll as Republicans. Isn't punching these people a much more pressing issue than the fifty thousand or so genuine ethnonationalists there might be in the entire U.S.?

    fuck outta here with your "all Marxists believe in repealing civil liberties"

  4. Is it more OK for Hollywood to openly create and market entertainment to black people or women than white people or men? Is 'Waiting to Exhale' fundamentally different in having a black monoracial cast than 'The Witcher 3' is in having a white monoracial one?

    Yes and yes.

    I guess it can't be said enough: releasing a movie with an all-Black cast in a society in which white people hold most of the power is a different thing from releasing one with a mostly white cast. Context exists.

  5. So I agree that slippery slopes are bad, but where's the line between a slippery slope, and an argument that a certain thing will lead to other things? I've heard slippery slope invoked even when there's supporting evidence, but because it's all hypothetical it's called a slippery slope

    Slippery slope arguments aren't simply "A tends to lead to B," but, most often, "A *will always* lead to B, which *will always* lead to C, which *will always* lead to D." It's a chain of inevitable causality.

    I'm in perfect agreement that a lot of people enter racist radical politics through video games, but we need to acknowledge that this isn't inevitable, that it is only certain people, and that the politics aren't caused by the video games. There are serious problems with gamer culture that make it vulnerable to white nationalist recruiters, and we need to look clearly at what the problems actually are instead of grabbing the simple explanation that somehow the games themselves are to blame.

  6. What's an opinion that academics generally profesionally hold that you disagree with?

    I'm not convinced the author is ENTIRELY dead.

  7. Thanks for answering my question about my story! I think I was probably leaning on what you answered anyway. Do you know of anyone more qualified to talk about racial issues I can ask in an anonymous setting?

    Well, the thing I said was "hire someone," which is hard to do anonymously.

  8. I haven't seen Blade Runner, but I have read DADES. I thought it was pretty good. Should I watch the movie or nah?

    I haven't read the book, but I gather the movie is pretty different. It's worth seeing.

  9. As someone who endorses #punchanazi do you believe the 'I may not agree with you but will defend your right to say it' era is over for politics?

    Nazis don't believe in freedom of speech for anyone but Nazis, so punching Nazis is defending free speech. I will defend any opinion I disagree with that isn't about denying rights to other people. And any society that protects the speech of those who would strip it from others is not a democracy.

  10. The whole "I just only like writing about white people" sounds like the most transparent " I'm not racist but.." ever.
    In my case though I've been putting together a story for years in a casual way and only noticed after a few years that there's no real diversity in it (I didn't pay too much attention to this until a couple years ago)
    It's a fantasy story where through a little shift in the world building I can insert more diversity in looks but in terms of racism or other realities of the very concept of race I don't think it's wise to touch upon it in large detail (I'm not really qualified to talk about it much and I think from the reality of the concept of race it would require even MORE world building that might take away focus).
    I can insert side characters, change some side characters or even change one (or two) of the main characters but that seems like tokenism to me. I'm concerned about what good it would do. What would be a respectable way to deal with this?

    This is something I've heard a number of minoritized people discuss at conferences, and their advice is pretty straightforward:

    White people should INCLUDE non-white characters in their stories.

    White people should NOT writer stories ABOUT THE EXPERIENCE OF BEING A MINORITY. If you want to write ABOUT race, you should hire a POC cowriter.

    So, if it would take only a small change to make a number of your central characters diverse, do it! But you are not the right person to make a story ABOUT race.

    As for the worry of tokenism, the general rule of thumb is that, say, a Black person is not a token if there are several Black characters. Diversity means not just many races, but a plurality of unique people of each race.

  11. In your previous reply to a user, you referred to Nazis as those who intend for the creation of a white ethnostate through extreme authoritarian behaviour. However, what if it is for the support of another ethnostate- for example, the Hutu leaders in the Rwandan genocide. Surely they should be considered Nazis as well?

    The Nazis were white nationalists, so I use the word to refer to other white nationalists. The fact that I don't refer to every genocidal group as "Nazi" doesn't mean I'm condoning that group, but calling the Hutus Nazis seems like whataboutism.

  12. Is there a specific term for when someone creates a carve out in their racism or misogyny for people they know (e.g. "I don't believe sexual harassment claims, unless I know the victim.")? It feels like something akin to tokenism but that doesn't quite fit under the umbrella.

    Probably, but I don't know it off the top of my head.

  13. What do you mean, primarily, when you refer to the alt right? What do you mean when you refer to neo-nazis?

    I use "Nazi" in the colloquial sense to refer to anyone who works towards the creation of a white ethnostate. Many such people will insist that they are not Nazis because of some technicality that makes their white nationalism distinct from 1930's German white nationalism, but these distinctions are meaningless. "Nazi" has been a synecdoche for white nationalist groups and/or particularly authoritarian behavior ("grammar Nazi," "soup Nazi") for decades. The only people advocating for distinctions between different times of white nationalists are white nationalists, because Nazis have learned not to call themselves Nazis.

    "Alt-Right" is a bit squidgier of a term. In its original formulation, it was just a euphemism for white nationalist, and if that's all it still was I would just say Nazi. But by giving a more generic term for themselves, the Alt-Right made it easier to allow in people who do not explicitly embrace white nationalism, or, at least, are in denial about it. Creating those kinds of alliances by way of a vaguer label is what the euphemism was for. So "Alt-Right" refers to a broader range of reactionaries, mostly defined by different flavors of bigotry and more mobilized than bigoted movements have been in a while. The borders of that group are harder to define, especially because, again, many people who ally with the Alt-Right, empower the Alt-Right, and support all the same policies as the Alt-Right have learned not to publicly admit to being Alt-Right.

    For my purposes, I use "Alt-Right" to refer to the original white nationalist movement fronted by the likes of Richard Spencer and the groups that have, to some extent or another, helped or defended them. So, basically: Nazis, Nazi sympathizers, and Nazi collaborators.

  14. Music?

    Yes.

  15. will you ever make a discord server for your viewers? I honestly think you've curated a viewership that is incredibly insightful and wise on a variety of topics and would love to be a part of that, especially since it's a Patreon thing

    I'm on the fence about it. A number of patrons have expressed interest in it. The concern I have is that a Discord server or Slack channel tend to interest people because it gives them access to, well, me. And I've tried as hard as I'm able to keep "me" from being the product sold on my Patreon.

    You can gather from my first video essay that I have extremely mixed feelings about what it means for a person to have an audience of people over-invested in them as humans.

  16. is whiteness inherent and biological?

    Melanin is biological. Whiteness is a social construct.

  17. I just watched the final cut of Blade Runner for the first time. Do you think Deckard is a replicant or a human? Does it matter?

    Whether or not he's a replicant doesn't matter, what matters is that you wonder.

  18. Is it OK for white people to write books and movies with just white people in them, for no other reason than they like writing stories about other white people?

    I'm not here to say what is and isn't OK, but I can't think of any reason a white person would want to write stories with NOTHING but white people in them that wouldn't warrant a side-eye.

  19. do you listen to Chapo?

    No.

  20. What's the difference between a euphemism and a dogwhistle?

    Intended audience.

    In the case of racism, the intended audience for a dogwhistle is other racists. You're trying to communicate with them without non-racists realizing it.

    The intended audience for a euphemism is the non-racists. You're trying to get them onboard with a racist idea by convincing them it isn't racist.

    Many words and phrases function as both at the same time, but not all.

  21. how many words are you planning on adding to your twitter username?

    maybe after the wedding I can make it Ian Goddamn Crosby Lexicon Barnfire Danskin-Glover

  22. Would you rather watch all the transformers in a row or watch se7en seven days in a row?

    fuckin' transformers, easily

    se7en is a good movie, but fuck me I never need to watch it again

  23. How do we get the white working class to see themselves as the white /working/ class instead of the /white/ working class?

    A) The white working class has been trained to see themselves as superior to Black people for over 200 years. Their investment in whiteness lets them feel like they participate in the wealth of other whites even when they have basically none of it. Ask them to give up that investment in whiteness, you ask them to admit that they're poor. That is a big ask.

    B) The white working class did, in fact, vote Democrat to a larger degree than wealthy whites, and the narrative that the Dems need to focus on WWC voters has always been false. The WWC has a problem with possessive investment in whiteness, but it's not NEARLY as bad as with wealthy whites.

    C) I don't know how to get greater class solidarity across races short of creating more meaningful contact between them. White people tend to get less racist when they have more casual interactions with non-white people. So if your local DSA isn't doing much outreach to non-white communities, maybe that's something to work on.

  24. Not going to lie Ian, I see a difference in your content. Obviously the playbook is a much more political subject than your usual essay matter, but it's coming off as intensely partisan. I haven't done exceptional amounts of research into this series, but please understand this is the impression it has given me as a consumer.

    Did you realise this in your production of it, or is this a byproduct that you were unaware of?

    Of course it's partisan.

  25. You don't engage with anyone that ever so slightly disagrees with you or your views.

    I posed a question where you would have had to admit fault on your part for not thoroughly researching a topic and you didn't respond.

    You made a video about not engaging with the right but at the same time you say you hate it when people put you in a box in the never play defense video.

    So you're a huge hypocrite because you do the same thing, you peg people to be right wing or whatever else you hate, you put them in that box and then pretend you don't have to engage with them.

    What I say, pretty explicitly, in my videos is to not engage unless you know how to do so productively.

    Believe it or not, part of the lead up to The Alt-Right Playbook was spending years - YEARS - trying to have conversations with people on the Right and having absolutely nothing come of it, and, a decent percentage of the time, making things worse. My hope is to begin engaging with the Right again when I've figured out how to do it in a way that doesn't waste my time and energy and doesn't put anyone else at risk.

    If I didn't respond to your specific criticism, maybe it's not because you'd so thoroughly backed me into a corner, but because I thought your criticism was bullshit and not worth responding to. I'm not playing the game where I am invalid if I don't respond to every single criticism, one by one, no matter how irrelevant or tedious.

    Have a nice day.

  26. when are getting more of this content https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dr8aRR3Xt4M

    When I can fit in those pants again.

  27. What do you think of David Fincher and his films?

    Do you think he's overrated? Like a pretentious Michael Bay?

    I think he's about accurately rated.

    Comparing him to Michael Bay is a little odd, since most of his stuff isn't action and he's just so, so much more restrained.

  28. How do you find or pick which books you want to dive into for research?

    Wish I had a better answer, but I hear about them through cultural osmosis. I talk about politics and follow people who talk about politics, so it's common for someone to recommend me a book related to what I'm talking about, or for someone who said something smart to mention the book they got it from, and then I look it up and, if it sounds useful, add it to the list. Sometimes I check the sources on a video, article, or essay I found insightful.

    Which book on the list I pick at a given moment is a mix of stuff: What outstanding questions do I have after finishing the last book? What videos am I looking to make next, and which books are relevant to that? Which books seem to be the best-written?

    For non-political research, the process is more mundane. I google a subject I want to look into and see what the best-sounding book(s) on that subject is/are. Extra points if they have a copy at the library.

  29. How much do you trust your academic institutions?

    I don't *trust* most institutions. But a healthy distrust doesn't mean I don't find value in some of them. My experience with the college I eventually graduated from was incredibly positive, but that's in spite of the myriad, serious problems with my school as an institution.

  30. Apologies if you've already clarified this, but in response to an earlier question, you referred to liberals and Leftists as separate entities (or so it seemed). If so, what is the distinction you make between the two, and how might all of us who are on the left side of politics start to better cooperate and form a more unified front?

    Super broadly speaking:

    Liberals = establishment Democrats.
    Leftists = socialists and the socialist-adjacent.

    How we form a unified front is primarily about the Democrats in power maybe, I dunno, making any effort whatsoever to collaborate with Leftists?

  31. "Should science classes hold debates on whether Newton was right about gravity?" Yes, that's how we got Einstein.

    Y'all. Y'ALL. I've gotten like three messages like this. Do folks even care what the original analogy was, or did they just see a statement about science that is less accurate than they want and need to challenge it?

    The march of progress in science is that a theory that holds up isn't necessarily the endgame, but that doesn't mean it's "wrong," per se. Newton wasn't wrong, he was incomplete, and Einstein couldn't have theorized relativity without standing on Newton's shoulders. Einstein didn't treat "objects of mass are attracted to each other" as up for debate, he used it as a foundation and asked "what if it's more complicated than that?"

    Do you think that's the debate white supremacists want to have on college campuses with Black people? Like, seriously, do you? Do you think conversations that treat "Black and white people are equals" as a base and then tease out the complexities of it are happening between race theorists and Nazis? Or are they happening between race theorists and other race theorists?

    The analogy is not "should Einstein debate with Newtonians about gravity," it's "should Galileo debate with the Roman Inquisition about whether the Earth goes around the Sun."

    Get your heads on straight.

  32. If my landlord demands extra rental payment for my room just because a friend of mine is just staying for only one night and leaving in the morning...

    Should i still pay that extra cash or what?

    Find out what your state's laws are before taking action. Nolo has a series of books that you can maybe find at your library about Tenants' and Renters' rights, or check their website here: https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/renters-rights

    If your landlord can't legally ask you to pay extra for a one-night guest, assess how badly it will damage your relationship to your landlord and what repercussions it might have. Even if you're on the right side of the law, you maybe don't want to deal with the courts.

  33. Favorite Edgar Wright films? (Best to Worst)

    Rankings are silly. I love Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead, and Baby Driver. Scott Pilgrim is a mess but I still really like it. I was underwhelmed by The World's End. Haven't seen Fist Full of Fingers.

  34. Have you seen any of Roy Andersson's works? Whether it be a feature film or his commercials (though i admit his commercials are a lot more fun and interesting to watch)

    I think I'm generally aware of his style, but I'm not familiar with his work.

  35. Did you feel bad when Heath Ledger had passed away back in 2007/2008?

    Sure.

  36. I have no respect for their politics, but any objective bystander would have to admit: Paul Joseph Watson, Golden One, and Blaire White are all really attractive. Therein lies the obvious question: where are all the hot liberals? I don't want arguments and thinking; I want sex appeal for my lizard brain

    Motherfucker, I'm gorgeous.

  37. Have you watched a Wong Kar Wai film?

    If so, which film is your personal favorite?

    I've seen In The Mood for Love and one edit of The Grandmaster. I'd need to see Chungking Express before picking a favorite.

  38. Do you think the news of Lando being pamsexual gets blown out of proportion? The movie itself doesn't even indicate any pansexuality in Lando at all

    Enh. The Disney Corporation publicly confirming that a character in their films is pansexual is not nothing. It's the absolute bare minimum, and if they don't have Donal Glover lip-locking a pretty boy in his spinoff I'm going to be FURIOUS. Slow progress is still progress, but it's aggravating as hell when all the reasons it's not going faster are bullshit.

  39. Do you believe in the supernatural?

    No.

  40. What did you think of Solo?

    it passed the time inoffensively

  41. Should black students debate white supremacists on university campus about whether they are inferior or not, instead of universities deplatforming white supremacists?

    Do you think there's an argument for why Black people are equal to whites that hasn't been made thousands of times over the last three centuries?

    Why do we always have to prove from first principles? Should science classes hold debates on whether Newton was right about gravity?

  42. should leftist flood the common dialectic with statements that are short, quippy, and /right/?

    That's not going to work as a blanket strategy, because the truth can never be as short and quippy as a lie, because lies don't have to conform to reality. Certain truths can be short and quippy, e.g. "this guy is a fucking racist," and we should hammer those where possible, but we also need to activate voters' skeptical side, get them suspicious of people who might be lying to them, and encourage them to listen to more complex statements on the virtue of them being true.

  43. I had a weird dream where one of your videos was a video of you watching your other videos but they all have Jay Z songs playing lowly in the background and you don't react to anything you're just taking notes. I guess my question is do you have a favorite pop music act

    That's wild, fam.

    Um, I feel like most of the pop albums I love are from bands that are kind of inconsistent. Like, I love the first OK Go album, but they their last several albums have great productions (and amazing videos) but the songwriting isn't exciting me anymore. And Weezer put out a couple great albums recently - I seriously can't stop listening to the White Album - but then they got all weird again.

  44. How long do you think it will take for the cultural effects of the Trump Era to fade away, and for racism to become taboo again?

    Also, do you think it is possible for the farther left to pull mainstream discourse further left, in the same way the far right has dragged discourse further right; and, if it is possible, would it be a good idea?

    Well, we haven't ENTIRELY lost the culture to the Trumpies. In a lot of America, racism is still taboo, and many folks are in complete denial about what's going on with Trump. So it's hard to say just how lasting an effect Trump will have on culture; it will really depend on how culture responds in the next few elections, and what policies get written.

    I think it is absolutely valuable - maybe even critical - that the Left drag the mainstream further Left. But the main difference is that the "moderate" Right was a pretty willing partner in the country's rightward drift, while the moderate Left is extremely resistant to ceding any ground to the farther Left. They seem utterly convinced that the only way to win elections is to appeal to centrists and that collaborating with Leftists is suicide, even though they keep LOSING ELECTIONS with that strategy.

    The country won't move Left unless liberals either agree to it or they get replaced by Leftists. I'd be fine with either.

  45. not the software anon, but on a related note: what software do you use to write scripts? thanks!

    The scripts themselves are Google Docs. I use Notepad/TextEdit for random notes and freewriting.

  46. As someone who lives in a state directly affected by the “Southern Strategy” I am glad you did a video on Political innuendos. One of my city councilmen just recently said that Islam should be banned in public schools, and seeing that blatant Islamaphobia was jarring. Especially considering my city has an unusually high number of Muslim citizens for the state. Thanks man, I’m definitely gonna be watching more of your stuff.

    :)

  47. What software do you use to make your videos? What does your writing process look like? Just stumbled upon your channel and I'm very pleased and inspired!

    Flash CS5 for drawings, Adobe Premiere CC for editing, Audacity for audio.

    Writing tends to involve a lot of being alone in the house and talking to myself while pacing, mulling over thoughts until I feel like I've got something. If the script is going to be long, or short but dense, I write an outline, but simpler stuff I can usually wing it on the first draft. Sometimes I do freewriting on the subject to get my thoughts clear, though freewriting tends to slowly turn into a draft the longer I do it. I write drafts in Google Docs so I can access it easily from the desktop or laptop (I tend to do more writing on the laptop because I like to be either in bed or at the library).

    If the first draft is good enough, I may record it as temp audio and start editing to it, making notes during the edit of what I want to change in the final draft. If it needs more structural revisions, I'll write a second (third, fourth) draft before going into the edit. No matter how solid the script is when I start the edit, there are always notes during the edit for things to change, if for no other reason than because the way I've visualized something requires the script to change. Then final revisions, recording the final narration, syncing the visuals to the new script, and publishing.

    Ideally, which I finish a video I already have some work done on the next script, but whether I have time for that varies from video to video.

  48. Just watched your new video. Great work, as always.
    I'm curious, in the course of your research for the video, did you discover any historical precedence for the rapid creation/death of racist euphemisms in less modern conservative movements? Are there any movements you think might be able to serve to predict results of our new political climate?
    For instance, did the nazis or American secessionists develop and drop racist euphemisms, or were there never any pretenses in the first place in those movements?

    Yeah, there's a section in Bob Altemeyer's book The Authoritarians where he cites a number of examples where genocides were preceded by sharp upticks in overtly racist language. He mentions Germany and Rwanda, among others.

    Also, Nazis were only explicit about the antisemitism when they knew the audience was receptive to it; they tended to dial it down when recruiting in less bigoted parts of the country, focusing on a more euphemistic "regaining German strength" message.

    This doesn't mean that genocide ALWAYS follows move towards explicit racism, but nothing good ever comes of it.

  49. have you ever been this politically engaged since you were a kid or it is a thing that happened at some more specific point in your life?

    It's been a gradual process. I was pretty disengaged from politics until 9/11, though after that I was more ENGAGED than I was INFORMED. Over the years I just took a steadily increasing interest in understanding why things are the way they are and what should be done about it. The 2016 election was another big bump in engagement, feeling a need to not just be informed but to be actively researching specific problems and arguing specific opinions.

  50. I find myself fascinated, not just by what you say in your videos but how you'd say it. Your visual style, timing and delivery are all captivating and I was wondering if that was something that took you time to find or even something that you actively worked on (I would assume so). Did you ever make content that was radically different in style and tone from your current stuff?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dr8aRR3Xt4M

  51. do you have any book recommendations about rhetoric? really digging your alt-right series btw

    Rhetoric generally? I dunno.

    Political rhetoric? I've found a lot of value in Don't Think of an Elephant by George Lakoff and Eclipse of Reason by Max Horkheimer.

  52. what’s it like in Massachusetts

    Right now it's overcast.

  53. Do you use the term "identity politics" or nah

    Yes, in certain contexts.

  54. Ever read rules for radicals?

    nope

  55. can't i think of a question?

    that's ok

  56. Rank your best to worst Star Wars films so far:

    I think ranking those movies is basically impossible. I grew up with the original trilogy, saw the prequel trilogy in my teens/early twenties, and am seeing the new stuff in my thirties. I have been three completely different people when I saw each batch for the first time. I can't dispassionately evaluate The Empire Strikes Back because I have never not known that Vader is Luke's father. I can't re-evaluate the possible virtues of the prequel trilogies because I viscerally remember how depressed I was after seeing Episode II in the theater.

    But since this is all anyone really cares about: I loved The Last Jedi.

  57. Whats the difference between legalization and decriminalization

    Decriminalization is simply removing the laws that make something illegal, i.e. how sex work was, until recently, technically legal in Rhode Island, since there were only laws against public solicitation.

    Legalization means specifically writing new laws that allow something that used to be illegal, which generally means it is only legal under certain conditions, and the terms under which the thing is legal are generally written with the biases of lawmakers embedded in them.

    Decriminalizing drugs means the people who buy and sell them are largely in control of how they are bought and sold. Legalizing drugs often means the people who already hold power end up benefiting the most from the new laws.

    You'll note Black people are still in jail for possession while bougie white people are opening boutique head shops because the new marijuana laws are easier for affluent whites to abide by. That's the problem with legalization.

  58. Do sex workers need to be liberated?

    Sex work needs to be decriminalized, if that's what you mean.

  59. Will you do a playbook series on vidjagames?
    Though seriously do you have any video game videos in the works?

    I have plenty of ideas for game videos, though I don't have a plan for when they'll come out.

  60. Wouldn't it be more relevant as a companion to the alt-right playbook to use Israel which they have a love/hate relationship with for slightly different reasons than progressives?

    The Alt-Right Playbook may comment on how the Alt-Right's bizarre love of Israel meshes with their antisemitism, but I am not the right person to do a series with Israel as the subject.

  61. Do you think all drugs should be legal?

    think Portugal

    There is a difference between legalization and decriminalization, and I'm for the second one.

  62. So are all cops evil?

    American policing is systemically broken, and anyone who participates in that system is, to some extent, complicit in the evil done by that system. There are many cops who are doing their best to stay ethical in a broken system, so no, I wouldn't say all cops are evil, but all cops are tainted by the system.

  63. Do you think Sociaism is possible in the U.S.?

    or will it just be regional at best?

    hell if I know

  64. Will you do a playbook series on progressives?

    No.

  65. Will you do a playbook series on the pro black movement?

    No.

  66. Will you do a playbook series on the politics of Israel?

    No.

  67. Heya. Just watched your new video, like, three times. I do that, it's weird.

    Anyway, something just occurred to me that I thought I should ask. Why did you censor -- but not immediately, letting everyone know who he was -- Barry Goldwater's last name?

    The Alt-Right Playbook has a soft "don't name names" policy. I've never even mentioned Trump by name, even though it's very obvious who I'm referring to.

    There are a few reasons for this. One is purely rhetorical: I leave a lot of specifics out when I use an example because I need to streamline the videos and keep the focus on the main point I'm making. As soon as you discuss any specifics, people start nitpicking, and unless you have the space to do a graduate thesis on a political subject, the comments just get mired in hairsplitting. Not naming names and speaking in broad strokes in my examples, and just linking to the details in the show notes, seems to keep people more focused on my actual argument instead of getting detailed-obsessed. I've found that Far Right types like to think they've debunked your entire argument if they can find a single detail they can dispute, so by speaking in broad strokes I make it harder for them to nitpick.

    The other reason is trying not to start dogpiles. A lot of the time if I'm speaking about a contentious figure - especially women who've been harassed - even mentioning their names can kick up more harassment. I made the decision going into this that I wasn't going to shine a spotlight on anyone if it might cause grief for them, and, when you're making overtly political videos, that's always a risk. Even people that I'm criticizing, I have zero interest in siccing a mob on them. That would mean leaving out a fair number of names, but then it becomes conspicuous if I'm saying some names and leaving out others, which I worry would lead people to conclude there must be a reason I left some names out and then go try to figure out who I'm referring to. So I just made it a blanket policy: no names.

    The only exception I made was Samuel R. Delany, because I wasn't sure how to talk about the experience of being a gay man in the 60's without sounding like I was speaking for a community I'm not part of unless I actually cited a person who had that lived experience, and, also, Delany's not much at risk of getting dogpiled (he's barely online, and I wasn't saying anything inflammatory) and I always want more people to read his work.

    Anyway, that's my reasoning. I know a good chunk of that wouldn't apply to Barry Goldwater, but I wanted to keep the series consistent, and I also thought the name "Barry Silvermilk" was hilarious.

  68. What do you think of polyamorous reationships amongst kids?

    If by "kids" you mean children, I'm skeptical of prepubescents dating anyone. If by "kids" you mean teenagers, I'm not here to tell young adults what kinds of relationships they should or shouldn't be in. Polyamory is a lot of work that many young people may not have the emotional intelligence for, but fuck it, I know plenty of adults who don't have the emotional intelligence for it, either, and it's not like I'm trying to stop them. If you can hack it, do it.

  69. Do you like the youtuber Three Arrows?

    I've only seen a couple videos, but they were quite good!

  70. Is Star Wars just garbage now?

    Star Wars is better than it's been in decades.

  71. Do you see orgies as a good thing?

    Depends on the orgy.

  72. If you could make a song today, what genre would it be in?

    If talent and musicianship were no objects? I've always wanted to make a mix of riff-heavy math metal and IDM. Like, a mix of Squarepusher and The Fucking Champs. I have none of the skills to make this happen and don't actually know if it would work, but that's what I'd do if I could do anything.

  73. How do I deal with an untrustworthy housemate? Are there any warning signs to look at?

    In my experience, when they claim you can't evict them because their lawyer says so, but then won't give you their lawyer's number, it's a good sign they don't actually have a lawyer, but you'll still have to take them to court to get them out.

    Not sure that's the kind of untrustworthiness you're dealing with...

  74. Views on Karl Marx?

    he had such a good beard

  75. Hey, i've been really enjoying the Alt-right playbook series (just finished watching the most recent one. Great stuff as always). So much so that a few months back I set out to put subtitles in portuguese for them (mostly so I could show it to my relatives, but also because I think it's important that more people watch it). And I even legitimately enjoyed doing it. But for the past three videos you didn't allow for community contributions. No hard feelings or anything, but I was wondering if there was any particular reason for that? 🤔

    I just keep forgetting you have to manually turn on community contributions with each video. Just turned them on, feel free to submit!

Anon commented:
Ian replied: