6 ms·

Did he go off the rails? My understanding is that the zeitgeist is taking people’s opposing views online and distorting them, removing context, to outrage our o

Did he go off the rails? My understanding is that the zeitgeist is taking people’s opposing views online and distorting them, removing context, to outrage our own audience and align it to our cause. Almost everyone is reasonable, it’s the contexts that our reasons are relevant to, which are different.

NitpickLawyer 9mo ago
> the zeitgeist is taking people’s opposing views online and distorting them, removing context, to outrage our own audience and align it to our cause. This is 100% the case, with very infamous baddies, but people don't want to acknowledge it. It's a sad reality of this always on media we ingest. No idea what can be done, other than slowly ignoring more and more algorithmic stuff, and choose your own adventures based on content providers you have known for a long time, and still have their backbone intact.
- riazrizvi 9mo ago
  Elements of society slowly wise up to how they are being manipulated, as they are increasingly exposed to it. Now with modern AI the online manipulation tactics are getting worse. So as we find ourselves in that pool of ppl who see what is happening, we just stop using those platforms, and increasingly trust more human-human contact or long form video where people have a chance to state their positions. Perhaps?
  - jpadkins 9mo ago
    I think it may be the opposite. The mass propaganda techniques that worked for so long (i.e. control of the narrative via the big 3 news networks) no longer work in the social media age. So you have a system that is trying more and more extreme tactics to regain control, and you have a population that is more and more agitated because they can see through the curtain and the implications are very unsettling.
overgard 9mo ago
I haven't followed everything Scott Adams has done recently (largely because most of his stuff ended up paywalled), but in the past I'd note that he'd have an interesting take on something, possibly hard to defend but not intrinsically "bad", but then he'd get lumped in as having a "bad" opinion by people that just wanted to create headlines. One example was his assertion that Donald Trump was a "master persuader", and much more skilled in his speech then people were giving him credit for. I remember, at the time at least, that he always prefaced it by saying it wasn't in support/antagonism of Trump, just an observation of his skill, but it quickly got turned into "Scott Adams is a MAGA guy." (Since then, I don't know if Adams ever became a MAGA guy or not, but it's an example of how at the time his statements got oversimplified and distorted). Anyway, I saw a lot of examples of that -- he'd have a relatively nuanced take probably expressed too boldly, but people wanted to just lump him in to some narrative they already had going. I think Scott Adams' biggest problem in life (although partially what also made him entertaining), is that he'd kind of pick fights that had little upside for him and a lot of downside.
- cess11 9mo ago
  It would have been easy for you to check whether he was a "MAGA guy or not", which he was in the sense that he spent the last years of his life spreading neonazi adjacent rhetoric. Some of it goes quite far back, even: https://web.archive.org/web/20070222235609/http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2006/10/sunday_blogging.html https://web.archive.org/web/20070222235609/http://dilbertblo...
  - anonymars 9mo ago
    I don't know, I feel like your link makes a better case for the parent's point than your own
    - cess11 9mo ago
      If your feelings tend to skew in favour of people suggesting that the jewish death toll in the Shoah was pulled out of the ass by someone, perhaps you'd have some to gain from keeping them in check.
dangus 9mo ago
“The best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from black people“ -Scott Adams Does that sound reasonable to you?
- nec4b 9mo ago
  [flagged]
  - lovich 9mo ago
    Can you cite a context that makes the quote acceptable?
    - deleted 9mo ago
      [deleted]
    - negzero7 9mo ago
      Sure, the context was a poll that asked Americans "Is it OK to be white?" with about half of the black participants saying they either disagreed or weren't sure. A bit of Scott's elaboration is near the bottom: https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/poll-finds-over-a-quarter-of-black-americans-dont-think-its-okay-to-be-white-scott-adams-dilbert https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/poll-finds-over-a-qu...
      - lovich 9mo ago
        I am aware of the situation and context. I was being sarcastic because the context still doesn’t make the quote acceptable.
      - meowface 9mo ago
        The poll did not ask "Is it OK to be white?", it asked "Do you agree or disagree with this statement: 'It's OK to be white.'"
        DonHopkins 9mo ago
pelorat 9mo ago
I mean he tried treating his cancer with Ivermectin instead of seeking treatment from medical professionals.

NitpickLawyer 9mo ago

> the zeitgeist is taking people’s opposing views online and distorting them, removing context, to outrage our own audience and align it to our cause. This is 100% the case, with very infamous baddies, but people don't want to acknowledge it. It's a sad reality of this always on media we ingest. No idea what can be done, other than slowly ignoring more and more algorithmic stuff, and choose your own adventures based on content providers you have known for a long time, and still have their backbone intact.

riazrizvi 9mo ago
Elements of society slowly wise up to how they are being manipulated, as they are increasingly exposed to it. Now with modern AI the online manipulation tactics are getting worse. So as we find ourselves in that pool of ppl who see what is happening, we just stop using those platforms, and increasingly trust more human-human contact or long form video where people have a chance to state their positions. Perhaps?
- jpadkins 9mo ago
  I think it may be the opposite. The mass propaganda techniques that worked for so long (i.e. control of the narrative via the big 3 news networks) no longer work in the social media age. So you have a system that is trying more and more extreme tactics to regain control, and you have a population that is more and more agitated because they can see through the curtain and the implications are very unsettling.

overgard 9mo ago

I haven't followed everything Scott Adams has done recently (largely because most of his stuff ended up paywalled), but in the past I'd note that he'd have an interesting take on something, possibly hard to defend but not intrinsically "bad", but then he'd get lumped in as having a "bad" opinion by people that just wanted to create headlines. One example was his assertion that Donald Trump was a "master persuader", and much more skilled in his speech then people were giving him credit for. I remember, at the time at least, that he always prefaced it by saying it wasn't in support/antagonism of Trump, just an observation of his skill, but it quickly got turned into "Scott Adams is a MAGA guy." (Since then, I don't know if Adams ever became a MAGA guy or not, but it's an example of how at the time his statements got oversimplified and distorted). Anyway, I saw a lot of examples of that -- he'd have a relatively nuanced take probably expressed too boldly, but people wanted to just lump him in to some narrative they already had going. I think Scott Adams' biggest problem in life (although partially what also made him entertaining), is that he'd kind of pick fights that had little upside for him and a lot of downside.

cess11 9mo ago
It would have been easy for you to check whether he was a "MAGA guy or not", which he was in the sense that he spent the last years of his life spreading neonazi adjacent rhetoric. Some of it goes quite far back, even: https://web.archive.org/web/20070222235609/http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2006/10/sunday_blogging.html https://web.archive.org/web/20070222235609/http://dilbertblo...
- anonymars 9mo ago
  I don't know, I feel like your link makes a better case for the parent's point than your own
  - cess11 9mo ago
    If your feelings tend to skew in favour of people suggesting that the jewish death toll in the Shoah was pulled out of the ass by someone, perhaps you'd have some to gain from keeping them in check.

dangus 9mo ago

“The best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from black people“ -Scott Adams Does that sound reasonable to you?

nec4b 9mo ago
[flagged]
- lovich 9mo ago
  Can you cite a context that makes the quote acceptable?
  - deleted 9mo ago
    [deleted]
  - negzero7 9mo ago
    Sure, the context was a poll that asked Americans "Is it OK to be white?" with about half of the black participants saying they either disagreed or weren't sure. A bit of Scott's elaboration is near the bottom: https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/poll-finds-over-a-quarter-of-black-americans-dont-think-its-okay-to-be-white-scott-adams-dilbert https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/poll-finds-over-a-qu...
    - lovich 9mo ago
      I am aware of the situation and context. I was being sarcastic because the context still doesn’t make the quote acceptable.
    - meowface 9mo ago
      The poll did not ask "Is it OK to be white?", it asked "Do you agree or disagree with this statement: 'It's OK to be white.'"
      - DonHopkins 9mo ago

pelorat 9mo ago

I mean he tried treating his cancer with Ivermectin instead of seeking treatment from medical professionals.