Thread by @delong

braddelong.substack.com/p/briefly-note…

Briefly Noted: For 2021-06-28 Mo
Things that went whizzing by that I want to remember: First: A Platonic Dialogue: Polemarkhos: Look at this! Is this still true?... 1/

...Glaukon: Yes it is…

Nikeratos: The grifters and the grifted—both are, to me, astonishing to watch.

Thrasymakhos: How so?

Nikeratos: On the one hand, the grifters say: Trump deserves 100% credit for warp speed, and Biden and the press are showing how despicable they... 2/

...are by not praising him every day. And the grifted buy it.

Polemarkhos: And on the other hand, actually getting a vaccine and so not being willing to fight the virus with your bare hands alone—that demonstrates that you are some kind of a… near-eunuch… what is the... 3/

...word they use?

Adeimantos: But if it is unmanly to take the vaccine, isn’t it even more unmanly to spend lots of money developing the vaccine? Doesn't that show that you are greatly afeared and not a manly man?

Thrasymakhos: It is not a coherent world view. The... 4/

...point is: different messages for different people. And modern media allows for segmentation of message. It doesn’t have to be coherent.

Adeimantos: I do not understand.

Aspasia: Suppose you are a wealthy and well-educated person who wants taxes low, and is looking... 5/

...for a reason that “Trump wasn’t so bad”.

Kephalos: Well, he wasn’t so bad: he decided to do Operation “Warp Speed” after all…

Aspasia: …then you get pitched the “warp speed” story. Exactly.

Alkiabides: But suppose you are someone doing less well. Suppose that your... 6/

...superior patriarchal gender status as a danger-seeking manly man is your primary identity. Then you defend that identity by demonstrating your fearlessness—by rejecting masks and vaccines.

Polymarkhos: But Akhilleus demonstrated his manliness by fighting another human... 7/

...with a spear, and trained long and hard…

Aspasia: …not by refusing to allow his immune system to train up for the contest of fighting microscopic semi-alive particles.

Thrasymakos: You are thinking of the Americans as if they were a group of rational Greeks... 8/

...capable of consistency, coherence, and analytic thought leading to agreement. You are forgetting the segmentation of the Republican base. If you care about keeping taxes low and staying alive; then you probably do not care that much about what happens to the... 9/

...“manly men” with COVID—the key is that Trump and his team worked hard to keep you rich and safe. You feel a little bit sad about the unnecessary deaths, but they could have taken personal responsibility and gotten vaccinated.

Alkiabides: And if you can’t figure out a... 10/

...reason to say “Trump wasn’t so bad for me”, you need to face the unpleasant fact that Trump grifted you to. And that people are unwilling to do.

Thrasymakos: And if you are willing to sacrifice your health to signal your fearlessness and thus your right to manly male... 11/

...gender dominance—well, whether Trump was also working for rich people to help them keep more of their money is not such a big deal to you. The big deal is that Trump models fearlessness, and is willing to say what he thinks—while, in their view, the Democratic men... 12/

...are all p-----whipped, too scared of being scolded by Alexandra Octavio-Cortez to speak up…

Aspasia: And it’s not just white blue-collar southern and semi-rural men—the New York Times continues to pay Maureen Dowd, and her “Democratic men are unnatural because they... 13/

...are too empathic, and Democratic women are too unnatural because they are too assertive” has long been a great crowd-pleaser, at least with her bosses and the owners. 14/END braddelong.substack.com/p/briefly-note…