Wars typically get a lot of coverage and much of it is criticism. Interestingly enough, even Ukrainians attacked by a huge heavily militarised aggressor are getting *lots* of it. Let me give some considerations on criticism - mostly to Ukrainians but to also to whoever. A short🧵
They gonna tell you that critics are not always the enemies. But the dark truth is that a good number of critics are. Human interactions necessarily include a political dimension. Neurotypical people do not just honestly tell what's on their mind. Instead they play a social game
What game are they playing? It depends. Some "critics" are haters who wish you death. There's an asymmetry between hatred vs sympathy. A fan is not *that* much of a fan, he has other interests, his life doesn't revolve around you. But the life of a hater absolutely fucking does
There's another category which might not wish you destruction. But if you make it, they'll be very very upset. This group may include some of those you consider to be friends. Your failure will cheer them up and vice versa. Finally, there are people influenced by first two groups
What unites them is that neither of these groups has you best interest in mind. However, they pursue different goals. Most typical games they are playing are:
1. Active subversion 2. Reputation destruction
Active subversion. They unconsciously (or consciously) try to figure out what course of actions would be worst for you. Then they socially pressure you to choose it. They'll criticise you for good moves and praise for bad ones. They guide you to your demise by booing and cheering
Reputation destroyers don't aim to guide you anywhere. They criticise whatever you do, both good and bad moves. If you are inactive they'll criticise your inaction, if you are active - action. They might not even think what would be worse for you, they just attack your reputation
So the test on active subverter vs reputation destroyer would be. Imagine you did so obviously disastrous, so clearly ruinous that he most probably understands you made a bad move? An active subverter will congratulate you on that. A reputation destroyer still gonna criticise
If you made a good move, you can't really tell a difference. For example when Ukraine declared mobilisation, both active subverters and reputation destroyers were booing. However, subverters did it cuz they thought it's a good move, while reputation destroyers didn't think at all
But if Ukraine didn't do that, then we would see the difference. Active subverters would be praising Ukraine for this ethical, reasonable approach. Meanwhile reputation destroyers would be criticising their cowardice and lack of will to exist (which proves they are a fake nation)
It's all about priorities. Since active subverters aim to guide you to your demise, they're trying to use both "carrot" and "stick" approaches. They fear that if they criticise you for a disastrous move, then you might reconsider and change your course of actions. Unacceptable
Reputation destroyers don't guide you anywhere. Thus they use only a "stick" all the time. That makes them very easy to recognise: they're non stop producers of negative affirmations. Which are also performative in a sense they're aimed both to your self-image and public image
Much of criticism is purely malevolent. And many critics don't really hide it. They don't even pretend to act in your best interest. If they criticise you, that's just a white noise. Ignore. But if they praise you (however they frame it), that's a reason to be concerned. End of🧵
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
The primary weakness of this argument is that being true, historically speaking, it is just false in the context of American politics where the “communism” label has been so over-used (and misapplied) that it lost all of its former power:
“We want X”
“No, that is communism”
“We want communism”
Basically, when you use a label like “communism” as a deus ex machina winning you every argument, you simultaneously re-define its meaning. And when you use it to beat off every popular socio economic demand (e.g. universal healthcare), you re-define communism as a synthesis of all the popular socio economic demands
Historical communism = forced industrial development in a poor, predominantly agrarian country, funded through expropriation of the peasantry
(With the most disastrous economic and humanitarian consequences)
Many are trying to explain his success with some accidental factors such as his “personal charisma”, Cuomo's weakness etc
Still, I think there may be some fundamental factors here. A longue durée shift, and a very profound one
1. Public outrage does not work anymore
If you look at Zohran, he is calm, constructive, and rarely raises his voice. I think one thing that Mamdani - but almost no one else in the American political space is getting - is that the public is getting tired of the outrage
Outrage, anger, righteous indignation have all been the primary drivers of American politics for quite a while
For a while, this tactics worked
Indeed, when everyone around is polite, and soft (and insincere), freaking out was a smart thing to do. It could help you get noticed
People don’t really understand causal links. We pretend we do (“X results in Y”). But we actually don’t. Most explanations (= descriptions of causal structures) are fake.
There may be no connection between X and Y at all. The cause is just misattributed.
Or, perhaps, X does indeed result in Y. but only under a certain (and unknown!) set of conditions that remains totally and utterly opaque to us. So, X->Y is only a part of the equation
And so on
I like to think of a hypothetical Stone Age farmer who started farming, and it worked amazingly, and his entire community adopted his lifestyle, and many generations followed it and prospered and multiplied, until all suddenly wiped out in a new ice age
1. Normative Islamophobia that used to define the public discourse being the most acceptable form of racial & ethnic bigotry in the West, is receding. It is not so much dying as rather - failing to replicate. It is not that the old people change their views as that the young do not absorb their prejudice any longer.
In fact, I incline to think it has been failing to replicate for a while, it is just that we have not been paying attention
Again, the change of vibe does not happen at once. The Muslim scare may still find (some) audience among the more rigid elderly, who are not going to change their views. But for the youth, it is starting to sound as archaic as the Catholic scare of know nothings
Out of date
2. What is particularly interesting regarding Mamdani's victory, is his support base. It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that its core is comprised of the young (and predominantly white) middle classes, with a nearly equal representation of men and women
What does Musk vs Trump affair teach us about the general patterns of human history? Well, first of all it shows that the ancient historians were right. They grasped something about nature of politics that our contemporaries simply can’t.
Let me give you an example. The Arab conquest of Spain
According to a popular medieval/early modern interpretation, its primary cause was the lust of Visigoth king Roderic. Aroused by the beautiful daughter of his vassal and ally, count Julian, he took advantage of her
Disgruntled, humiliated Julian allied himself with the Arabs and opens them the gates of Spain.
Entire kingdom lost, all because the head of state caused a personal injury to someone important.
One thing you need to understand about wars is that very few engage into the long, protracted warfare on purpose. Almost every war of attrition was planned and designed as a short victorious blitzkrieg
And then everything went wrong
Consider the Russian war in Ukraine. It was not planned as a war. It was not thought of as a war. It was planned as a (swift!) regime change allowing to score a few points in the Russian domestic politics. And then everything went wrong
It would not be an exaggeration to say that planning a short victorious war optimised for the purposes of domestic politics is how you *usually* end up in a deadlock. That is the most common scenario of how it happens, practically speaking