I think a good recent example of this phenomenon is the treatment of Sam Harris. A few years ago Sam had Charles Murray on his podcast and was quickly pilloried in Vox, and then later in a debate with Ezra Klein. But Sam being who he is did not cave, apologise or retract his interview.
Notwithstanding that obvious demonstration of integrity, Sam is now one of the most hated individuals on the US Right simply because he did not bend the knee to MAGA, and he did not go along with his former buddies when they became retarded on vaccines.
Does he get any credit from the Right for bringing some of science on intelligence into the mainstream? Of course not. Does he get any credit for being frank about the threat of Islamism and the importance of defending Western civilisation from barbarians? Of course not.
So smart centrists, liberals and small-c conservatives look at the treatment of people like Sam Harris and think to themselves "why the f would I align myself with these idiots" and go back to their quiet lives of raising families and making money.
Excellent and inspiring article. Regarding the roots of Wokeism in Christianity/blank slatism: wasn’t it the case that in the 1920s large numbers of Western elites accepted the Darwinian paradigm regarding group differences? How did they escape the (proto) woke paradigm? (And why would the Holocaust cause elites to throw out the Darwinian baby with the Nazi bath water?) I agree that Rufo/Hanania have not adequately explained the roots of Wokeism, but neither does your article adequately explain why high IQ, scientifically-minded, Leftists, who could easily read/comprehend Jensen, et al., prefer less sophisticated (if not downright silly!) woke arguments over superior, scientifically-based, arguments. Sometimes I think many Leftists know the truth about group differences but since minorities are crucial to their political coalition, they lie about it.
Rufo and Hanania are missing the core of the issue. The morality that exists enables and empowers leftist philosophers and activists, which translates into the law. Both Rufo and Hanania are talking about the second-order effects of egalitarian morality, which stems from Christianity. I am sure it's easier to sell to a right-wing conservative audience that Wokeness is all the result of either nefarious Marxists (which plays to Rufo's right-wing conspiratorial biases) or legal machinations of "Big Government" (which plays to Hanania's anti-government libertarian biases), both of which are acceptable explanations within the mainstream right, instead of the true and real explanation, that being Christian morality.
Imagine going on Fox News and saying that Wokeness is caused by Christian morality; they'd never let you back on, not to mention the fact that you would be swarmed by right-wing religious nuts calling you a "cringe atheist" and a libtard. You would be persona non grata even in many of the more intelligent parts of the right.
On the matter of destroying the taboo against hereditarianism and group differences, I think most of that will not come down to the facts. After all, the studies have been known to exist for generations, and ultimately, people, even including elites, are not driven mostly by empirical reality. As you said, when facts collide with morality, morality is the one that wins. First and foremost, changing morality is key. The questioning, challenging, and deconstruction of those base assumptions is and should be the first attack; the facts will come in a close second. That will be an immense task, and you're going up against two millennia of Christian assumptions.
The question we should be asking is: What is the great utopian appeal of defecting and leaving behind egalitarian moral assumptions and social conditioning? Can a better world be created through the acceptance of these facts? Offering a better story than the egalitarian utopianism of our elites will be key to sewing doubt and disillusionment and ultimately defection.
Extremely good critique of the woke and the right.
The issue, as you've explained, is a shared fundamental premise of human sameness. This motivates cosmic injustices to be reinterpretted as interpersonal injustices, resulting in ineffective solutions and unnecessary hostility. Social sciences lend support to the false woke ideas by interpretting correlations as causation or by exploiting their researcher degrees of freedom (esp. p-hacking) to give false positive findings in support of progressive ideas. The postmodern part of the woke tosses empirics aside and just tells narratives and philosophizes. The nonsense isn't driven out because many social science departments are 100% progressives.
If the realist position is correct, then advances in genomics will produce more and more persuasive evidence that undermines much of the social sciences. While the public might not be able to understand the evidence, conservative elites can and need to be able to understand the evidence. Hopefully, Aporia is successful.
you make a lot of good pts, including about my endorsers, but, some rejoinders
- steven pinker is partisan democrat, but a centrist, not a liberal (he is a classical liberal). probably in many ways his beliefs would be 'ordoliberal'
- carlos bustamante is a republican. he obv did not want to advertize that when he was deep in academia, but it's well known
i guess i'll get some right-wing endorsements. there are plenty of fans of my work on the right like michael anton. my readership actually tilts a bit right, but is pretty diverse
You make a compelling case but I think you’re missing a discussion on the perils of your own position.
When the average person hears about hereditarianism they will apply such views to all members of whatever group without regard to individual differences within that group. This is the massive threat that leads to despicable outcomes as bad as the ones we are seeing today. It seems to me that even more fundamental than a rejection of the role of heredity is an inability to treat individuals as individuals rather than as members of a group. A society that fully accepted hereditarianism without concurrently and fundamentally embracing individualism to avoid such pitfalls will degrade into the kind of racism we all deplore.
Excellent piece. However, you missed a critical point - the right's inability to engage controversial right-wing thinkers. Paul Gottfried and Walter Block are yet to be interviewed by people posing as dissidents. How can you say that you are radical when you don't engage people who were cancelled before wokism became ubiquitous? Also, why are right-leaning intellectuals positing that wokism is embedded in Marxism, when Marxist scholars are arguing that Cultural Marxism is an incoherent concept? Why are conservative intellectuals commenting that the far-right is Christian when it is a Nietzchean movement?
I took my time reading this because it was exceptional, but I'd add that on top of being stupid, right wingers are also just cruel. You'd need to be a callous and morally stunted person to not want to strive for equality if you believe that all groups are equal in ability. Left-wingers have a stronger moral compass which allows them to see inequality and injustice, but it often backfires when they're not able to see that some inequalities and injustices might have non-deliberate causes(i.e. they're part of nature).
I remain amused, at the very smart people who believe they can wish reality to be what they want.
Evolution is not a moral process. Inequality, genocide, rape, are all by-products of its design. When we peer over the ledge of our construction, we shouldn't expect to see a friendly face.
Thanks for writing this. It amazes me that excellent conservative thinkers like Glenn Loury still can’t bring themselves to admit to the painfully obvious truth of hereditarianism.
Very interesting and thorough, and largely agree that developments like formal philosophy and law are naturally derivative of changing social attitudes and beliefs. There are two assertions of which I'm not completely convinced. Maybe you can change my mind.
The first is the implicit assumption that intelligence is responsible for the majority of variation in group outcomes. As you write, the debate between 'conservatives' and your camp hinges upon whether intelligence is largely determined by culture or genes. Yet even if one accepts that intelligence is largely hereditary, it still remains unshown that outcomes like crime, absolute measures of poverty, infant mortality, etc., are uniquely caused by one's intellect. Seems more intuitive to me that social circumstances (e.g. family composition, behavior of peers) and resource provision (e.g. top-notch schools and hospitals) would have more causal power on these outcomes than intelligence. Indeed, the hyper-focus on intelligence only seems well-suited to explain scalar measures of individual achievement, especially those at the top end of the distribution (i.e. MATHCOUNTS contest results, FAANG engineer job hires), rather than measures of deprivation like those above.
The second is perhaps more relevant to this specific article -- your contention that 'hereditarianism' needs to be widely promoted in elite circles. Notwithstanding that this may result in a hyper-fixation on intelligence by the Right (rather than foci on social or material factors that institutions can actually solve ... see above), 'race realism' advocacy seems like a poison pill right now. You write that "Rufo’s strategy of creating a counter-elite won’t work unless left-wing elites start defecting to the right on scale" -- yet these defections will never happen in the first place by formally introducing race realism into public debate. If anything, it'll push centrist liberal-types leftward again and get you uninvited to every Georgetown/Upper West Side dinner party along the way.
Aside from the plan's strategic flaws, it seems hard to square widespread elite acceptance of 'race realism' with multiracial democracy. If, as you say, Locke was wrong and certain groups of people are fated to be more intelligent than others, why should we confine ourselves to a Lockean political system where every adult can vote? Shouldn't the highly intelligent groups dictate a disproportionate amount of political affairs (de jure, not just de facto)? More importantly, what do you tell the groups of people who, by virtue of their race and upbringing combined with predominant 'hereditarian' thought, have internalized feelings of inferiority or impotence? How do you dissuade them from antisocial behavior, rampant crime, and conflict? The reality is that times in the West are good right now (as they have been for at least 79 years), so much so that elites are willing to accept the costs of weird 'wokism' in order to avoid the horrors of a world that swallows what some might call the 'race realist red-pill.'
Great job on identifying the many problems with Rightoid epistemic culture. However, I think that they are even more intractable than you imply, and that the most prospective approach is to try to creatively route around them, as opposed to spending decades more trying to convince people who have no interest in being convinced.
Really insightful analysis.
I think a good recent example of this phenomenon is the treatment of Sam Harris. A few years ago Sam had Charles Murray on his podcast and was quickly pilloried in Vox, and then later in a debate with Ezra Klein. But Sam being who he is did not cave, apologise or retract his interview.
Notwithstanding that obvious demonstration of integrity, Sam is now one of the most hated individuals on the US Right simply because he did not bend the knee to MAGA, and he did not go along with his former buddies when they became retarded on vaccines.
Does he get any credit from the Right for bringing some of science on intelligence into the mainstream? Of course not. Does he get any credit for being frank about the threat of Islamism and the importance of defending Western civilisation from barbarians? Of course not.
So smart centrists, liberals and small-c conservatives look at the treatment of people like Sam Harris and think to themselves "why the f would I align myself with these idiots" and go back to their quiet lives of raising families and making money.
A good critique. I think the approaches here—cultural history, civil rights law, philosophical problems—are complementary.
Excellent and inspiring article. Regarding the roots of Wokeism in Christianity/blank slatism: wasn’t it the case that in the 1920s large numbers of Western elites accepted the Darwinian paradigm regarding group differences? How did they escape the (proto) woke paradigm? (And why would the Holocaust cause elites to throw out the Darwinian baby with the Nazi bath water?) I agree that Rufo/Hanania have not adequately explained the roots of Wokeism, but neither does your article adequately explain why high IQ, scientifically-minded, Leftists, who could easily read/comprehend Jensen, et al., prefer less sophisticated (if not downright silly!) woke arguments over superior, scientifically-based, arguments. Sometimes I think many Leftists know the truth about group differences but since minorities are crucial to their political coalition, they lie about it.
Demographics are on Aporia’s side. Also, I think we will have 100k readers in our first five years.
-- Matt
Rufo and Hanania are missing the core of the issue. The morality that exists enables and empowers leftist philosophers and activists, which translates into the law. Both Rufo and Hanania are talking about the second-order effects of egalitarian morality, which stems from Christianity. I am sure it's easier to sell to a right-wing conservative audience that Wokeness is all the result of either nefarious Marxists (which plays to Rufo's right-wing conspiratorial biases) or legal machinations of "Big Government" (which plays to Hanania's anti-government libertarian biases), both of which are acceptable explanations within the mainstream right, instead of the true and real explanation, that being Christian morality.
Imagine going on Fox News and saying that Wokeness is caused by Christian morality; they'd never let you back on, not to mention the fact that you would be swarmed by right-wing religious nuts calling you a "cringe atheist" and a libtard. You would be persona non grata even in many of the more intelligent parts of the right.
On the matter of destroying the taboo against hereditarianism and group differences, I think most of that will not come down to the facts. After all, the studies have been known to exist for generations, and ultimately, people, even including elites, are not driven mostly by empirical reality. As you said, when facts collide with morality, morality is the one that wins. First and foremost, changing morality is key. The questioning, challenging, and deconstruction of those base assumptions is and should be the first attack; the facts will come in a close second. That will be an immense task, and you're going up against two millennia of Christian assumptions.
The question we should be asking is: What is the great utopian appeal of defecting and leaving behind egalitarian moral assumptions and social conditioning? Can a better world be created through the acceptance of these facts? Offering a better story than the egalitarian utopianism of our elites will be key to sewing doubt and disillusionment and ultimately defection.
Extremely good critique of the woke and the right.
The issue, as you've explained, is a shared fundamental premise of human sameness. This motivates cosmic injustices to be reinterpretted as interpersonal injustices, resulting in ineffective solutions and unnecessary hostility. Social sciences lend support to the false woke ideas by interpretting correlations as causation or by exploiting their researcher degrees of freedom (esp. p-hacking) to give false positive findings in support of progressive ideas. The postmodern part of the woke tosses empirics aside and just tells narratives and philosophizes. The nonsense isn't driven out because many social science departments are 100% progressives.
If the realist position is correct, then advances in genomics will produce more and more persuasive evidence that undermines much of the social sciences. While the public might not be able to understand the evidence, conservative elites can and need to be able to understand the evidence. Hopefully, Aporia is successful.
you make a lot of good pts, including about my endorsers, but, some rejoinders
- steven pinker is partisan democrat, but a centrist, not a liberal (he is a classical liberal). probably in many ways his beliefs would be 'ordoliberal'
- carlos bustamante is a republican. he obv did not want to advertize that when he was deep in academia, but it's well known
i guess i'll get some right-wing endorsements. there are plenty of fans of my work on the right like michael anton. my readership actually tilts a bit right, but is pretty diverse
You make a compelling case but I think you’re missing a discussion on the perils of your own position.
When the average person hears about hereditarianism they will apply such views to all members of whatever group without regard to individual differences within that group. This is the massive threat that leads to despicable outcomes as bad as the ones we are seeing today. It seems to me that even more fundamental than a rejection of the role of heredity is an inability to treat individuals as individuals rather than as members of a group. A society that fully accepted hereditarianism without concurrently and fundamentally embracing individualism to avoid such pitfalls will degrade into the kind of racism we all deplore.
Excellent piece. However, you missed a critical point - the right's inability to engage controversial right-wing thinkers. Paul Gottfried and Walter Block are yet to be interviewed by people posing as dissidents. How can you say that you are radical when you don't engage people who were cancelled before wokism became ubiquitous? Also, why are right-leaning intellectuals positing that wokism is embedded in Marxism, when Marxist scholars are arguing that Cultural Marxism is an incoherent concept? Why are conservative intellectuals commenting that the far-right is Christian when it is a Nietzchean movement?
This is an outstanding analysis of the origins and causes of Woke ideology. Everyone who is concerned about their influence should read it.
I took my time reading this because it was exceptional, but I'd add that on top of being stupid, right wingers are also just cruel. You'd need to be a callous and morally stunted person to not want to strive for equality if you believe that all groups are equal in ability. Left-wingers have a stronger moral compass which allows them to see inequality and injustice, but it often backfires when they're not able to see that some inequalities and injustices might have non-deliberate causes(i.e. they're part of nature).
I remain amused, at the very smart people who believe they can wish reality to be what they want.
Evolution is not a moral process. Inequality, genocide, rape, are all by-products of its design. When we peer over the ledge of our construction, we shouldn't expect to see a friendly face.
Thanks for writing this. It amazes me that excellent conservative thinkers like Glenn Loury still can’t bring themselves to admit to the painfully obvious truth of hereditarianism.
One of the best articles I've read.
Saved to my folder of great essays.
Very interesting and thorough, and largely agree that developments like formal philosophy and law are naturally derivative of changing social attitudes and beliefs. There are two assertions of which I'm not completely convinced. Maybe you can change my mind.
The first is the implicit assumption that intelligence is responsible for the majority of variation in group outcomes. As you write, the debate between 'conservatives' and your camp hinges upon whether intelligence is largely determined by culture or genes. Yet even if one accepts that intelligence is largely hereditary, it still remains unshown that outcomes like crime, absolute measures of poverty, infant mortality, etc., are uniquely caused by one's intellect. Seems more intuitive to me that social circumstances (e.g. family composition, behavior of peers) and resource provision (e.g. top-notch schools and hospitals) would have more causal power on these outcomes than intelligence. Indeed, the hyper-focus on intelligence only seems well-suited to explain scalar measures of individual achievement, especially those at the top end of the distribution (i.e. MATHCOUNTS contest results, FAANG engineer job hires), rather than measures of deprivation like those above.
The second is perhaps more relevant to this specific article -- your contention that 'hereditarianism' needs to be widely promoted in elite circles. Notwithstanding that this may result in a hyper-fixation on intelligence by the Right (rather than foci on social or material factors that institutions can actually solve ... see above), 'race realism' advocacy seems like a poison pill right now. You write that "Rufo’s strategy of creating a counter-elite won’t work unless left-wing elites start defecting to the right on scale" -- yet these defections will never happen in the first place by formally introducing race realism into public debate. If anything, it'll push centrist liberal-types leftward again and get you uninvited to every Georgetown/Upper West Side dinner party along the way.
Aside from the plan's strategic flaws, it seems hard to square widespread elite acceptance of 'race realism' with multiracial democracy. If, as you say, Locke was wrong and certain groups of people are fated to be more intelligent than others, why should we confine ourselves to a Lockean political system where every adult can vote? Shouldn't the highly intelligent groups dictate a disproportionate amount of political affairs (de jure, not just de facto)? More importantly, what do you tell the groups of people who, by virtue of their race and upbringing combined with predominant 'hereditarian' thought, have internalized feelings of inferiority or impotence? How do you dissuade them from antisocial behavior, rampant crime, and conflict? The reality is that times in the West are good right now (as they have been for at least 79 years), so much so that elites are willing to accept the costs of weird 'wokism' in order to avoid the horrors of a world that swallows what some might call the 'race realist red-pill.'
I was too busy to comment on this at the time, but I Tweeted a response now.
https://twitter.com/powerfultakes/status/1752152146185691394
Great job on identifying the many problems with Rightoid epistemic culture. However, I think that they are even more intractable than you imply, and that the most prospective approach is to try to creatively route around them, as opposed to spending decades more trying to convince people who have no interest in being convinced.