Folks in mentions call me a “fascism apologist” for not calling Scott a crypto-reactionary. He IS credulous about reactionary ideas & “insight”, part of their recruitment pipeline, and his community overlaps heavily with theirs. A fellow traveller. Bad & dangerous enoug

On Nick Land: The Weird Libertarian

The philosopher Nick Land has been widely described as “fascist”, “neofascist” or “alt-right”, all essentially inaccurate or uninteresting labels. Those who bother with fine distinction would call …

Jay Van Bavel, PhD on Twitter / X

I think it’s extremely unhealthy for any academic field to make it taboo to critique publications from senior or junior scholars or to critique certain popular methods. This makes the field worse or makes us look bad to people outside our field (including the public). It erodes…— Jay Van Bavel, PhD (@jayvanbavel) October 13, 2024

The thinking style that makes people vulnerable to extremism | Psyche Ideas

The people most drawn to ideological thinking and authoritarianism aren’t aware of what makes them so susceptible

The Impact of Toxic Influencers on Communities

There’s a common character that can be often spotted in many online communities. It’s the “toxic influencer” (sometimes referred as “intellectual bully”). A toxic influencer is a person…

Reactionary Philosophy In An Enormous, Planet-Sized Nutshell

I have heard the following from a bunch of people, one of whom was me six months ago: “I keep on reading all these posts by really smart people who identify as Reactionaries, and I don’…

The Authoritarian Personality

This hugely influential study on the psychology of authoritarianism was written in answer to Hitler’s Germany—and now rings more relevant than ever as fascism and anti-Semitism sweep across America.What makes a fascist? Are there character traits that make someone more likely to vote for the far right? The Authoritarian Personality is not only one of the most significant works of social psychology ever written, it also marks a milestone in the development of Adorno’s thought, showing him grappling with the problem of fascism and the reasons for Europe’s turn to reaction. Over half a century later, and with the rise of right-wing populism and the reemergence of the far-right in recent years, this hugely influential study remains as insightful and relevant as ever.This new edition includes an introduction by Frankfurt School scholar Peter E. Gordon and contains the first-ever publication of Adorno’s subsequent critical notes on the project.“Adorno and his colleagues could easily have been describing Alex Jones’s paranoid InfoWars rants or the racist views expressed by many Trump supporters.” —New York Times

Ian Preston (@ianopolous.bsky.social)

Mathematician/particle physicist turned privacy researcher. Java Rockstar #Oxford Building a better web - private, self-sovereign identity, p2p, social - with @peergos.org. Public social media undermines democracy. #covidisairborne #maskswork #cleantheair

Data Feminism for AI

Attacks on women and trans people are not happening in a vacuum. Communications scholars W. Lance Bennett and Marianne Kneuer recently argued that we are witnessing the intensification of "illiberal public spheres" around the world (Bennett and Kneuer, 2023). These are characterized by a set of anti-democratic communications tactics that include the denigration and exclusion of minoritized people, targeted attacks on the press and political institutions, and transgression of norms of civil discourse. Such tactics are enabled and amplified by the social media platforms owned by Big Tech, whose business model elevates attention above all other metrics, such that they profit richly off extremism, threats, spectacle, and lies. The success of this corporate partnership with right-wing extremism is evident in the proliferation of book bans (Magnusson, 2024), the demonization of DEI and critical race theory (Crenshaw, 2022), and mob tactics to doxx, intimidate, misrepresent, and otherwise silence people that study misinformation, speak out against racial and gender violence, or rule against insurrectionists (Edmonds, 2024). At the same time, we have seen the continued work of feminists, including Latin American, Indigenous, and abolitionist feminists in the US and globally, doing the work of imagining alternate worlds (Cullors, 2021; Davis, 2022; Ricaurte, 2019; Simpson, 2017). This paper represents our own first attempt to imagine a more equitable, sustainable, feminist world for AI research.

Opinion | DeSantis hits CAIR and antifa with bogus ‘terrorist’ labels

The Florida governor’s new designations for the Council on American-Islamic Relations and antifa are as dangerous as they are absurd.

The phony comforts of useful idiots

On Casey Newton and the shallowness of anti-skepticism.

FROM KIRK TO A/I

For a detailed breakdown of our investigation check out our DEDICATED INVESTIGATION PAGE How a post-assassination campaign against "Antifa" moved through outside advocates, the White House, Congress and U.S. counterterrorism policy before…

‘This Is Nuts’: Nolan Wells’ Friends Get Judge to Silence Black Influencer from Posting About Them

Nolan Wells’ litigious friends have silenced a Black influencer, whose accusations against the teens have already put him at the center of a defamation

Grok Becomes ‘MechaHitler,’ Twitter Becomes X: How Centralized Tech Is Prone To Fascist Manipulation

This week, Elon Musk’s Grok AI started spewing extreme antisemitism, responding with conspiracy theories about Jewish people, and for a brief period telling people to call it “MechaHitl…

Rubio and Miller warn of the ‘mortal threat’ of ‘far-left terror’ in speech to 67 countries | CNN Politics

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and top White House adviser Stephen Miller on Thursday sought to paint a dark picture of the threat of “far-left terror” to the United States as they urged diplomats from around the world to “defend” their civilizations against the “scourge.”

Eventually Everyone Will Be Called A Terrorist | Defector

Secretary of State Marco Rubio convened representatives from 66 different nations on July 16 for a “ministerial meeting” on the resurgence of “political terrorism.” The White House described the summit as the launch of “an unprecedented global offensive against the transnational threat of Radical Left terrorism.” This historic occasion took the form of Rubio, White…