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Comment by pfisherman | Hacker News Reader

> Yeah, I call BS. Back in 2010 the word 'woke' (as an adjective) was practically unknown outside of AAVE and had no negative connotation.

My understanding of that passage was that the author was paraphrasing Yarvin - who from my understanding is somewhat of a monarchist? I remember his moldbug persona from the blog-o-sphere back in the mid/late aughts as someone who would write long meandering posts in the comment section of pickup artist blog; which ironically is where much of this alt-right stuff started. Kind of (darkly) funny that lot of the intellectual scaffolding for this new authoritarian political philosophy is a at its root a visceral reaction to feelings of powerlessness and lack of agency in dating women.

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Sorry, this is just completely wrong, at least regarding Moldbug.

> I remember his moldbug persona from the blog-o-sphere back in the mid/late aughts as someone who would write long meandering posts in the comment section of pickup artist blog

He got his start on the 2blowhards blog, which was not about pickup artistry at all. While I suppose it's possible he left comments on pickup artist blogs, he never wrote about pickup artistry on his own blog except to dunk on them (e.g. https://www.unqualified-reservations.org/2013/06/civil-liber...).

> the intellectual scaffolding for this new authoritarian political philosophy is a at its root a visceral reaction to feelings of powerlessness and lack of agency in dating women

During the entire time of "Unqualified reservations" existing he was happily married. Moldbug has never written about women's rights at all (neither for nor against). It's simply not a focus of his work. I challenge you to find one written sentence of his that indicates that he is a misogynist.

It’s where his audience was, and where the discussions took place.

I think saying that moldbug was responsible for the intellectual scaffolding of the alt-right overstates his role.

The intellectual underpinnings of the alt-right world view is more closely aligned with the stuff expressed on Roissy’s blog than anything moldbug wrote. Imo, moldbug was just a convenient associate who was tapped to lend the movement a thin veneer of intellectual rigor.

Eric Hoffer’s “The True Believer” does explore the common quality of low status/perception of failure in the personal development of German authoritarian leaders.

(Yes, yes - Godwin…)

Otherwise powerful people (or people capable of being powerful) can obviously have some kind of internalized “low status” beliefs, so it’s not much of a stretch to expect them to seek explanations/redefinitions that deny those self-perceived weaknesses.

A lot of authoritarian types are insecure jerks reacting to perceived slights. Seems to be a relatively common, if unfortunate, pattern.

The important part is making sure they don't get power over others.

> insecure jerks reacting to perceived slights

Human beings in general.

> The important part is making sure they don't get power over others.

That too!

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