Speaking an Uncomfortable Truth – The Intellectual Dark Web
- Communication, Relationship Studies, Relationships
I know this is a site for dating and relationship advice – but it’s also a site where we tackle thorny issues in an untraditional manner for the love business – with a bias towards truth, rationality and big data rather than feelings.
If you haven’t noticed – or have been living under a rock – some of the brightest and most liberal thinkers in America have been tagged as racist, sexist and far-left heretics, simply for pointing out things that are observable.
If you haven’t noticed – or have been living under a rock – some of the brightest and most liberal thinkers in America have been tagged as racist, sexist and far-left heretics, simply for pointing out things that are observable.
I wrote about it here and am not doing it again any time soon. Instead, I wanted to use today’s post to share a worthwhile op-ed piece by New York Times Bari Weiss that has already made the rounds.
It’s called “Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web,” a term that is somewhere between “sad” and “tongue in cheek.” Really, it shouldn’t be newsworthy when a scientist points out that men and women are biologically different, that Islam has a unique terrorism problem or that the far left is eroding first amendment rights by shouting down any professor, author or comedian who dares to disagree with it.
If I were a public intellectual, I would love to be grouped in with the folks on this list, if only for the reasons Weiss describes here:
“They all share three distinct qualities. First, they are willing to disagree ferociously, but talk civilly, about nearly every meaningful subject: religion, abortion, immigration, the nature of consciousness. Second, in an age in which popular feelings about the way things ought to be often override facts about the way things actually are, each is determined to resist parroting what’s politically convenient. And third, some have paid for this commitment by being purged from institutions that have become increasingly hostile to unorthodox thought – and have found receptive audiences elsewhere.”
“There is no direct route into the Intellectual Dark Web. But the quickest path is to demonstrate that you aren’t afraid to confront your own tribe.
The metaphors for this experience vary: going through the phantom tollbooth; deviating from the narrative; falling into the rabbit hole. But almost everyone can point to a particular episode where they came in as one thing and emerged as something quite different.”
I always thought I was pretty typical: East Coast, Jewish, liberal, well-read, likes to argue, could have been a lawyer, but became a writer. There are thousands of me. What it took me over a decade to calculate was that most people are more concerned about being liked than anything else. And while I’d love to make everybody happy all the time, if it’s between speaking truth or kowtowing to cater to the whims of a bifurcated audience, I’ll stick with truth every time.
if it’s between speaking truth or kowtowing to cater to the whims of a bifurcated audience, I’ll stick with truth every time.
As a result, I’m proud to say that I have haters on the right (the MGOTW community who thinks the worst of women) and haters on the left (the radical feminist community who thinks that any man who offers constructive (albeit solicited) criticism to women is a misogynist mansplainer).
So while I haven’t hit it huge in the mainstream media – millions of blog readers notwithstanding – I’m proud to stand with the motley crew that makes up the Intellectual Dark Web. They just go to show that truth should not be subjective and one should never be ashamed to tell it simply because it’s unpopular.
Your thoughts, below, are greatly appreciated.
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