Why can’t optimism over the economy and support of the fed coexist with HBD (human bio-diversity) and right-wing and libertarian ideologies of the blogosphere? Through the Grey Enlightenment, I’m trying to forge such a connection, but the results have been poor. With the exception of Reddit and a handful of sites, in general, there is an overabundance of pessimism on much of the internet when discussing political, sociological or investment matters. You tell people that America is not doomed, that the bank bailouts worked, or that the financial system is not on the verge of collapse and they become incensed or peeved, over what should be good news? America is the most successful nation because of the meritocracy, and accordingly it rewards smart, hard-working people for the value they create. If anything, America is a perfect example of the inextricable role HBD plays in all aspects of our lives, from social mobility to to wealth inequality, and HBD bloggers and the right wing should celebrate this.
This segues into an article by Derb about the hardship of taking the ‘red pill’, or having to face the unpleasantness of reality. He writes:
We gloomsters are right about pretty much everything, but we’re not very happy
Derb is right about IQ and how it’s an important predictor of success at life and how smart people are important, but disagree with gloomers being right about everything. If you’re an empirically minded science person (as Derb would classify himself as being) and for the past six years you keep reading from the doom and gloomer crowd about how the stock market will crash, or how there will be a deep recession, that America’s global influence will be diminished or that there will hyperinflation and none of these things happen, don’t we reject their hypothesis, or at least look at it more critically?
Who wants to hear you say that the emperor has no clothes, when everyone else they know—including all the cool people!—says otherwise?
If he means Obama being the emperor with no clothes he’s right, but from years of personal experience posting on message boards and reading the comments from sites as diverse as Market Watch to the New York Times and National Review, people prefer to read doom and gloom over optimism, because just like the left wants to believe IQ is not important, they want to believe the reason why they are poor, unhappy or unemployed is because of unfairness in the economy, not their own fault. Those failing to participate in the recovery want to blame society, Wall St., the fed, credit card companies, Washington, etc instead of personal factors, such as bad genes. The link between IQ and wealth, employment, and income is well-established. Doom and gloom becomes a coping mechanism, “Well, if my life isn’t going well, the economy must be on the verge of collapse and the game is rigged.” Or, “I don’t like XYZ, therefore America is doomed.” There’s many examples of this, and they are all wrong.
If not as a comping mechanism, the gravitation towards doom and gloom is based on comforting, popular misconceptions about the US economy, as discussed in some detail here. America pays record low interest on its debt and has reserve currency status. Theoretically, all of that could change, but the odds are slim. America’s advantage is its size, defense and free market. Argentina defaulted this week. With brief periods of panic such as 2008, optimism tends to win in the end.