Random Thoughts April 4th

A question I have pondered is, how does one come up with interesting insights/thoughts? I would suspect there is a reading involved and also necessary to gauge the interests of the prospective audience, but what makes something ‘click? or viral” From what I have observed, content that is introspective and personal that tells the author’s own personal experience, but is also a critique of society and the ‘human condition’–be it loneliness (the so-called loneliness epidemic, which I don’t believe exists but it is a very popular topic among the intellectual web), ‘finding oneself’ (related to existentialism), making sense of the contradictions and limitations of modernity, critiques of class and social structures and hierarchies, etc.–tend to do well.

Unlike the average-IQ left/right, who are irreconcilably polarized and want little to do with each other (just view the comments beneath the Tweets of any major American politician, to see how bitter this acrimony is) , the high-IQ left/right are untied by shared narratives and experiences, so writing that taps into these beliefs tends to do well. I saw a post by Moldbug in which he links to blog post by Scott about Moloch. The two individuals, although understood to be ideologically diametrically opposed (Moldbug being a reactionary, Scott a liberal) share some similarities and overlap in terms of their value systems and experiences and idiosyncrasies, way more than the overlap between the typical Trump supporter vs. the typical Biden supporter, which is vanishingly small.

Perhaps, instead of IQ, the framing should be rural vs urban/suburban values. As some have posited, the divide between rural conservatives and urban conservatives is greater than the divide between rural liberals and rural conservatives or urban conservatives and urban liberals. [The divide between urban liberals vs. rural liberals is probably not as great as it is between rural vs. urban conservatives.] Scott and Moldbug, as well as others of the IDW and the intellectual-web, tend to personify urban values. Whereas rural people tend to god-fearing and value personal autonomy but also ‘strong families and communities,’ urbanites , even on the right, tend to be government-fearing instead of god-fearing, are mask-wearing instead of flag-wearing, and are more inclined to defer to policy experts and trust government institutions, even if those institutions are controlled by the opposing party.