Are the Woke Machiavellian?

A Response to Games People Play

So Tove has a new article in Wood from Eden, which you should read. Like all of her best posts, this one was more intellectually provocative than rigorously scientific, and it ultimately provoked a response from me that seemed too large for a simple comment.

In her article, Tove proposed that, in the style of Eric Berne’s Games People Play, the modern Woke have hit upon a social game Tove calls Agree With My Stupid Idea.

It goes something like this:

1. Pick an obviously stupid, harmful, illogical position. 

2. Show your power through defending that position in public. If you get away with that and even get people to ape you, you have proven your social status.

3. With your social status confirmed, attack all people who still call your position stupid. Those who don't get that defending Stupid Position is the thing people should be doing today are the outgroup, and get treated as such. 

Tove argues that the Woke are playing this game with Drag Queen Story Hour:

In order to separate the loyalists from those you can’t count on, a good idea won’t do. For that purpose you need an obviously bad idea. 

Drag Queen Story Hour is one of those bad ideas.

So what’s wrong with this?

Well here’s what I think, and you can be the judge.

For one thing, Games People Play is pre-pre-replication crisis psychology. For any newcomers to the world of the soft sciences, around the mid 2010’s it came out that the vast majority of findings in psychology are not verified by studies attempting to replicate them. This has had enormous consequences for anyone who follows psychological science; we always took the newest psychological finding with a pinch of salt, but now the more sensible approach is to poke it a bit with your fork before swallowing it.

And well, if psychology in the early 21st century is shot through with wide-eyed claims backed by shoddy statistical practices, what does this say about psychology in the 20th century?

To be fair, there was some solid research going on then—the traits they were naming and measuring had nonzero heritability, and these were findings which did replicate, over and over. For just one example, Type A competitive workaholics were contrasted with easygoing members of personality Type B; numerous measures of this dichotomy were explored, finding a consistent, nonzero heritability. Whether Type A and Type B personalities were wisely conceptualized or not, if genes played some role in a person developing Type A or Type B personality, then the questionnaires for this dichotomy had to be measuring something. The heritability of random noise is zero, but here are two typical studies finding heritability coefficients well above zero for type A/B personality. This pattern has been so consistent, and so well-replicated, that it’s now known as The First Law of Behavior Genetics: Everything is at least a little bit heritable. So yes, there was some absolutely solid psychological science going on in the 20th century.

…And on the other hand there was Freudianism, about which the less said, the better. Yet unfortunately Tove’s post was inspired by the writings of Eric Berne. And if we’re going to talk about Eric Berne’s contribution to psychology then we have to talk about Freudianism, because Berne trained for many years as a Freudian psychoanalyst. That Berne was ultimately rejected from the field is not something I really hold against him, but let’s be clear that Berne was steeped in a nonscientific tradition where the idea of hypothesis testing was vaguely offensive. If you don’t mind a quick foray into Wikipedia’s article on Freud:

In 1934, when the psychologist Saul Rosenzweig sent Freud reprints of his attempts to study repression, Freud responded with a dismissive letter stating that "the wealth of reliable observations" on which psychoanalytic assertions were based made them "independent of experimental verification."

Berne also trained under various other nonscientific psychologists like Erik Eriksen, so it’s hardly a surprise that his own book, Games People Play, is devoid of statistical content. I love this reviewer who described his experience reading Games People Play on Goodreads:

[I]t dawned on me around halfway through the book to ask "how much of this has been empirically verified?"

Now all of the above is not to say that nonscientific claims have no place in science—science requires hypotheses to test. Unsubstantiated ideas are the raw materials to be tested, juicy apples for the pie. But without actually testing them, they are, unfortunately, raw. Data-based findings in psychology may not replicate, but there should at least be some data there to begin with.

OK but you still haven’t said what you don’t like about Tove’s Idea

So Tove’s interpretation may not be wrong, but it looks very much like that of someone living on the outside looking in. Seen from the outside, I agree, Drag Queen Story Hour really does seem like a straightforwardly bad idea. Tove takes this at face value, and proceeds by assuming everyone is on the same page; whether they like Drag Queen Story Hour or not, they realize what a bad idea it is. But I think the proponents of Drag Queen Story Hour believe it is a good idea—not only a good idea, but necessary, because I’ve seen this kind of phenomenon over and over again.

Consider another practice that seems like a straightforwardly bad idea: Snake handling. This religious rite practiced by a few scattered Protestant sects is notoriously dangerous. Seen from the outside, it’s easy to look for ulterior motivations to explain people grabbing a fistful of venomous reptile and holding it up to their heads. “Oh,” we might assume, “They must have some clever social reason for this! Maybe they are trying to garner sympathy after being bitten, or, maybe they’re trying to gain respect for courage.” Maybe they are; social factors always always play a role in human behavior. But there’s another very powerful, very compelling explanation for this phenomenon: belief.

In a 2014 story reported on USA Today:

The death by snakebite of a Kentucky pastor who starred in the TV show Snake Salvation has raised questions about the often illegal and deadly ritual…

Pastor Jamie Coots died after a snake bit him during a worship service Saturday… Brian Pennington, a religion professor at Maryville College in Maryville, Tenn., has studied Coots during his research on snake handling in worship.

He said the prominent leader of the snake handling community saw the practice as "an absolute command of God…”

Snake handling began near Chattanooga, Tenn., in 1910 when Pastor George Hensley said he was commanded by God to "take up serpents." He was inspired by the book of Mark chapter 16:18, that says: " they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well."

Pennington said snake handlers do not operate under the assumption snakes will never bite them.

"They do it simply as an act of obedience," he said.

Handlers, he said, have an understanding that unless they feel the anointing of the Holy Spirit, they are not to pick up the serpent. If they feel anointed by God, they must pick it up.

"This is by no means a test of their faith," he said.

In Tennessee and Kentucky, it is illegal to use snakes for worship. Toomey said snake handlers do not attempt to rationalize their actions. He said they understand the risks going into it, they accept death as a consequence, and are not concerned about the legal repercussions.

"They believe they are individually bound to do this. Laws don't matter. If you receive direction like that, state statutes simply don't matter," Toomey said.

Ultimately, the snake handling phenomenon makes no sense except in the context of religious belief. Why do we only see this in the context of Evangelical Christianity? Why no atheists or agnostics reaping the social rewards of the snake handlers? And, if all they are doing is trying to look for sympathy or display courage, why handle snakes? Why not overdose on heroin, or play Russian Roulette? The answer is obvious: The Bible expressly mentions snakes, so for those who take the Bible literally, snakes it is.

To the extent that any social factors do come into play, they relate to the reinforcement of an ideology. You can’t impress irreligious people by picking up a deadly snake and holding it to your face, because skeptics aren’t impressed by quotes from the Bible. They’ll simply view you as crazy. It’s the presence of a body of fellow believers who justify that belief, who dedicate themselves to it and support you in your own belief, and this social support is what strengthens a worldview enough to result in such complete devotion to it. From the outside, snake handling is really not a good idea. Seen from the inside, snake handling isn’t just logical, it isn’t just a good idea, it’s an inescapable consequence of belief in the literal text of the Bible.

Drag Queen Story Hour is the same.

What does the data say?

I’m much more comfortable talking about things that have been well established whenever I can. Since we’re wandering into a realm where the actual science is spotty, I want to share some independent research I’ve carried out in psychology. I actually have a survey I gave to users on an online political forum in 2013, n = 100. Although the questions weren’t designed to examine Woke attitudes, it turns out that the questions there can be combined and analyzed to give us some data on Wokeness, a belief in the power of the environment on human behavior, and Machiavellian attitudes.

Wokeness Scale: (Average score: 3.8 out of 5)

1. Gays and lesbians should be allowed to marry and adopt children

2. Racism is a major problem in this country

3. Sexual Equality is important.

4. We would have fewer problems if we treated people more equally

Power of Environment Scale: (Average Score: 3.4 out of 5)

1. Personality is mostly learned from our environment and upbringing.

2. Human personality is mostly inherited. (Reverse scored)

Machiavellianism Scale: (Average Score: 2.8 out of 5)

1. Honesty is the best policy in all cases. (Reverse scored)

2. There’s no excuse for lying to someone else. (Reverse scored)

3. Don’t tell anyone the real reason you did something unless it’s useful to do so.

4. Generally speaking, people won’t work hard unless they're forced to do so.

5. Most people are basically good and kind. (Reverse scored)

So just a few comments: The data was gathered on unselected participants, who, like most people who post on the Internet, leaned to the left. This may partly explain why the mean response on a 1-5 scale for the Wokeness items was above 3. But it’s also consistent with the idea that lots of people agree that gay couples should be able to adopt children, oppose sexism, and think of racism as a major problem.

The relationship between Woke attitudes and belief in the power of the environment to shape people’s lives (left) and Machiavellianism (right) in a sample of 100 people. If you’re interested in the details, feel free to ask in the comments.

The results are… interesting. As I predicted, Wokeness was related to a belief in the power of the social environment (r = 0.29, p = 0.0032), but not to Machiavellianism—or at least, not in a straightforward linear way (r = -0.04, p = 0.6). Yet visually there did seem to be something going on with Machiavellianism, and when I checked if there was a curvilinear relationship, in fact, I found one (r2 = 0.0805, p = 0.0021). If real, this curved relationship means that Machiavellian attitudes are elevated at the extreme end, where the hardcore Woke live their lives.

Of course, all the usual caveats apply. This survey may not be representative, the sample size was not large, and I can’t guarantee that the results will replicate. Indeed, I tend to suspect that the curvilinear relationship with Machiavellianism is just an artifact; we’re looking at a 2nd order effect in a sample of only 100. What information I have to share with you does say that the Woke could indeed be more Machiavellian than other people. Yet what is more obvious is the clear linear effect showing their belief in the power of the social environment to mold and shape people. And when we take these findings into consideration, their process looks something more like this:

1. Pick something controversial you really, really care about.

2. Think, “I want everyone to feel about this the way I do!”

3. Realize you are not persuasive enough to convince adults to agree with you.

4. Assume, “I can get kids to care about this! Their critical thinking skills are undeveloped!”

5. Figure out a way to indoctrinate people as children.

Does it actually work? Well, plenty of pre-replication-crisis psychologists definitely shared the Woke attitudes to social conditioning:

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select — doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.

—John Watson (1930) Behaviorism.

But whether it works or not isn’t the point, any more than it matters whether God actually protects snake handlers or not. What matters is that this is one of the most basic elements of Woke attitudes—the notion that we’ll fix anything, everything, through social conditioning. I remember growing up with all the other gen-Xers, dutifully filing into English or History class to watch Ferngully and the Earth Day Special in school. (Gen Z readers, be thankful you have no idea what I’m writing about; these films weren’t like Wall-E or Soylent Green—though we did see Soylent Green in 8th grade Science.) This is what the Woke have been doing since before Wokeness was even a word: relying on the transformative power of education to bring about a better future. This is what’s in their Bible.

Imagine

The theme song for this post is John Lennon’s Imagine, which he made all the way back in 1971. Though the lyrics ask us to dream a hopeful dream, to me, this is a melancholy melody, a song that paints the picture of an unhappy man searching for another world to live in. John Lennon inspired a generation of protestors with his passionate leftism; he was so revolutionary the FBI kept tabs on him. But they eventually concluded that he was, like the rest of us here on Earth, mostly harmless: Lennon spent his days under the influence of narcotics.

If Lennon isn’t really your thing, and you want something more modern, sit down and watch American Beauty (1999), Star Trek: Enterprise (2001) or Lovecraft Country (2020). Soon enough, you’ll realize that the people who crave this kind of media are deeply unsettled by the injustices of the world, horrified by the unimaginative, uneducated conservatives who surround them, and yearning for a beautiful future where bigotry is erased. Society is flawed; the way forward is to change that society, starting right now—always right now, let’s not wait, or try to understand things, it must be now, right now—with the youngest generation.

Unfortunately, ours genuinely is an imperfect world: Millions of innocent people are born with a stigmatized sexual orientation, or a mismatch between the gender they were assigned and the gender of their heart. Very often, they have to live their entire lives by lying to everyone dear to them about something as basic, and as personal, as who they are. This is heartbreaking. Worse: It’s an injustice! But what can be done? Something must be done!

So, Drag Queen Story Hour.

Drag Queen Story Hour is definitely something.

Something being done.

The Woke Need Something

It’s always hard to know what my readers do and don’t know, but in case this is news: Currently, mental health is poor on the political left, and it gets worse the farther to the left you go. I don’t believe this was always true, and I doubt that it will be always true, but here in the modern world, this is just the way things look:

The upside, and the downside, to religious fundamentalism, is that there’s not really much incentive to solve problems in the world. Snake handlers aren’t trying to improve the world, just be obedient to God. And mainstream evangelical Christians accept the world is fallen, and can be satisfied to simply ride it out as a test of faith. But when John Lennon encouraged his fans to “Imagine there’s no heaven… no hell below us, above us only sky,” he asked them to imagine a world without anything to comfort or reassure them.

Though we may try to put a good face on it, that graph above represents daily, grinding suffering on the far left end of the political spectrum. When you’re in distress, it helps to have some kind of buffer. That buffer can be anything—friendship, a personal story, a sense of purpose that gives value to your days, or some reassurance that things will get better. But coming together to change the world provides all four of these things. For the Woke, Drag Queen Story Hour is what they need.

At what point does corruption complicate the picture? Maybe the story begins with troubled, if innocent, naivete. Or maybe, if you trust the results I’ve presented here, Machiavellianism was there from the very beginning. But over time, as the movement gains traction, Drag Queen Story Hour is a regular feature of modern life, and we have a critical mass of Woke people who believe, savvy Machiavellians can easily exploit the scene. Just like the cynical televangelists who took advantage of their followers, there are plenty of people out there who can tell which way the wind blows nowadays. But they couldn’t exist without the ordinary believers: people who, rather than trying to play status games or keep anyone down, simply want something to believe in—a better world to imagine.