Which, when you see Antifa mugshots, pictures of folk sacked from Twitter, similar gatherings of the very “woke”, or the data you cite on mental health, you begin to wonder if there is not something to the hypothesis.
On very unkind, and very gay, commentator refers to “wokery” as “the revolt of the uglies”. Being physically unfortunate (in whatever manifestation, including ill-health) is likely to somewhat degrade your experience of the world and encourage imagining a better one.
There is evidence that physical beauty/attractiveness inclines one towards conservatism.
> And then there is the spiteful mutant hypothesis.
Well, at least people are still calling it a hypothesis. It might end up being right, but the science is shoddy, and key behaviors ascribed to the spiteful mutants are known to relate to high intelligence:
> There is evidence that physical beauty/attractiveness inclines one towards conservatism.
This is more solid, at least insofar as it's 1. Replicated, 2. Extended by findings that physical strength inclines towards conservatism, and 3. Reported by liberal psychologists.
Fair. I am more amused, and slightly worried, by the spiteful mutant hypothesis than convinced. The authors have too many priors they are attached to. Hence the poor science.
That was a very interesting study! I never thought of asking people questions about political beliefs in such a systemated manner. It would be great if someone wanted to replicate that study.
Fundamentally I think you are right that most Woke people are not Machiavellan. Most organizers of Drag Queen Story Hour probably genuinely believe they are helping to solve a problem. Still, I think those who came up with that idea were people who liked to provoke. There is nothing strange in that. I also like to provoke. But as Eric Berne observed (observed, not proved) was that provocation can also be a means of exerting power. Maybe the Drag Queen Story Hour phenomenon is an alliance between people who like to provoke, Machiavellans who see the link between provocation and power and a majority of genuine believers seeking meaning and community.
I wasn't really prepared for the statement that Eric Berne was unscientific. Of course he was unscientific! Psychologists in the mid 20th century were storytellers more than scientists. They were still struggling to invent a language in which to describe what they observed. I think Eric Berne did that better than most.
Glad you liked it, Tove! Ultimately I think the data ended up bearing out your interpretation much better than I had initially predicted - I thought the Woke would be *low* in Machiavellianism, or at least average, and I had to change the title of this post after I saw the data plotted out. This curvilinear relationship makes it much easier to imagine that there are many on the far left who really, genuinely are playing Agree With My Stupid Idea (or perhaps some variant where they don't think it's stupid, but know that you do).
There's actually a long history of research that's been published here; in the early 20th century Ferguson was analyzing survey data from Stanford and mapping attitudes on "Religionism" and "Humanitarianism;" Eysenck later found similar factors in a rotated form; and eventually Ronald Inglehart made comparable findings on an international scale. The article isn't well written, but you can follow the research if you skim over Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_spectrum#Academic_investigation
All of this may represent millions of hours of work, but ultimately it is at best semi-replicated and somewhat contentious in the psychological community. Even with good data and powerful statistical tools, it still isn't easy to figure out what is really going on. If Berne had good insights into human behavior, then the thing to do is find some way to test them!
It would be very interesting to see how your study would replicates over time. I spontaneously make up a hypothesis that Machiavellans are sensitive to trends.
Testing is just one part of science. Creating concepts that makes sense to test is one part. Maybe the biggest part. I think Eric Berne could be part of that process. But testing his concepts straight away would probably not be very meaningful, since better concepts should have evolved during 60 years.
And then there is the spiteful mutant hypothesis.
https://www.amazon.com/Spiteful-Mutants-Evolution-Sexuality-Religion/dp/159368083X
Which, when you see Antifa mugshots, pictures of folk sacked from Twitter, similar gatherings of the very “woke”, or the data you cite on mental health, you begin to wonder if there is not something to the hypothesis.
On very unkind, and very gay, commentator refers to “wokery” as “the revolt of the uglies”. Being physically unfortunate (in whatever manifestation, including ill-health) is likely to somewhat degrade your experience of the world and encourage imagining a better one.
There is evidence that physical beauty/attractiveness inclines one towards conservatism.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/caveman-politics/201803/science-weighs-in-conservatives-look-better
> And then there is the spiteful mutant hypothesis.
Well, at least people are still calling it a hypothesis. It might end up being right, but the science is shoddy, and key behaviors ascribed to the spiteful mutants are known to relate to high intelligence:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/unique-everybody-else/201806/defending-atheist-mutational-load-theory-the-authors-reply
Ultimately, the Woke are not really the same as atheists. For instance, atheism really does correlate with Machiavellianism in a straightforward, linear way; see for example Arli, "Are religious Millennials more ethical and less Machiavellian" at http://repository.ubaya.ac.id/38939/9/Dudi%20Anandya_Are%20religious%20consumers%20more%20ethical%20and%20less%20Machiavellian.pdf
> There is evidence that physical beauty/attractiveness inclines one towards conservatism.
This is more solid, at least insofar as it's 1. Replicated, 2. Extended by findings that physical strength inclines towards conservatism, and 3. Reported by liberal psychologists.
Fair. I am more amused, and slightly worried, by the spiteful mutant hypothesis than convinced. The authors have too many priors they are attached to. Hence the poor science.
That was a very interesting study! I never thought of asking people questions about political beliefs in such a systemated manner. It would be great if someone wanted to replicate that study.
Fundamentally I think you are right that most Woke people are not Machiavellan. Most organizers of Drag Queen Story Hour probably genuinely believe they are helping to solve a problem. Still, I think those who came up with that idea were people who liked to provoke. There is nothing strange in that. I also like to provoke. But as Eric Berne observed (observed, not proved) was that provocation can also be a means of exerting power. Maybe the Drag Queen Story Hour phenomenon is an alliance between people who like to provoke, Machiavellans who see the link between provocation and power and a majority of genuine believers seeking meaning and community.
I wasn't really prepared for the statement that Eric Berne was unscientific. Of course he was unscientific! Psychologists in the mid 20th century were storytellers more than scientists. They were still struggling to invent a language in which to describe what they observed. I think Eric Berne did that better than most.
Glad you liked it, Tove! Ultimately I think the data ended up bearing out your interpretation much better than I had initially predicted - I thought the Woke would be *low* in Machiavellianism, or at least average, and I had to change the title of this post after I saw the data plotted out. This curvilinear relationship makes it much easier to imagine that there are many on the far left who really, genuinely are playing Agree With My Stupid Idea (or perhaps some variant where they don't think it's stupid, but know that you do).
There's actually a long history of research that's been published here; in the early 20th century Ferguson was analyzing survey data from Stanford and mapping attitudes on "Religionism" and "Humanitarianism;" Eysenck later found similar factors in a rotated form; and eventually Ronald Inglehart made comparable findings on an international scale. The article isn't well written, but you can follow the research if you skim over Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_spectrum#Academic_investigation
All of this may represent millions of hours of work, but ultimately it is at best semi-replicated and somewhat contentious in the psychological community. Even with good data and powerful statistical tools, it still isn't easy to figure out what is really going on. If Berne had good insights into human behavior, then the thing to do is find some way to test them!
It would be very interesting to see how your study would replicates over time. I spontaneously make up a hypothesis that Machiavellans are sensitive to trends.
Testing is just one part of science. Creating concepts that makes sense to test is one part. Maybe the biggest part. I think Eric Berne could be part of that process. But testing his concepts straight away would probably not be very meaningful, since better concepts should have evolved during 60 years.