Quote:
Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski
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Srsly? You realize the meta group here is Trump critics. The only groups of Trump critics I would say have 0.00 signalers in them are those targeted by Trump.
I do not believe there is any demographic of Trump critics out there which does not contain a percentage of virtue-signallers except those targeted by the man.
I think this about almost every "movement' of the day. People start movements for the right reasons, and then glommers-on jump into them, looking for a purpose. You get a mix of truly committed people and people who just want something to commit to, among many other varieties. Fromm nailed it all in
True Believer, which might be the most ironically titled book of all time.
ETA: It's nearly impossible to miss the "religious" element of these movements. We're wired to behave in a tribal manner. Recall how everyone was suddenly behind W after 9/11? You'd have been beaten up for saying, "Well, this is kind of a result of our failure to follow through on foreign aid to Afghanistan after the Russians were defeated." People were all suddenly aligned and there was a fervor, sort of a reverse of Melville's line that " genius all over the world stands hand in hand and a shock of recognition runs the circle round": "Righteous anger stands hand in hand and a shock of recognition causes all hands to eschew questioning and act as one."
You can see the religious element in the MAGA rallies, in Bernie's rallies. It popped up in that pipeline protest that attracted thousands of people, many of whom weren't even sure what they were protesting. You saw it in #MeToo, which erupted from an investigation of a rapist (Weinstein) into a hurricane of accusations that continues to grow. You see it in the resurgence of right wing political parties in Europe. You just saw it elect a right winger in Brazil. It exists in our environmental movements, in pro-life movements. All of these things, any movement, are comprised enormously of people looking for direction and people desiring to signal to others. It's both a feature of and bug in our socializing instincts.
