rant · moment 17 of 19
Why the Alt-Media Space Got Overrun by Trolls and Lunatics
from What is Shangri-La · #129
Audio-only archive episode — no video to seek.
6 minTim argues that the space for sane alternative history got co-opted by hysterics and Antifa-adjacent comedians accusing people of being white supremacists, and that no one cares about actual historical facts anymore compared to moral panics like campus culture wars, using examples like drone strikes on Pakistani weddings versus outrage over Louis C.K.'s jokes.
- 47:57Tim jokes that as long as people say he's funny, they can say whatever else they want about him.
- 48:38The problem with current discourse is that everyone's hysterical and no one's the sane rational person trying to find middle ground.
- 48:49People stopped caring about what actually happened and now only care about what should have happened—everything's become a moral argument.
- 49:51Tim wanted to examine actual historical events with evidence that they might have happened differently, but nobody really cares.
- 50:24Campus culture and being uncomfortable in class have more immediate impact on people's lives than events like Watergate that happened 50 years ago.
- 50:44Being uncomfortable at work matters more than blood on the streets of Panama or drone wars, apparently.
- 51:14Tim's learned from comedy that everybody's just fearful of not working and wants to say the right thing.
- 51:57The response to people being renditioned to Sudan and tortured wasn't as outraged as the reaction to Louis CK's parking lot joke.
- 52:34Corporate overlords love social justice because as long as everyone's consuming and buying, they're happy.
- 53:25Tim and Ray prank-called a Cars for Kids charity pretending to ask if they were trafficking children in the cars.
- 53:40The joke implied the Cars for Kids workers thought something inappropriate was happening inside the vehicles.
NikeDavid TalbotNoam ChomskyChris HedgesSalonJordan PetersonPanamaWatergate