Tag: Gamma

Honest Liberal, Successful Gamma

I have long believed that Garrison Keillor was one of the greatest writers of the Boomer generation, both in terms of style and substance. One of the reasons for my belief is that as a native-born Minnesotan raised in a deeply Christian family, he is too honest and accurate an observer to fail to report even that which directly contradicts his personal preferences, which, as a Scots-Scandinavian hybrid, are unfailingly progressive and liberal. And Keillor himself is refreshingly aware of the contradictions that complete him.

I am all in favor of diversity and inclusivity in theory, but when the pilot comes on the horn and welcomes us from the cockpit, I want to feel that he or she is a Republican. I want to hear authority in the voice, a growliness that comes from having shouted orders at people. I do not want my pilot to come on singing “Off we go into the wild blue yonder” and if he does, I’m off the plane. If it’s a woman pilot, I want her to be crisp and chill, not warm and caring. If she mentions turbulent conditions ahead, I don’t want to hear concern in her voice. I do not want her to thank us for flying — that’s for the flight attendants. I prefer my pilot to be a Republican with military service, preferably at the rank of captain or higher, preferably as an aviator, not in the Quartermaster Corps. I’m a Democrat and I’d be leery of a progressive Democrat pilot whose concern about air pollution might make him reluctant to use full power on takeoff. I don’t want anyone like me up front. No deep thinkers. A high-flier, please.

You might ask, not unreasonably, how a man raised in a good Christian home, with a strong inclination toward honesty and a deep familiarity with Scripture, could fall so completely into error. Part of the answer is his genetics; the Scandinavians are the innocent lambs of the world, psychologically shaped by their need for mutual cooperation to survive in the icy North, as evidenced by his grandmother’s belief in the native superiority of the coloreds, a belief of the sort that can only be formed in perfect ignorance of the subject.

Grandma whistles under her breath, a tuneless music. She cuts me a slice of warm yeasty bread and pours me a cup of Salada tea. Her fingers are knotted at the knuckles. She is a woman of firm beliefs. If you leave your windows open at night, you won’t get sick. Chew your food thirty times before you swallow. There’s no need for herbs if the ingredients are good. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. And once I heard her say, “The colored are better looking, more intelligent, more talented, harder working, more honest, and more loving toward their families than Caucasians.” I was impressed. Her grandfather had been a federal administrator in the South after the Civil War, during Reconstruction, and she got her ideas about people of color from him.

That Time of Year: A Minnesota Life, Garrison Keillor

You could still hear Minnesotans say things like that in the early 1980s. I rather doubt they are so inclined to do so any more, now that they have actual experience living in the vicinity of those hypothetical paragons of intelligence, honesty, and hard work. Now they blame LBJ and the Federal government for ruining them with welfare. They’re still entirely ignorant of the history of Africa and its various peoples, but they are a little less clueless about color now.

The other reason is that he was doomed by nurture as well as nature to gamma status that no amount of height, money, or worldly success could ever balance. His 2018 firing by Minnesota Public Radio for purported “sexually inappropriate incidents” is only remarkable in how long it took for his SSH rank to catch up to him; it was all but inevitable from the start.

  • I took an eye test and had to get glasses, and after that I stayed clear of organized sports and stuck to the disorganized; instead of the respect of my peers, I sought the approval of teachers and aunts.
  • I didn’t shine in high school. I was a B-minus student, thanks to my perfect pitch on multiple choice tests. The correct answer tended to be C. If you went with C, you could probably get a B and B was good enough. And I found a path in life there. I shied away from competition—speech contests, sports, honor roll—I didn’t care if I were 3.0 or 3.6—I wanted to be unique and so turned to writing.
  • I became Garrison. Eventually it wound up on my driver’s license and tax return— my girlfriend Mary married me as Garrison. In my heart, however, I still am Gary: Garrison feels like a fake mustache.
  • I started out playing with ambiguity, a fine way to disguise ignorance. “To be great is to be misunderstood,” said Emerson, so, in search of greatness, I wrote poems that couldn’t be understood because they made no sense.
  • I trace my heterosexuality to the offer of a seat on the bus at the age of thirteen. Boys defended territory. Girls were civilized and shared.

And yet, it is through the ruthless exploitation and chronicling of Gary’s weaknesses, failures, and secret shames that Garrison Keillor became a legitimate and substantial success as a writer. He even, after several failed attempts, managed to establish a lasting marriage with an attractive woman. And there is a lesson in that for the gamma, which is that relentless honesty and systematic perseverance can provide even the deepest double-dyed gamma a means of surmounting his natural patterns of behavior.

DISCUSS ON SG

Scott Adams Doubles Down Again

If you ever wanted to know how far a Gamma will go to avoid admitting that he was wrong despite conclusive evidence that he was wrong from the start, just review the Scott Adams post-vaccination rationalization dance. And as an economist, it’s fascinating to see him argue that making a logical assessment based on the known probabilities is not “a rational decision”. DISCUSS ON SG

Bait-Mute-Block

I posted the following on Gab this morning for purposes that any member of the Dread Ilk – or House Dread as one of the Bears has dubbed you all – will probably recognize.

The worst thing about social media, in my opinion, is the way it encourages gammas and midwits to believe that they have the right to force their unwanted opinions on others.

This is incorrect. You have the right to express your own opinion on YOUR OWN posts. You do not have any right to express your opinion on MY posts or on anyone else’s, which is why the Block and Mute features exist and why I make extensive use of them.

If someone does not ask for your opinion, do not give it to them. And above all, do not attempt to correct those who do not ask for correction. First, experience indicates that you are probably wrong, and second, you are not the reality police.

In addition to the 409-and-counting likes, it inspired 153 comments, which included the expected amount of outrage from the gammas and midwits angry that their “right” to comment, correct, and critique my posts was being denigrated. Interestingly enough, of the 46 accounts I muted and blocked on the basis of their responses, only THREE of them were from accounts that followed me. Here is a small sample of their reactions.

  • I guess @voxday doesn’t believe in healthy debate, only single sided arguments. And I have no desire to just listen to other’s opinions without being able to challenge them.
  • @voxday uum, you do realize you are posting in a PUBLIC forum yes? Sure, you have the right not to listen and mute/block whoever, but you dont have the right to tell people they cant respond to your public posts. Go ahead and block mute the whole damn world for all I care, but as long as you are posting publicly, people can and will respond and if you dont like it, you are free to leave.
  • Want to know what a beta cuck looks like? Check out this garbage from @voxday Don’t comment or give your opinion on my post Vox Day. Your opinion isn’t welcome here, this is MY thread. Ffs
  • The “right”? Check the functionality of the private platform: anyone has the “right” to comment on anyone else’s posts – that’s what this type of place is. Just as you have the right to block…
  • @voxday Nobody asked for your opinion.
  • Your wrong, I have the right to express my opinion anywhere I wish to, you have the right to not listen. I guess you could like an intellectual coward box yourself into an echo chamber of one with the block feature you speak so highly of, however this will only serve to make you more sensitive (that is weaker) to things you don’t want to hear.
  • Who are you, to boss us around ? If I want to comment on someones idiocy, I will. I don’t need their invitation or permission. Unless I’ve already been blocked, I DO have a right to express my views , wherever I’m not prohibited from doing so. When someone posts a comment on Gab, it’s an implicit invitation to reply.
  • So what you’re saying is: You want to broadcast your own opinions but are too scared to discuss them with people who disagree with you, while you’re happy to take validation from people who agree with you, because your opinions can’t survive outside of your echo chamber?
  • This has to be the dumbest & most vomit-inducing post I’ve seen on Gab, and also the most characteristically Vox Day post on top of it all.

If these responses don’t make you grateful for SocialGalactic, I don’t know what will.

DISCUSS ON SG

The Mark of the Midwit

Show me the library and I will show you the calibre of the man. The scanty selection of books from the library of the man below indicates a genuine mediocrity, albeit one with pretensions of grandeur and aspirations toward a higher class. It was not at all a surprise to see this and learn that it was a picture of Jeffrey Epstein’s house. But in fairness, many of the books look as if they may have been at least partially read.

DISCUSS ON SG

In Which We Are Corrected

A Gamma male explains that I’ve got the Socio-Sexual Hierarchy all wrong:

Completely an utterly incorrect. Gamma males love having fun but don’t shrug off their responsibilities at the same time. They’re definitely adventurous and fun-loving and tend to get very restless if they’re left idle for too long. It is possible an alpha male might mature into a gamma male, because gamma males are a more refined version of them. They’re sensitive towards the opposite sex and are very aware of the needs and nature of what women truly want and they do anything in their power to fulfil their partner’s needs. Yup, women are lucky to have a gamma male in their life. They also display a certain amount of feminine behaviours, expectations and values to win their partners heart. They love putting their family first, in any given situation and scenario. The Gamma is seen as having a little bit of every other type of man combined in his personality, with no specific one of those personalities being dominant over the others. One of the main reasons for this is that the gamma male is one who is adventurous in life and creates his own path away from the opinions of others. Where the alpha male acts in a way that pleases others, the gamma male will do whatever he wants to feel fulfilled in his life. Gamma males usually have a wide array of skills and interests, leading to them enjoying exploring life and learning and doing as they please. Where the alpha male relies on his group for reassurance of his character and status, the omega male acts completely opposite of that with little regard for how he is seen by others. Because of this, the omega male’s sense of self-assurance allows him to avoid trivial popularity contests. An omega male will definitely have a few close friends he trusts and respects, but his primary source of meaning and confidence comes from within. A downside to this is that an omega male often neglects to care for others, as they only know how to care for themselves.

Well, I guess that settles that. Secret King wins again!

Is there a wider gap between other people’s perception of the Gamma and the Gamma’s perception of himself?

Machiavelli on the Haters

In his Discorsi, which are rapidly threatening to unseat the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius as my favorite practical guide to life, the Florentine analyst explains the futility of attempting to appease, accommodate, reason with, or otherwise win over those whose enmity is ultimately rooted in envy. It’s from Chapter 30, That a Citizen in His Own Republic Who Wishes to Employ His Authority for Some Good Work Must First Extinguish Envy:

This text takes note of what a good and wise man should do, of how much good it can bring about, and how great a benefit such actions can bestow upon his native city when, through his goodness and exceptional ability, he has extinguished envy, which is on many occasions the cause of men’s inability to do good deeds, since it does not permit them to enjoy the authority necessary in important matters. This envy is extinguished in two ways: either through some serious and difficult incident, where someone, seeing himself lost, defers every ambition and willingly races to obey the man he believes may, with his exceptional ability, deliver him; this happened to Camillus, who, having given so many indications of being a most excellent man, having been dictator three times, and having always conducted that office for the benefit of the public rather than for his own, had acted in such a way that men did not fear his greatness; and since he was so great and so renowned, they did not deem it shameful to be inferior to him (and for that reason, Livy wisely declares in these words: ‘nor did they believe, etc.’). * Such envy is extinguished in another way when, either through violence or the natural course of events, those men die who have been your competitors in attaining a certain reputation and a certain level of greatness; such men will never be able to acquiesce or remain patient, seeing you are more highly esteemed than they. Furthermore, when they are men accustomed to living in a corrupt city, where education has produced no good in them whatsoever, in order to fulfil their wishes and to satisfy their perversity of mind, they will be happy to see the ruin of their native city.

To conquer such envy, there is no other remedy than the death of those who feel it, and when fortune is so favourable to a man of exceptional ability that he dies in a normal fashion, he becomes illustrious without scandal from the moment that, without any obstacle or harm, he can demonstrate his exceptional skill. But when he does not have such good fortune, he must think about every means of removing the envious from his path, and before he does anything else, he needs to adopt methods that will overcome this difficulty. Anyone who reads the Bible intelligently will see that, in order to advance his laws and his institutions, Moses was forced to kill countless men, who were moved to oppose his plans by nothing more than envy. * Brother Girolamo Savonarola recognized this necessity very clearly; Piero Soderini, the standard-bearer of Florence, also recognized it. The former (that is, the priest) could not overcome envy, because he lacked sufficient authority to do so, and because he was not well understood by those who followed him and who might have possessed such authority. Nevertheless, he did what he could, and his sermons are full of accusations and invectives against the wise men of the world: for this is what he called such envious men as well as those who opposed his institutions. The latter believed he could extinguish that envy in the passing of time through kindness, his own good fortune, and favours to some; he saw himself to be rather young and with the great new popularity his mode of conduct brought him, he believed he could overcome those many who opposed him out of envy without any unusual acts, violence, or disorder, and he did not know that time does not wait, kindness is insufficient, fortune varies, and malice receives no gift that placates her. In this way both of these two men came to ruin, and their downfall was caused by not knowing how or not being able to overcome this envy.

Discourses, Machiavelli

If it sounds a little bit too much like the average suburban mother’s analysis – they’re just being mean to you because they are jealous of you – keep in mind that Machiavelli literally recommends having them executed. While that isn’t generally an option for people who are not Roman consuls, Renaissance princes, or dark lords, what that means in a practical quotidian sense is that one should pay absolutely no attention to anything that the trolls, haters, and critics want, and one should not ever bother to engage with them in any way.

It’s really rather remarkable how many of the great minds of the past clearly observed the gamma mindset in action, they simply never happened to label it.

I view this section as additional support for my decision to not revive the comments here on the blog, as well as for the autoblocking of every social media account that attempts to correct, criticize, or contradict my posts on the posts themselves. While I neither object to nor mind correction, criticism, or being contradicted, those who wish to do so can do so on their own time, in their own space. As it happens, very little is lost this way, as the noise-to-signal ratio is so great that the extinction of the envious from the discourse is well worth the cost of losing the occasional substantive critique.

DISCUSS ON SG

When Gammas Rage

It’s so predictable, and more than a little amusing, to see how Gammas inevitably react when you inform them that you have no interest in listening to their Very Important Opinions or their Very Honest Questions, and will not subject yourself to their Very Valuable Instruction and Very Substantive Criticism.

Notice how they immediately go on the attack, and in doing so, underline the need for their exclusion. Meanwhile, they fail to observe that literally hundreds of people approve the policy.

  • I don’t even know who you are but you sure sound like a faggot to me.
  • “I won’t tolerate any of those hurty words!!! I can’t deal with the emotional fallout that comes from any criticism of my opinions!”
  • Jesus…. I feel like I just caught AIDS from your weak ass gab flex.
  • Writers from Teen Vogue have thicker skin than you do faggot.
  • This makes you sound weak.
  • I’ll just mute you instead so I don’t have to see this kind of drivel. Gamma (cough-cough)
  • Since you failed to provide context for your post, your attempted message is ambiguous at best.
  • 🤣😝😆🤣😂🤣😂 That was hysterical, so on this platform of yours if I’m getting this right is you and only you have a opinion and only you can get all in their feelings? 😝🤯😆
  • sure thing. that is the sole purpose of a social media platform. to be all alone.

They are all blocked and muted now, of course. It works every time.

DISCUSS ON SG

Comments Gone, Gammas Hardest Hit

An unusually wise and insightful commenter who calls himself “Savantissimo” is complaining about the absence of post-Google comments here at AC’s place:

Looks like Vox Day isn’t going to have comments at his new site, and is going to leave deleted all the hundreds of thousands of comments that people, many of them unusually wise and insightful, collectively spent many years writing.

He really does think that it’s all about him, or should be.

First, I have made it perfectly clear since 2003 that I don’t care about the comments. I permitted them as a courtesy, nothing more.

Second, it is a distinct pleasure to no longer have to spend any time moderating the hundreds of spam and troll and wise and insightful comments. I had no idea how much time I was wasting on it until I suddenly didn’t have to think about it anymore.

Third, why was it my responsibility to preserve the comments of those unusually wise and insightful individuals? I arranged to back up my posts, so why weren’t they wise enough, or insightful enough, to preserve their own comments? It’s precisely because I didn’t regard their comments as mine, or think their comments were all about me, that I did not consider myself to be responsible for them.

Fourth, we’ve already been through this. Literally no one cared that all the Co-Comment comments were lost. Comments are intrinsically ephemeral, and while they are not entirely devoid of value, they are seldom worth the effort that is required to police them. And furthermore, despite what certain wise, insightful, and totally disinterested parties insist, literally no one reads any site for the comments. As has been repeatedly confirmed on this blog, and numerous other sites, getting rid of the comments doesn’t reduce the site traffic at all.

And fifth, we have SocialGalactic. Chats and superchats are coming to UATV. There is no shortage of opportunities for engagement within the community.

By the way, the comments aren’t actually gone. So, if you are seeking unusual wisdom or insight in them, you can still do so.

Discuss on SG.

Money cannot compensate

When it comes to intersexual relations, money is a force multiplier. It is not a complete replacement for any element of attraction. Didactic Mind considers the Gates divorce from the perspective of the Socio-Sexual Hierarchy:

First among these is that money CANNOT compensate for Gammatude. It doesn’t matter how rich, wealthy, or influential you are – if you are a hardcore Gamma, this will show through eventually and inevitably. The list of such men goes on at some length – Jeff Bezos, Harvey Weinstein, Harry the Ginger Whinger, and now Bill Gates. And, in the case of Weinstein, the Gammatude has devastating consequences for those women unfortunate enough to be caught up in his web of influence and corruption.

The second, related, lesson has to do with an old maxim of Roissy’s from back in the day. Essentially, the sum of testosterone in a marriage equals the sum of oestrogen. A low-T man like Bill Gates will eventually end up with a low-E woman. By contrast, a high-T man will inevitably end up with a high-E woman.

Case in point: Hazy history of Melania Trump’s immigration status raises …

The third lesson can be found in the key phrase, “irretrievably damaged”, used in the statement to describe the couple’s separation. Think about it from Bill’s point of view. He is one of the richest, most powerful, most influential men on the entire planet. He has deceived himself into thinking that he is on a quest to save Mankind from itself. And his best buddies are all liberal, progressive, right-on loonie gazillionaires like him – and every single one of them has the approximate musculature of a chipmunk. (Even Jeff Bezos isn’t in that great shape, these days.)

Yet, even then, he knows, somewhere deep down, that he can do better than what he has. He could buy himself a harem of the most jaw-droppingly beautiful Eastern European women to rival King Solomon’s, but he stays with a woman whose best days are thirty years in the past.

Would you be able to avoid straying under those circumstances? Especially given the reputation that Melinda Gates has for being an unpleasant ball-buster?

That’s not me saying this about Melinda Gates, by the way: Given her appearance, I can WELL believe it, though.

The overriding lesson of all of this remains the same for all men, of any age:

Money, power, and influence do not make up for innate Gamma traits, and never will. The ONLY way out of that particular Hell is through relentless, focused, careful, structured self-improvement.

Money is just a tool. And the love of it is the root of all evil. So never, ever, rely upon it for anything, especially not as a foundation for your relationships.