An elected official is publicly mocking a student for wearing a kufiyeh, having purple hair, and using they/them pronouns. Not because it affects governance, not because it harms anyone.
But because, in the age of culture war politics, symbolic identity is the battleground.
But because, in the age of culture war politics, symbolic identity is the battleground.
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The student isn’t a person here, they’re a prop in a narrative war.
Try talking to them before you decide what their motives are for presenting themselves as they do.
Engagement > accuracy
Performance > governance
Emotion > evidence
Identity = target
The logic of the algorithm now structures political speech. It rewards those who dramatise difference and punish deviation from the tribe.
In the old times an example of this democratic identify framework was the scouts.
Should a democratic society provide a Default Mode Network identity framework in its modeling.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/29/pelosi-condemned-pro-palestinian-russia-ties
Inna Vernikov is a trumpist former D on NY city council
performative targeting of identity isn't an absolute monopoly of trumpist Rs, but it is a specialty
and maybe it's epistemic decay, I'd say it's depraved indifference to our freedoms + safety
Epistemic decay perfectly describes what's happening in the USA.
This garbage only comes from one side of the political spectrum.
This ostentative display of rebellion, or whatever this is, will *always* be offensive to more conservative people (it's probably what they're looking for anyway)
It’s to define who belongs in the public. This student is being told, implicitly and explicitly, you don’t. That’s what makes this moment chilling. That’s why it matters.
Or: real democracy.