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Comment by thepasswordis | Hacker News Reader

There's a mantra among these people of

"I just wanted to play video games, why couldn't you leave me alone?"

The culture of a lot of redditors and internet trolls in general seems to be that they feel like they are the eternal punching bag of society. They were the punching bag in high school, they didn't get into a good school (or go to college at all), and now they're the punching bag of society as "incels" or "white males" or whatever, and I think what you're seeing here in a big way is them fighting back.

A comedian named Tim Dillon somewhat accidentally NAILED the sentiment here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0pgEWcq_YQ (NSFW language).

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I'm not sure there's much of an overlap. Incels are a rather small group, and I think most wallstreetbets users are surprisingly... normal. You can't bet on stocks if you're poor. So you'll have lots of mid/late 20s educated guys with decent incomes. This to me really feels like a classic "for the lulz" (and some personal profit), avalanche-style event.

This. Plus every subreddit has different make up. Its pretty ignorant putting all reddit as one homogenious group.

This applies even to the internet "cesspools" really. Most of my friends were/are regular posters on reddit/4chan, and they are surprisingly normal. All of them have decent jobs that pay well, some are married. If you met them in real life, you couldn't really tell there's something wrong with them.

They seem a far cry from what internet tells you a 4chan user looks like. Funny enough, none of them (including me) are white.

> you couldn't really tell there's something wrong with them.

Okay, but is there? The way you're phrasing it sounds that merely posting to 4chan makes them abnormal.

The other way around is true: there's an unusually high share of abnormal people on 4chan. Just posting there shouldn't be a sign of abnormality. It's just a Mongolian basket weaving forum after all.

Yeah, but that doesn't mean they aren't portrayed as incels.

"for the lulz" isn't really a normal-person thing to do.

Not everybody takes themselves so seriously.

The people that are getting the highest praise in the subreddit are probably not in that group. We're seeing people investing $10^4 to $10^5 in GME.

If they are gambling their entire life savings away, then I guess they got lucky this time but I do hope they see this as the anomalous event that it is. I have invested a small amount into the WSB "portfolio" and have similar great returns. But given that I only do this with the "play" money in my portfolio, I'm not retiring because of it.

Tim Dillon is one of the funniest and most thoughtful comedians out there right now. His ability to describe the ongoing political and social climate is unmatched.

I don't think you're quite right. These people don't actually think this way (or think of themselves this way). They maybe think that they could have ended up that way, but that's much different.

What ties all these communities together is idolizing that archetype, without necessarily yearning to be that archetype.

The real punching bag in our country is probably poor, minority single mothers.

Sad but true.

She didn't have to get knocked up at 16 and 18, from two different guys who aren't around anymore...

There are 3 million people at WSB. Are you calling all 3 million "incels" and "white male" or whatever? Why are you calling them "these people"?

Do you think their opinions are less than yours?

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