Nihilistic Violent Extremism
en.wikipedia.org
en.wikipedia.org
It is very challenging to truly believe in nothing. I think it is much more realistic to see nihilism as a label applied to others’ belief systems that we find entirely void of valid belief.
Organizations described as Nihilistic Violent Extremists do have beliefs that motivate them, they are just vacuous beliefs in the eyes of the vast majority of human beings.
However if you can show me someone who can convincingly claim to be that they really are a nihilist I would be curious to see it.
There’s also a third option, the person doesn’t see a problem with superficially adopting other beliefs as a form of camouflage, but they do have a core set of beliefs.
In general I think the chaos of the internet and the exposure to multiple points of view encourages fragmentation and dynamic systems of belief. I don’t necessarily see it as a bad thing, either.
And yes many people in tech are on the spectrum. I suspect that much of what's dysfunctional with SV and tech culture is the result of raising a generation of socially awkward neurodivergent kids on 4chan and making them millionaires before their frontal lobes have even fully developed. That necessarily bleeds into HN and becomes normalized within the culture as performative cynicism, misanthropy and toxicity.
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To the point where I wouldn't be surprised if these people have or would kill people if they aren't in line with their agendas. They have the connections, power and money.
Related concept: Salad Bar Extremism
Part of it is legit, I think. There are legit things to be angry about, though they differ depending on where you live in the world.
Part of it is an addiction. Anger releases some powerful brain chemicals, and it can be addictive.
And for "scratch", it's usually sufficient to compare the angry fanatic's views/actions with some of the more prosocial parts of their supposed ideology.
For the far right, it's either the techno-fascist "we become Gods" stuff or the trad "back to a perfect green agrarian utopia that looks like a Hitler painting where my happy tradwife greets me every day." I suppose the not quite as far right idea of rewinding history and reviving 1950s America (and pretending that was a utopia) also counts.
For the far left it's the ludicrous green anarcho-primitivist stuff where we LARP the Na'vi on Avatar or the idea of achieving peaceful and lasting equity through legislation and redistribution.
I have a hard time accepting that anyone actually believes any of that shit. I get kind of angry when I see it because it's so insanely absurd.
It feels like window dressing for an ideology that, stripped of these fantastical goals, is just grievance politics and nihilistic accelerationism. It's a way for them to hide it even from themselves. They're just angry and they hate their lives and they want other people to suffer for it.
Or do Scientologists actually believe in Galactic Emperor Xenu and Thetans?
nit: Your phrasing pigeonholes straightforward reforms into the impractical category. "Legislated redistribution" would be a better phrasing. What you've said also bites off reforms like antitrust measures, personal data protection regulation, campaign finance reform, etc.
I'd go further and say it's not just social media optimizing for engagement, though. I think part of it is the utter lack of social context for internet messages, which is usually a moderating factor. In meatspace interactions, you can signal disagreement without getting into an overt argument. And you can even maintain the relationship afterwards, as there are other dimensions to it that you do respect. Whereas online the sheer majority of the context is the comment you're responding to itself, and one generally dives right into pressing fully-fleshed-out arguments.
Additionally I'd say there is a different dynamic whereby there are a lot of valid rightist criticisms of leftist extremism, and valid leftist criticisms of rightist extremism. Which then make perfectly reasonable people and reasonable comments appear to be from "the other side", and presumably held with extremists views of the other side (see the above lack of moderating context).
Criticizing both sides won’t save you. Recently I’ve noticed even greater ire toward those who dare depart from the duality, either by arguing that the old “middle” was not as broken as people think or by adopting an entirely different view.
I agree with most of this, and context collapse is a great point I did not bring up. I’d also add that these nutty ideas tend to be context collapse friendly. Their arguments can be compressed down to slogans and memes and often rely on no context besides invoking a common grievance. Other ideas, including those that might actually help address some grievances, require essays and context to explain. The social platforms tend to push low depth populism.
The parent comment is warning about the potential for a false representation of a crisis being used to grab more power; the underlying facts being inconsistent with the supposed crisis is not particularly surprising
That was a bit of a canard, though, right? Did anyone seriously think he was a conservative? I thought this was just another mental gymnastics act in the Whataboutism Circus. With some photo fabrication to support it, according to Wikipedia.
Doesn't invalidate the point of using "NVE" to avoid describing a number of assassins or would be assassins as conservatives.
It's like how they desperately wanted to pin trans trans trans onto Charlie Kirk's murderer, to take focus away from the rightist dynamic of DIY solving your problem with a gun.
Yes it was, by the right (including the current administration.) People on the right (including plenty here on HN) literally called BLM a "violent Marxist terrorist organization" that "burned entire cities to the ground."
ICE protests are called "violent leftist extremism." Anyone ICE shoots dead was a violent leftist terrorist all along. Protesting Israel is violent leftist antisemitism. Making jokes about Charlie Kirk only shows how bloodthirsty and violent the left is. Every single US mass shooting is linked to "stochastic leftist violence" regardless of the shooter's actual politics.
It's really annoying when people talk around what they actually want to say. It's clear you're accusing someone or something of bias against the right, and you're using absolute terms for something relative. Just come out with it.
I didn't expressly want to spend a bunch of time looking things up that I hadn't seen in a few months and wouldn't be fresh in my mind on what/where to search... that's the only reason for the vagueness.
edit: I'm human... I can remember a lot of things, but not always specific context or what/where I read a given article on a subject, or the specific video to even search for if it was so. Often in these scenarios, where facing pushback, I'll actually spend the time to try to lookup things based on recollection and sometimes the searches go better or worse, I just don't have the time or inclination at the moment. I'm not trying to be obtuse or cagey, just real.
For starters, “treat others well because everyone deserves our empathy” is completely compatible with atheism.
Of course the actual people doing harassment, exploitation and violence are just dark triad personality types
for everyone else the standard advise applies: BE ANGRY [at sin—at immorality, at injustice, at ungodly behavior], YET DO NOT SIN; do not let your anger [cause you shame, nor allow it to] last until the sun goes down.
Their general MO was to push a kid on the fringes to do something illegal, then blackmail them into upping the risk and illegality. They collected videos of all those “for lulz”. Various crimes included producing CSAM, torturing animals, and assaulting or killing random people.
It’s rare that I sit my kids down and have them watch training videos with me. With this, I did, to show them what’s out there and help them identify it if they ever came across it.
My problem with the NVE label is the scope creep, some would like to apply that label to anyone who has a strong opinion and doesn’t fit in a neat box.
(I also don’t think “nihilist” is the right label for these groups. They have beliefs, they just believe in evil.)
But the OG NVE groups? Freaking yikes.
Has KF changed since I last checked? They had an explicit policy of "don't touch the poo"; that is, users mock and ridicule on the forum, but don't try to disturb the lolcows, unless they're committing crimes. That's what I saw; I lurked occasionally in the past. There's been a lot of misinformation about KiwiFarms since it became a minor news story, round about that time of the big DDoS attacks.