Virtue Signalling

[Dildo Argentino]

Okay, I can see the difference. Then I thought maybe virtue signalling is a subset of group-affiliation signalling - but thinking some more I note that virtue signalling is used to indicate disaffiliation just as much as affiliation - the underlying message is often "I'm not one of those people who...", as well as "I'm one of those who...". I'm not sure I get what you mean by "viewing through the lense" (please clarify), but it seems to me that privileged groups do more virtue-signalling than deprived groups. Now this could be a perceptual artifact caused by my own position (rather more privileged than deprived). But if it is correct, the question does arise: is it the case because they have better access to signalling tools and more leisure-time to indulge their urge to virtue signal, or whether there is some underlying motive.

As for hope: stupidity, while a major destructive force now, is still partially self-correcting, and anyway, the not-so-stupid have always had to live with it, consider it part of their adaptive landscape. The lack of empathy thing and the ridiculously simple theory of mind/understanding of personhood that late capitalism foists on its children is worrying, but this is still a very permissive society (I mean my country in particular, and affluent west in general) - as long as you know how to shut up and display conformity at the right moments and pay your bills (give to Ceasar), you can afford to be quite weird in the head without major risk of ostracism. Hence the hope. Not much, but some.

[LMNO]

Tangentially related side-note; asking fedoras who refer to women as "females" whether they are intentionally being trans-exclusive yields hilarious results.

OMG

I suck at trolling, but I so want to do this.

[MithridatesXXIII]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain_folks

This fallacious appeal is adjacent to claiming non-privileged status, however apt. There are benefits to claiming it, be it membership in a class unjustly persecuted, freedom fighter, the list goes on.

As far as the phrase 'through the lense of' I mean using a system of reference, jargon, principles, and/or ideology to characterize, define, explore, or explain a situation, environment or phenomenon. For example,  literary analysis. There are a variety of lenses through which a given piece can be evaluated i.e. Marxist, Feminist, Discordian, Christian, Freudian and so on.

So my point about evaluating signaling in terms of privilege was to say the value of that type of evaluation is somewhat limited. Not to say valueless or meaningless, just limited. There'll have to be a lot more robust dialogue and understanding and theory regarding privilege.

[LMNO]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain_folks

This fallacious appeal is adjacent to claiming non-privileged status, however apt. There are benefits to claiming it, be it membership in a class unjustly persecuted, freedom fighter, the list goes on.

As far as the phrase 'through the lense of' I mean using a system of reference, jargon, principles, and/or ideology to characterize, define, explore, or explain a situation, environment or phenomenon. For example,  literary analysis. There are a variety of lenses through which a given piece can be evaluated i.e. Marxist, Feminist, Discordian, Christian, Freudian and so on.

So my point about evaluating signaling in terms of privilege was to say the value of that type of evaluation is somewhat limited. Not to say valueless or meaningless, just limited. There'll have to be a lot more robust dialogue and understanding and theory regarding privilege.

Could you re-state that in Hemmingway or Vonnegut English?  There's a lot of meandering up there, and for the most part it sounds like you're saying, "seeing signaling in terms of privilege has little value."

Which, you know, is something someone with privilege would say.

[MithridatesXXIII]

Correct and Correct/but besides the point. I'm not attempting to undermine the value of that mode of thought. It needs more development.

[LMNO]

You're trying to undermine the concept of looking at signaling from a perspective of privilege?

[MithridatesXXIII]

Hahaha 

No. I'm saying go ahead and do it, but at least be mindful of the problems signaling illuminates about privilege before you then use privilege to analyze signaling.

[Dildo Argentino]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain_folks

This fallacious appeal is adjacent to claiming non-privileged status, however apt. There are benefits to claiming it, be it membership in a class unjustly persecuted, freedom fighter, the list goes on.

As far as the phrase 'through the lense of' I mean using a system of reference, jargon, principles, and/or ideology to characterize, define, explore, or explain a situation, environment or phenomenon. For example,  literary analysis. There are a variety of lenses through which a given piece can be evaluated i.e. Marxist, Feminist, Discordian, Christian, Freudian and so on.

So my point about evaluating signaling in terms of privilege was to say the value of that type of evaluation is somewhat limited. Not to say valueless or meaningless, just limited. There'll have to be a lot more robust dialogue and understanding and theory regarding privilege.

So would I be correct in interpreting this as the point that privilege and signalling are in a dialectical relationship, and hence neither is fully sufficient to explain the other? I could go with that. You could say that the ability and the capacity to signal ('having a voice', or 'being literate', 'being educated', 'having free time not occupied by producing the bare essentials')  is a major, essential form of privilege in itself.

[MithridatesXXIII]

You could say that the ability and the capacity to signal ('having a voice', or 'being literate', 'being educated', 'having free time not occupied by producing the bare essentials')  is a major, essential form of privilege in itself.

I agree about the privilege and I think that's why it might give the appearance of more signaling taking place by the middle class, but I think that is also a kind of sampling bias. The only thing I'd really like to add is that signaling is ubiquitous across humanity.

So would I be correct in interpreting this as the point that privilege and signalling are in a dialectical relationship, and hence neither is fully sufficient to explain the other? I could go with that.

I don't know. I think signaling has more explanatory power, but that's not the end-all-be-all. Karl Popper, a philosopher who had a lot to say regarding epistemology, says that Falsifiability is the demarcation between science and non-science. Evolutionary psychology is pretty notorious for being able to explain away a lot of behavior in a seemingly ad hoc manner, and that's a huge pitfall of signaling; the lack of Falsifiability.

[Dildo Argentino]

Signalling is ubiquitous, but I think its character and function (and frequency and intensity) changes quite radically when people move from the tribal life, spent mostly in the company of primary group members, to the modern way of conducting various transactions with strangers and slight acquaintances whose background is largely unknown. You can see the penny drop in any reasonably intelligent and alert child when they start attending an institution.

I think Zizek would probably claim that the particular contortions of identity-display that the western (or, increasingly, global) middle class engages in is driven by their deep-seated denial of the increasingly obvious fact that there is something downright wrong with the system, something that will not be made to go away by cosmetic action or "programs".

As for the relationship between the two concepts, signalling was clearly in place a long time before anything like privilege could really take off (except for the fairly simple power structure of the extended family-horde), probably since the time the first monkey learned to lie. We even taught dogs to lie. But certain characteristics of the type of the somewhat bizarre signalling that gets done these days may have their origin in the fundamentally fucked up power relationships of people on Earth.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

This thread has become recursive.   

[LMNO]

I mean, I'm a Circuit III kind of guy, but jeeze.

[MithridatesXXIII]

Signalling is ubiquitous, but I think its character and function (and frequency and intensity) changes quite radically when people move from the tribal life, spent mostly in the company of primary group members, to the modern way of conducting various transactions with strangers and slight acquaintances whose background is largely unknown. You can see the penny drop in any reasonably intelligent and alert child when they start attending an institution.

I think Zizek would probably claim that the particular contortions of identity-display that the western (or, increasingly, global) middle class engages in is driven by their deep-seated denial of the increasingly obvious fact that there is something downright wrong with the system, something that will not be made to go away by cosmetic action or "programs".

Yes. I'd say because the risk of signaling the wrong affiliation at the wrong time has been virtually eliminated as we have moved away from tribal and feudal systems to what we have now.

There was a poster here that got banned a while ago who stated that he would use violence to institute fascism and I had a physical and mental reaction so primal and novel to me it took a while for me to deal with. The kind of implications with gravity people take acid or shrooms to reveal.

As far as Zizek goes I think that is very in line with the things he's been trying to emphasize about a desperately necessary shake up 

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Tangentially related side-note; asking fedoras who refer to women as "females" whether they are intentionally being trans-exclusive yields hilarious results.

OMG

I suck at trolling, but I so want to do this.

It's VERY gratifying.

[MithridatesXXIII]

I mean, I'm a Circuit III kind of guy, but jeeze.

One day I got stuck in a horrible and traumatizing  feedback loop between circuits 3 and 6, if you're referencing the 8 circuit model. It has been going for a few years now and I am just recently able to return safely to public life. The process continues, but it no longer consumes everything