Hate Is Not A Family Value

Brian Cates (@drawandstrike) blocked me on Twitter yesterday. It made me realize why people block others. I mean, why block, when you can mute? And why mute when someone appears three times in your notifications? Ignoring someone is the most powerful response.

You block someone because they know they have been blocked.

It's a behavior I'll call clique-signalling. I have been told by Cates that I don't belong in his group. It reminds me of being in high school, when social climbers would exclude people like me from their pack. It's a manifestation of insecurity.

The really popular kids, secure in their place, are nice to everyone.

Cates is a prolific at clique-signalling. His Twitter avatar is Westley the Pirate from the movie The Princess Bride. His background is one of Westley's quotes from the movie, "Get used to disappointment."

People who quote movie lines to each other are practicing a kind of password "challenge and response" type of exclusion. It's a trite, shopworn technique for practicing group cohesion, and preventing outsiders from accessing the group's resources.

What are Cates' group's resources? As far as I can tell, an unreadable and mostly unread blog. The blog posts are usually articles with virtue-signalling themes, and grabber titles like "Conservatism Is Not Now, Nor Has It Ever Been About Race."

That title is so hackneyed that it could fit on a bumper sticker. At least if it were on a bumper sticker, it would attract more eyeballs.

The thing is, conservatism will always be conflated with racism. African-American voters are always going to vote monolithically for the Democratic party. The failure of the G.O.P. to attract these voters is always going to be used as evidence of the G.O.P.'s "race problem."

The only way the G.O.P. could hope to gain voter share among minorities, would be to promise to give away more stuff than the Democrats. But that is a false illusion, because it will be framed as pandering.

I'll just close by noting that I quote movie lines too. If I ever met a real movie star, I would never quote one of their lines back to them, and tell them "it's my favorite." Plus, it's incumbent on the person quoting the line, to do the voice. If we ever meet, ask me about my hair.