So much of debate, including political and economic debate, is about which groups and individuals deserve higher or lower status. . .
I hypothesize that an MR blog post attracts more comments when it a) has implications for who should be raised and lowered in status, and b) has some framework in place which allows you to make analytical points, but points which ultimately translate into a conclusion about a).
My comments:
1. Lowering another group’s social status is the most powerful message of all. It is more powerful than raising the status of those who one likes.
2. It would be an interesting exercise in honesty for everyone who uses social media for political discussions to say, “My main purpose is to lower the status of the following three groups. . .” What would my answers be? MIT economists would be high on the list. Also progressives. And people who align entirely on one of the three axes.
3. How much of writing in the social sciences and the humanities (can you broaden this to other academic disciplines?), including research papers and journal articles, is motivated and made popular by the way that it affects relative group status?
You can take man out of tribal society, but you cannot take tribal society out of man.
It is possible to overestimate this though. How much of the focus on status is merely an attempt to avoid having to address real arguments, face unpleasant facts, and mark our beliefs to market?
These days, lowering someone else’s status (or even ruining their life) in order to elevate one’s own has practically become a rite of passage https://sweettalkconversation.wordpress.com/2015/07/21/the-sacrificial-rites-of-the-panopticon/
This is so true. Status games between groups explains just about 100% of the variance in who cares about what events. The “identity” of the rapist, or shooter, or whatever determines who cares and who doesn’t, almost completely independent of the severity of the event.
Arnold writes: “You can take man out of tribal society, but you cannot take tribal society out of man.”
Both true and relevant.
If politics/economics/social science/psychology.etc., were to learn nothing else but this, then the world would be transformed for the better.
I think part of what attracts me to Tyler and Arnold (and also Slate and Volokh Conspiracy), is that they are less predictable players in “The Status Game”.
With Krugman or O’Reilly or even Reason Magazine, it’s pretty predictable who the author will try to raise or lower in status.
A few authors (not every author at Slate, by a long shot, but a few) mix it up more, and are consequently more fun to read.
I think the language wars are aimed at cutting the status of politicial opponents so that their arguments will be ignored.
() Define a new vocabulary in detail. Teach it to all good people, the people who want to not offend others, the progressive base.
() Conservative opponents, “deniers” will not be versed and practiced in these rules.
() Critics of climate change (for example) will make mistakes in word usage, committing micro-aggressions and showing that they are bad people. These critics can be dismissed as not caring enough about others and arguing in bad faith. Criticism is itself a micro-aggression.
This approach in prior decades was tested in discussions about race. The proper term changed from negro, to black, to people of color, to African-American. Someone arguing the conservative position would be immediately dismissed if he used an older term. Even discussing race was racist when done by a white person.
Or, as I like to put it, you never outgrow junior high school.
AK,
I’ll go further, making good policy is actually about… solving for the complaints of low status people without actually raising their status.
This is how I build all my policy positions. Give liberals what they say they want (help the poor), without giving them what they really want (higher status). That’s exactly how I dreamed up Uber for Welfare. It’s how I dreamed up Manifest Destiny Mexico.
(note: you haven’t endorsed #U4W yet! I got Sumner, Farmer and Kimball, so come on man!)
Low status people (progressives) in a successful country (US) have the behaviors that would make the country less successful. They don’t care, bc what they really want is higher status, even if country goes Greece.
The optimal strategy for hegemony (Libertarian property rights / rules of law) for a successful country is to let the air out of Low Status balloons, without ceding any power.
My list is 1. People who think a single peer reviewed paper IS science. 2. Politicians. 3. PK.
The common denominator is these are people who play dirty in the status game using ad hominem to denigrate opponents so as not to deal with arguments. I suppose you were hoping for something a little less self-congratulatory.
All good points. Here’s my question: do any analytical points NOT implicate status? In other words, is Tyler’s (and your) point about actual implications, or intention? If the former, then I’m not sure what heuristic value this observation has. If you advocate, say, for a higher minimum wage, you are arguing for the raised/lower status of someone whether you like it or not. But if the former, then by what criteria do you differentiate between an argument that happens to raise/lower status, and one that intends to do so?
I suppose one good criterion might be the degree to which a person’s conclusions consistently do or do not line up with a more or less established worldview.
“If you advocate, say, for a higher minimum wage, you are arguing for the raised/lower status of someone whether you like it or not”
Does raising the minimum wage REALLY help the people whose status is raised by the discussion?