Sisyphus Was a Sigma
How SSH factors into the demotivational campaigns of the culture wars
There is a very good chance that you have some idea what I’m referring to here, but if you don’t, there are some more details on the UATV substack as well as a call to a very simple action that will be useful.
But the video channel is not the only operation under assault. I’ve spoken to three other creators who are under various forms of attack on their platforms, attacks ranging from algorithmic suppression to deplatforming. And while some of the attacks are economic in nature, and all of them have some economic effect, the real purpose behind the attacks is psychological.
The primary objective of these various forms of psychological assault is to demoralize the creator and inspire him to give up and quit. Now, obviously this has not worked with me despite many repeated attempts over the last 20 years. To the contrary, like Russia being empowered by the sanctions that were meant to economically cripple it, being forced to rely upon my own resources has only made me stronger, harder, and more independent.
So why do they continue to utilize these various tools of repression and suppression?
The first reason is because even when these demoralization attacks fail at their primary purpose, they still serve to diffuse and reduce the strength of the signals they fail to shut down entirely. Because people are creatures of habit, any disruption of their daily routine will have a considerable effect. If I shut down this substack tomorrow and started putting up identical posts on a different site, at least 50 percent of the regular readers here would fail to follow me to the new site. It would probably take one year just to get back to where we are now, based on my previous experiences.
For example, being kicked off Blogger somehow reduced my daily average page views from 120,000 to 25,000. Now, I personally believe that those 120,000 daily views were probably more like 25,000 all along, given the way in which everything about mainstream social media, especially the reported numbers, is fake and manufactured, but certainly the superficial perception would be that the deplatforming was a massive success from a traffic-reduction perspective. Of course, it was complete failure from a motivational perspective, as evidenced by the subsequent creation of this and other sites.
The second reason for these continuing attacks is SSH-related. The passive-aggressive and insidiously snarky manner in which they are couched strongly indicates that the individuals responsible are Gammas. It has been confirmed that many of these attacks are not ordered by executives of the responsible corporation, or triggered in response to any policy-violating action of the party targeted, but are conducted by low-level employees whose actions are entirely unknown to their employers, and indeed, are reliably contrary to their employer’s interests.
As we know, Gammas are entirely devoid of empathy, and they are also prone to considerable emotional projection. This means they’re are totally incapable of understanding the emotional reserves or the determination to persist that are possessed by those they target. Gammas can’t even handle success, real or manufactured, with any degree of equanimity; famous and financially-successful Gammas such as John Scalzi and Neil Gaiman regularly whine about their so-called Imposter Syndrome, while even more successful Gammas like George RR Martin and Patrick Rothfuss lack the energy and motivation to even finish the books that they have been writing for over a decade.
So, it’s natural that the Gammas involved in these demoralization attacks can’t imagine that just one more deplatforming, just one more disavowing, just one more demonetization, won’t do the trick and finally make us stop. Being conflict avoidant, they can’t imagine what conflict does for those whom it is the very air we breathe, the very adrenaline rush we crave, the very water in which we are accustomed to swim.
One reason that the ride never ends is that the Gammas will be with us, doing what Gammas do, always. They are the weeds in the human population, and unless Man one day discovers the root cause for their psychological disorders and succeeds in curing it, we are always going to have to be ready for the disruptions that they cause.
Sisyphus was a sigma.
I described this phenomenon in the context of writers in my post on "The Rise of the Antibiotic Resistant Creator." With their ankle biting and sniping, the gammas of Big Tech are molding the super-creators who are poised to not only survive, but to thrive in an adversarial environment. And part of that is the need for all of us to recognize and support creators under attack. The gammas tell us who they most fear. We should listen to them. https://basedbooksale.substack.com/p/the-rise-of-the-antibiotic-resistant-a20
This reminds me of a book I read yesterday, Good to Great by Jim Collins. In Chapter 4 Confront the Brutal Facts (And Never Lose Faith), he recounts the incredible story of Admiral Jim Stockdale. He was the highest ranking military officer in the Hanoi Hilton PoW camp. The man endured 7 and a half years of regular torture and isolation. When asked which people didn't survive in captivity he said,
"Oh, that's easy, the optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said, 'We're going to be out by Christmas.' And Christmas would come, and Christmas would go. Then they'd say, 'We're going to be out by Easter.' And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. And they died of a broken heart. This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end—which you can never afford to lose—with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be."
While the Ankle Biters plot and scheme to shut you down with their next attack, you can be supremely confident that you'll win in the end. All it requires is brutal honesty to accept the situation you're in and the choice to believe in God's plan for you.
Or as John Wayne's character in the Seekers put it:
"Ethan: Injun will chase a thing till he thinks he's chased it enough. Then he quits. Same way when he runs. Seems like he never learns there's such a thing as a critter that'll just keep comin' on. So we'll find 'em in the end, I promise you. We'll find 'em. Just as sure as the turnin' of the earth."