Prospecting for Reputation Riches as a Key Correlate for the Rise of Social Manias
As different as the Covid and 10/7 social manias were, they ultimately share deep underlying sociopolitical similarities
As different as the Covid and 10/7 social manias were, they ultimately share deep underlying sociopolitical similarities. In both cases there was suddenly a whole lot of available social currency (reputation) that one could potentially acquire if one were known to be a member of a certain sociopolitical community.
THE COVID CULT
A new “care about fighting the pandemic” community had formed, and signaling membership within it — and engaging in “work” to promote or enrich the narratives — promised lavish rewards if you were able to position yourself as a reputable member within it. Opportunities within new sociopolitical communities rich in social currency are rare, and so people are strongly driven to them so as to prospect for reputation rewards.
OCTOBER 7 ANTI-SEMITISM
The massacre amounted to an epic humiliation of Israel. Like the defeat of the boxing champion by a scrappy underdog, suddenly all those who had stridently claimed the champion would wipe the floor with the newcomer in any conflict — and thereby staked a lot of reputation — lost it all. A torrent of reputation was suddenly available within the network, a scenario ripe with opportunity for those wishing to acquire it. By end of day 10/7 there was an explosion of conspicuous signals about the evil genocidal Jews, along with over time ever more elaborate post hoc justifications for these claims (which aren’t claims so much as membership signals, which got transformed over time into virtue signals as the narrative came to justify, post hoc, why the absurd signal was true).
Very different triggers, but both ending up with a sudden abundance of available reputation riches that one might earn with the appropriate conspicuous membership signals, always absurd, like wearing masks or accusing Israel of genocide.
These are the sorts of mechanisms underlying the great crimes against humanity.