Philosophy | Zeitgeist Reviews

What do you mean anti-woke?

What do you mean anti-corporate?

So is wokeism, or capitalism to blame?

Which theories explain the Culture War?

Hard to say. Probably some mixture of reasons. Research them and make up your own mind. Thuletide has a good TL;DR and so does Keith Woods.

@AuronMacintyre also has a good video on “earlier thinkers” talking about this as well, citing Machiavelli and Pareto.https://t.co/g6sLpYKsF3

— ZeitgeistReviews•com (@ZeitgeistRev) June 2, 2023

But please allow me a few paragraphs and dozens of memes to severely overreach, navel gaze, and huff my own farts while I expand on each point. Here’s how I see it:

So, it seems that once a civilization or institution grows past a certain point, its growth inevitably gets subverted & its output diverted by elements within. Nietzsche talks about this in terms of “slave morality.” He claims the Christians were the beta male subversives who slowly inverted the chad pagan values that made Rome great. And that all civilizations inevitably go through these cycles of death and rebirth as the chad & beta subsets of humans manifest their “will to power” in struggles for dominance.

Nowadays, some academics explain the cycles of civilization via a loosely applied r/K selection theory. They claim that although no human is r selected, leftwingers tend to have r loaded traits. The studies on testosterone levels and likelihood of adopting unpopular opinions supports this. So instead of taking woke leftists’ words at face value, but rather interpreting them as post hoc rationalizations for self-preservation, you can more accurately understand their actions through a biological lens.

This is why they move the goal posts and change the definition of racism to be “power + privilege” when you point out their hypocritical bigotry towards Whites. Or why they now champion “equity” not “equality.” And part of why intersectionality is a thing. ( Give a mouse a cookie… ) Or why it’s always women who find an excuse to get naked when ostensibly fighting for X cause. Or why so many feminists still want you to open doors and pay for meals. And on and on and on…

@whateverpod Feminist DOES NOT want to pay for first dates?! #whateverpodcast #whopays #moderndating #datinginla #datinginyour20s #datinginyour30s #splitthebill ♬ original sound – whatever.com

Lily Wachowski explains that trans porn made him trans. pic.twitter.com/L41afK1XYJ

— genericeddie, inventor of nutella coffee. (@genericeddie) May 18, 2023

Bottom line, stop arguing in good faith. Speaking of which, although the science wasn’t there yet, Machiavelli’s intuition & experience helped him pick up on the same patterns that Nietzsche and others would elaborate on centuries later. Machiavelli described a “Lions & Foxes” theory of how elites interact in society, and Pareto later expounded on it with conclusions about the pleb class in his 80/20 rule. They both seem to be depicting the same sociological structures that Nietzsche’s “slave morality” and the r/K selection theory characterize.

Likewise, within that same framework, others have pointed out the effects of feminism on a society and how women (on average) are r loaded / natural leftwingers with non-confrontational fox like tendencies. Which can complicate the r/K paradigm since the stereotypical female subversion means inviting both r & K loaded outsiders into the ecosystem. Either as a gaggle of orbiters or to fulfill the cliché fantasy of 2 men fighting for her.

But it can also manifest as the HR department, a DE&I office, or merely nagging AWFLs spread throughout the company ruining everyone’s fun.

Alissa Heinerscheid, Bud Light’s VP of Marketing, doubles down on her extreme woke strategy to promote the “declining” American beer brand to “young people”, while smearing her former customers as “fratty and out of touch”.

How’s that working out for you, lady? @budlight pic.twitter.com/zNYKbMnZnu

— Old Row (@OldRowOfficial) April 9, 2023

All of these memes and theories are just explaining different iterations of human nature that coincide with each other. Obviously, most of the people who join a community or pick up a new hobby aren’t thinking about any of this consciously, and are likely motivated by enjoying their free time first and foremost. But with these subconscious motivators in mind, the gradual shifts social groups make over time form a very predictable pattern. Once you start viewing humanity from an evolutionary psychology perspective, the Culture War starts to make more and more sense. And every new bit of knowledge just adds another missing puzzle piece. Take these 3 “laws” for example, they all describe the same will to power stuff discussed above:



O’Sullivan’s First Law :

“Any organization not explicitly and constitutionally right-wing will sooner or later become left-wing.”

Michel’s Iron Law of Oligarchy :

“All complex organizations, regardless of how democratic they are when started, eventually develop into oligarchies.”

Conquest’s Third Law :

“The behavior of any bureaucratic organization can best be understood by assuming that it is controlled by a secret cabal of its enemies.”

Examples given by O’Sullivan:

Examples given by Derbyshire:

It seems fitting that John Derbyshire was talking about institutional takeover in the National Review, considering how former Trotskyite Neo-Cons took over the magazine and ousted him for being too rightwing.

And while we’re on the topic, we’d be remiss if we failed to mention one of the most talked about theories on why Hollywood is the way it is. It was literally founded by Jews who were kicked out during Russian pogroms.

This background has an undeniable influence on what they choose to make and who they choose to platform. In one of Arnold’s speeches he explained that the industry thought audiences wanted neurotic beta male types like Dustin Hoffman & Woody Allen. (Maybe ‘cuz that’s who they identified with…) But once he got his chance, the box office proved otherwise.

So now we come full circle when we recall that Nietzsche’s “slave morality” writings were saturated with criticism of what he considered a foreign Jewish influence as the source of the “slave morality” subversion he railed against.

Disclaimer:

To be clear, we love Jews and minorities and all the marginalized groups mentioned above. That’s why we feature LGBT & POC critics all over the site. And despite our references to the famous “God is dead” atheist, we are a pro-faith website. We encourage spirituality and try to embolden Christians. Which should be obvious considering how many Christian reviewers and family friendly sites we integrate on ZR.

We disavow any discrimination and are just speculating on cultural/biological/& sociopolitical influences in the Culture War. But for someone to explore what makes Hollywood tick without mentioning the most influential groups that helped build it would not only be cowardly it’d be dishonest. If our edgy portrayal of each group and their motivations seems too harsh, just chill out & scroll down to see how we convey our frustrations with the right.

The logical follow up questions are: how much colluding happens top down through institutions like the MSM, and how much is merely a natural byproduct of progress and Darwinian chaos? Certainly some of it is just the consequence of an abundant & successful society that permits fake jobs for the unproductive 80% to hinder the other 20%. But what percent of it is malicious and what percent is just self-interest?

Who knows…

There is undeniable proof of secret societies, top down pushes of unpopular agendas, and malevolent elites. And the intensity of the pushback you get is a good litmus test to see which ones are more credible conspiracies. For example, flat earth videos might get banned but you won’t be debanked or suicided for talking about it. A.I. is a threat and Ted Kaczynski has many valid points but no one is prevented from posting his manifesto or discussing his ideas on major tech platforms. The Free Masons may have played a big role in the founding of the country but you can openly criticize them all day online. So which taboo topics are the biggest threat to the system you’re never allowed to speak about 🤔

Anyways, it’s like the nature vs nurture topic, fun to explore but a precise percentage is unobtainable. We’ll leave those conclusions up to you.

Either way, it seems there’s a sweet spot right before an operation grows too big. And since pretty much everything else that could remedy the aforementioned problems is out of our control, it makes the most sense to focus our energy on what we can control: filtering and aggregating to help bolster decentralization. And consolidating online efforts to boycott & fund accordingly so we get more of the good stuff. Besides, even if it doesn’t make a difference in the grand scheme of things, at least it makes our lives more enjoyable when we cut out big business & woke crap.


Which is why we have filters for box office revenue/profit limits, a way to filter out the top 50 production studios, and a way to limit the number of seasons displayed in your search results. No more corporate husks of once great shows on their umpteenth season like “Walking Dead” or “The Simpsons.” No more diversity quotas or agendas crammed in like they did with the final seasons of “Game Of Thrones,” or like how “Rick & Morty” was forced at gunpoint to fill their writing staff with affirmative action broads. Just great, indie, soulful small projects, like the 12 episode anime, “Kids On the Slope.” Or the intimate “28 Days Later” and not its bigger budget panoramic followup, “28 Weeks Later.” Or the experimental and DIY “FishTank.live” series:

She’s right but I hate her pic.twitter.com/vIuVCNhBVw

— ? Josh Lekach ? (@JoshLekach) April 16, 2023

.

TL;DR
If you want art/entertainment that isn’t ass, then you need a team of people with enough resources to make good stuff, but small enough to maintain creative control.

Until…

What do you mean pro-faith?

Do you guys welcome leftwingers?

Yes!

If we’re gonna talk about the genetic predispositions of right v.s. left, it wouldn’t be fair to leave out how (on average) lefties are much better at art.

Well, it’s mainly the Conservatives that suck, not all right wingers. But still… gotta’ call out the cringe:

A TV writer who worked on “King of the Hill,” Michael Jamin, talks about how people in general, hypocritically value STEM and trades over the arts:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Michael Jamin (@michaeljaminwriter)

.

He doesn’t say it, but that describes most Conservatives. Which is probably why their art is often such trash. Since right-wingers tend to be “K loaded” “lion” types with high levels of conscientiousness, preferences for strict borders, and forthright communication styles, the art they produce is correspondingly blunt & tactless. Go figure. For example, all the red meat that Pajeet grifter throws his base like “Hillary’s America.” Or the painfully cheesy Christian propaganda films like “God’s Not Dead.” Anything implicitly rightwing or with ambiguous conclusions left for the viewer to interpret like Scorsese’s “Silence” get the cold shoulder. And God forbid it has any sex/violence/or cursing like “The Sopranos” or “Brawl In Cell Block 99.” ‘Cuz all its rightwing credibility will be tossed out the window as Andrew Klavan points out:

What’s worse, is when they finally green lit a major blockbuster film that portrays rightwingers as underdog protagonists, the same mouth breathing Republican retards that whine about the culture war, organized a boycott! It’s all so tiresome.

But this is really just an admonishment of the 80% of society that are NPC’s, regardless of political leanings. The virtue signaling woke mob SJW types are the NPC’s of the left. The perpetually grouchy normie-Con Fox News types are the NPC’s of the right.

But if we can put our egos aside for a bit, the truth is that the genetic clusters that seem to have permeated throughout every population since the dawn of time,( long before the French Revolution coined the terms to describe the left/right dichotomy they materialize in), are there for a reason. There are pros and cons to both.

Think about the premise to “The Last Kingdom” where a Christian Saxon boy set to be a lord is enslaved by Danish Pagans. And how in order for him to develop the necessary grit to live on, his genetic makeup absolutely requires aspects of fluidity and neophilia. The survival of those genes depends on an optimized spectrum with varying levels of tribal loyalty, reverence to authority, conscientiousness, and openness. Some members of the tribe need a plan B in case their team loses to an invading tribe. And some degree of flexibility is crucial in case the traditions you inherited from your tribe are flawed or no longer work due to environmental changes.



Obviously, there’s overlap and most people have a combination of these genetic traits. And of course there are tons of the right-wingers in the top 20% who make amazing art.

(Full Article)

And certainly, our definitions of right or left change over time so trying to hamfist our views onto DaVinci or Shakespeare is retarded & pointless presentism. It’s a loose pattern, not a strict division. However, these memes resonated with people for a reason:

The memes don’t lie.

How are you gonna’ win when you literally identify as a “reactionary?” Always on the defense, never presenting a vision for the future.



Sure, there’s plenty of top tier right-wingers with more refined taste than their counterparts, appreciating ancient sculptures/architecture, and who are more well read on the classics. And yeah, many sh*tlibs will fawn over non-objectivist splatters of paint because the mob mentality trampled through their high levels of openness, tricking them into thinking the emperor’s new clothes is stylish. But the yuppie right-winger’s genetic predisposition to be more easily disgusted at new things is part of why (in general) leftwingers dominate the cultural trends and direction of the Overton Window. “Yesterday’s liberal is today’s conservative,” as they say. And it seems the right is perpetually playing catch up, never setting the tone. ?

That’s why ZR doesn’t care to step foot in the trenches of the culture war. Maybe it’s our determinist temperament talking, but it seems that that’s the fate of the right. To be voices of caution that uphold the traditions for as long as they’ll last, while other members of society experiment and die off in search of progress for the tribe. The only problem is that technology is advancing exponentially and so the combination of the first mover advantage, liberalism, and democracy has knocked the natural order out of whack. The progressives never reach an equilibrium with society like they used to. Social media and algorithms speed things up so they are beyond parody. The “LGBTQrstuvwxyz” Boomer joke is almost a reality:


Nowadays, the “r loaded” population never learns its lesson. When a movie bombs because of “go woke, go broke” they just lean into reboots, remakes, and ESG for a safety net, then blame the fanbase for being sexist or racist, and continue the process. Or they vote for hobos to sh*t in the street, socialist tax laws, defunding the police, etc. and then just move somewhere else to repeat the process.

Talk to a leftwing California transplant. They literally blame global warming for why everyone’s leaving or don’t even question why and just say, “It’s really expensive now so I left.” It’s insane. Perhaps a meta economy will occur like how DeSantis and other states competed in attracting Tesla. If we’re lucky, we’ll see states competing for high quality citizens the way real estate communities do for clients, and will develop laws limiting migration from other states unless you have a family & certain income. Or maybe there will be state electoral colleges the way Razorfist suggests. This could be a proxy way to limit this endless cycle of mob mentality gone astray. But considering how the federal government literally forces economic migrants into suburbs that are too White, and states rights was the basis of our civil war, things look bleak…

So who knows how this will all end in the coming years. Maybe a national divorce will actually take place in America or a civil war will pop off. The trans thing will surely continue, but it seems we’re currently at the Model T stage of the transhumanism journey. Hopefully as technology improves, the angry incels on HRT will be replaced by body builders, Kardashian wannabes, split tongue body modification tattoo parlor types, and furries who’ll ditch the suits and become legit catgirls. A man can dream…


Whatever happens happens. For now, we are exhausted with all the bullsh*t. We’re doing our part to counter the imbalance caused by the woke mob and mega corporations. Obviously there’s more important things than media, so we highly encourage localism and entryism. And needless to say we don’t endorse any illegal activity….. BUT…. there are other ways to push back against the tide.



But that’s not ZR’s focus. Besides, what would winning the culture war look like? There’s a reason we evolved to have so many NPC’s in a population, not everyone should be a leader. And there’s a reason leftwingers exist globally. It seems the main issue is that the people in charge of the government and media don’t have our best interests at heart. And perhaps our current form of government is flawed and doesn’t take human nature into account. But we’ll leave the huge systemic change to others, while we tackle the media.

And in terms of the culture war, we take a dharmic hippie approach, that fully accepts leftwingers as healthy and vital ingredients for civilization. Keep making art, keep taking irrational risks, keep experimenting with novelty. Just cut it out with the drag queen story hour, the transgender men in sports, and the ironic war mongering of recent years. If you’re not part of the regressive left, and you’re anti-woke/anti-corporate, then “my enemy’s enemy is my friend.”


<3

Reject the false dichotomy, embrace the third position:

Does every review have to be political?

No.

The point of the site is not to write reviews from a political viewpoint. ( Although that does happen a lot.) Really, it’s just a place for uncensored reviews so you can have an accurate populist aggregate rating. Why? Because all of our competitors are slowly neutering their own user base. You can’t trust any other review site anymore.

The biggest offender is Rotten Tomatoes. They manipulate, purge, and restrict reviews all the time in order to protect their woke orthodoxy.
( Examples: 1, 2, 3, 4 )

Netflix simply removed its ratings altogether after Amy Schumer’s special bombed.

Likewise, YouTube removed its dislike feature after Santa Inc was disliked into oblivion.


Similar to RottenTomatoe’s sneaky alterations, IMDb quietly added a new weighting system after some simp complained about the ratio of female critics. So now many IMDb scores are manipulated if they are ever overwhelmingly negative for a woke show.


MetaCritic held out longer than the others but they are conforming like the rest by “cracking down on bigots.” (A.k.a. censoring any dissent.)


All of these sites blame “review bombing” and assume it must be trolls. Which to be fair, may be the case here and there. But they’re so trigger happy and defensive that honest distaste for a film gets censored just the same.

We saw some articles about how “based” Russian and Chinese reviews are, but after we imported and integrated their reviews the reality falls a bit short. It turns out most of their average ratings are on par with IMDb.

And since they often censor woke stuff, their MPAA ratings sometimes judge a different cut. Nevertheless, comparing their MPAA ratings has been useful. Likewise, lurking through their translated pages can help counter the obfuscation of popular opinion by Western review sites.

We also started importing 4Chan and Reddit forums to see what people were saying. Although getting a concrete conclusion from such data is near impossible, it is much more honest and unfiltered.

But at the end of the day, all you can do is glance at all of these curated datasets to get a gist of what the world’s really thinking. The best way to get good recommendations is to read and leave reviews on ZR yourself!

TL;DR

We welcome trivial reviews with no mention of politics. Don’t worry about finding some clever hot take. Just think of ZR as a populist aggregate.

Isn't this site hypocritical?

Share this page: