Aarvoll@Aarvoll_
Nick wants to downplay the Epstein stuff partly because he's adopted Keith Woods' strong anti-schizo conspiracy line
Now he wants rock solid proof before leaning into any conspiracy theory and it bothers him when people speculate or extrapolate beyond what the data clearly proves
His basic flaw is that now his default hypothesis tends to be "no conspiracy" instead of suspending judgment and continuing to investigate
Claiming that there's a conspiracy without warrant and claiming that there's no conspiracy without warrant are both epistemologically lazy
Exploring the realm of possible elite corruption and collusion is actually useful, extremely effective rhetorically, and doesn't need to stray into unwarranted claims provided a few caveats terms are used like "it is suspected" or "allegedly"
Those who want to believe in the conspiracy theory might read too far into your statements, but people have superstitious beliefs all the time - they might as well be beliefs that are politically useful rather than ideas like flat earth or Tartaria
Contrast with 2019 Nick, when he started using the phrase "trust the plan" during QAnon, and he frequently dog whistled to Q followers - he understood at that time the power of directing people's schizo tendencies
Or contrast with Nick's religious beliefs, which, by his own newly adopted strict epistemological standards, he can't fully justify, but which he feels confident proclaiming without attempting a comprehensive supporting argument
I like Keith Woods but his war on the Schizo Right is destined to fail, because people are always drawn to impute personal intent onto historical and natural phenomena; it's why people started believing in gods and its why conspiratorial thinking is widespread on the left and the right
Rather than countersignaling that natural tendency out of contempt for average lowbrow right-wingers, the thing to do is to offer the most compelling and well evidenced narrative that's both plausible and gives your audience a clear sense of how good and evil are active in the world
Be faithful to the data, but don't be hamstrung by the data and don't refuse to speculate
Epistemologically conscientious and high information right wing content creators have to supply speculative conspiratorial narratives without making unsupportable claims, and average people will inevitably go further with those narratives to make them more sensational - that's a good thing actually
Promoting clearly false and discrediting conspiracy theories is one vicious extreme, refusing to entertain possible conspiracy theories is the other, and the best path will be the golden mean between them
There a million + pages of files that were just released that we haven't gotten everything out of - now is not the time to hand wave it away and say there's no new revelations; it's the time to investigate and speculate
I've said it before and I'm not joking, the Schizo Right is the most powerful force in American politics and not activating it or directing it in a useful way is a strategic blunder
