Severian riffs on a theme by Freeberg.
An excellent question over at Morgan’s. I took a stab at an answer over there, but I think it needs fleshing out.
…
To return to Morgan’s question, and the mask: For the Liberal, the character they’re playing is “Genius.” House MD, or maybe Mulder from the X-Files. Maybe Spock, if they’re old enough, or Commander Data, or whatever, the actual character doesn’t matter much for predictive purposes. What matters is that the character “Genius” is what they think a heroically big-brained movie character would do in a given situation. The docs in the ER think it’s just a bad flu, but Genius — in this case, House MD — knows it’s really some pathogen that hasn’t been seen since 1378. The Vancouver cops think it’s a gangland slaying, but Mulder knows it’s really the chupacabra. And, of course, Genius is right! It doesn’t matter that Scully and the Vancouver cops have seventy-seven other much more plausible theories. The mountain of data arguing against the chupacabra doesn’t matter. Hell, it doesn’t even matter that what Mulder is 100% right about this week directly contradicts something he was 100% right about last week:
What he’s right about doesn’t matter. At all. All that matters is that he’s right, every single time. And he knows it, every single time. He doesn’t express doubt. He doesn’t wonder if Scully might be right, just this once. Scully’s never right, because that’s the character, so even though her objections are logical, reasonable, and backed by shitloads of actual evidence out in the real world, she’s wrong, because she’s Skeptical Sidekick and he’s Genius, that’s the movie they’re in.
This explains, to a considerable degree, the prevalence of Soy White People at nominally pro-black protests. They weren’t around to march with Martin Luther King, but they conceive of themselves as the sort of people who would march with Martin Luther King and so they attempt to create that scene in whatever movie (Mississippi Burning?) they’re starring in this week, regardless of whether the conditions that faced Martin Luther King exist (which they don’t) or not, because they need to demonstrate to everybody they know (and many that they don’t) what sort of virtuous people they are. This is the ‘virtue signalling’ I-am-the-couragious-struggler-against-oppression shtick is all about.
Those who are old enough may remember the roots of this in the ‘ghetto blaster’ phenomenon of the sixties and seventies — the custom of People of Color from the ‘hood wandering around with a portable stereo system almost bigger than they were perched on their shoulder and blasting out black subculture music 24/7 … because they were the star of their own movie, and their vision included this kick-ass soundtrack that apparently they had to provide for themselves.
This is the motivation behind tattoos, piercings, oddly colored hair, weird makeup, the whole shaved-head-and-chin-beard thing, etc. When yo’ is impo’tant, yo’ gots to look impo’tent. If you get the appearance right, the reality will necessarily follow.
UPDATE: All Noble Abolitionists!
