THREAD on conspiracy theories & attachment.
I keep seeing frustrated social media posts asking why people believe conspiracy theories. Answer: It gives a sense of control - includng belonging, predictability & safety. It's emotional regulation. Here's research to unpack that.

A man just said “WHAT IS THAT?”when I walked by and then quickly yelled “IT WAS A COMPLIMENT” and then a small child said, and I quote, “Uncle Joe you can’t say that to ladies.” This boy will one day lead us all to greatness as a nation.

This is the second time in a month some dude has said something to me on the street and been shut down before I even said a word. Granted the LA version was more polite than when an NYC dude told me to smile and a lady cursed him out. People are hilarious.

I wouldn’t have been rude to either dude but wow, I didn’t even have to make the choice because we Americans are chatty.

Also I’m worried about Uncle Joe because $10 says his sister is the boy’s mom and we now know she’s not afraid to tell guys what to do.

My eyes got SO BIG and I almost laughed and Uncle Joe said, “That’s fair, my dude” to this kindergartener and I was like oh God the children will lead us.

1. I was walking in the woods yesterday and I had an epiphany. It wasn’t one I wanted to have. I was thinking about today’s class, where we are reading Kimmerer’s ‘Gathering Moss’. I’ve taught Braiding Sweetgrass in multiple classes every year since 2016. It’s eminently teachable

2. Both books are beautifully written. Students uniformly enjoy them as assigned reading. They do a great job communicating to non-Indigenous folks the contours of basic Indigenous relationships to more-than-human beings. They’re wildly popular with white readers.

3. I’ve found Braiding Sweetgrass to be a great entry point for non-Indigenous folks to Indigenous scholarship. But this is where yesterday’s epiphany comes in. Neither Braiding Sweetgrass or Gathering Moss tends to the deep deep lineages of Indigenous scholarship in Canada or US

4. As the popularity of ‘Braiding Sweetgrass’ has soared, I’ve seen more and more white folks wax on about ‘braiding knowledge’. But they often don’t know any of the lineages of these concepts beyond what is presented in this one book. They confidently run with this.

5. Kimmerer does a commendable job of weaving in her own experiences, her family stories+nods to some very important knowledge keepers who deserve to be celebrated for their work. But Braiding Sweetgrass does not tend to the citational politics Sara Ahmed & others teach us about

It's funny how so many people who claim to worship "democracy" also dismiss nationalism as selfish xenophobia. Democracy is absolutely meaningless without strong national sovereignty. Under globalism, citizens of any given state have little influence over how they are governed.

Nationalism isn't just mindless tribalism. People are correct to insist their government has a responsibility TO THEM that vastly outweighs any imagined responsibility to foreign governments they have absolutely no influence over, or foreign populations.

We've seen that point taken to absurd extremes by the Left during the Trump administration, with whack-job judges ruling that foreigners have rights that EXCEED those of American citizens, including absolute rights to enter the U.S. and influence its government.

And we're frequently told that some international elite "consensus" completely overrides our ability to make individual decisions - or even to petition our own government, or vote for representatives who disagree with whatever "the world" has supposedly decided.

All of that is the absolute negation of "democracy" in any form, including the dangerous mob rule and majoritarianism that the Left selectively advocates. (Notice they always have a list of things nobody gets to vote on anymore, no matter how strong the majority vote would be.)

Every crisis becomes a religion if it lasts long enough.

One factor in that transformation is the Beautiful Theory phenomenon: the power elite insists its remedies are logical and politically correct so they MUST work, even if the actual evidence shows they obviously don't.