Political Polarization Makes a Surprising Turn on The Internet
Several online celebrities have been making strides in cooperation that have been long unforeseen by the American political climate.
Laci Green, a household name for many young liberals, surprised many dedicated viewers two months ago when she contacted Blaire White, a far-right online ideologue.
Laci Green has been a prominent leftist figure on Youtube for almost a decade, educating her viewers on the many nuances of sex and sexuality, feminism, and other hot-button left-wing topics. Blaire White, on the other hand, is a transgender activist who frequently criticizes leftist ideology — typically regarding racism, feminism and trans rights — and expresses her support for president Donald Trump. In today’s society, it’s almost unnatural to see people as far-left as Laci even acknowledge the existence of those as far-right as Blaire White without an aggressive undertone, or vice-versa. However, in a tweet to Blaire, Laci diverted those expectations.
Blaire followed up on this proposal a few days later with a live 2-and-a-half hour conversation with Laci about feminism, trans issues and rape culture — topics in which they find little-to-no agreement. While many viewers took note of some hostility between the two figureheads, the debate was a surprising step towards online bipartisanship.
A couple of weeks later, Laci uploaded a video in response to public pause entitled “TAKING THE RED PILL?” The so-called “red pill” that Laci refers to is commonly used by internet users who oppose ideas presented by feminists and other “social justice warriors”. In the 1999 film The Matrix, protagonist Neo chooses to take the red pill, which exposes him to reality, despite its dystopian nature, after living for his whole life in a false simulation of reality. In a sense, the “red pill” is used to expose people, typically liberals, to hard truths that they may otherwise deny out of personal comfort.
In Laci’s video, she describes her recent dedication to contacting people with drastically different viewpoints, citing her dedication to skepticism as one of her main motives.
[Skepticism is] questioning even the seemingly unquestionable, and being willing to adjust our beliefs as we get new information.
Perhaps inadvertently inspired by Laci, online nonbinary trans activist Milo Stewart uploaded a video on their channel a week later entitled “Growth, Change and An Apology”, where they expressed regret towards their past videos in which they opposed any alternate opinions in response to incessant bullying from several right-wing Youtube channels.
I caught myself using many logical fallacies in that I’ve noticed the loudest and the biggest voices critiquing me were calling me an “it” or making jokes about my appearance or my speech patterns, and so I put up this brick wall that precluded me from being open to other criticisms.
Just a day after the upload of this video, conservative Youtube star June (Shoe0nHead) made a response video, apologizing for the assumptions she had previously made about Milo’s gender identity. She starts the video by referencing the recent trend of people reflecting on past mistakes (Milo in specific) and her positive reaction to it, and thus was inspired to reflect on her own past comments. She had long accused Milo, as well as trans activist Riley Dennis, of being “trans-trenders”, or pretending to be transgender, primarily because of their outward positivity when discussing trans issues in spite of the prevalence of violent transphobia in the United States. She also previously affirmed that non-binary identities (gender expressions separate from “man” or “woman”) do not exist, because of the lack of scientific backing of said identities. While she affirms that she will continue to combat feminism, she is willing to reconsider such LGBT issues because of her lack of understanding of such topics.
The thing is, I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know what these people are like. I don’t know what they’re feeling. (…) I feel like it’s not my place to look at somebody like Riley Dennis and go “You ain’t trans”. I don’t know. (…) I feel like I’m a bad person for not giving it a chance.
Her video, which also cites Laci’s first Red Pill video in its description, has been met with a flurry of negative responses in the comments section, from accusations of “catering to delusion” to being “confused now because some extremists are showing humanity”.
But it’s not just the right who finds issue with this development. Laci uploaded a video on May 26 entitled “Caught between extremes. [Red Pill 2]”, where she describes negative backlash she’s recieved not only from the right, but from the left as well.
From the feminist side, you know, I have seen a similar tone deafness [to the anti-feminist side]. You guys may have seen some of the things that people posted after that video [TAKING THE RED PILL?].
A prominent example of backlash towards Laci “taking the red pill” is Kat Blaque, a poignant-yet-underrated Youtuber who champions many of the same liberal issues as Laci Green, albeit typically taking stances further left, and has been accused of alienating herself from alternate world views. In a recent livestream entitled “Rant Stream: Interacting with people who disagree with me”, she points out that many of these accusations against her have escalated in response to Laci Green.
People like Laci can actually have this thing where they’re like “Oh, sure, I’ll sit down and have a reasonable conversation with people who have been very racist. Yeah, sure, I’ll sit down and have a reasonable conversation with people who have been very f*cking transphobic.” Because they don’t have the same exact connection to those things. Because she’s not dealing with it in her day-to-day.
In an era where left-wingers are moving further left (eg. the rising popularity antifascist movements) in order to account for the rise of the “alt-right”, it has become increasingly more difficult to find compromise. Long gone are the days of middlemen such as George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose policies modeled those of Eisenhower’s “Middle Way”. While these presidents worked with Democrats and Republicans alike in order to maximize public approval, any such compromise is rare in today’s political climate with the election of current president Donald Trump.
But compromise is difficult within good reason. As Ms. Blaque pointed out, people like Laci and Milo are able to openly discuss issues such as racism with people commonly understood as racist without feeling like they are putting their own lives at risk. It’s natural to not want to associate oneself with people who perhaps pose a threat to their personal identity, and those who are openly racist, transphobic, and otherwise oppressive have gained an outlet in the past year by which they can express their ideas more freely in the public sphere.
So, is this a promising development towards cooperation and compromise in American society? Or is it a discouraging softening of resistance towards racism, transphobia, and other forms of oppressive speech that has been penetrating the public sphere since the 2016 election? It’s hard to say. But we can all agree that, good or bad, this kind of civility and integrity on the internet has never before been seen by such a large audience since the rise of the Trump era.
Thanks for reading! This article has also been published on my website, annajhaynes.com. All support is appreciated.
