The Matrix vs Bubbles: A New Framework for Political Sensemaking
Ever since I have been politically conscious I have been aware of the existence of ideological bubbles. If you only watched Fox News and listened to Rush Limbaugh, you were in a conservative bubble. If you only watched MSNBC and read the New York Times, you were in a liberal bubble.
This isn’t interesting. Old news. We get it.
BUT while we may understand the fundamentals of ideological bubbles, what many of us don’t understand is their distinction from the concept of “The Matrix.” In 2015 and beyond, understanding this difference is essential to making sense of our cultural and political landscape. To use them interchangeably (which I often see) would only serve to further confuse you.
A basic understanding of either the film The Matrix or it’s source material “The Allegory of the Cave” from Plato’s Republic is a prerequisite for understanding this political analogy. So if you’re completely unfamiliar with both of those, click the links.
The Matrix is Not a Bubble
The first key difference between the Matrix and a bubble is the level of awareness of a person inside each about the perspective of their counterparts.
For example, the liberal in his “MSNBC, New Yorker, Real Time With Bill Maher” bubble knows 1) that he is in a bubble and 2) that there exists another bubble counterbalancing him on the right. This is obvious to even the most stringent liberal or conservative. So much so, that we joke about it in moments of self awareness on late night TV or at the White House Correspondents Dinner when Obama makes a playful joke directed at the Fox News table (the mainstream media source of the opposing bubble.) Because we are aware of the biases these bubbles create, some of the more intellectually curious venture into enemy territory to more robustly form their opinion. You can hedge against being in the liberal bubble by reading the Wall Street Journal or watching Fox News in addition to your typical news sources, and vice versa. The most bubble-hedged amongst us will have even voted for candidates from both the RNC and DNC down the ballot. Achieving the high score, some have even voted for Democrats and Republicans at the top of the ticket. People who regularly do this are considered “Independents” and every election cycle they are simultaneously highly valued and highly scrutinized: Valued by those running for office who need them to choose their team this time around, and scrutinized by those more solidly sided with a particular team (less bubble-hedged) wondering “How could you have voted for someone far left and now support someone so far right? Where is the overlap?”
The liberal and conservative bubbles (others exist but the vast majority of people fall into these two categories so I will focus exclusively on them) are reliant upon, and informed by, the various consensus “centers of excellence” as Jordan Greenhall calls them. (Fig. 2). Some individual institutions within each center are considered more or less “reliable”(ideologically hedged) than others, but as a group they are accepted as trustworthy and necessary. For example, there are more liberal (Universtiy of California, Berkeley) and conservative (Liberty University) centers of academia, Liberal (MSNBC) and conservative (Fox News) centers of the mainstream media, and liberal (Center for American Progress) and conservative (The Heritage Foundation) think tanks. There are even more “liberal” or “conservative” banks and financial institutions, including local credit unions. Each bubble has its preferred individuals from each center, but the centers themselves are bedrock, and again, AWARE of the others operating within their space.
So what is the matrix? If a bubble is aware of its counterbalance, then those in the matrix must be unaware of those outside it. This is, after all, the premise of the film. Up until the moment Neo is given the opportunity to leave the matrix and see the “real world” he didn’t even recognize the existence of a second reality (unlike how those in the libearl bubble know there is a conservative bubble.) In the film, and in today’s political jargon, recognizing the existence of this other reality is called “taking the redpill.”
Taking the Redpill
To understand the diagram in Fig. 3 we need to follow the rules of the road, namely: you can cross dotted lines but not solid lines. In this analogy, movement across lines is the ability to understand the other groups in a profound way, or “being redpilled” on their points of view.
Of couse the mainstream media and academia know about the existence of crypto currencies or the Tea Party, but they were not “redpilled” on them. They don’t understand them beyond their surface level. This is regularly made evident by the attempts of those operating within the matrix to map these phenomena onto their already existing centers of excellence. Statments like “crypto currencies are a new fiat that will have the chance to really take off once major financial institutions incorporate them” or “most Bernie Bro’s will ‘return home’ and vote for the DNC and Clinton. She is much more closely alingned to his values than Trump” demonstrate this shallowness (if these examples sound like facts to you, maybe you are not redpilled on the topics.) These phenomena are misunderstood by those, still not redpilled, who see them as phenomena that fit within their already understood WORLD. When in reality, they are entirely new phenomena that will disrupt their all encompassing MATRIX. At this point I want to make an important note; “the real world” isn’t a normative value claim. It’s not the same “real world” as a pejorative “welcome to the real world idiot” though I recognize it sounds the same. No one operating in “the real world” portion of Fig. 3 comes to conclusions that are necessarily any more or less correct on any given topic. They just have access to more choices. But as we know, you can have all of Netflix at your disposal and still watch Fuller House. Being redpilled and thus having access to the real world options isn’t about outcomes, rather it’s about having those options at your disposal to be able to reach some outcome. When you do reach an outcome, “being redpilled” won’t be a sufficient argument for it validity. Don’t fall for that trap.
Windows and One Way Mirrors
Let’s dive deeper into the ability, or inability, to move across lines (again Fig. 3.) It’s a key distinction between a bubble and the matrix, so it’s important we understand it. To reiterate, bubbles know of the other bubbles’ existence, they can cross the dotted line, they can peer inside as if through a window. The matrix, on the other hand, doesn’t allow you to see outside, everything you understand is necessarily mapped onto your world inside the matrix. Instead of looking at the other side through a window, you are just looking back at yourself in a one-way mirror. On the other side of that mirror, however, the “real world” is observing you. It’s asymetrical. In the beginning of the film The Matrix, Neo only knew about the matrix. It was all he could see. After he took the redpill, he could still see and operate within the matrix, but his perspective was expanded, he now knew about the world beyond it as well. Bubbles are hedgable but ultimately zero sum (you can allocate your intellectual portfolio however you want but it will equal 100%) but the real world is non-zero sum (everything you initially had access to, plus more.) Importantly, like in the film, we were all born and raised inside the matrix. Those who are redpilled and step into the real world still have access to that pre redpill perspective.
Ones and Zeros
The second key feature of the matrix is the inability to hedge once redpilled. While bubbles allow everyone the opportunity to allocate their intellectual portfolio as they see fit (60% NYT + 20% WSJ + 10% The Economist + 10% Brietbart = a robust independent) the matrix is binary. You’re aware or you’re not. This is why Neo’s choice between the blue and red pill was so consequential, there is no going back to the pre-redpill world. While he can go back and operate inside the matrix post redpill, he can’t go back into the matrix and not know about the real world (with the exception of the example of Cypher, whom we will come back to.) Since the defining factor of “the real world” is negative, that is to say the realization that the matrix is an inauthentic construct, there is no portfolio that can include belief in the authenticity of the matrix. This isn’t to say, however, that everything created in the matrix is not authentic or valid. For example, once redpilled on the mainstream media’s proclivity for fake news, it is not correct to assume everything printed by the NYT is inauthentic, fake news. Instead, your redpill just woke you up to the fact that NOT EVERYTHING printed in the NYT is by definition authentic and real. This particular example of the claim “The NYT sometimes lies to us” has gone from tinfoil hat lunacy to bipartisan accepted fact in a very short period of time, which brings us to another characteristic of the matrix. You can be (and usually are) redpilled on one thing at a time. The redpill menu is á la carte. While there exist people who are ultimately redpilled on all of the examples in Fig. 3 (which is not an exhaustive diagram, just some examples) it’s not necessary that they all happen, especially not at the same time. Each issue is its own redpill, some larger than the others. The umbrella circle of “alternative media” encompasses all the others as it would be implausible to arrive at those redpills through the exclusive sources provided by the centers of excellece’s approved mainstream media.
Redpill Case Study: Presidential Election 2016
“We were watching a magic performace that has been performed every four years…and suddently someone threw on the lights and we see trap doors, and we see wires, and we see false bottoms of boxes and everybody is looking at this saying “you’re kidding me right?” So with the lights off, it was a believable show for many people. Now some of us, who had slightly better night vision, were looking at the wires in the dark. But now I feel like I’ve mostly lost whatever special edge I had…It’s wonderful. I’ve never had so many people to talk to about the obvious inauthenticity of what are considered to be the pillars, in particular, of the fourth estate.”
- Eric Weinstein (Speaking about the 2016 Presidential Election)
What Weinstein is describing here is the Jonestown level mass redpilling that was the 2016 presidential election. The election (as well as Weinstein’s thoughtful analysis) is a primary reason I, and many others, are now having these conversations. It was a massive catalyst for the rapid reclassification of the previously mentioned “Sometimes the NYT lies to us” from tinfoil hat to accepted fact. That type of reclassification doesn’t exist in a vacuum. So what else did 2016 teach us about the matrix? Let’s refer back to Fig. 3.
Why is there so much overlap between Bernie Bros and MAGA? In the matrix this wouldn’t make sense. We were told that Bernie was the furthest left and Trump was the furthest right. As a result, the outcome didn’t make sense to most forecasters predicting the 2016 election. While some did predict a certain level of Bernie Bro support for Trump, the primary reasons they gave were superficial. Because they were not redpilled on the relevant topics, they were unable to view the real world phenomena with the necessary depth. Predictions like “some Bernie Bros will support Trump because they hate Clinton and are still outraged by losing the primary” make up the majority of what I was hearing to justify the potential DNC mutiny (not all of course, but most of what I remember). While I don’t necessarily disagree with that point, it’s by no means a profound analysis.
This justification requires that the Bernie Bros are voting for Trump because they disliked Clinton, but many Bernie Bros were eventually enthusiastic Trump supporters in their own right. Cassandra Fairbanks, a high profile new media personality, flipped from Bernie to Trump after Clinton secured the Democratic Party’s nomination. In her YouTube video “Why I, a Bernie supporter, prefer Trump to Hillary Clinton” she explains some of these Trump-positive reasons. It wasn’t all “I’m mad at Hillary Clinton.” So if the matrix isn’t providing us with satisfying predictions where IS the overlap between those groups? Redpill. Bernie Bros (myself included) had a front row seat to Weinstein’s “light flipping.” When the lights turned on we saw 1) MSM fake news, and 2) Deep State interference in the “democratic” primary process. From the level of excitment visible at every Bernie rally; to the numbers of donations and huge sums they aggregated into; to the activity online, in social media, and in his subreddit; it was obvious that something was happening with Bernie. But if you watched CNN or MSNBC (purportedly liberal bubble outlets) you saw a very different picture. Bernie wasn’t portrayed as even a legitimate candidate until well into the primary process, when in reality he was a frontrunner in many of the releveant qualitative and quantitative metrics. Fake news was real. *Redpill* When Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Donna Brazile colluded with the Clinton campaign from their supposedly impartial positions at the DNC, the formerly tinfoil hat concept of “Deep State” became more real. Not only was it a stronger theory, thanks to Wikileaks its existence was provably true. To say that the DNC didn’t collude with the Clinton campaign to beat Bernie Sanders would now be a tinfoil hat statement. Instant reclassification for Bernie Bros who now learned to disregard the prognostications of the mainstream media and prefer alternative media outlets who were reporting things that were verifiable from personal experience. *Redpill* But damn, Bernie lost. Okay, who else is fighting against MSM fake news and deep state? Easy: Donald Trump. When you are redpilled on the relevant topics, the Bernie Bro support for team MAGA moves from an irrational outlier, negative overreaction to Clinton to a rationally motivated, positive reaction to Trump. Again, this isn’t to say that all Bernie Bros voted for Trump (they didn’t) or that none voted for Trump soley because they hated Clinton (they did) or even that some didn’t vote for Trump because they were confused (at least one HAD to.) These are all certainly true, but less interesting, profound, and predictive. These reasons don’t lead to predictions like “10% of Bernie Bros will support Trump” that ultimately (per that survey) were realized. This led to many “experts” (per the centers of excellence) coming up confused on election day in a way that many redpilled non-experts (also per the centers of excellence) were not.
Again, I want to reinforce my earlier point that “matrix” and “real world” are not normative value claims. Every redpilled Bernie supporter did not vote for Trump. And if they did because they were redpilled, it wasn’t “right” and to vote for Clinton wouldn’t have been “stupid.” Drop all normative claims you naturally want to bring to this analysis. It’s hard to do but always keep it in mind. To be redpilled on any given topic doesn’t mean the “correct” explanation was revealed to you, you just have another potential explanation you can try. A potential explanation not visible to those in the matrix, or cosigned by the centers of excellence. It’s up to you to see which ones help or hurt your predictive ability. Implement the scientific method. Eric Weinstein is a perfect illustration for this. On election day 2016 I was not very redpilled, I voted for Clinton (and even posted a photo on facebook of my “I voted” sticker with the caption “Go Fuck Yourself Donald Trump!”…*virtue signal cringe*.) It’s tempting to think “so he’s saying that if he were redpilled at that time he would have voted for Trump instead.” But that’s not true. It’s too simple. Eric Weinstein, a redpill tribal elder of mine, was clearly “sufficiently redpilled” on election day, but he (as he talks about in that Rubin Report episode) voted for Clinton. Beyond that, not everyone who voted for Trump was redpilled either. That’s why I chose “MAGA” for the label in the real world (the distinction of Trumpism vs Trump, look for future posts on this.) I’m sure a large portion of Trump’s base was life long matrix-bound Republicans. Every four years they go to the voting booth and vote for the guy with the R. I’m sure some matrix-bound sexists who couldn’t stand to see a woman in the Oval Office did the same too. Likewise with matrix-bound Democrats who supported Bernie for non redpilled reasons. THE MATRIX/REAL WORLD DIVIDE IS NOT NORMATIVE TO THE OUTCOME. Always keep this in mind.
So What Now?
Once “redpilled” you are faced with an uncomfortable choice: do you A) return to the inauthentic but comfortingly recognizable matrix, or do you B) continue to explore the real world, completely unaware of where you stand in relation to it? What seems like an obvious choice is much more difficult in practice once you realize inhabiting this new “real world” will require you to reconsider all bedrock assumptions upon which your matrix worldview was built. In Plato’s Republic this choice is represented by the once shackled prisoners deciding if they want to voluntarily remain in their cavernous prison or freely explore the new world beyond it upon being unchained. Again, not as obvious a choice as it sounds. This brings us back to the example of Cypher in the film The Matrix. Cypher is the Judas of the redpilled matrix crew. Knowing full well the vapid inauthenticity of the matrix, he decides that it’s still preferable to the frightening loneliness of the real world. When given the opportunity to erase his brain and go back to his life in the pre redpill matrix, he abandons his team and accepts.
“You know.. I know this steak doesn’t exist. I know when I put it in my mouth; the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy, and delicious. After nine years... you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.”
- Cypher
Ignorance is Bliss
When you take a redpill (let’s stick with “Sometimes the NYT lies to us”) there is a level of discomfort that comes with knowing the information it gives you access to. It’s nice to have that extra option on the menu, but if after weighing all your options you think some redpilled explanation is the best choice, revealing that can be unpopular and carry with it a large social cost. If you are in a political debate and the NYT is brought in as evidence because of its previously agreed upon value as an appeal to authority (formerly a relatively bubble-hedged, “impartial” source at that) and you respond with “yeah…but the NYT can be fake news” you run the risk of being misunderstood. Eric Weinstein illustrated this perfectly on an episode of Sam Harris’ Waking Up Podcast with his “Four Quadrants” diagram. (Fig. 4)
To best understand this chart I recommend you listen to Eric explain it on Sam’s podcast (here’s a timestamped video link). But if you are unable, in short, the model has to do with misinterpreting (incorrectly mapping) positions that deviate from consensus group think from their true home along the stigmatized narrative to their perceived location along the media narrative (or across the X axis.) So “The NYT sometimes lies to us” shorthanded as “the NYT is fake news” will at times be mismapped from the upper left quadrant to the lower left quadrant. While your position may be supported by a factual, but redpilled, understanding of an issue, that may not be understanable to someone stuck in the matrix. As a result, they may incorrectly assume you belong to the troglodyte quadrant and hold some unacceptable view. Let’s look again at the Bernie Bro who moves to MAGA post Democratic primary. This person (let’s call her Sam) decides that Trump’s fight against the MSM fake news and Deep State actors who inappropriately influence our “democratic” process has won Trump her support, after all, she witnessed the antidemocratic influence of these entities first hand in the primary. However, when Sam is talking to her friend who is not redpilled on these two issues, her friend is unable to make sense of once “liberal” Sam’s support for a candidate so “right wing.” “There must be some other reason. Maybe Sam doesn’t think Mexicans should be allowed in America. Is Sam a racist?” This is a caricature of course, but did this happen? I’m positive. And not only once or twice. Her friend mapped Sam from the contrarian quadrant to the troglodyte quadrant largely because she didn’t have access to the redpill options on the menu that Sam was selecting. If she did, perhaps her better sense would have led her away from the evidence-free conclusion of “Oh, I guess Sam is a racist after all” for something more likely like “Sam’s probably tired of fake news.” Ask yourself: Have you made surprising discoveries about the unacceptable political views of people you thought were very reasonable over the past two years? Maybe those suprising discoveries are misinformed. Dig deeper with those people. Ask them to fully explain their unexpected positions. This type of scenario is an example of why a modern political Cypher could want to return into the comfort of the matrix. But the intellectually honest among us are unable to once we see the full menu of options. Many of us also wouldn’t want to if we could.
The Matrix Within the Matrix
These final portions of this essay (thank you for sticking with me) will focus on one of the most interesting parts of the current matrix phenomenon: The existence of the Matrix’s own matrix myth. You don’t need to be even 0.0001% redpilled to watch the movie The Matrix (it’s great just as an action sci-fi movie too, go rewatch it…it holds up) or to read Plato’s Republic. This means that the concept of the matrix exists within the matrix. Even beyond these two literary examples, the matrix has its own political matrix analogy as well. I have had many conversations with friends post election where “matrix” and “bubble” are used interchangeably, usually, to describe Trump’s coalition. “These people are delusional. Totally removed from reality. It’s like they are in the matrix. How can’t they see how obvious a con man Trump is? Get out of your bubble!” This is maybe one of the most common sentiments of the past two years. I’m very bored with it. But my boredom is not an argument. So is it valid? Is the Trump crowd in the matrix? I would argue they are not *gasp*.
As I clarified earlier, some Donald Trump supporters are indeed in the matrix. More specifically they are in the conservative (more specifically still, the Republican) bubble of the matrix. In preparation for the election they watched Fox News and listened to Rush Limbaugh, and (after Fox flipped from anti-Trump to pro-Trump) they followed directions and voted for the candidate with the R. Right on schedule. But this describes a person that didn’t lack access to any extra information. There was no asymmetry. They had the same options on the menu. They were not in their own matrix, separate from the matrix-bound Clinton voters. They occupied the same space. On Fig. 3 they would likely reside in the RNC circle, not the MAGA circle. This is where the distinction between bubble and matrix is so necessary. To use them interchangeably ignores the main characteristics of each. Was there a Trump bubble? Of course. But these people were not in a matrix where their world did not match anything recognizable to those in the liberal bubble. Again, it existed in the same space. It was so recognizable that many of the people debating in this space recycled the same tired R vs D arguments, just swapping “Trump” and “Clinton” into their respective slots. The matrix analysis of this historically unusual election was often oddly typical. When the analysis relied heavily on terms like “liberal”, “conservative”, “democrat”, “republican”, “left”, or “right” (which most MSM coverage did) it was not appropriate for the spectacle unfolding in front of us because it was trying to map real world phenomena onto the matrix. If to signal reliability and “nonpartisanship” (toss this term onto the list as well) CNN created a panel with Democrats and Republicans to respond to Trump‘s latest rally, they clearly didn’t get it. These are simply two sides of the same matrix-bound coin. They were asking somone looking into the reflective side of a one way mirror to describe what’s in the room on the other side. It was entirely invisible to them. Without the ability to see into the real world, the centers of excellence didn’t recognize its existence. What room? It’s just a mirror. Instead of a Trump matrix, we had the matrix-bound Trump bubble and the matrix-bound Clinton bubble, both fully understandable to each other, trying to get a grasp on what was happening (however strange.) Contrast this bubble dynamic to a redpilled MAGA voter or Bernie Bro or Crypto douche approaching a matrix-bound anything and talking about how “Blockchain is the most revolutionary techological innovation since the argricultural revolution.” It appears as though this person is in some absurd matrix-esque reality. When actually, they are in the real world (NOT NORMATIVE!) To confuse someone ordering something not on your menu as them being insane is making the mistake of prematurely drawing a conclusion. Before you do, wait and see what the server brings to the table. Maybe there’s a secret menu.
“Wow…you’re so woke!”
So if “redpilled” is what people who have left the matrix in some way (after recognizing an inauthenticity of a center of excellence) are called, what is the term for those still in the matrix who think their “right wing” bubble counterparts are in a separate matrix? That was confusing. We’re talking about specifically matrix-bound liberals pointing at their fellow matrix-bound conservatives, accusing them of being delusional and “in the matrix.” The self prescribed term for this liberal is woke.
It’s almost as if the liberal matrix-bound bubble is drawing this word directly from the symbolism of the film. When Neo is redpilled he does “wake up” and climb out of his wet, viscous battery pod in the real world. Urban Dictionary perfectly “defines” woke: a state of perceived intellectual superiority one gains by reading The Huffington Post. While this is of course somewhat tongue in cheek, it’s actually spot on. Woke is the term used to describe adherents to the liberal ideologies (dogmas) taught by some centers of excellence to distinguish themselves from the conservative bubble that they incorrectly perceive to be the matrix. It’s a way of discrediting (their bubble myth IS NOT normative, being woke is a value judgement of outcomes) others perceived to be in a different matrix. When you watch a debate (here or here for two examples from this week) between someone who thinks they are “woke” and someone they think is not, you’ll often hear the “woke” person say things like “You just don’t get it! You haven’t done your homework!” often in reference to some racial or gender critical theory. The “woke” person thinks they have more options on their menu and those options are necessarily correct. They can’t have a useful dialogue with the person they perceive to be in the “unwoke” matrix. After all, the unwoke just don’t know the right things. If they aren’t “woke” they must be asleep. But as is evident in the linked videos, often times the “unwoke” person has much of the information their opponent claims they are ignorant to. Critical theory is a matrix creation, everyone has access to it. A CNN panel composed of Rs and Ds is able to debate its validity until the next commercial break. But those confusing the conservative bubble with the matrix don’t recognize this, they think they are privy to asymmetric information. This matrix myth within the matrix is leading to the extreme polarization of the liberal and conservative bubbles, creating further confusion inside the, once relatively orderly, matrix. So matrix-bound conservative bubble voters aren’t in the matrix. What about MAGA? Is the woke liberal in the real world and the MAGA voter in the matrix? To answer this ask youself: Who might have access to extra information? It’s very tempting to answer this question with “the liberal obviously!” But are you sure? Have you looked at the “smart person’s” case for MAGA as told outside the centers of excellence? Do you think any “smart MAGA people” exist? If so what are their arguments? (If not, really? Not one?) I often find matrix-bound liberal bubble occupants ignorant to the MAGA case for Trump (I certainly was), but seldom do I see it the other way around. The MAGA crowd is typically well versed in their matrix-bound counterparts’ talking points and arguments. Perhaps I have a selection bias. But maybe you do.
You take the bluepill, the story ends. You wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the redpill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.
