Alt-Right Date Night, a Curio Essay (Patreon)

Alt-Right Date Night, a Curio Essay

Hey kids, today is a very special day so today I’m not just your regular Curio. Today I’m Love Curio, and I’m here to talk about love.
Let’s talk about love. Let’s talk about how non-binary people love one another, how women love women, how men love men, and even, if you can imagine it, I’ve heard that sometimes men and women -- no I knew it was silly as soon as I started writing it. Let’s talk about how Rand Paul loves his neighbour’s hedge, how Baked Alaska loves streaming for 9 hours in an In-N-Out Burger Car Park to tell everyone how he got owned online, and let’s talk about how fascism loves lonely people.

Section I: All the lonely people

It’s gotta be tough trying to date as a right winger. There are so many people to choose from on the left: film geeks, saucy boys, degenerates, gamers, sea captains, swedish syrup lovers, hot take factories, furries… although we’re always pouring stuff on our faces for some reason. That is off-putting.

On the right though, who do you have to choose from? That angry nerd with the dark hair and short beard? Or wait, no that’s not fair there’s also the angry nerd with the dark hair and no beard. Ohhh so much variety. I know, who am I to talk, but at least I try. 

Alright let’s get to it, and talk about Paul Joseph Watson. Paul is a minor internet celebrity here on youtube dot com offering awful takes and mild-to-strong islamaphobia.

What does Paul believe? Well he wants to make it clear to everyone that he has no problem with people of colour or LGBT people, but he hates anything he would call “virtue signalling” which includes companies advertising towards minorities, anyone advocating for their rights, people representing them in movies - in fact he dislikes black people being represented so much that he knows Black Panther is a “piece of shit” without ever seeing the movie. By the way Paul, there’s actually a community of people here on YouTube who also hate companies trying to be “woke” to advertise. Actually the two parties I’ve seen most mad about Gillette’s new ad using feminism to market their products are your guys and my guys.

[An ad for Adversaries from Peter Coffin will go here]

No Paul seriously I think you would really like Adversaries. I’m being totally serious. They talk about all the same things you do, they just um… understand basic economics? Politics? Critical theory? I’m sorry for making fun, I genuinely think you’d actually really like the show.

Also I think it’s pretty funny you’re so worried about “boys growing up to be pussies” when all you do is stay home and pull cutiepie faces at a camera. I mean they’re very cute faces. Actually, let me try watching with the sound off. Oh, mmmmmm that’s better. That works.

Adversaries also doesn’t dogwhistle white genocide, the uhhhh [CHECKS NOTES] Neo-Nazi conspiracy theory. Meanwhile Paul “In the long term, a society that emasculates its men will be replaced by a society that doesn’t*” *shots of muslims praying. It’s like… his hair looks so nice here, how can he be saying such awful things.

So what’s the deal Paul? Why am I COMING AT YOU, BRO? Well, a long time ago now, I saw something on twitter that really intrigued me. I saw Laura Loomer tweeting at you, repeatedly, begging for a date, and I saw you ignoring it. This struck me as really odd, because here are two good looking people by most people’s standards, who as far as I can tell believe a lot the same things, and at this point Loomer hadn’t even handcuffed herself to Twitter HQ or trespassed on Nancy Pelosi’s property, so at that time it wasn’t like she was too cringey for anyone in your sphere to touch.

So there’s a mystery, and frankly, I can’t resist a good mystery. Let’s make a note of that one for now. Why doesn’t Paul Joseph Watson fuck? Why can’t you people date anyone, even each other? That’s the mystery that sort of sat in the back of my mind for a while. It’s not the reason I made the video, but it’s what got my attention. Let’s put a pin in that for now.

In a recent article The Alt-Right Is Recruiting Depressed People, Paris Martineau writes that… well, that the alt-right is recruiting depressed people. Paul, you might disavow being called alt-right because you know the word has become a synonym for “fascist” but… honestly Paul, that’s a bit boring - you’re a prominent member of UKIP and you work for Alex Jones, the brain genius behind “the children killed in Sandy Hook were fake, let’s harass their grieving parents”.

Anyway, Paris Martineau writes in the article that certain people promoting themselves as giving self help, validation, and an outlet for depressed and lonely people lead straight on to recommending horribly racist or fascist online personalities, disguised as “motivational speakers”.

“Type “depression” or “depressed” into YouTube and it won’t be long until you stumble upon a suit-clad white supremacist giving a lecture on self-empowerment”

For example, even if Jordan Peterson himself doesn’t promote the guy, many people have talked about being linked through by JBP fans to Stefan Molyneux, the pathetic CHUD who was last seen on his world tour with Lauren Southern telling people that “different races have different average IQs” but “nobody will let them talk about it”.
Stefan Molyneux by the way, has been accused multiple times of running a cult, and used to listen in to his wife giving her patients therapy sessions, interjecting over an intercom and suggesting that they come listen to his anti-feminist anti-immigrant gibberish rants on his radio show.

I mean, I’m trying to talk about manipulating lonely people into becoming fascists and there’s Stefan just openly recruiting therapy patients into his cult.

Section II: Angry Boys

I’ve always wondered why you do this, why you say such easily debunkable nonsense and edgy garbage takes online all day. I mean your opinions on modern art and music were such low-hanging fruit that it made you the laughing stock of YouTube. So that’s another mystery circling around you Paul - you’re becoming quite the enigmatic figure. 

So here I am with all these mysteries, and no answers, no clues. But then I saw two videos in quick succession. The first, by Blaire White, titled Why I’ve Changed (The Truth) is a video in which Blaire says that she’s becoming disillusioned and disengaged with the right wing, and furthermore says that lots of the people on the right say things they don’t believe for money. It’s really quite something, I’d recommend giving it a watch.

The second video Paul, was one of yours, called Love Is A Mental Illness. Let’s be clear here Paul, when you attack Muslims, or women, or feminism, or trans people, you’re a boring bigot, and you’re not worth my time, but I love love. You leave love alone.

In Paul’s video, he argues that romantic love is unhealthy and obsessive, and quotes Nietzsche, the most misunderstood philosopher by far and… let’s just check - I actually have Nietzsche’s Ahporisms on Love and Hate right here - yup, misunderstands him. Yes, Paul claims that Nietzsche thought romantic love was “merely the lust for possession” which sure… maybe…? But Nietzsche saw friendship as the highest form of love and he said the most important thing for a romantic relationship was for the lovers to also be friends, which… yeah dude that checks out. Friedo-Needo 1, Poor Garbage Wasteman 0. Nietzsche, since Nietzsche is your authority on this Paul, thought that men and women in relationships should be friends. They should respect each other. They should see each other as equals.

Generally though, this video, Love Is A Mental Illness plays as the most “freshly just right now been rejected” video you’ll ever see, like Paul got stood up for a Tinder date, came straight back to his room and recorded this.

Paul says that cheating and divorce are on the rise and this is because of social media and dating apps. He says that the average relationship length is shrinking and continues to shrink and he says this is because of social media and dating apps. 

“Over half [of people in a poll about previous relationships] said that the reason their relationship ended was because their partner had met someone else or was flirting with someone else on social media.”

This is Paul’s pretty standard pre-lapsarian fallacy argument, he does this a lot. If you want more about that I recommend this excellent video by this handsome chap. Look, I really hate doing debunking, it’s just… I’ve gotta get this out of the way to get to why Paul is really making this video so here we go Paul you’re really gonna make me make you look like a tit online.

If the average length of relationship is shrinking that means more people are having short relationships, meaning that they feel more confident they’ll be able to find a new person and they end up with someone really right for them rather than staying together for decades with someone they don’t like because they feel like they have no other options. That’s how averages work.

As for divorce rates, the Office of National Statistics - I actually know someone from the Office of National Statistics by the way Paul, he really doesn’t like people like you - the Office of National Statistics says that divorce rates have fallen in the last couple of years, so… okay. And even when there are people getting divorced the same argument applies - these are just people who are happy to leave relationships that are bad. Good for them! A good example of this would be that divorce in same-sex couples is on the rise, somewhat sharply: that’s not because gay people are unhappier, it’s because same-sex marriage was introduced relatively recently, and lots more gay people are now getting married, which means, funnily enough, lots more gay people are getting divorced. Imagine my sh-- nope, see what you did to me Paul, this is why I hate debunking.

As for people cheating or flirting through social media - ya dingus - people are just behaving like they’ve always behaved, only now they’re doing it online. Is it easier to flirt with someone other than your partner because of the internet? Sure. It’s also easier to meet your partner in the first place, easier to order shopping, easier to become a musician, easier to avoid leaving the house and have tins and tins of vegetables and soup delivered to your underground bunker because every day Brexit looks increasingly like an actual apocalypse.

When I saw this video, something really clicked into place, and I knew I had to start writing this essay. I understood why he does this, and it’s ultimately because there’s this hole in his life, where love should be.

And it has occurred to me Paul, if you have a romantic partner, then I’m wildly off-base with all of this, but you’re a fucking liar who’s manipulating lonely people for clicks… but I’m sure that’s not it.

Gavin McInnes, sometimes called a “hipster nazi” or “frat fascist” or “twat” recently publicly stepped down from a group he founded called the Proud Boys - a name that I have to assure people every time is in fact a real thing, not a parody, not a joke about them being pathetic manchildren desperate for approval. The Proud Boys are fascists. They go to some lengths to try to tell people they aren’t specifically white supremacists, but they are an all male, anti-immigrant, Trump supporting gang who uphold violence as a moral good, and obey a set of weird rules that dictate how important they each are in their community.

For example, at some tier of being a Proud Boy you have to get a Proud Boys tattoo. For another example on one of the tiers you have to give up masturbation. Once again, the fascist ideology seeks power over the domain of human desire and lust. Proud Boys, the Proud Boys are told, by Proud Boys, are more powerful and self-controlled if they can resist temptation.

I have another theory though.

I believe it was Ray Parker Jr who first said “bustin’ makes me feel good". It does. Bustin’, does in fact, make you feel good. Fascists use a lot of language explaining why they’re going to make everything right, fix everything, essentially make you happy - but they won’t. They can’t. The way fascists work is to feed your tension, your dissatisfaction, your frustration. The Proud Boys on almost every level seem like a parody of pathetic fascist CHUDs because hey, their no-masturbation rule is necessary because if their members jack it they might feel content for literally one minute, and then they might not need fascism any more.

Fascists want you to believe that being a leftist, being a feminist, being an SJW involves being angry and offended and tense about everything all the time, but I can tell you straightforwardly: I’ve never been more content, more happy, more free than since I let my more hateful ideas go.

Section III: Being gay is good actually

Let’s talk about The Truth About Soy Boys in which Paul lays out claims that soy foods are feminising men (and making them vote for left-wing ideas) because they contain plant hormones chemically equivalent (in plants anyway) to the human hormone Estrogen. Paul made the insult “soyboy” his entire life for about 10 seconds before the whole of YouTube made videos dunking on him for not understanding basic science. Most of all, this soyboy absolutely devastated Paul with facts and logic. Why am I talking about this? Is it just to remind Paul of when he thought he’d invented a total slam dunk on leftists and instead got mercilessly and powerfully mocked by not just leftists but the whole of YouTube and generally became the laughing stock of the entire website? No, that would be mean.

No, I’m talking about it because we need to talk quickly about homophobia, because Paul’s videos regularly stop just short of outright explicit homophobia. The Truth About Soyboys which by the way Paul you might want to retitle - it’s just the “truth” seems…. Anyway, The Truth About Soyboys starts with Paul outlining his basic idea, that soy is making men more feminine, which is bad because… and then he goes on to explain that he isn’t talking about gay men, he has no problem with gay men obviously.

This is really weird to me, because logically what this says is that in Paul’s world view, gay men are necessarily more feminine, but that’s okay with him, it’s just true, and feminine men are inherently lesser and bad because… but that’s fine with him, he just disregards gay people. If you ask for his opinions on it, he’ll tell you he has no problem with gay people because, basically, he knows homophobia is past the point of no return. He knows people don’t get away with hating gay people any more. So instead he just shames men for being feminine while suggesting that gay men are more feminine, and frames being feminine as negative because… but won’t explicitly say that he just hates women or gay men.

He does however, incidentally, seems somewhat in support of Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right President of Brazil who had these things to say of gay people: “I would be incapable of loving a gay son, and I am incapable of feeling joy” and “I would prefer my son die in an accident than be gay, and also I eat literal shit, and I love to eat shit”. I may have translated those quotes a little poorly. My portuguese is rusty.

And it has occurred to me Paul, if you are actually gay, then I’m wildly off-base with all of this, but you’re a fucking liar who’s manipulating lonely people for clicks… but I’m sure that’s not it.

Maybe we missed out on the most important type of love: self-love.

I made a video about Carl Benjamin a while ago and, not to get too much into how the sausage is made, I deliberately didn’t talk about Carl for most of that video - it’s 20 minutes of Coyote Peterson analysis and only 10 minutes of Carl Benjamin analysis because, well, Carl loves when people talk about him and he hates sitting through long videos and listening to points and engaging with them in good faith when they aren’t about him.

I think what Carl needs is to sit through a video patiently and absorb some points without feeling attacked. Patience and engaging in good faith would do a lot for him.

What I think would help you Paul, what I really, totally seriously think you need, is a big, long hug from a large man. Well, I’m 6’4” and a bit wider than I’d like but luckily that makes me very huggable, and I’m saying this in utter sincerity: I will meet you and give you a hug and maybe all the poison will just... leave.

I want to make that clear because one of the things Life After Hate and other organisations focused on de-radicalising fascists talk about a lot is that when they do manage to help someone get out of a toxic community, they leave all their friends behind. I want to make it clear because I know at least two other lefty YouTubers have offered to go for a drink with you if you want, and now I’m offering this Paul: I’ll meet you, let’s say in Trafalgar Square, and I’ll give you a big long hug, because I think that’s seriously what you need.

I don’t like to just be negative. I’ve talked about that before on this channel. So, with that in mind it’s… [LONG SIGH] time to talk about my favourite Paul Joseph Watson video. Incidentally I won’t be accepting responses to this that don’t tell me what their favourite video of mine is. Okay? Okay.

In The Truth About Incels Paul examines the world of the incels. A group of lonely, sad individuals who blame feminism, cuckoldry and dating apps for their inability to get sex that they feel extremely entitled to. Incels hold radical beliefs about the way society functions, even sometimes going as far as claiming that the difference between the virgin beta-male experience and alpha-male or “chad” experience of life all boils down to traits inherent in their skull shapes. If you want a great video explaining incels you can watch Contrapoints’ video, plainly titled Incels.

So, why do I like Paul’s video about Incels so much? Well… watch it. He’s charming, and funny, and he’s giving genuinely good advice. He sees what’s wrong with the incels and he sees that they’re blaming bizarre bullshit for their problems. He’s even brighter lit than usual and he’s wearing this white top and it’s… is this Good timeline Paul? Did Paul die and go to heaven?
Well, no. At the end of the video, Paul goes on his usual rant about feminism and the west and how SJWs are ruining -- do you see what you did Paul? You were doing so well telling incels they had it all wrong right up to the point where you told them they were exactly right. 

That’s what’s wrong with your approach to helping people. You offer some genuinely helpful points and then you end up just reinforcing the exact stuff that made them lonely in the first place.

It’s just like Jordan Peterson’s approach to self help: tell young men to stand up straight with their shoulders back, and clean their rooms (perfectly helpful advice) but also evidently doesn’t respect women at all and desperately wants to fight people more than anything. No seriously, he talks about it all the time. He wrote in his book about a time he fantasized about beating up a toddler, and he wrote in his blog about a dream he had where he physically assaulted a journalist who pissed him off.

This is why you guys can’t write good fiction. Guys like this write fiction like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMgMr0JcYJ4

I’m not complaining. I love these books. I’ve read Ben Shapiro’s shitty, shitty novel. It’s hilarious. I do wish it wasn’t such a conservative dominated market though. Maybe I should write a dystopian fiction book about the UK being destroyed by gay shariah communist SJWs. Leave a comment if you’d buy my book 10 Drowning Street: The last free man against the rainbow hordes.

Okay let’s get back on track. The self help these guys offer just really falls short in the way that it tells people somewhat obvious, but tried and tested advice, but then goes on to perpetuate the exact things that made them miserable in the first place.

A selection of useful advice leads on to espousing a worldview, a pathology, that tells men never to be vulnerable, never to open themselves up or express themselves. Paul, for example, puts forth stoicism as the way for men to live their lives and look: Suicide is, and has been for decades, the single biggest killer of men under 45. In 2017, over 4000 men killed themselves, or to put it another way, on average 12 men every day. Paul, I don’t believe you really believe that talking less about your feelings is the solution there, but if you do, I don’t even know how to start telling you how wrong you are. And by the way I know you don’t brand yourself as a self-help guru Paul, but honestly you make far too many prescriptive statements about what real men do and say and act like to just be called a straight forward news channel.

Paul, I know you’d say that men in previous eras talked less about their feelings, I’ve seen you complain that men talk more about their feelings nowadays. Well, since 1981 male suicide rates have steadily decreased, and while we all know that correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation, I don’t even need to cite a study or anything here do I bud? There’s a reason that talking to someone is the first course of action recommended for suicidal people.

Telling young men not to talk about their feelings is absolutely the worst thing you can be doing for them Paul.

Put short: Your friends who only like you when you’re a real man aren’t your real friends.

If you still want someone who can help you be happier with your interactions with other people, generally get your shit together, heck - it’s Valentine’s Day - maybe even get a date, maybe you want to check out Dr. Nerdlove. He gives, for my money anyway, really good advice.

So go watch Dr. Nerdlove, and make friends that want you to be better instead of friends that let you be shittier, and most importantly: love yourself. 

And Paul: I’ll see you in Trafalgar Square.