i’ve been reading tim urban’s
what’s our problem? book out of sheer curiosity (luigi called this the “most philosophical book of the 21st century”)
and it’s actually not bad but that’s besides the point. but anyway, the more i read this book and synthesize its main ideas, the more convinced i am that luigi genuinely wanted to
be tim urban— like this faggot really wanted to embody urban’s ideas and framework of thinking and wanted to pass it off as his own.
now, i know i’m CERTAINLY reading too deep into this, and i’m sure im nitpicking at straws here, but with what we know about weegee’s identity crisis, i think he really tried to mimic those he admired
quote from the last portion of urban’s book: “
Throughout American history, and in each case, the country ultimately prevailed. There’s a reason liberal democracies have persisted for centuries: they’re remarkably robust and resilient.” — generally, urban presented a clear cyclical pattern throughout american history to demonstrate how and why america has been successful thus far, through all of its trials and tribulations.
number 25 from weegee’s “27 things” list: “
She [America] is haunted by her past, she is sick, she is plagued by inner turmoil - such is her nature as a nation of individuals. She is young, in the midst of an adolescent identity crisis. But despite all her flaws, her frame is robust and her potential unmatched.”
additionally, urban is adamantly against political tribalism and echo chambers; majority of the book is about these echo chambers producing major issues in what should be a democratic american society.
he refers to the “extreme right” / “extreme left” and their ideologies as two separate, asinine golems (a golem is a large, fictional monster) who spearhead forms of absolutist, counterproductive thinking, causing america to regress as a society. a “political golem” is unfortunately what happens when americans lose their grip on nuance and sturdy logic, and end up resorting to extremism.
and when the country allows its “political golems” to take over, urban claims that there has been a transparent breakdown in the country’s critical thinking and exchange of free-flowing ideas. this streamline and analytical thinking is what urban refers to as the country’s “high-rung immune system.” in his eyes, a “political golem” feeds off of the country’s very black-and-white, divisive thinking (ie: cancel culture), which destroys the “high rung immune system” of america. so basically, a very systemic, generalistic viewpoint.
there’s also numbers 23 and 24 from his “27 things” letter: “
The conservatives, who fiercely conserve the aspects of our society that make us great.
The liberals, who liberate us from the outdated aspects of our society that prevent us from being greater.”
at the introduction of urban’s book—and a consistent theme he upholds throughout the book—is that the nuanced morals and ideas of both liberals and conservatives are crucial to america’s consistently progressing “immune system”:
from one of the early chapters of What’s Our Problem?:
“
It’s easy to see why progressivism is important. No country is perfect, and you can’t become a better country without making changes. Progressivism drives that change.
“But conservatism is just as important. There are usually some aspects of a country that are already working well… Progressivism is also the generation of lots of new ideas—most of them untested—and inevitably, many of them will be bad ideas. The conservative resistance to progressive ideas provides an important filter.”
and finally, one major conceptual theme in urban’s book is something called “Power Games,” which he describes as the presence of political, absolutist thinkers/leaders who abuse their control to dominate and restrict the country’s free speech by forcing everyone to bend to their narratives and ideas.
this is a minor excerpt from luigi’s alleged manifesto: “
But many have illuminated the corruption and greed (e.g.: Rosenthal, Moore), decades ago and the problems simply remain… It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play…”
definitely cherry-picking here but holy shittt if you
really, truly read this book and then sift through weegee’s twitter, you’ll see how much he internalized the book’s approach to contemporary society and regurgitated its main ideas as his own. luigi’s whole twitter is reflective of urban’s every outlook.
the book is also EXTREMELY literal. it uses pictures, graphs, stick figures, creatures (ie, the “golems”), objects, etc to represent and outline abstract concepts. i remember being on lc and discussing with anons how luigi seems to be a very concrete thinker (luigi’s MBTI “friend” also claimed months ago that luigi struggled with depth in his ideas and “literal” thinking). no wonder he ate this book up.
