Michael Pemulis
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Apr 14, 2022
On the internet and elsewhere, many rhetorical approaches are reliant on an 'appeal to normality'. Usually this goes along the lines of saying X is a weird extremist idea/practice, whereas Y is mainstream. This generally also carries the assumption that the mainstream is 'le good'.
It's really hard to know what the average person is like though. One thing we do know pretty well is that they don't do a good job of answering surveys, so that won't get you far. The way most people handle this is by assuming they are normal, so anything they do (or maybe anything they do within certain boundaries, exempting their 'weird time') is normal. This is a dangerous assumption though, it can get an abnormal person acting even more abnormal on the assumption that everyone else approves of their behavior.
On the other hand, what do you do if you know you aren't normal and that your experiences are a poor representation of the average person? You definitely shouldn't just assume the opposite of everything you do is normal, that would be absurd (you're bound to be in the right position on at least a few points, a broken clock and so on). However, the view we see from some extreme shut-in edgelords is pretty close to this: that "normal people" are all happy, productive, are in healthy sexual relationships, and are really sensitive and hate being exposed to turmoil. This is really not the case, normal people do have some sensitivities and tend to get laid from time to time but they definitely have some issues and shortcomings. The fact that all of our stories and media are about suffering and conflict show that it is marketable to the general public, and thus relatable. How do we get a better sense of the details of the truth though?
Who should we pay attention to? We can't trust our friends, they tend to be weird and terminally online too (that's why we get along with them). We also can't trust people who try to paint themselves in our eyes as examples of normality, doing so is an abnormal trait. What does that leave?
It's really hard to know what the average person is like though. One thing we do know pretty well is that they don't do a good job of answering surveys, so that won't get you far. The way most people handle this is by assuming they are normal, so anything they do (or maybe anything they do within certain boundaries, exempting their 'weird time') is normal. This is a dangerous assumption though, it can get an abnormal person acting even more abnormal on the assumption that everyone else approves of their behavior.
On the other hand, what do you do if you know you aren't normal and that your experiences are a poor representation of the average person? You definitely shouldn't just assume the opposite of everything you do is normal, that would be absurd (you're bound to be in the right position on at least a few points, a broken clock and so on). However, the view we see from some extreme shut-in edgelords is pretty close to this: that "normal people" are all happy, productive, are in healthy sexual relationships, and are really sensitive and hate being exposed to turmoil. This is really not the case, normal people do have some sensitivities and tend to get laid from time to time but they definitely have some issues and shortcomings. The fact that all of our stories and media are about suffering and conflict show that it is marketable to the general public, and thus relatable. How do we get a better sense of the details of the truth though?
Who should we pay attention to? We can't trust our friends, they tend to be weird and terminally online too (that's why we get along with them). We also can't trust people who try to paint themselves in our eyes as examples of normality, doing so is an abnormal trait. What does that leave?
