Update (several hours later):
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Speaking with lunatic Joy Reid, echoing Jeffrey Marsh from one of his many grooming video, Yale psychiatrist Amanda Calhoun advises MSNBC viewers to break off ties with family members who voted for Donald Trump and refuse to see them on the holidays. This is the way Scientology and other cults operate; they use isolation or social isolation so that the target becomes more dependent on the cult. By isolating the target, the cult can more easily manipulate them, establish control over them, and increase the target’s reliance on them for emotional and social support. (I have written several essays on this. See, e.g., Dianetics in Our Schools; Seeing and Admitting Grooming; Child Sexual Abuse and Its Dissimulation in the Rhetoric of Diversity and Inclusion; What is Grooming? Pedophilia and Other Paraphilias: A Primer in What Our Betters are Normalizing.)
It’s often called “going no contact.” A key tactic in cult induction is to separate people from their friends, family, and associates to estrange them from their core associations and pull them ever deeper into the doctrines and rituals of the cult. They do this by making the familiar sinister. For example, Scientology identifies “suppressive persons,” those the inductee or member feels—or is told to feel—don’t share her or his views. Cult membership creates a state of perpetual unreality where the subject of control becomes capable of believing the most unbelievable things.
We often think of cults as small and rare. But cults can be large and are quite common. They’re marked by the extraordinary capacity of members to rationalize reality—that is, deny the obvious. MSNBC provides a useful window into one of the largest cults in operation today, namely woke progressivism. You would think that Chief Resident of the Yale Albert J. Solnit Integrated Adult/Child Psychiatry program would not engaged in grooming tactics, but this is one of the big problems of psychiatry: this is how psychiatry increases its patient pool (Making Patients for the Medical-Industrial Complex).
There a new form of “going no contact”—women withdrawing from reproductive and sexual relations. Trump’s election as US President for a second, non-consecutive term has triggered strong reactions among some women on social media. In response to Trump’s victory, echoing a feminist movement in South Korea that instructs women to stop dating, having sex, getting marriage, and having children, women are pledging to go on a sex strike to voice their frustration and discontent (they are also shaving their heads). Pitched as a movement to achieve female autonomy from patriarchal relations, withdrawing from heterosexual relations en masse is a manifestation of an extremist ideology, one that rests on a mythology about men, and demands on the basis of that mythology transgression of societal norms that have been in place since time immemorial and served our species well. This is where woke progressive culture has brought us.
Woke culture shares a lot of features with Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution. Consider Mao’s “Four Olds” campaign aimed at negating “old customs, old culture, old habits, and old ideas” in China. The “Four Olds” movement encouraged the Red Guards to destroy anything seen as representing traditional or bourgeois values. Sacred sites, religious texts, and other items associated with historical traditions were attacked, as well as normal familial relations, with the goal of disembedding young people from the normative system that safeguarded them and prepared them for an autonomous life (to the extent that this could be achieve in Communist China), and reincorporating them into the void of Maoist thought, transforming Chinese society into a collectivist state with no independent thought or intrinsic moral value.
(I have been making this comparison publicly since 2020, see e.g., The Wuhan Virus, the Chinese Communist Party, and its Menagerie of Useful Idiots; The New Serfdom and its Useful Idiots: Boots Waiting to Stamp on the Face of Humanity; Why the Woke Hate the West; Mao Zedong Thought and the New Left Corruption of Emancipatory Politics; The Mao Zedong Thought Shift from the Class-Analytical to Race-Ideological; Playing China’s Game: Obscuring the Character of American Chaos; The Cultural Revolution; Maoism and Wokism and the Tyranny of Bureaucratic Collectivism; Frantz Fanon and the Regressive Ethics of the Wretched: Rationalizing Envy and Resentment—and Violent Praxis.)
This type of transgressive praxis lies central to gender ideology. In his 1995 Saint Foucault, David Halperin explores Michel Foucault’s influence on queer theory, particularly how Foucault’s ideas of power and sexuality can be applied to understand queer desires and identities outside traditional frameworks. In there, Halperin makes the following observation: “Unlike gay identity, which, though deliberately proclaimed in an act of affirmation, is nonetheless rooted in the positive fact of homosexual object-choice, queer identity need not be grounded in any positive truth or in any stable reality.” He continues, “As the very word implies, ‘queer’ does not name some natural kind or refer to some determinate object; it acquires its meaning from its oppositional relation to the norm. Queer is by definition whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. There is nothing in particular to which it necessarily refers. It is an identity without an essence.”
While homosexuality, i.e., same-sex attracted, has an essence and limits, queer is nihilistic; life lacks inherent meaning, purpose, or value. “‘Queer,’ then, demarcates not a positivity but a positionality vis-à-vis the normative, a positionality that is not restricted to lesbians and gay men but is in fact available to anyone who is or who feels marginalized because of her or his sexual practices: it could include some married couples without children, for example, or even (who knows?) some married couples with children —with, perhaps, very naughty children. ‘Queer,’ in any case, does not designate a class of already objectified pathologies or perversions; rather, it describes a horizon of possibility whose precise extent and heterogeneous scope cannot in principle be delimited in advance.”
Thus, in the same way Mao sought to disrupt traditional understandings and practices of cultural and family life in order to create a new society in which Mao Zedong thought would prevail and the multitude would behave accordingly, queer theory transgresses normative boundaries, including those that safeguard children and women, to create a new society in which queer theory is the hegemonic ideology the masses are required to obey, rules that are always in transitions as those unburden by what has been push their desires on those who resist or who go along for fear of what will happen to them if they don’t.
This is achieved through control of the language, which in turn controls thought (see Gender and the English Language; Linguistic Programming: A Tool of Tyrants; Magical Thinking and Perception Management in Gender Ideology’s Imperial Ambitions; Decoding Progressive Newspeak: Equity and the Doctrine of Inclusion). The outburst from the guest on a CNN program illustrates the demand that everybody obey the Newspeak rules.
Gender ideology extends beyond trans activism and others who crave openly exercising their paraphilias. The “4Bs” movement, which originated in South Korea, has become a feminist wave, advocating for the rejection of traditional gender roles and intimate relationships with men. Initially a fringe element of South Korean feminism, the movement has gained international attention, particularly in the United States, following political shifts and perceived impacts, but especially the election of President Donald Trump. The movement represents a radical rejection of societal expectations surrounding heterosexual marriage, childbirth, dating, and sexual relationships, calling for women to reclaim autonomy over their bodies and lives and resistance to its extremism only makes it more determined to distort reality and disrupt normal social relations.
The “4Bs” is shorthand for four Korean words, each starting with “bi,” meaning “no.” The central tenets of the movement are Bihon (no heterosexual marriage), Bichulsan (no childbirth), Biyeonae (no dating), and Bisekseu (no heterosexual sexual relationships). These demands express a radical rejection of the roles that have historically been “assigned” to women, who have been expected to marry, bear children, and engage in heterosexual relationships as central elements of their identities and societal duties. By rejecting these “impositions,” women can challenge the patriarchal structures that have marginalized them and assert their autonomy.
The “4Bs” movement’s core message of resistance to traditional gender roles has found resonance beyond its borders. In the United States, following Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election, a similar sentiment began to take hold, particularly among younger women, preparing the ground for an equivalent movement in the US. Many young women on social media platforms like TikTok and X (formerly Twitter) have explicitly embraced the “4Bs” in the wake of the 2024 Trump victory, expressing their frustration with a political system they see as increasingly hostile to women’s rights and bodily autonomy.
One of the key reasons why the “4Bs” has found a growing audience in the US is the profound disappointment among many women regarding the voting patterns of men. CNN’s exit polls following the most recent presidential election revealed a striking gender divide: while 54 percent of women voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, 56.5 percent of men voted for Trump. This stark contrast points to a troubling reality for women who know that a significant portion of the male electorate supported a candidate who they believe disrespects their bodily autonomy and perpetuates sexist attitudes. For these women, the “4Bs” movement offers a form of resistance, a way to reject the traditional roles that they claim men have been allowed to dictate.
Moreover, the rise of social media has facilitated the spread of this and other tendencies by allowing women to amplify their voices. Platforms like TikTok, X, and chatrooms on various social media sites have provided a space for women to reinforce perceptions about gender relations and express their desire to transcend them. The anonymity and reach of social media have allowed young women to discuss issues such as autonomy, consent, and gender equality, and gender identity in ways that would have been difficult in mainstream media and ordinary social spaces. But in the bubble they become distorted and exaggerated. Warped discourses on gender relations are reinforced in the same way that other destructive ideas have spread across social media, leading to such pathologies as transgenderism and self-identification with various psychiatric categories in the DSM-5 (see Why Aren’t We Talking More About Social Contagion?).
Obviously, there is a thematic similarity between Mao’s “Four Olds” campaign and the principles underlying the “4Bs.” But the crucial point here is that they parallel each other substantively. Both push to challenge and replace dominant cultural values and social norms. Mao’s campaign during the Cultural Revolution sought to eliminate “old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits,” aiming to dismantle traditional structures and make way for a society built on new collectivist ideals. Mao wanted a complete rethinking of social values, relationships, and even personal identities, urging individuals to reject longstanding cultural and social practices seen as obstacles to progress. The feminist 4Bs movement represents a similar spirit by rejecting traditional gender expectations that are deeply embedded in culture. The call for “no dating, no sex, no marriage, and no childbearing” is a deliberate rejection of the social roles traditionally “imposed” on women, especially those centered around relationships with men and family roles, which are rooted in natural history. Like Mao’s campaign, the “4Bs” challenges social norms as a way to subvert power dynamics, questioning and refusing to participate in practices that proponents argue reinforce gender inequality.
In assaulting on the truth, transgressive politics create a climate in which lying to self and others becomes endemic to discourse, constituting the structure of a person’s cognitive frame. There are several theories in social science that address how cognitive framing can lead to communication breakdowns due to differing meanings assigned to the same words. Prominent among them is frame theory, rooted in cognitive linguistics and sociology, which explores how individuals use mental frameworks, or “frames,” to interpret signs, symbols, and situations. When two sides have different frames, even when using the same terms, they interpret those terms differently, leading to misunderstandings or outright communication failures. Any meaningful dialogue requires first clarifying the meanings of words and determine the words upon which there is agreed-upon meaning.
A key contributor to this theory is linguist George Lakoff, who emphasizes that words evoke mental frames shaped by culture, experience, and ideology. For example, the term “freedom” may mean personal autonomy to one person, while for another, it might imply the ability to uphold social responsibility without external interference. Another example is the way in which, for progressives, “democracy” becomes a cover for “bureaucracy” or “technocracy.” Differing frames mean words evokes entirely different values and ideas depending on affinity, leading to conflicting interpretations and failures in meaningful dialogue.
Likewise, Erving Goffman’s frame analysis in sociology suggests that people organize experiences and meaning-making into “frames” that guide their understanding of situations. When people communicate without aligning these frames—particularly when they are unaware that they even hold different frames—misinterpretation is likely. This misalignment can be especially pronounced in emotionally charged discussions, where words carry significantly different connotations for different groups, based on their unique cultural, ideological, or personal experiences.
The proliferation of lies, then, can be seen as a consequence of frames that distort words from their intended meanings, obscuring objective reality. While frames are meant to help individuals interpret and organize experience, they also act as filters, refracting or even warping what might otherwise be universally understood signs and symbols. When individuals hold opposing frames, their perceptions of reality diverge, with each group interpreting signs in ways that align with their worldview. This distortion can lead to a fundamental breakdown in the shared understanding of language itself, where words no longer reliably represent the same concepts across perspectives. Words like “justice,” “equality,” or “freedom” become battlegrounds for ideological warfare, as each side asserts its frame as the only truthful interpretation, casting the other as misinformed or deliberately deceitful.
As frames become increasingly rigid and polarized, they encourage a kind of epistemic insularity, where individuals disregard or reinterpret information that does not align with their established worldview (I have often referred to this as the practice of “cerebral hygiene”). In such an environment, deliberate deception or lies become endemic, as individuals and organizations tailor facts to fit within their frames. Here, language becomes an instrument of manipulation rather than a means of authentic communication. The result is not simply a diversity of perspectives but a clash of competing versions of reality itself—some closer to truth, others to falsehood. Lies, in this context, are not merely the result of dishonesty but are embedded in the structures of cognition and communication themselves, perpetuating a climate of obscurantism where language is weaponized to obfuscate rather than illuminate truth.
The many videos I see of progressives in hysterics over the election, the blame for their situation (fake videos aside) in large measure rests on the shoulders of those who have for years politically manipulated language and, more immediately, lied about Trump and mischaracterized his politics. The effects are not small. There are people who have actually killed themselves over the election result. One man, 46-year-old Anthony Nephew, killed his family before killing himself.
There are people close to me who are terrified by a Trump presidency. When I listen to the explanations for why they believe what they say about him, it’s the lies they repeat (see Averting Catastrophes and a Few Other Friday Afternoon News Items with Commentary). When I try to show them why these are lies, and why the liars are lying, I find they’ve taken no time to listen to the other side or find out for themselves whether the claims are true or false. But more than this, they have taken no time to work out the problem of meaning in word usage (or a theory of power). They can’t believe me; their cognitive frame applies different meanings to words we use in ways that make my claims and arguments appear extreme or untoward. I sound like the freed prisoner who has returned to Plato’s cave to explain to his colleagues still chained to the wall what he saw on the outside. They wonder what happened to me, as if I were radicalized by rightwing media and political figures.
This is a huge problem. We have one side of the electorate that is remarkably incurious about reality and tangled in ideology. They believe their ideology represents the real world. “We are the educated,” the progressives say. Look at the crosstabs and you will see that the educated did indeed vote for Harris. But educated in what? In what way? A person educated in gender studies is not going to be smarter than an engineer—or the carpenter who dropped out of high school and uses complex mathematics daily. The gender studies graduate is going to see the world through gender ideology, a neoreligion that denies truth and admits it does. The panic we witness tends to be associated with belief in the most impossible things, e.g., the notion that boys can be girls, or ridiculous things, e.g., that heterosexual relations are imposed on women and are generally oppressive. In this way, woke progressivism makes people not merely ignorant, but stupid—and self-destructive.
I understand the tenacity of these people in clinging to ideology. It’s associated with a personality type. Indeed, modern politics is in many ways a division between those personalities who are close minded and those who are open to other points of view and who listen to what people are saying, working to make sure that the meaning of the words used mean the same thing to everyone involved in the conversation—and to find that consensus on the basis of a shared concern for accuracy and precision in conveying reality.
But Jürgen Habermas’ ideal speech situation is not what’s going to build the new consensus. As intellectuals and leaders in the Democratic Party pivot in the face of reality, and the corporate state media talking heads pivot with them (not everybody on the progressive side is deluded, and some are already “standing up” to the woke progressive mob), many of the faithful will follow them towards the center. But centrism has always been a cover for the administrative state and regular technocratic rule, and as such the center is always the illusion of a genuine consensus.
freedom and reason 