This is an interesting article, I want to push back a little though.
There are a lot of people like me, who have no public profile are not public intellectuals and the scope of their role gives little space to explicitly push back. My company has gone mad, but in departments far from me, in areas that are not really within my role. I neither promoted this ideology nor did I push back on it. I feel some guilt for letting things go, but I also think there is wisdom in picking your battles. To keep your powder dry so to speak.
I assume this article is directed at public intellectuals and commentators not ordinary people who will make up the main readership. For ordinary people it's a pretty complicated decision deciding when and what to speak up about.. and not all of the reasons for biding your time are cowardice.
Frustratingly, I feel this is correct. Most people aren't brave. Mattias Desmet wrote that 15% are freedom fighters, 15% authoritarian, and the 70% in the middle just see which way the wind is
blowing to form their opinions. I think most atrocities in history show this to be true (e.g.Stalinism, Nazism). It's pointless waiting for apologies or acknowledgement of their cowardice in the face of evil.
Nobody can ask you to fall on your sword, but everyone can do something. Even a small thing - grtting people to switch from google search to Brave, Linux vs Microsoft, changing where you shop..... there was no excuse for complete silence....
I will gladly use any other search engine than Google. However, the Google creeps have far and away the best search engine for my current purposes, which are medical/scientific.
I'm disabled, and another reptilian thing ( as you see from my photo, I am an amphibian, and smug about it ), the loathsome Amazon, is a godsend to the disabled. I hate it but I'm grateful for it. I was giddy when during his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, Sean O'Brien, Teamsters' President, declared his intention to unionize Amazon employees.
Oh, and yes, Donald, we would be grateful for some vigorous antitrust prosecution. Sink these dismembered monsters in a steaming, hissing sea of ruthless litigation.
In an anti - Christian time which is mean and becoming worse, I have not let my witnessing be intimidated. I live in an old Rust Belt city in the American Midwest, however, and my opportunities to be persecuted unambiguously for The Faith have been limited because of it. However, the Devil knows my name, and I cannot see the odds -defying financial losses which I have suffered in the last twenty years as anything other than his best attempts to kill me.
I do not vaunt myself. I do not see myself as courageous. I do remember that in childhood I was aware that, as someone said C.S. Lewis recognized, there were high stakes, indeed, intrinsic to being a man, and I did not want to fail my hour in history, but I recognize that my lifelong glee in being contrarian has been at least as important to my obnoxiousness.
I’m on X, using my real name, and I’ve been condemning every woke ideology there is for years. In addition, I’m a firm believer in Islam being incompatible with Western values, Sharia law should be banned in every western country, and every Islamist (not Muslim) should be deported from every western country.
I’m not afraid to say it. At the same time I donate $800 a month to the Ukraine war effort. I hate Russia, despise Putin and his cronies. I looking forward to the fall of Iran and the end of North Korea.
We are on the brink of total destruction if we don’t beat back the lunatic fringe and end our enemies as fast as possible.
The problem for us is the middle is the old Paradox of Tolerance.
I want to tolerate things. I do. I also don't want to draw weird lines like so many on the Modern Left where they're intolerate of totally normal stuff.
But I'm also weary of the libertarian "do whatever you want" at the expense of wider society. Polyamory? No. Transing kids? No. Celebrating victimhood? No.
I'm drawing a hard line in these radical Post Modern ideas.
Yah, I’d not be too quick to pat oneself on one’s own back. Some are natured fearless, others not. What we want now is a mass movement back to sanity, not self-congratulations. I’m also not so sure that those who were silent once are those now pretending to always have been anti-woke. How do we know who was what retrospectively? I’m just glad the worm is turning. Assuming it is (it isn’t everywhere, not yet, just sayin’…)
It’s an interesting question. There must be a bit of “I was here first; I always knew and spoke out early. Now my courage is being diluted by the come-latelies”. It has a narcissistic streak to it. I guess we should applaud their valour. I was an early adopter also (in fact since the 1980s) but feel no need to disparage those who have finally come on board. Isn’t that what we want…?
I live in one of those places...Oregon! They have doubled down on their wokeness by having a Democrat run house and all the city officials in both the City and the County of Multnomah are the same ilk. 😫
Change where you spend money. No Dropbox. Brave vs Google for search. Linux computer vs microsoft. Find ways to deny them funding, one person at a time.
I personally would not call you a coward. Though I understand that some people would. We stayed in Portland as long as we could take it. Met a lot of great people but not enough of them would stand up to the Left. They allowed groups like Antifa to destroy Portland during the George Floyd riots. They played nice with the politicians thinking something would change. We moved to Molalla but obviously not far enough away because what the politicians are doing at the State level is going to destroy Oregon.
The nice thing I suppose is that if that is the case: a stable left wing ideology causing further damage to the state, then we still have a whole lot to fight for. I have a niece and soon a nephew living in the Portland area and I feel a responsibility to work to improve things for them. At least to speak up and simply state my opinion as controversial as that may be today. I have friends in Molalla, they say it's nice, hope you enjoy it there!
I know this post isn't directed at people like me, but it does strike a nerve in any case.
Sometime in 2012, within a few months of the Trayvon Martin story becoming a "national discussion" and "racial reckoning," I started looking into the facts of the case versus how it was being portrayed by the media. It became very clear to me that the media was manipulating and distorting a number of aspects of the narrative, or worse, outright lying.
I took to Facebook, under my real name, to push back against people who were buying into that false narrative. An example of the lies and distortions I was pointing out was the widespread dissemination of photos of a much younger, skinnier, and more innocent looking Trayvon, and a much heavier, more menacing George Zimmerman. A little bit of research revealed that these images had no relationship whatsoever to the physical size and appearance of the two men on the night of the alleged crime.
The blowback in response to my most public Facebook post about this was swift and brutal. My Facebook friend count, including people I knew in real life, dropped more than it ever has before or since. There are people who never spoke to me again. It was obvious that these people who were "unfriending" me were interpreting my pointing out uncomfortable facts about the case as outright racist. The level of groupthink liberals and progressives engaged in at that time was shocking. I consider the summer and fall of 2012 to be the birth of identity politics and "wokeness" as we know it today.
Fast forward to 2020-2024: I left New York City for the wokest, bluest state in the country (try to guess), and needed to rebuild my career due to a massive, multi-year gap in my professional resume, due to taking an extended break from my first career. While my private criticism of identity politics, wokeness, and gender ideology had only intensified, the professional risks of being too vocal about it while trying to rebuild my career were simply too great, not least because I worked in higher ed, and now K-12.
A couple of weeks ago I was in one of the dreaded DEI workshops, and I dared to point out that the University of Michigan has gotten rid of diversity statements and that there seems to be a backlash against many aspects of the DEI agenda. I pointed out that this is only after U of M spent $250 million on DEI. This was in response to a slide the instructor put up showing how many states have passed anti-DEI legislation. Within minutes of each other, and in reaction to my comments, the only person of color in the room as well as the Director of DEI had to "leave the room" to "get some air."
My point is that I've worked too hard climbing my way back up from a $20/hr job to a senior position in my line of work to risk losing my job. The struggles I've endured in the past 4 years I wouldn't wish upon anyone, and the reaction to even mildly pointing out the facts about the DEI backlash, much less engaging in more pointed criticism, reminded me that I have too much to lose to risk doing that again. I practically lost sleep with paranoia that some of my colleagues have secretly marked me down on their "enemies" list.
We need the Murrays, Boghossians, Weinsteins, and Lindsays to speak up in ways we cannot. The rest of us can exercise what little power we have in the voting booth, and that's exactly what we just witnessed a few weeks ago. Keep doing what you're doing, Peter. We are grateful for it!
Speaking of Gay black friends, at a Hollywood Hills Thanksgiving dinner party back in 2016, the all white Gay liberal attendees were in quite the funk because, you know, Hillary lost to Trump just a couple of weeks prior. My husband and I like to throw Molotov cocktails into liberals faces and I did just that: “Boys, why the sour pusses?? Is it because Trump defeated the vile, wicked, evil Hildebeest?” Silence. The hosts were seething and asked us to leave. My husband said: “Gosh, we’re hurt. Oh well, plan B: we’re going to visit our black gay buddies in the Baldwin Hills. They all voted for Trump. By the way, why have there NEVER been any Negroes at any of your parties, Dan? Oh wait, I’m sorry. I meant to say ‘why are there never any COLORED people at your dinner parties?”
Gay white liberals all had their tongues tied. We departed.
Hey Peter! Dan and his husband Walter are STILL dear friends of ours. They know my hubby and I are Republicans since we all met at a Christmas party in Burbank in 2001. No big deal. Dan showed up at my then home in Long Beach, CA a couple of weeks after Thanksgiving to ‘chat’ and to apologize for kicking us out of his home. “Vick, you just caught me off guard and really hit a nerve with the guys. Negroes and Coloreds? Jesus, Victor, you’re such a dick! But I love you, Walter loves you, my friends are all phonies, but you know that. Fact of the matter is none of us have any close black friends. We don’t go out of our way to visit South LA or Compton or Watts, you get the picture. And we all feign fake outrage at injustice at the hands of the LAPD! From our perches in the Hollywood Hills of course!” We hugged, joked about Hanukkah and Christmas, joked about the Hildebeest and the incoming Trump presidency. “Fucking Donald Trump, Victor! Can you believe it?” Me: “Believe it Danny boy! Isn’t it fucking incredible? But you shouldn’t be surprised. Hillary couldn’t be bothered with Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. Blue collar workers? Democrats have lost them FOREVER.”
Fast forward to November 2024. Danny and Walter are among the ‘normal’ gay men that JD Vance talked about and voted for Trump.
Unless I am mistaken, I recall your having once been on another list that spoke to your courage. A "10 Most Wanted List" where your thoughts and words were targeted by a group of evangelicals.
I remember thinking at the time, what a badge of honor it must be, to be put on a such list. An unintended recognition for fearlessly speaking your mind ... when no one else did.
I'm new to Mr Boghossian. Who were the "Evangelicals" who compiled the list, and who were his companions?
I'm curious, because I am by most people's definition "an Evangelical." Actually, I am a traditional, or historic, if you like, Protestant. I have never seen such a list, and cannot imagine that it was issued by any group which would be endorsed by an actual Christian.
It's easy to come out of the shadows when that's part of your brand. When you make your money from speaking tours and writing books about building a counter-woke society, the more you get cancelled, the more publicity you get, the more books you sell, the more stops on your speaking tour. But if you just have a normal job and you might end up fired for a "mean" post on X and you might end up homeless, then you post under a fake name.
I don't know how brave it has been to push back against this insanity in my own life for the past several years? It cost me significantly in real income and wealth (my warehouse and vehicles were targeted by Antifa in Portland before our presence there became untenable). Near 15 years of life's work destroyed because the local population was too cowed and co-opted to stand with the few of us. And of course the loss of long and medium term relationships, I simply stopped counting how many people no longer speak to me as I refused to go along. Or have alluded that I am some secret NAZI (always like that one, being Jewish, it really strikes a particular cord) for challenging the reflexive chants of BLM, and all that followed it.
For me it was very simple: I could follow along and pretend I agreed with truly horrible and vulgar ideas, Or stand up for basic observable, objective reality. For me, the price of not standing up was far greater, or so I have convinced myself.
Complaining about "demon trolls" anon accounts now, like JBP?
If these accounts were not anon, you would call them bigots and would be silent as they are banned from social media (as Elon still does) and their jobs are forfeit. You would not defend "Jew-haters" for example. You would not lift a finger as ADL, SPLC and other NGOs militate for their financial destruction and life ruination.
The anonymity will drop when all these powerful, rich organizations start to lose power. For now, it should stay, because it offers people an outlet to challenge the monopoly of liberalism in all its flavors.
I don't want to lose my job, which I know I would. My family, including parents, depend on it. I don't have the finances for a safe landing nor many alternative skills. Worse, I could land in jail, because there are laws that severely limit freedom of expression.
Then operate quietly. Every person can take $5k/year just from Brave search vs Google, going Linux vs Windows or Mac, Mega vs Dropbox, Epik v GoDaddy. No Starbucks,McD, Target....
Thank you for the unsolicited advice. You Americans are absolutely broken off the rest of the planet. Might've missed the part where I don't even enjoy 1A protections, quite the contrary.
I hear what you are saying and admire you for sticking your neck out when so few would, but don't be too quick to castigate those who are just now arriving at a place you have been for years. People were swept up in the woke madness and saw themselves as righteous crusaders for social justice who were continuing the work of the great heroes of the 20th century. It all seemed so logical- there just had to be a reason, beyond plain old human cultural differences, to account for the group-based outcome gaps between racial groups. Trans rights were so logically Gay Rights 2.0. Bravo to you and the few others who saw through this from day one, but most people have taken a while to see this stuff for what it is- a cultural revolution pitting the meritocracy against equality of outcome for everyone; capitalism Vs. communism. Welcome anyone willing to join the cause of individual rights and embracing our common humanity.
I also think we need a national reconciliation where people come forward and say “I was wrong and I did some terrible things, and I am sorry for that.” They also need to be very specific about what they did that was wrong and apologize directly to those people.
I think that it would help use move forward as a society, but I am not hopeful that it will happen.
I agree completely. It seemed so confusing at first, and that's why I subscribed to Peter. His story, a liberal who was harassed at a liberal university, was compelling. What was going on? I was no woke crusader, but someone who came of age during Civil Rights and was a convinced liberal. And it took a while before I could really see, because, as you say, all that was woke "seemed so logical." I will always admire Peter's courage, and I suppose he has some resentment against those who harassed him, but I learned to see through his Substack and I am grateful.
I was an LMP for v wealthy clients in Seattle for over 20 yrs. I wrote in Sherrod Brown for the past three presidential elections bc I think the Dems should tear a pg from his book. I knew T was going to win in '16 and my clients thought I was crazy.
Afterwards, I convinced two of them to fund proper interviews of sample sz of the ppl in swing states who'd voted Dem their entire voting history or had voted for Obama twice then switched to T. I have no idea what they chose to do w that info, but it obviously wasn't viewed as useful by the DNC.
I also posted the following messages, using my real name, everywhere. I was ostracized by friends, family and clients. Fun times.
"If identity really is all, then no white person can ever have an opinion on race, no man can have an opinion on feminism, no Gentile can have a position on Israel, no straight person can have an opinion about gays, and so on. Or, if they do, they’re simply displaying white supremacy, misogyny, anti-Semitism, and homophobia, which renders those opinions void before they have even been expressed. How much easier this is than refuting actual arguments, or judging an individual on the cogency of her arguments rather than the color of her skin, biological sex, or sexual orientation. How much simpler to deploy the words “mansplaining” or “whitesplaining” as an alternative to the somewhat harder task of refuting. But among many elite liberals today, identity has come to eclipse reason and even aspire to be reason itself.
This is why, at the end of 2017, I feel close to despair about the liberal-democratic project in the West. When it isn’t being assaulted by the identitarian thugs of the hard right, it is being corroded by the identitarian puritans of the “social justice” left. This is how liberal democracies die — or rather how they reveal that they are already, under the surface, dead." Andrew Sullivan
"Resistance is by nature reactive; it is not forward-looking. And anti-Trumpism is not a politics. My worry is that liberals will get so caught up in countering his every move, essentially playing his game, that they will fail to seize -- or even recognize -- the opportunity he has given them. Now that he has destroyed conventional Republicanism and what was left of principled conservatism, the playing field is empty. For the first time in living memory, we liberals have no ideological adversary worthy of the name. So it is crucial that we look beyond Trump.
The only adversary left is ourselves. And we have mastered the art of self-sabotage. At a time when we liberals need to speak in a way that convinces people from very different walks of life, in every part of the country, that they share a common destiny and need to stand together, our rhetoric encourages self-righteous narcissism. At a moment when political consciousness and strategizing need to be developed, we are expending our energies on symbolic drama over identity. At a time when it is crucial to direct our efforts into seizing institutional power by winning elections, we dissipate them in expressive movements indifferent to the effects they may have on the voting public. In an age when we need to educate young people to think of themselves as citizens with duties toward each other, we encourage them instead to descend into the rabbit hole of the self. The frustrating truth is that we have no political vision to offer the nation, and we are thinking and speaking and acting in ways guaranteed to prevent one from emerging."
-Mark Lilla, The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics
But liberals already control most institutions including main line religion and education. That is what allows them to indulge in their obsessive identity politics destroying low income citizens the opportunity education and religion could give them by convincing people math is racist and religion is dead.
You invented the politics of self over country. I don't see how liberals seizing control of anything is in the country's interest.
Perhaps a touch of humility is what you need to cultivate now.
I took care of my 102 year old, sweet, father at my home. My husband's brother had died and we needed to go out of town for his memorial. There was a hospital that provided respite for such a situation so my dad was booked there for 3 days. When I went to pick him up the intercom asked if I had been fully vaxxed. I said I only had one because it very likely gave me Bell's Palsy. She told me I couldn't come in. I said to her, "oh, my father is here for respite but I guess this will be my father's new home then"? She opened the door and had me come in immediately. What a hypocritical farce. A bozo making the rules that could be changed in an instant to suit them. I dont automatically see the good in people anymore.
There are those of us who never got a spotlight in any way, who had no "rights" to be heard because no college degrees, who are now yes, spent, burnt out, ostracized, run out of society, have majorly been outcast and derailed from life. Seriously a tiny minority, and wondering where the rest of my people are. Because we've had to live in hiding for too damned long.
I got called a racist and screamed at at dinner a couple weeks ago for not agreeing the murder of the health care CEO was ok. It just kept escalating, with the shock of the liberals who couldn’t get their way. Oh Gay black “friends”, everyone needs them to experience the ongoing delusion.
I love your stuff on Taiwan. That is a people that is fucked based on the attitudes I heard.
I have very much appreciated the honesty and courage that you have shown over the past decade despite being u dear constant threat. I can understand your feelings.
I am also very frustrated by the fundamental lack of respect for the virtues of Honesty and Courage in our society. I believe that preference falsification has played a key role in the growth of Woke ideologies. The problem was not so much the true believing Woke as the “respectable” Center Left who pretended to be Woke in order to not be attacked.
The true believers were always a small minority, but it was the Center Left white males who let them into the institutions.
On the other hand, I know that humans are frail social animals with instincts to follow the group. I am glad that the fear has declined enough that many people are finally showing some honesty and being willing to state the obvious.
I can understand why this must infuriate a person like you who has sacrificed so much to tell the truth. I guess that I think that more people will embrace honesty if they know that they will be welcomed by those who fought the Woke through the entire period.
Might I suggest, though that you take the win and smile while gritting your teeth at these people. This problem is a hell of a lot better than another decade like the last.
By the way, I have written a bit on this issue, so you might be interested in my take:
I'm sorry, I'm going to have to take issue with your "criticizing moderate Muslims for not condemning radicals" comment and comparing it to the "cancel mobs" and "witch hunts" that you and your colleagues are more familiar with. It's just not a good comparison. There is a major difference between refusing to call out or condemn terrorism or terrorist organizations, and not speaking out for someone who is about to get fired for calling someone by the wrong pronoun. The former is far more violent, the latter extremely problematic but not the same in scale.
This is an interesting article, I want to push back a little though.
There are a lot of people like me, who have no public profile are not public intellectuals and the scope of their role gives little space to explicitly push back. My company has gone mad, but in departments far from me, in areas that are not really within my role. I neither promoted this ideology nor did I push back on it. I feel some guilt for letting things go, but I also think there is wisdom in picking your battles. To keep your powder dry so to speak.
I assume this article is directed at public intellectuals and commentators not ordinary people who will make up the main readership. For ordinary people it's a pretty complicated decision deciding when and what to speak up about.. and not all of the reasons for biding your time are cowardice.
Thanks. It also applies to people who don’t move in the public space. I’ve experienced this time after time in my conversations.
Frustratingly, I feel this is correct. Most people aren't brave. Mattias Desmet wrote that 15% are freedom fighters, 15% authoritarian, and the 70% in the middle just see which way the wind is
blowing to form their opinions. I think most atrocities in history show this to be true (e.g.Stalinism, Nazism). It's pointless waiting for apologies or acknowledgement of their cowardice in the face of evil.
Nobody can ask you to fall on your sword, but everyone can do something. Even a small thing - grtting people to switch from google search to Brave, Linux vs Microsoft, changing where you shop..... there was no excuse for complete silence....
I will gladly use any other search engine than Google. However, the Google creeps have far and away the best search engine for my current purposes, which are medical/scientific.
I'm disabled, and another reptilian thing ( as you see from my photo, I am an amphibian, and smug about it ), the loathsome Amazon, is a godsend to the disabled. I hate it but I'm grateful for it. I was giddy when during his recent interview with Tucker Carlson, Sean O'Brien, Teamsters' President, declared his intention to unionize Amazon employees.
Oh, and yes, Donald, we would be grateful for some vigorous antitrust prosecution. Sink these dismembered monsters in a steaming, hissing sea of ruthless litigation.
In an anti - Christian time which is mean and becoming worse, I have not let my witnessing be intimidated. I live in an old Rust Belt city in the American Midwest, however, and my opportunities to be persecuted unambiguously for The Faith have been limited because of it. However, the Devil knows my name, and I cannot see the odds -defying financial losses which I have suffered in the last twenty years as anything other than his best attempts to kill me.
I do not vaunt myself. I do not see myself as courageous. I do remember that in childhood I was aware that, as someone said C.S. Lewis recognized, there were high stakes, indeed, intrinsic to being a man, and I did not want to fail my hour in history, but I recognize that my lifelong glee in being contrarian has been at least as important to my obnoxiousness.
I’m on X, using my real name, and I’ve been condemning every woke ideology there is for years. In addition, I’m a firm believer in Islam being incompatible with Western values, Sharia law should be banned in every western country, and every Islamist (not Muslim) should be deported from every western country.
I’m not afraid to say it. At the same time I donate $800 a month to the Ukraine war effort. I hate Russia, despise Putin and his cronies. I looking forward to the fall of Iran and the end of North Korea.
We are on the brink of total destruction if we don’t beat back the lunatic fringe and end our enemies as fast as possible.
The problem for us is the middle is the old Paradox of Tolerance.
I want to tolerate things. I do. I also don't want to draw weird lines like so many on the Modern Left where they're intolerate of totally normal stuff.
But I'm also weary of the libertarian "do whatever you want" at the expense of wider society. Polyamory? No. Transing kids? No. Celebrating victimhood? No.
I'm drawing a hard line in these radical Post Modern ideas.
Yah, I’d not be too quick to pat oneself on one’s own back. Some are natured fearless, others not. What we want now is a mass movement back to sanity, not self-congratulations. I’m also not so sure that those who were silent once are those now pretending to always have been anti-woke. How do we know who was what retrospectively? I’m just glad the worm is turning. Assuming it is (it isn’t everywhere, not yet, just sayin’…)
Yeah, there’s something to be said for this to be sure. How does one explain the smugness?
It’s an interesting question. There must be a bit of “I was here first; I always knew and spoke out early. Now my courage is being diluted by the come-latelies”. It has a narcissistic streak to it. I guess we should applaud their valour. I was an early adopter also (in fact since the 1980s) but feel no need to disparage those who have finally come on board. Isn’t that what we want…?
I live in one of those places...Oregon! They have doubled down on their wokeness by having a Democrat run house and all the city officials in both the City and the County of Multnomah are the same ilk. 😫
Change where you spend money. No Dropbox. Brave vs Google for search. Linux computer vs microsoft. Find ways to deny them funding, one person at a time.
Think of it along the Old Testament line of the dog returning to his vomit. Enjoy their getting a double portion of that.
I live in Oregon too, find it very troubling, makes me want to move, then I'm a coward for moving!?
I personally would not call you a coward. Though I understand that some people would. We stayed in Portland as long as we could take it. Met a lot of great people but not enough of them would stand up to the Left. They allowed groups like Antifa to destroy Portland during the George Floyd riots. They played nice with the politicians thinking something would change. We moved to Molalla but obviously not far enough away because what the politicians are doing at the State level is going to destroy Oregon.
The nice thing I suppose is that if that is the case: a stable left wing ideology causing further damage to the state, then we still have a whole lot to fight for. I have a niece and soon a nephew living in the Portland area and I feel a responsibility to work to improve things for them. At least to speak up and simply state my opinion as controversial as that may be today. I have friends in Molalla, they say it's nice, hope you enjoy it there!
We really enjoy Molalla and have the Mayor's number on our speed dial. The good thing here is he will answer his phone and emails. 😁
I know this post isn't directed at people like me, but it does strike a nerve in any case.
Sometime in 2012, within a few months of the Trayvon Martin story becoming a "national discussion" and "racial reckoning," I started looking into the facts of the case versus how it was being portrayed by the media. It became very clear to me that the media was manipulating and distorting a number of aspects of the narrative, or worse, outright lying.
I took to Facebook, under my real name, to push back against people who were buying into that false narrative. An example of the lies and distortions I was pointing out was the widespread dissemination of photos of a much younger, skinnier, and more innocent looking Trayvon, and a much heavier, more menacing George Zimmerman. A little bit of research revealed that these images had no relationship whatsoever to the physical size and appearance of the two men on the night of the alleged crime.
The blowback in response to my most public Facebook post about this was swift and brutal. My Facebook friend count, including people I knew in real life, dropped more than it ever has before or since. There are people who never spoke to me again. It was obvious that these people who were "unfriending" me were interpreting my pointing out uncomfortable facts about the case as outright racist. The level of groupthink liberals and progressives engaged in at that time was shocking. I consider the summer and fall of 2012 to be the birth of identity politics and "wokeness" as we know it today.
Fast forward to 2020-2024: I left New York City for the wokest, bluest state in the country (try to guess), and needed to rebuild my career due to a massive, multi-year gap in my professional resume, due to taking an extended break from my first career. While my private criticism of identity politics, wokeness, and gender ideology had only intensified, the professional risks of being too vocal about it while trying to rebuild my career were simply too great, not least because I worked in higher ed, and now K-12.
A couple of weeks ago I was in one of the dreaded DEI workshops, and I dared to point out that the University of Michigan has gotten rid of diversity statements and that there seems to be a backlash against many aspects of the DEI agenda. I pointed out that this is only after U of M spent $250 million on DEI. This was in response to a slide the instructor put up showing how many states have passed anti-DEI legislation. Within minutes of each other, and in reaction to my comments, the only person of color in the room as well as the Director of DEI had to "leave the room" to "get some air."
My point is that I've worked too hard climbing my way back up from a $20/hr job to a senior position in my line of work to risk losing my job. The struggles I've endured in the past 4 years I wouldn't wish upon anyone, and the reaction to even mildly pointing out the facts about the DEI backlash, much less engaging in more pointed criticism, reminded me that I have too much to lose to risk doing that again. I practically lost sleep with paranoia that some of my colleagues have secretly marked me down on their "enemies" list.
We need the Murrays, Boghossians, Weinsteins, and Lindsays to speak up in ways we cannot. The rest of us can exercise what little power we have in the voting booth, and that's exactly what we just witnessed a few weeks ago. Keep doing what you're doing, Peter. We are grateful for it!
I really appreciate that. Thank you.
Speaking of Gay black friends, at a Hollywood Hills Thanksgiving dinner party back in 2016, the all white Gay liberal attendees were in quite the funk because, you know, Hillary lost to Trump just a couple of weeks prior. My husband and I like to throw Molotov cocktails into liberals faces and I did just that: “Boys, why the sour pusses?? Is it because Trump defeated the vile, wicked, evil Hildebeest?” Silence. The hosts were seething and asked us to leave. My husband said: “Gosh, we’re hurt. Oh well, plan B: we’re going to visit our black gay buddies in the Baldwin Hills. They all voted for Trump. By the way, why have there NEVER been any Negroes at any of your parties, Dan? Oh wait, I’m sorry. I meant to say ‘why are there never any COLORED people at your dinner parties?”
Gay white liberals all had their tongues tied. We departed.
Did you ever hear from them again? If so, what was their reaction?
Hey Peter! Dan and his husband Walter are STILL dear friends of ours. They know my hubby and I are Republicans since we all met at a Christmas party in Burbank in 2001. No big deal. Dan showed up at my then home in Long Beach, CA a couple of weeks after Thanksgiving to ‘chat’ and to apologize for kicking us out of his home. “Vick, you just caught me off guard and really hit a nerve with the guys. Negroes and Coloreds? Jesus, Victor, you’re such a dick! But I love you, Walter loves you, my friends are all phonies, but you know that. Fact of the matter is none of us have any close black friends. We don’t go out of our way to visit South LA or Compton or Watts, you get the picture. And we all feign fake outrage at injustice at the hands of the LAPD! From our perches in the Hollywood Hills of course!” We hugged, joked about Hanukkah and Christmas, joked about the Hildebeest and the incoming Trump presidency. “Fucking Donald Trump, Victor! Can you believe it?” Me: “Believe it Danny boy! Isn’t it fucking incredible? But you shouldn’t be surprised. Hillary couldn’t be bothered with Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania. Blue collar workers? Democrats have lost them FOREVER.”
Fast forward to November 2024. Danny and Walter are among the ‘normal’ gay men that JD Vance talked about and voted for Trump.
Have a happy and an amazing 2025, Peter!!!
Unless I am mistaken, I recall your having once been on another list that spoke to your courage. A "10 Most Wanted List" where your thoughts and words were targeted by a group of evangelicals.
I remember thinking at the time, what a badge of honor it must be, to be put on a such list. An unintended recognition for fearlessly speaking your mind ... when no one else did.
I had forgotten about that list. That was a long, long time ago.
One has to have a high threshold of abuse for this sort of thing. Or cultivate one over time.
I agree. But if I had been on that list, I certainly would not have forgotten it.
It would be framed and hanging over the mantle.🤣
I'm new to Mr Boghossian. Who were the "Evangelicals" who compiled the list, and who were his companions?
I'm curious, because I am by most people's definition "an Evangelical." Actually, I am a traditional, or historic, if you like, Protestant. I have never seen such a list, and cannot imagine that it was issued by any group which would be endorsed by an actual Christian.
It's easy to come out of the shadows when that's part of your brand. When you make your money from speaking tours and writing books about building a counter-woke society, the more you get cancelled, the more publicity you get, the more books you sell, the more stops on your speaking tour. But if you just have a normal job and you might end up fired for a "mean" post on X and you might end up homeless, then you post under a fake name.
I don't know how brave it has been to push back against this insanity in my own life for the past several years? It cost me significantly in real income and wealth (my warehouse and vehicles were targeted by Antifa in Portland before our presence there became untenable). Near 15 years of life's work destroyed because the local population was too cowed and co-opted to stand with the few of us. And of course the loss of long and medium term relationships, I simply stopped counting how many people no longer speak to me as I refused to go along. Or have alluded that I am some secret NAZI (always like that one, being Jewish, it really strikes a particular cord) for challenging the reflexive chants of BLM, and all that followed it.
For me it was very simple: I could follow along and pretend I agreed with truly horrible and vulgar ideas, Or stand up for basic observable, objective reality. For me, the price of not standing up was far greater, or so I have convinced myself.
Complaining about "demon trolls" anon accounts now, like JBP?
If these accounts were not anon, you would call them bigots and would be silent as they are banned from social media (as Elon still does) and their jobs are forfeit. You would not defend "Jew-haters" for example. You would not lift a finger as ADL, SPLC and other NGOs militate for their financial destruction and life ruination.
The anonymity will drop when all these powerful, rich organizations start to lose power. For now, it should stay, because it offers people an outlet to challenge the monopoly of liberalism in all its flavors.
Are you stating this because you are anonymous? What is your reason for anonymity?
I don't want to lose my job, which I know I would. My family, including parents, depend on it. I don't have the finances for a safe landing nor many alternative skills. Worse, I could land in jail, because there are laws that severely limit freedom of expression.
Then operate quietly. Every person can take $5k/year just from Brave search vs Google, going Linux vs Windows or Mac, Mega vs Dropbox, Epik v GoDaddy. No Starbucks,McD, Target....
Thank you for the unsolicited advice. You Americans are absolutely broken off the rest of the planet. Might've missed the part where I don't even enjoy 1A protections, quite the contrary.
I hear what you are saying and admire you for sticking your neck out when so few would, but don't be too quick to castigate those who are just now arriving at a place you have been for years. People were swept up in the woke madness and saw themselves as righteous crusaders for social justice who were continuing the work of the great heroes of the 20th century. It all seemed so logical- there just had to be a reason, beyond plain old human cultural differences, to account for the group-based outcome gaps between racial groups. Trans rights were so logically Gay Rights 2.0. Bravo to you and the few others who saw through this from day one, but most people have taken a while to see this stuff for what it is- a cultural revolution pitting the meritocracy against equality of outcome for everyone; capitalism Vs. communism. Welcome anyone willing to join the cause of individual rights and embracing our common humanity.
Is it unreasonable to expect that they would apologize? “I made a mistake. I went along with this and I was wrong. I’m sorry.”
The honest ones will admit to it.
Sasha Stone apologizes all the time. She's quite transparent in her appraisal of herself.
Yes, that is very reasonable.
I also think we need a national reconciliation where people come forward and say “I was wrong and I did some terrible things, and I am sorry for that.” They also need to be very specific about what they did that was wrong and apologize directly to those people.
I think that it would help use move forward as a society, but I am not hopeful that it will happen.
I agree completely. It seemed so confusing at first, and that's why I subscribed to Peter. His story, a liberal who was harassed at a liberal university, was compelling. What was going on? I was no woke crusader, but someone who came of age during Civil Rights and was a convinced liberal. And it took a while before I could really see, because, as you say, all that was woke "seemed so logical." I will always admire Peter's courage, and I suppose he has some resentment against those who harassed him, but I learned to see through his Substack and I am grateful.
I was an LMP for v wealthy clients in Seattle for over 20 yrs. I wrote in Sherrod Brown for the past three presidential elections bc I think the Dems should tear a pg from his book. I knew T was going to win in '16 and my clients thought I was crazy.
Afterwards, I convinced two of them to fund proper interviews of sample sz of the ppl in swing states who'd voted Dem their entire voting history or had voted for Obama twice then switched to T. I have no idea what they chose to do w that info, but it obviously wasn't viewed as useful by the DNC.
I also posted the following messages, using my real name, everywhere. I was ostracized by friends, family and clients. Fun times.
"If identity really is all, then no white person can ever have an opinion on race, no man can have an opinion on feminism, no Gentile can have a position on Israel, no straight person can have an opinion about gays, and so on. Or, if they do, they’re simply displaying white supremacy, misogyny, anti-Semitism, and homophobia, which renders those opinions void before they have even been expressed. How much easier this is than refuting actual arguments, or judging an individual on the cogency of her arguments rather than the color of her skin, biological sex, or sexual orientation. How much simpler to deploy the words “mansplaining” or “whitesplaining” as an alternative to the somewhat harder task of refuting. But among many elite liberals today, identity has come to eclipse reason and even aspire to be reason itself.
This is why, at the end of 2017, I feel close to despair about the liberal-democratic project in the West. When it isn’t being assaulted by the identitarian thugs of the hard right, it is being corroded by the identitarian puritans of the “social justice” left. This is how liberal democracies die — or rather how they reveal that they are already, under the surface, dead." Andrew Sullivan
"Resistance is by nature reactive; it is not forward-looking. And anti-Trumpism is not a politics. My worry is that liberals will get so caught up in countering his every move, essentially playing his game, that they will fail to seize -- or even recognize -- the opportunity he has given them. Now that he has destroyed conventional Republicanism and what was left of principled conservatism, the playing field is empty. For the first time in living memory, we liberals have no ideological adversary worthy of the name. So it is crucial that we look beyond Trump.
The only adversary left is ourselves. And we have mastered the art of self-sabotage. At a time when we liberals need to speak in a way that convinces people from very different walks of life, in every part of the country, that they share a common destiny and need to stand together, our rhetoric encourages self-righteous narcissism. At a moment when political consciousness and strategizing need to be developed, we are expending our energies on symbolic drama over identity. At a time when it is crucial to direct our efforts into seizing institutional power by winning elections, we dissipate them in expressive movements indifferent to the effects they may have on the voting public. In an age when we need to educate young people to think of themselves as citizens with duties toward each other, we encourage them instead to descend into the rabbit hole of the self. The frustrating truth is that we have no political vision to offer the nation, and we are thinking and speaking and acting in ways guaranteed to prevent one from emerging."
-Mark Lilla, The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics
https://www.thefp.com/p/gender-affirming-care-dangerous-finland-doctor?triedRedirect=true
https://www.salon.com/2017/09/02/time-to-give-up-on-identity-politics-its-dragging-the-progressive-agenda-down/
Oh, and The Great Barrington Declaration...
But liberals already control most institutions including main line religion and education. That is what allows them to indulge in their obsessive identity politics destroying low income citizens the opportunity education and religion could give them by convincing people math is racist and religion is dead.
You invented the politics of self over country. I don't see how liberals seizing control of anything is in the country's interest.
Perhaps a touch of humility is what you need to cultivate now.
I took care of my 102 year old, sweet, father at my home. My husband's brother had died and we needed to go out of town for his memorial. There was a hospital that provided respite for such a situation so my dad was booked there for 3 days. When I went to pick him up the intercom asked if I had been fully vaxxed. I said I only had one because it very likely gave me Bell's Palsy. She told me I couldn't come in. I said to her, "oh, my father is here for respite but I guess this will be my father's new home then"? She opened the door and had me come in immediately. What a hypocritical farce. A bozo making the rules that could be changed in an instant to suit them. I dont automatically see the good in people anymore.
There are those of us who never got a spotlight in any way, who had no "rights" to be heard because no college degrees, who are now yes, spent, burnt out, ostracized, run out of society, have majorly been outcast and derailed from life. Seriously a tiny minority, and wondering where the rest of my people are. Because we've had to live in hiding for too damned long.
I got called a racist and screamed at at dinner a couple weeks ago for not agreeing the murder of the health care CEO was ok. It just kept escalating, with the shock of the liberals who couldn’t get their way. Oh Gay black “friends”, everyone needs them to experience the ongoing delusion.
I love your stuff on Taiwan. That is a people that is fucked based on the attitudes I heard.
Thanks.
The Taiwan stuff is of interest to so few people. We have great content, but few are interested. It’s a shame. But I am glad you like it!
I have very much appreciated the honesty and courage that you have shown over the past decade despite being u dear constant threat. I can understand your feelings.
I am also very frustrated by the fundamental lack of respect for the virtues of Honesty and Courage in our society. I believe that preference falsification has played a key role in the growth of Woke ideologies. The problem was not so much the true believing Woke as the “respectable” Center Left who pretended to be Woke in order to not be attacked.
The true believers were always a small minority, but it was the Center Left white males who let them into the institutions.
On the other hand, I know that humans are frail social animals with instincts to follow the group. I am glad that the fear has declined enough that many people are finally showing some honesty and being willing to state the obvious.
I can understand why this must infuriate a person like you who has sacrificed so much to tell the truth. I guess that I think that more people will embrace honesty if they know that they will be welcomed by those who fought the Woke through the entire period.
Might I suggest, though that you take the win and smile while gritting your teeth at these people. This problem is a hell of a lot better than another decade like the last.
By the way, I have written a bit on this issue, so you might be interested in my take:
https://frompovertytoprogress.substack.com/p/understanding-diversity-equity-and
https://frompovertytoprogress.substack.com/p/the-dangers-of-soft-totalitarianism
https://frompovertytoprogress.substack.com/p/the-rebirth-of-the-totalitarian-left
https://frompovertytoprogress.substack.com/p/radical-ideologies-feast-on-mental
I'm sorry, I'm going to have to take issue with your "criticizing moderate Muslims for not condemning radicals" comment and comparing it to the "cancel mobs" and "witch hunts" that you and your colleagues are more familiar with. It's just not a good comparison. There is a major difference between refusing to call out or condemn terrorism or terrorist organizations, and not speaking out for someone who is about to get fired for calling someone by the wrong pronoun. The former is far more violent, the latter extremely problematic but not the same in scale.