Political Psychologist (MSc) deradicalizing your mum | Shitposts mixed with research | We're not outnumbered, just out-propagandized| Never doom 🦅🇪🇺 🇺🇸
Hades
Joined April 2024
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Horseshoe Theory™️ has always been real - at least in psychological terms!
Left- and right-wing authoritarians share the same traits*, they just aim them at different targets.
Social media reinforces extremist views by creating cultish echo chambers that authoritarians then can weaponize for their own goals.
We are all part of this profitable radicalization pipeline, and simply by publicly taking a political position, we will likely trigger an authoritarian's dogmatic need for absolutist categories...
And if you're not on their side (aka "the good team"), it logically follows that you are an evil motherfucker (aka "the bad team") who deserves harassment 💀
BTW: By analyzing which rage-inducing side shows up most on your timeline, you might learn how the algorithm has classified you internally $$$
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*(Additional traits not on the graphic: 1. seeing the world as dangerous, 2. mental rigidity.)
Political psychologists keep finding the same pattern: the extremes on both sides think alike, and the middle thinks differently.
Moderates score lower on rigidity, overconfidence and conspiracy thinking. Independents were more mentally flexible than Democrats or Republicans.
Extremists are also more likely to believe complex problems have simple solutions, like blaming everything on "immigrants" or "the rich."
And the more extreme the views, the higher the authoritarianism on both sides (Costello 2022 preprint).
More on this in part 2 tomorrow ⏰
Asmo Studio retweeted
There is no known universe where I'm okay on any level with any person who endorsed that nazi rapist Graham Platner.
Asmo Studio retweeted
Finland refuses to withdraw from NATO at Russia’s demand — Bloomberg.
Comments by the Finnish Minister of Defence regarding these demands came in response to a report published in *Bild* concerning negotiations with Russia. Antti Häkkänen described the demands from the "swamp empire" [Russia] as absolutely outrageous, noting that they are intended to test the resolve of the U.S. and Europe within the negotiation process.
"Russia wants European NATO member states to limit their operations in Russia's interest, but such matters are not up for discussion," Häkkänen told reporters in Helsinki on Friday.
Commenting on the negotiations in Abu Dhabi, the Finnish Defence Minister added:
"In recent days, Russia has clearly decided to test how flexible the U.S. and Europe are. It is evident that Russia is not serious about peace talks; rather, it is expanding its demands—moving beyond the war in Ukraine to seeking a restructuring of the European security architecture in a way that favors Russia. Western policymakers must realize that this is part of a Russian psychological strategy—one employed for decades—aimed at altering the terms of negotiations to our disadvantage. We must not fall for their bluff."
Russia is demanding that Finland withdraw from NATO and that Moldova be transformed into a federal republic—coupled with "independence for Transnistria and Gagauzia." These are just a few of the conditions mentioned by Russian representatives during unofficial negotiations regarding an end to the war in Ukraine, reports *Bild*.
Other demands from Moscow include:
➡️ NATO must agree not to establish military bases in Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania;
➡️ Russia must retain control over all occupied Ukrainian territories;
➡️ The entire Donbas—including parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions currently controlled by Ukraine—must be handed over to Russia;
➡️ Ukraine must adopt a non-aligned status and renounce any intention to join NATO (though EU accession is not ruled out);
➡️ The ports of Mykolaiv and Odesa must be "demilitarized";
➡️ Agreements must be reached regarding freedom of navigation in the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea;
➡️ Should Moldova join the EU, Transnistria and Gagauzia must be granted the right to hold referendums on their independence.
In return, Moscow is reportedly prepared to withdraw nuclear weapons from Belarus, refrain from stationing intermediate-range missiles there, and pull Russian troops out of Transnistria.
How should Europe respond to these outrageous demands?
1/ Is populism a function of culture or money?
I've been reading Lammert & Vormann (see sources) on this and I agree that the framing itself is the problem, which makes it annoying to see so many panels using it.
Short version: both camps describe the same thing from different ends and mostly skip the part that matters, which is politics🧵
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10/ How do we do that?
We start by getting educated and by networking politically as much as we can!
A good start to read is Lammert & Vormann, who argue quite elegantly that feeling the system is unfair may explain more than the Gini coefficient (inequality index).
Link to the chapter and the free full book, "The Palgrave Handbook of Populism," below.
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SOURCES 📚
Base article
• Lammert, C., & Vormann, B. (2022). "Populist Mobilization in the United States: Adding Political Economy to Cultural Explanations." In M. Oswald (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Populism (pp. 263–). Palgrave Macmillan. www2.itif.org/2021-palgrave-… · Publisher: doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80…
Tweet 2: China shock and the cultural thesis
• Autor, D., Dorn, D., Hanson, G., & Majlesi, K. (2017). A Note on the Effect of Rising Trade Exposure on the 2016 Presidential Election. econpapers.repec.org/RePEc:p… · PDF: mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/1128…
• Autor, D., Dorn, D., Hanson, G., & Majlesi, K. (2020). "Importing Political Polarization? The Electoral Consequences of Rising Trade Exposure." American Economic Review 110(10), 3139–3183. doi.org/10.1257/aer.20170011 · Free reprint: ifn.se/media/3j2pjs2o/reprin…
• Norris, P., & Inglehart, R. (2019). Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and Authoritarian Populism. Cambridge University Press.
Tweet 3: incomes and male employment
• Page, B. I., & Gilens, M. (2017). Democracy in America? What Has Gone Wrong and What We Can Do About It. University of Chicago Press. everand.com/book/615832301/D…
• Bivens, J. America the Unequal: Origins and Impacts of a Policy Revolution. Demos. demos.org/sites/default/file…
• Bivens, J. (2017, December 12). "Inequality Is Slowing U.S. Economic Growth: Faster Wage Growth for Low- and Middle-Wage Workers Is the Solution." Economic Policy Institute. epi.org/136654/pre/68059a63e…
• Elkjær, M. A., & Iversen, T. (2022). Class Politics (working paper). websites.harvard.edu/iversen…
• Eberstadt, N. (2016). Men Without Work: America's Invisible Crisis. Templeton Press. Author's 2024 slides: apps.legislature.ky.gov/Comm…
• Review and critique of Eberstadt, The American Prospect (2017). prospect.org/2017/04/26/men-…
• 2016 exit polls, CNN. cnn.com/election/results/exi…
Tweet 4: trust, responsiveness, money, lobbying
• Pew Research Center (2025). Public Trust in Government: 1958–2025. pewresearch.org/politics/202…
• Gilens, M., & Page, B. I. (2014). "Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens." Perspectives on Politics 12(3), 564–581. doi.org/10.1017/S15375927140… · Related working paper: russellsage.org/sites/defaul…
• Northwestern IPR, summary of Page & Gilens (2018). ipr.northwestern.edu/news/20…
• Allen-West, C. (2016, November 7). Post on research presented by Benjamin Page (Northwestern University) and Christopher Wlezien (University of Texas at Austin) at the Center for Political Studies Interdisciplinary Workshop on Politics and Policy. CPS Blog, Center for Political Studies, University of Michigan. cpsblog.isr.umich.edu/?p=172…
• Bonica, A., McCarty, N., Poole, K. T., & Rosenthal, H. (2013). "Why Hasn't Democracy Slowed Rising Inequality?" Journal of Economic Perspectives 27(3), 103–124. legacy.voteview.com/pdf/jep_…
• Sunlight Foundation (2013). The Political 1% of the 1% in 2012. sunlightfoundation.com/2013/…
• Brady, H. E., Schlozman, K. L., & Verba, S. (2013, March 1). "Unequal Citizen Voice and the Broken Promise of American Democracy." Scholars Strategy Network. scholars.org/print/pdf/node/…
• Schlozman, K. L., Verba, S., & Brady, H. E. (2012). The Unheavenly Chorus: Unequal Political Voice and the Broken Promise of American Democracy. Princeton University Press.
Tweet 5: perceived unfairness and the dignity deficit
• Brooks, A. C. (2017). "The Dignity Deficit: Reclaiming Americans' Sense of Purpose." Foreign Affairs 96(2). foreignaffairs.com/articles/…
• Darvas, Z., & Efstathiou, K. (2016). "Income Inequality Boosted Trump Vote." Bruegel. bruegel.org/2016/11/income-i…
• Zingales, L. (2012). A Capitalism for the People: Recapturing the Lost Genius of American Prosperity. Basic Books. archive.org/details/capitali…
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Asmo Studio retweeted
There is the new rhetorical trick leftist scum like Hamas supporter Mehdi Hasan do where they call liberals ‘centrists’ -don’t fall for this piece of dog shit’s tricks
"These people attacking us are Haley Stevens Democrats."
@mehdirhasan and Jennifer Welch theorize why centrists like Neera Tanden continually amplify right-wing smears against leftists.
Watch the full episode of 'We're Not Kidding,' tap the link in replies.
Asmo Studio retweeted
Yeah, "what if we can trick tired trump to do good things and just let him take credit" was a cute idea that every adult in America had a decade ago and we quickly learned it wouldn't work.
We shouldn't feed him or help him. Just grayrock and sweep power ourselves when he's gone.
Asmo Studio retweeted
Pelosi co-sponsored universal single-payer legislation in 1993.
congress.gov/bill/103rd-cong…
When Hakeem Jeffries sounds more like AOC than Nancy Pelosi, you know the Overton window has officially shifted and progressive ideas have won
teapawt.org/teamhakeemhq/status/21…
1/ Political psychology spent decades treating authoritarianism as a right-wing trait. Some researchers called left-wing authoritarianism "the Loch Ness Monster" of the field. A 2022 study of ~7,000 people says it's real, and measurable 🧵
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3/ What it predicts: dogmatism, low intellectual humility, moral disengagement, enjoying opponents' suffering, and support for political violence.
On intolerance, conspiracy beliefs and coldheartedness, left- and right-wing authoritarians were nearly identical.
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4/ The takeaway isn't "the left is bad." It's that authoritarianism is a personality style, not an ideology.
If you only watch for it on one side, you'll miss it on yours.
Costello et al. (2022), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: scottlilienfeld.com/wp-conte…
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