/lit/ - Literature

>>18939760
Hi I'm the original guy. I'm don't dispute that PhilosophyTube is a pontificator and an attention-whore. Virtually anyone with a half-way successful YouTube channel is (c.f. Fantano). I'm also not awestruck by their degree, despite what you seem to have read into my comment. For what it's worth I go to a University generally regarded as better than theirs. I'm not a devotee of the channel (don't think I've watched a single video since they transitioned, actually) and I don't think I've particularly taken to heart any of the ideas they've put across in their videos.As far as I'm concerned, they simply originate or regurgitate mildly interesting (if non-profound) theses and present them in an entertaining and high-production-value way. Sometimes the ideas they have presented have led me to seek out similar expositions from more rigorous thinkers, which is partly why I said I find them worth watching.

You are concerned that I am undiscerning. To this I would say; I do read the difficult, challenging texts that /lit/ adores, I do devote time to climbing intellectual Munros such as writing poetry and learning foreign languages - but (as is the case for 99% of people) it's not feasible for me to do challenging things all the time. So given that I know I'm going to watch shite on YouTube at least some of the time, as far as I'm concerned it's better that it at least be fertile shite. For me, channels like Philosophy Tube, that do engage with some intellectual topics, even if in a superficial/narcissistic/populist way do a reasonable job of filling this niche.

The extent of your fury bemuses me. Do you consider this channel to be a radicalising influence, taking in angsty young people and spitting out blue ticks? I suggest that if someone were to be radicalised by PhilosophyTube then they were heading that way to begin with. I personally trust my ability to engage with media, with ideas, without them infecting my thought.

It's ironic to me that one of the common threads of thought shared between both reactionaries and progressives in the present moment is the near reverence of propaganda and information hazards. Progressives live in fear of the 'alt right pipeline', reactionaries seethe at the 'globohomo agenda'. The honestly held belief that it is possible to dispassionately and hermetically interact with an idea seems to be a dying one. In any case, I at least still hold it.