Please note the image on this article comes from Twitter User @QuantumofSouls
I’m going to let you in on a secret.
There’s no such thing as a grass roots movement.
Okay, that’s a bit of an overstatement. Grass roots movements exist but they take a very, very long time to grow. Think fifteen to twenty years. For that reason, although there might be a couple in the charity or religious space, they are almost nonexistent in politics. How could it work? Politics moves too fast. Any movement you started today around any hot button political topic would be completely irrelevant in six months, to say nothing of a decade or two. But, the idea of them is seductive. People love it. The idea of a pure movement of the body politic towards some good end, uncorrupted by corporate greed or bureaucratic machination. In some sense that’s the entire idea behind Democracy itself. Doesn’t work though. It’s a fairy tale. You’re being played.
Outside of the shockingly rare exception, almost everybody on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and so forth that’s at all popular is playing a game, and that game is GET VIEWS. Just like the other games on your phone, there’s the free way to play, where you have to wait a long time to get gold to build your farmhouse or watch X many ads to get another life; and then there’s the pay to play model, where you skip all that in exchange for cash. Twitter is no different. And note, here I’m not talking about the “official” promotion option that is offered by Twitter.com. That’s for suckers. It looks like an ad and so people ignore it. It’s a waste of money. But there is another sort of advertisement you can use, one that doesn’t look like an advertisement at all. You can pay other, larger accounts to give you street cred.
Retweets, Quote Tweets, even Twitter Fights. Most of these that you see are entirely orchestrated. If you see a big account (let’s say over 100K followers) and they have their “DMs open”, that’s code for, “ask me how much for a retweet”. Not cheap by the way. They can go for around $100 bucks a tweet, often sold in bundles of 10. I know because I’ve asked. I’ve never purchased, but I’ve asked. So, yes, for one twitter boost from a big account you’re looking at spending at least one thousand dollars. If you’re trying to grow your account for business reasons, it’s probably worth it. To any normal person just using it like a microblog or to follow news trends, that sounds insane. It arguably is insane. But, hey, here we are.
Those two Instagram body builders having a beef and “calling each other out?” That’s fake too. Drama drives engagement. It gets eyeballs. They message one another and decide on a plan to have a fake fight, often litigiously scripted down to the sentence to make sure neither “brand” is damaged by having something said of them that might make them lose followers. It’s no different than MMA fighters pretending to hate each other before a pay-per-view. Occasionally that hate is real but most of the time it’s just hype. Conor McGregor was the king of this. Sure, the fights are real (most of the time) but all the drama around them isn’t. The guys who actually lose their heads and get emotionally invested in such things never get out local fight venues in the back of dingy bar rooms. At the pro level, everybody’s first and foremost a businessman. Speaking of, you think those Jake Paul bouts aren’t scripted?
Look, in today’s world, everything’s about turning a buck. In this way the radical leftists are sort of right when they blame everything on Capitalism. For better or worse society has become a dog-eat-dog competition and people are doing and saying whatever they can to come out on top. People like to believe that the people they follow on all these social media networks got there just by the strength of their message, or their hard work, but the truth is they’re all paying to play. Success goes to those with cash, not necessarily to those with good ideas. Ninety percent of people served up on your screen as an “expert” or an “influencer” are there because the system took their money and decided that you were a good target for their “personal brand.” If you take your political cues or fitness advice or investing tips from someone on social media, congrats, you’re views and opinions were, quite literally, bought and paid for. There’s nothing organic about them. They aren’t served up for your consumption because of their quality. They’re ads. Paid ads. A “personal brand” is just a living advertisement. Somehow, capitalism has figured out how to turn people into biological billboards. Sort of impressive when you think about it.
But here’s the thing. It works because you buy it. The grifter with his grifting message? You want it. You click the “like” button. You subscribe. You enjoy the feelings he or she gives you. Maybe they make you feel righteous indignation because “Just look at those EVIL republicans! We’re the good ones.” Maybe they make you feel despair, thus giving you a reason not to try. That’s a big market actually, selling people the ability to feel good about the fact they’ve given up. “I can’t succeed anyway. Too much immigration, can’t get a job.” Or maybe they make you feel important, like you’re apart of something. Maybe they make you feel scared. People like that. Getting scared that “Democracy Dies in Darkness!” is sort of like the next level of a horror movie. It might be real. All the spookier. Whatever it is, those playing the influencer game on the pay to play model have dialed in a message and aesthetic that people want. They succeed because they’re offering a product that there’s demand for. That’s it. They’re not honest, nor genuine, nor really telling you their true opinions. They’re crafting an experience that you enjoy consuming. From Tucker Carlson to Anderson Cooper to the recently exposed Jack Murphy. They’re just content creators. No different from an overly excited minecraft Youtuber. They’re making the content they are because it gets views.
This doesn’t mean they’re not useful or that they never tell you true things. Far from it. A fitness influencer may very well have good solid tips to get in better shape. A news anchor may be telling you something vaguely close to true. A political blue check on twitter might be giving you her honest opinion. But, if they are, it’s because their audience just so happens to also like it. If the audience didn’t like it, they’d shut up about it and tweet something else instead. That’s how they got popular. That’s how they play the game.
I don’t blame them. I get it. I write and podcast about God and living a good life where you try not to hold anger or hate others. That’s not overly marketable because people don’t like to support such things with money. They like outrage. Feeling righteously upset. Drama. Sex, drugs, and adrenaline. I’ve felt the temptation to just tell people what they want to hear lots of times. A few times I have, and, what’d’ya’know. It works. Lots of likes. Retweets. Subscriptions. But I felt cheap afterwards. I don’t believe one should try to alter the message about God to get more money, or more likes. And there’s enough people selling anger. So, I don’t. I’m not opposed in principle to buying retweets I guess, they’re just damned expensive. If I ever alter what I’m saying to be more popular though, I’ll know I’ve crossed a line. I even counter the impulse sometimes by posting absurdities, just to drive people away, to make sure I’m not in this for the clout. But I get why others do it. I don’t blame them. The world is hard and grifting is nowhere near the most immoral way to make a buck. Banking is worse in my opinion, so.
Here’s the thing though. Remember this. You get grifted it’s because you wanted it. You wanted what they were selling. As a rule, people don’t want to support and pay for wholesome, so it doesn’t get served. Supply and demand. You want better media? Toss a few bucks towards people trying to make it. And by that I don’t mean me, although, sure, if you want to, God knows I could use it. But rather, I mean, if you’re spending your money on people that deal in outrage and anger and fear, why would you be surprised that that’s what you’re getting in return? The state of this country, the state of this world, it’s nothing more than the result of our collective desires. We pay for hypersexualization, violence, anger, greed. Just look at what’s on T.V. That’s what people pay for. It’s what they want.
So, next time, don’t be too shocked when your favorite pundit or influencer turns out to have been grifting all along.
You get what you pay for.
Now I understand why Scott Adams makes me feel dirty.
This is why democracy is always actually aristocracy.