The modern American political system operates as an information-fueled oligarchy in which narrative control is the key to power. When power is based on narrative control, any alternative story that helps the population make sense of what is happening is a threat to the ruling elite.
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00:00:30.000The mainstream media was finally forced to admit the truth last week after research published in The Lancet revealed that the natural immunity acquired from COVID infection provides protection either equal to or superior to that granted by two doses of mRNA vaccine.
00:00:46.880Outlets like NBC News ran headlines prominently displaying a medical fact that was dismissed as a right-wing conspiracy theory for years by those same media outlets.
00:00:57.400Conservative commentators, politicians, and even prominent physicians were regularly deplatformed from social media for stating simple medical facts that have been later proven scientifically, but no apology will be coming from the cult of COVID.
00:01:12.760Due to the constant stream of propaganda coming from both media and government, trust in American institutions is cratering, especially among conservatives.
00:01:23.500We are all seeking truth, but average people don't have time to sift every piece of data or read every study.
00:01:30.260They need reliable authorities that can be trusted to help evaluate and understand information.
00:01:36.880When the authorities charged with this task prove completely corrupt, individuals will speculate and grasp for narratives that help them make sense of the world around them.
00:01:46.520Many of those narratives will prove true, but just as many will prove false, which allows the left to smear all opposing narratives as conspiracy theories that can be easily dismissed.
00:01:57.840The right lacks a network of parallel sense-making institutions to offer credible alternatives to the lies of the progressive left, and this puts conservatives at a distinct disadvantage in the battle for truth.
00:02:11.340The modern American political system operates as an information-fueled oligarchy in which narrative control is the key to power.
00:02:20.720When popular sovereignty is the only acceptable mechanism for granting legitimacy, those that seek to maintain power must control the ways in which voters receive and process information.
00:02:33.220Progressives understand this well, which is why they are invested heavily in controlling institutions like the media,
00:02:40.060universities, Hollywood, and public education, which shape the way Americans see the world around them.
00:02:47.220When power is based on narrative control, any alternative story that helps the population make sense of what is happening is a threat to the power of the ruling elite.
00:02:56.960This is why progressives work so hard to deny conservatives access to institutions that grant credibility and help to coordinate information.
00:03:05.240Academics, entertainers, media figures, and anyone else who weaves our cultural narratives must declare allegiance to progressive power constantly or face immediate destruction.
00:03:17.040When actors with mildly conservative opinions get blacklisted in Hollywood or professors with dissenting opinions are rejected from academia, a clear message is sent.
00:03:28.280Any deviation from the approved storyline will destroy your career.
00:03:33.400We hope you're enjoying your Air Canada flight.
00:04:03.580The lack of access to authoritative institutions robs the right of the tools necessary to participate in narrative warfare.
00:04:11.800In our modern age, research and data have been held up as the most powerful ways to grant legitimacy to any argument.
00:04:19.580But if only one team decides what data is legitimate and which topics are allowed to be researched, then that team gains a monopoly on truth.
00:04:28.380If heterodox research is defunded and blacklisted, then the opposition never has access to the data necessary to grant its position credibility.
00:04:38.140The left not only denies conservatives access to authoritative institutions, but also works to make basic conversation impossible in the public square.
00:04:47.600For years, any attempt by the right to have discussions on issues like the pandemic or even gender identity had to be heavily coded to avoid censorship on large platforms like social media.
00:04:59.080The language and assumptions of the left had to be adopted to even attempt the discussion, because failing to do so would result in an immediate ban, even for prominent figures or those with legitimate expertise.
00:05:12.240Scientific truth was no defense, because truth was determined by political affiliation, not empirical fact.
00:05:18.980This made it impossible for the right to coordinate any cohesive narrative to challenge the ruling elite and led the opposition to splinter into dozens of subgroups, each pursuing its own version of the truth.
00:05:31.340The difficulty the right has in sorting fallacious theories from legitimate opposing narratives is not a mistake.
00:05:38.820It's an intentional feature cultivated by the progressive hegemony of sense-making institutions.
00:05:44.100An observant reader will notice that ideas labeled right-wing conspiracy theories by the mainstream press have a shockingly good batting average when it comes to being vindicated.
00:05:54.960When all your sense-making institutions have been thoroughly corrupted, betting against them indiscriminately is a pretty good strategy.
00:06:02.780It's not, however, a good long-term way for your side to arrive reliably at the truth.
00:06:08.940Many joke about InfoWars host Alex Jones and his gift of prophecy,
00:06:12.860but there's nothing magical about what he's doing.
00:06:15.880Jones is just embracing the exact opposite of whatever narrative the insanely corrupt oligarchy is demanding its institutions push onto the public.
00:06:25.500This means the InfoWars host is often right when far more respectable sources are wrong,
00:06:31.520though when this strategy fails, it fails rather spectacularly, and in a way that causes permanent damage to one's reputation.
00:06:38.520Our current elite rule through a distributed network of prestige,
00:06:42.760which relies on each node in the oligarchy to grant legitimacy to each other institution in the network.
00:06:49.540The New York Times relies on expertise from Harvard and Yale,
00:06:53.540whose professors in turn rely on glowing articles and book reviews from the paper of record.
00:06:59.360This symbiotic relationship exists across the entire network of sense-making institutions in the United States and the wider Western world.
00:07:07.300The good news for those who oppose progressivism is that the network is degenerating.
00:07:13.280The generation that has inherited this narrative manufacturing device is far stupider and less disciplined than those who constructed it.
00:07:21.280The ruling elite are now so corrupt that they are burning the legitimacy of their network for cheap paydays
00:07:27.180and the opportunity to humiliate their enemies, which naturally brings about instability.
00:07:31.900The regime elite shut down small businesses to enrich their powerful corporate donors,
00:07:37.800then found scientists who were willing to lie about violent Black Lives Matter protests not spreading COVID.
00:07:44.720That's the kind of vulgar display of power used by third world dictators,
00:07:49.240not the delicate manipulation of a sophisticated information network.
00:07:53.060The job of the right going forward is twofold.
00:07:56.640To accelerate the destruction of credibility that is already underway in leftist institutions
00:08:02.600and to create alternatives that the public can turn to as those institutions collapse.
00:08:08.480Instead of attempting to reform or correct institutions that progressives have captured,
00:08:13.220the right should seek to erode their prestige at every opportunity.
00:08:17.040These institutions should be mocked, discredited, and treated as irrelevant whenever possible.
00:08:22.220At the same time, conservative leaders must seek to carve out spaces for the right
00:08:27.420to generate alternative institutions that will fill the void.
00:08:31.540Governor Ron DeSantis is working with Chris Ruffo to transform New College in Florida
00:08:36.720into an institution where the right can flourish.
00:08:39.540These are early days, and it's yet to be seen whether the effort will be successful.
00:08:44.280But these are the exact kinds of moves the right must make.
00:08:47.820The progressive monopoly on the narrative fed to Americans cannot be broken
00:08:51.960until the right has an alternative network in which it can seek truth.