Intersectionality and words as behavior-guiding categorizers

An introduction to leftist semantics

I have not posted in a while because I’ve been and still am working on a personal project which has been taking up both the time and inspiration that is needed for me to write these essays, but I’ve just been exposed to the ideal catalyst that let me synthesize a couple of ideas that I’ve been pondering for a while.

This tweet is a perfect illustration of the leftist relationship to the meaning of words. Most rational people (read: sane men) rightfully get confused by this word salad, because it’s rife with semantic contradictions, which means it has no semantic meaning (as a whole). But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any meaning, as this word salad actually has a very clear meaning, it maps very accurately on a set of relationships between concepts, it’s just that these concepts are not what we (sane men) think they should be. Incidentally, you can see the exact same situation in this Dr. Phil clip where Matt Walsh tries to debate two tr@nnyz on the meaning of woman, but fails to get his meaning across¹.

Before we proceed, let’s do some rectification of names:

• Semantics is the study of the meaning of words.

• Semantic meaning is the descriptive quality of a word - the semantic meaning of the word apple is round, baseball sized, red (yellow or green) fruit with a meaty center and sweet flavor. The semantic meaning of the word oligarch is a very rich Russian business leader with a great deal of political influence. Whoops, that’s actually the meaning of oligarch according to leftist semantics. My bad.

• Leftist semantic meaning is the meaning of words within a leftist moral, ideological and epistemological framework.

• Right wing semantic or rational semantic or GNON-compliant or reality-compliant semantic meaning is the meaning of words within an epistemological framework that is reality compliant.

A case study in leftist semantics

Let’s, as the chick in the tweet would probably say, unpack this (the tweet). As I’m writing this I’m suddenly struck with the notion that this could just as well be a tr@nny, but let’s proceed with the assumption that it’s a woman (according to RW semantics).

Lesbians can like men and lesbians can be men

She starts with two clear contradictions. Lesbian is a word used to refer to women that are sexually attracted to other women. And yet apparently men can describe themselves as lesbians and women that are attracted to men can also describe themselves as lesbians. This is the first insight into leftist semantics: the primary purpose of words is not to describe parts of reality.

In other words, in RW semantics a word is a descriptor, a label that carries a meaning - the description of an object that exists in reality. The word is an accurate label for said object if the description invoked by the word matches the properties of the object as observed in reality. If I refer to an apple as orange, then I am using an inaccurate label, because orange doesn’t invoke a description that fits the object that I am referring to. Hence I must refer to it as apple.

Put more simply, in RW semantics reality is primary and our description of it is secondary. As I’ve noted in my post on consensus vs truth there is a difference between the map and the territory - our model of reality and reality itself. The relationship between map and territory is one of the primary distinctions between right-wing and left-wing philosophy. RWphil puts the territory before the map - the map is judged according to its adherence to the territory. LWphil puts the map before the territory - the territory (the world as it is) is judged according to its adherence to the map (the world as the leftist wishes it to be), because all leftwing philosophy stems from the fundamental leftist impulse of inverting status hierarchies until the leftist xemself is on top. In the same vein, in leftist semantics words are not judged by their adherence to reality, which can only mean that their purpose is something other than describing reality.

What lesbian is is an umbrella term and up for people to decide what they mean for themselves

She continues by stating that lesbian is really a general term, a category, that contains many variations and anyone can decide what being a lesbian really means for them. This gives us our second insight: In leftist semantics, words are categorizers that denote group identity.

A key facet of contemporary leftist philosophy is intersectionality the idea that one’s identity within society is predicated on their belonging to various subgroups of said society. Because these subgroups are not equal in status, a person’s level of oppression is determined by their intersectional identity - the more oppressed groups a person belongs to, the more oppressed xey are. This ties back into Thuletide’s oppression olympics pyramid that I described in my post on leftist power (the picture has since been removed from his post, it seems). As an example, a straight white man is not oppressed at all, because he belongs to the oppressor group, whereas a black nonbinary pansexual transwoman is oppressed to the third power (oppressed race x oppressed orientation x oppressed identity).

Words are thus categorizers that denote group identity and confer status according to said group identity. If in RW semantics, a word is a label with a descriptive function; in leftist semantics, words are labels with a categorizing function. But, in accordance with leftist philosophy, these labels don’t need to match reality. You can categorize yourself as a woman even if the semantic meaning of the word woman doesn’t describe the physical characteristics of your body. In doing so you claim the oppressed identity of womanhood - all the struggles of women worldwide are your struggles. And according to this identity you receive status in the leftist moral and ideological framework. Same goes for the word lesbian. Let’s move on to the last part of the twatter post:

There are straight lesbians, mspec lesbians, asexual lesbians, and non-binary lesbians and all of them are valid.

This is where intersectionality shows its ugly face. Oppressed people are part of the tribe, oppressors are enemies of the tribe. Lesbians are a subcategory of all oppressed and marginalized people and it itself has a variety of subcategories, each with their own experience of oppression, thus their own status and rank in the hierarchy of victimhood. In this case, the ranking goes like this: NB lez > asex lez > mrspec lez > str8 lez. Note that that tweet mentions them in the opposite order, from least oppressed to most oppressed and therefore from least valid to most valid. From this follows our third insight into leftist semantics: words have a status ascribing function.

So far we’ve learned the following about leftist semantics:

1. leftist semantics is a subset of leftist philosophy/leftist epistemology

2. in leftist semantics, words are not descriptors of reality

3. words are instead categorizers that denote group identity and confer status based on the intersectionality of one’s group identity

Applying this to the above tweet lets us translate its contents from leftist or wokish, as James Lindsay would say, into english.

Men can choose categorize themselves as lesbians and women who like men can categorize themselves as lesbians. Lesbian is not a descriptive term, it is a a group identity that confers oppressed status to those that identify with it. There are straight lesbians, mrspec lesbians, asexual lesbians, and non-binary lesbians and all of them are valid and each next one is more valid than the previous one.

Neither leftist nor wokish is the truly correct term, however. In light of this gem of a tweet I saw today:

The correct term is obviously womanese, as our forefathers surely knew before us.

Right wing vs left wing as masculine vs feminine

I’ve spoken before on the topic of leftism and I have a half finished draft on the topic of female power sitting in my dashboard which was supposed to cover parts of this topic, but inspiration led me in a different direction this time.

If we return to the distinction between RWphil and LWphil being predicated on an inverse understanding of the relationship between map and territory, we can find a foundation upon which to build our comparison between RW/LW and masculinity/femininity.

A quick detour into physiology and evolutionary psychology. Men are bigger and stronger than women, better at spatial manipulation and tool use, as well as logical problem solving and numeric computation. In other words men are better at interacting with and manipulating the natural world. That is a massive comparative advantage, which calls into question how women can even compete. The answer is, of course, because women don’t need to manipulate the natural world. Women instead manipulate men into manipulating the natural world for them. An insight that struck me while I was working out a few days ago - we men love to watch our reflections in the mirror while doing curls. Women on the other hand, love showing themselves doing lunges, squats and similar stuff. In other words, a man’s favorite activity in the gym is admiring his arm pump, whereas a woman’s favorite activity in the gym is having her ass admired. Ok, everyone knows this, but the interesting part was why? The obvious answer that springs to mind is that women like guys with big arms, whereas guys like chicks with a nice ass. But I think that’s a second level cause, the fundamental cause is that:

• men are metaphysically attached to their arms because they are the instrument used to exert our will on the external world

• women are metaphysically attached to their posteriors (and other secondary sexual characteristics) because they are the instrument used to exert their will on the external world

This is because men influence the world directly, whereas women influence it indirectly, by influencing a man into exerting her will.

If we accept the men as manipulators of reality, women as manipulators of men (and I mean manipulation in the neutral meaning of the term, not the negative connotation) model, then we can begin to make sense of the difference between RW (really masculine) and LW (really feminine) semantics. In masculine semantics, words are descriptors that are judged based on their correspondence to reality - because an organism that needs to learn how to interact with reality needs to be able to accurately describe and communicate about reality. In feminine semantics, words are categorizers that are judged based on their ability to confer status - because an organism that doesn’t need to directly interact with reality and instead interacts primarily with other people needs only a rudimentary grasp on description. It is much more important for women to understand how to use words to make themselves the highest status possible, because that means they will have the maximum amount of reality manipulating organisms (men) at their disposal. This means that for men it makes sense to attempt to align the map with the territory, whereas for women it makes sense to attempt to align the territory with the map.

I’ve spoken about leftist hierarchies being based on victimhood in my post on the leftist relationship to power and contrasted this with right-wing hierarchies that are based on competence, but this too can be translated to the woman/man distinction. The reality manipulating organism acquires status based on competence - proficiency at reality manipulation, whereas the man manipulating organism acquires status based on helplessness and victimhood, because like their indirect connection to reality, women acquire status based on the willingness of men to do things for them. Helplessness and victimhood are status-positive for women and attractive to men because the (perceived) helplessness of a woman inflates the man’s perception of his own competence, therefore inflating his self-perception of his own status. Thus leftist moral frameworks and hierarchies are really female moral frameworks. Formimg hierarchies and ascribing status based on intersectionality and oppression olympics is just the female version of the dick measuring contest. Feminized men participate in them because they instinctively sense their inability to compete in male hierarchies, but every human has a desire to increase their status, therefore they employ female tactics in their pursuit of status as a man by redefining what it means to be a man. Which brings us to the punchline.

Leftist semantics seeks to subvert status hierarchies by applying high status labels (signifiers) to low status objects (signifieds)

In leftist (womanese) semantics, words are categorizers that denote group identity and confer status based on the intersectionality of one’s group identity. And the purpose of words is to twist their meaning in order to be able to apply a high status label to a low status object. The redefinition of words, the invention of new meanings, the inversion of old meanings - these are all tools for the navigation of leftist (female) status hierarchies. If a man can redefine woman to be able to apply it to himself he can now cash in on the victimhood status conferred to women and rise through the ranks of the victimhood hierarchy/oppression olympics. Higher status within the leftist tribe means you get to puke more word salad from your mouth while your subordinates are forced to listen and affirm everything you’re saying.

This makes sense if we apply it to the masculine/feminine distinction again. Men raise their status by increasing their competence - their ability to manipulate reality - and are rewarded for it by getting to tell other men how to manipulate reality (women tell you what to do, not how to do it²). Women raise their status by increasing their victimhood, or more generally, their correspondence to a high status trait by twisting the meaning of said high status trait to incorporate characteristics that describe her. And the result is that she gets to redefine words some more, so that they correspond even better to her actual description. In concrete terms, a man becomes Chad by adopting all of the characteristics of Chad, a woman becomes beautiful by changing the definition of beauty to describe literally her.

This dynamic is not limited to female (victimhood-based) status hierarchies. Women try to maximize their status by redefining [high status trait] to correspond more closely to them all the time (see Sailer’s first law of female journalism). It’s just that doing so within a intersectional victimhood status hierarchy leads to the largest amount of semantic erosion, as it’s basically femininity to the third power (redefinition of words x victimhood x intersectionality). The result is words that lose all semantic value and become buzzwords - pure categorizers that denote group identity and confer status, guide behavior based on that identity. Obviously this doesn’t happen to all words, although not for a lack of trying. The main targets are words that categorize groups of different status, because you are incentivized to twist their meaning in order to increase your status.

I’ve now realised that what I’ve just described is very similar to the Nrx concept of holiness spiraling (also referred to in my article on Scientism), which makes sense, since holiness spiraling is a core facet of leftism. Apparently also of being a woman.

Some might protest my leftism = femininity interpretation, because a lot of leading leftist thinkers were men. My rebuttal would be that being a man is hard. Particularly for intellectually inclined men, truly embodying your masculinity can be hard because you get trapped in your thoughts. This can lead to a deficient masculinity in your early years, compared to your peers. The challenge life presents you with is thus: will you embrace your masculinity and hone your body so that it is no longer overshadowed by your mind, or will you reject it while envying competent and healthy men? Leftist philosophers overwhelmingly chose the second option, discarded their masculinity and resorted to the feminine strategy of redefining manhood, strength, authority, hierarchy, health and everything else that makes society tick. Leftist analysis of societal power dynamics is always motivated by a desire to invert them in order to put the leftist on top. To those who would like to refute this last paragraph, post fizeek.

1. Full video for those interested

2. Well in reality they don’t even tell you what they want, you are supposed to intuit it from a series of vague cues, but I am just stressing the difference between male and female instructions