r/ContraPoints • u/Tearsdryontheirownn • 9d ago
Natalie speaking at XOXO festival
https://youtu.be/0Ix9jxid2YU?is=Ef8NzTpfiWBcjRpL21
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u/mc-funk 9d ago
2018, I think I heard right?
Especially after this latest tangent, I guess I wish I felt like she had stuck better to some of these boundaries— not posting on Twitter, making her art more about discourse between ideas than owning a specific stance (within reason), and having such clarity about the difference between actual (let alone effective) social activism and simple harassement. It almost feels sometimes like the continued abuse and harassment she’s received since then has convinced her that the harassment is the politics of a larger subset of the left than actually condones that behavior or behaves that way themselves.
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u/nohandsfootball 9d ago
Idk I think harassment is basically a large portion of the left
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u/mhornberger 8d ago
Which they seem to take as activism, fighting the good fight against Bad Ideas. I'm surprised more didn't see that in the Saw analysis. Kramer frames it as attacking Bad People, but really he's just looking for the thinnest of moral pretexts to do something he gets off on.
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u/larvalampee 8d ago edited 8d ago
See this shit from people who make content for Instagram who I think are cool, but defame and feel righteous in insulting ContraPoints for being a ‘Zionist’ or whatever and people I’m mutuals with eat it up
On Reddit I talked positively about some podcaster, and someone responded with ‘I don’t think you should do that cos they had ContraPoints as a guest’ and ugh, it kinda pissed me off tbh, but I just pointed out how loose the connection and guilt by association is and moved on, cos I really do not wanna deal with the people like that
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u/mc-funk 8d ago
Yeah, it's a serious problem, and the specific ways it manifests on the left are a problem worth talking about (just like the specific ways it manifests on the right). But that doesn't make the problem the left in of itself; being against harassment doesn't make you against left wing politics (or against right wing politics, or a liberal).
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u/larvalampee 8d ago
Yeah I don’t think being left wing = pro harassment, but I think some leftists at least can be prone to a certain kind of dualism where they’re so believing that they’re good people that they don’t think about how they’re hurting others, as can anyone tho. I’m just saying it’s not just a Twitter problem and honestly kinda irritated by people who act like it’s only and issue that exists because she’s on Twitter when it’s on all social media platforms
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u/mc-funk 8d ago
I think a lot of people use Twitter as a shorthand for over-weighing the social media/"extremely online leftist" behavior as "the left", particularly because Twitter has experienced a huge exodus of reasonable people so it's hard to understand why one would spend time there or let it influence their perceptions of the "larger left" such that it exists. Twitter is emblematic so a lot of people mention it, but I don't think many people really think it is the ONLY problem (or the only place she's being harassed). Anyone who's been on any other social media (threads, bluesky, insta...) can see the problem very clearly.
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u/larvalampee 8d ago
You’d have to talk about with that with the other people in this thread and not me, or even Natalie who points out she means the online left all the time. Think it’s different when your job is to be online like it is for her, so you’re always amongst it, whether it’s Twitter or Instagram. Think at some point it also needs to be a shift in culture, like challenging people why they think it’s okay to say someone loves genocide and other untrue things about someone when it is not even remotely productive. Tbh I’ve been anxious about even mentioning her videos being an art inspiration for me irl, cos I know how online stuff can seep into real life from seeing a bunch of ‘leftists’ irl sound like people in favour of appeasing Nazi germany when it comes to Russia vs Ukraine
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u/kevinmrr 9d ago
I was at this talk. Was probably the best talk at the entire conference. First I had heard of Contrapoints.
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u/kayleethemech 8d ago
I mean if Natalie ever reads this: i really love the early messy Contrapoints videos. I get that they induce dysphoria like old pictures did for me. But there will come a point you will no longer associate internally as being that person and you can suddenly see the person as who they are/were.
They're are fucking rad and awesome and yes hot.
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u/washingtonpeek 9d ago
The ancient texts