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Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web

For those who’ve been paying attention, you might have heard of the intellectual dark web. It’s a nebulous group of YouTubers, podcasters and former academics who demonize political correctness.

For them, reason and science belong to no one party or tribe. Rather, they’re defenders of reason and facts in a culture that’s not very hospitable to those who seek truth.
The Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web

A recent profile in The New York Times explored the intellectual dark web, an alliance of renegade thinkers who are challenging the mainstream conversation about politics and culture. The story portrayed these intellectuals as would-be mavericks who were waging a righteous crusade against the rising tides of political correctness and intellectual conformity.

As Bari Weiss, editor and writer of The New York Times article, notes in her article, the intellectual dark web is a group of academic renegades and media personalities who have been “purged from institutions that have become increasingly hostile to unorthodox thought.” They use podcasts, blogs, social media, and YouTube channels to discuss issues ranging from evolutionary biology to the gender gap to the rise of anti-sex rights movement.

Many of these thinkers are committed to rationality, and they claim to be defenders of objective truth. But they are also quick to attack progressive movements and left-wing ideologies, often using inflammatory language to do so. For example, Jordan Peterson has called transgender rights activists a “dark force” that will one day impose a “religious sexism.”

But while their attacks on liberal ideas are valid, they should not be taken at face value. The intellectual dark web’s critiques of political correctness and campus activism may be entertaining, but they also present a dangerous threat to American democratic institutions.

Moreover, while the dark web’s criticism of the liberal left may be based on sound data and empirical interpretations of social science, it is still conservative. This is especially true of their claims about the ill effects of political correctness on society.

The dark web’s members also claim that they are defending free speech. But what does that mean? Does it mean they are free to criticize liberals and campus activists without fear of being accused of promoting right-wing ideas?

In any case, the intellectual dark web’s ideas are conservative and should be addressed accordingly. The dark web’s efforts to equate political correctness and other left-wing policies with racism and other bad ideas could do more harm than good for the future of democracy in the United States. By recognizing the intellectual dark web’s conservative roots, progressives and leftists can have a clearer discussion about how they might address these ideas without indulging in right-wing ideology.
The Intellectual Dark Web’s Renegade Network

In May, the New York Times ran an article about a group of intellectuals who call themselves the “Intellectual Dark Web.” They’re a renegade network that believes they’ve been purged from the mainstream. They’re podcasters, bloggers, YouTubers, and public speakers who feel compelled to make their own way in the world of media.

Bari Weiss describes these renegades as “iconoclastic thinkers, academic renegades and media personalities.” She points out that they’ve been “purged from institutions that have become increasingly hostile to unorthodox thought.” These renegades have begun to build their own ways of communicating with their audiences.

These intellectuals claim that reason and science belong to neither the right nor the left. They stress that they’re trying to bring a more open and critical approach to the conversation of ideas.

But when we examine their views, it becomes clear that they have a lot more in common with conservatives than they let on. Among the people profiled in Weiss’s story are neuroscientist Sam Harris, comedian Joe Rogan, and University of Toronto psychologist Jordan Peterson.

Many of these figures argue that the liberal movement has been influenced by postmodern neo-Marxism, which they claim is an irrational and dangerous theory from the Old Continent. They also argue that leftist college professors are turning generations of young progressives into enemies of liberal democracy.

What’s more, these intellectuals seem to believe that the left has been corrupting political discourse by promoting “political correctness,” which they believe has caused great harm to the American people. It’s a view that they believe is irrational, unscientific, and ultimately immoral.

Those are some pretty serious beliefs, especially when you look at the way in which they’re expressed in public platforms like podcasts and YouTube channels. It seems like they’re using these platforms to promote their own ideas, and then they also use those same platforms to criticize other people’s ideas and talk about their opponents.

They’re able to achieve this because of their audience, which they’ve built up through podcasting, social media, and YouTube videos. But that audience also comes with risks, like the idea that they could attract a certain type of person who might be susceptible to their own brand of conspiracy theory.
The Intellectual Dark Web’s Renegade Ideas

In a recent feature in the New York Times, Bari Weiss introduced readers to an underground movement of thinkers that she calls the “intellectual dark web,” a loose collective of intellectuals and media personalities who are trying to reimagine the ways in which they communicate with their audiences. This group includes prominent atheist writers Sam Harris and Bret Weinstein, podcasters Dave Rubin and Jordan Peterson, and public speaker Joe Rogan.

These intellectuals, many of whom have been purged from their academic institutions, believe that they are locked out of the mainstream conversation and are building their own networks and audiences on the internet. They believe that their new platform is a better place for them to express their ideas because they can reach a larger audience and engage in more meaningful debates with their peers than they could through traditional media platforms.

Their main goal, however, is to uphold the ideas of reason and science. They see themselves as defenders of these values against the political correctness that ascribes to liberals and progressives, as well as against the neo-fascist alt-right, which has also become a major threat to free speech on campus.

It is a view that these intellectuals often defend on their public platforms. They frequently assert that leftist college professors have been captured by politically correct doctrines that are ostensibly anti-discrimination but actually have little meaning outside of the campus walls.

Whether or not these claims are true, they have been used to delegitimize a wide range of progressive policies that the intellectual dark web has deemed dangerous. These include gay marriage, women’s rights, and the status of African Americans.

The dark web’s use of these ideas as an argument against the left is not new. It dates back to the campus wars of the late 20th century, when conservatives pushed the idea that social justice issues — including equal outcomes for women and minorities — should be interpreted in a manner that is unfriendly to prevailing cultural norms.

This approach to social justice has been a primary source of the anger and resentment that Weiss writes about in her piece. It is a resentment that comes from being driven from the center of intellectual debate and, in some cases, from the public square altogether.
The Intellectual Dark Web’s Renegade Media

In her recent New York Times piece “Meet The Renegades Of the Intellectual Dark Web,” opinion writer Bari Weiss identifies a group of media personalities and thinkers who feel they are locked out of mainstream media and are building their own ways to communicate with readers. She highlights such prominent figures as neuroscientist Sam Harris, University of Toronto psychologist Jordan Peterson, podcaster Dave Rubin, and conservative commentator Ben Shapiro.

Deep web links These writers and media personalities have gained a following through their work on platforms like YouTube, Patreon, and podcasts, and have found success by upending antiquated beliefs that are popular in their own circles of opinion. They have a cult following, and their content regularly gets millions of views on social media channels.

The members of the intellectual dark web often claim that they are not political activists and that their ideas are not based on party politics or tribes. Their belief in rational principles is a central tenet of their identity.

As a result, many of them have attracted critics on the left and right who believe their ideas are neo-fascist or racist. But they also often receive large audiences from people who share their political views.

In this sense, the intellectual dark web’s renegade media represents a potential threat to mainstream American culture. It is a form of intellectual activism that combines a commitment to facts with a distaste for the politically correct left.

This combination of resentment and a commitment to rationality is an attractive trait in some conservative political movements, but it can be used for destructive purposes when abused. This is why it’s important to be careful when analyzing the intellectual dark web.

The intellectual dark web has been around for decades, but it’s only recently that neoconservatives began to use it as a way to push back against liberal democracy. During the 1980s and 1990s, the debate over political correctness became a frequent feature of national media debates, and neoconservative thinkers argued that college professors were promoting an illiberal or totalitarian view of America.

The intellectual dark web’s renegade activists are a reminder that there is always an audience for ideas that challenge popular culture and conventional thinking. When they finally emerge from the shadows, this could have important consequences for American public discourse. If these renegade ideas are taken seriously, they could provide new alternatives to liberal democracy.