Discussion Thread #10: February 2020

Sounds like a cult. We have the answers. Everyone should join us in The Truth.

Expansion is often an opposite force to sanity. It was e.g., at least in part what created the rift in new atheism and destroyed the atheist/skeptic community from within, by empowering 'atypical' voices within the community in order to make them feel more at home. These atypicals often turning out to be psychopaths who weren't actually attracted to the ethos of the community at all, but who were powerfully attracted by how they identified the community as one that would tolerate their misbehaviour because of its desire to attract more members of their identity group in order to "expand".

I prefer the opposite approach. Don't let anybody in unless they prove themselves. Gatekeep hard. Go the way of the jews. Thousands of years, those people have been around, and they're still going strong. Assuming you think your precepts are worth maintaining, the jews have the recipe for doing that down to a tee, from which the rest of us should learn.

/r/slatestarcodex Thread Parent