Thursday, May 02, 2024

How the Department of Homeland Security Wasted $700,000 in Taxpayer Money on "Diverting Hate"

 

AIN'T NO REST FOR THE WICKED

April was a busy month for me. It entailed the end of a busy tax season. Two cross country trips totaling over 4,500 miles driven. A fun (though physically exhausting) 20 mile hiking adventure in Utah. And the obligatory week of physical labor entailed in spring cleaning. And so when I pulled into my home late last night after a 1,100-mile-one-day drive, I was looking forward to nothing more than banging out the spring cleaning, mowing my yard, hitting the gym, and bingeing on Gintama, my latest interest in Japanese anime.

That was until I found out I was on a government list.

And if you know anything about "government lists," you know you don't want to be on one.

And so, instead of being able to enjoy a well-deserved week-long rest of just hitting the gym and getting my anime-geek on, I was obliged to research how I got on this list, what this list was all about, and who put together this list. Furthermore, upon figuring these things out, it became apparent to me I would additionally now have to go public, explaining this list and the people behind it, as this list is going viral and many of my fine audience members are bringing it to my attention.

So much for Gintama.

WHAT HAPPENED

While the original report has been taken down (though a copy has been linked below), the best I can put together with what remains on the internet is that a non-profit organization called "Diverting Hate" received $700,000 in government funding from the Department of Homeland Security to conduct some research into the possibility of "redirecting traffic" from red pill/manosphere sites to other man-oriented sites that "Diverting Hate" deemed..."not hateful." This was done under the claim that red pill sites (such as my own, Fresh & Fit, Rollo Tomassi, etc.) were radicalizing susceptible, lonely, and marginalized men into misogyny, extremism, even "violence and hatred" against women, and by running ads on our platforms and channels, these alienated men would discover and be diverted to the alternative pro-male channels "Diverting Hate" deemed appropriate and not anti-woman.

To do this Diverting Hate hired out various academics at various colleges including Middlebury, Arizona State, the McCain Institute and others. These academics would identify "hateful" red pill channels/sites, research the channels, measure their "misogyny," even come up with some colorful (and ridiculous) methodologies to create a "Male Supremacy Scale." They also did significant research into other platforms, vocabulary used in the manosphere/red pill community, speculation into how to intervene and protect susceptible males, and ultimately created a recommended "course of action list." And best I can tell they actually did purchase advertising to redirect traffic from the aforementioned sites to the politically-correct sanitized ones (though the success of this is to be determined. Additionally, I will change anything above that proves to be erroneous.).

Had this been any other academic research it would have largely been ignored. But since Diverting Hate published their report in March of 2024, it has gone viral for several reasons. First, in accusing a list of sizable online influencers of being misogynists and proponents of violence, Diverting Hate immediately fired up these influencers' large audiences, who then proceeded to make this report go viral. Second, the accusation alone of promoting violence prompts influencers to answer and defend themselves (my video I'm sure will only be one of many). Third, the presence of Homeland Security. Not only is it controversial, even scandalous that taxpayer money is being used to fund such "research," but there's the implication said influencers are possible domestic terrorists or supporters/enablers of domestic terrorism (and you can read that implication in the report).

But if the three aforementioned things weren't enough to rile up millions of fans, it's the absurdity of the report that probably caused it to go viral most. The researchers just blatantly and unfoundedly accuse people of misogyny, male supremacy and violence. They arrogantly accuse all these people of misogyny and violence on the sole reason and rationale that "they say so." And so now we have government-financed academics arbitrarily and spuriously accusing people of promoting sexism, violence, even domestic terrorism, with absolutely no checks or being questioned, resulting in an Orwellian, STASI like government list (though technically, it is an academic list, not an actual government list). In short, it is the tyrannical nature of the report and the academics who published it that has resulted in this report going viral (and consequently being taken down by the now-embarrassed and exposed researchers).

WHAT IS REALLY HAPPENING

For you to truly understand what's really going on, you really do need to read the report in its entirety. The reason being is that while these academics and researchers thought they were being clever, the report is the single most damning bit of evidence as to their true motivations, sloppy research methods, political bias, ulterior motives, intellectual dishonesty, and frankly, laughable stupidity. However, it's completely understandable if you don't have the time or inclination to read a 55 page document (I didn't. I could have watched 3 episodes of Gitnama in that time!) But here is my proposed synopsis of what I think is really happening, of which you can verify by reading the report yourself.

It's nothing but a rank and file money-grab.

Admittedly, this may sound too simplistic or trite, but again, I implore you to read their report as evidence. It's all there.

First, not a single person involved in the writing, researching and publishing of this report has a real job or a real degree (trust me, I looked into all their backgrounds). They are all life-long academic hacks who have been in school since kindergarten, and all have avoided any serious subjects that require math, rigor, intelligence or hard work (just look at their degrees which include gender studies, sociology, social psychology, cultural studies, and tellingly "terrorism studies"). However, their bloviated bullshit degrees indicate they're too egotistical to merely accept a welfare check. And so when there's government grant money to be had (be it the DHS or not), these people have a tremendous financial and egotistical motivation to get it because it allows them to think they're doing something valuable for society, while avoiding real work at the same time. In short, this is just a welfare jobs program, and they need to rationalize it.

Second, their laziness shows throughout the report.

Not a single calorie of effort was made to understand or even accept the chance that the people they were critiquing had legitimate concerns, more nuanced arguments, or simply different views. Additionally, no one from the opposing team was interviewed or asked to give their input. Diverting Hate and its participants just mindlessly accused everyone of being "Saturday-Morning-Cartoon-Villain-Evil" because its easier than doing actual investigations or interviews, let alone trying to understand the other side.

Also painfully obvious was how little effort they put into compiling their "Male Supremacy List." Their list of 11 "main influencers" was a good start, but was missing some major and much more influential red pill/manosphere influencers. It shows they were too lazy to put in the rigor required to perfect a list of a GENUINE "top 10" or "top 20" influencers. And it's likely they didn't want to crunch the data for more than a mere 11 channels.

Related, the methodologies were just laughable, showing equal laziness via a lack of rigor. Of particular note was research done by "PERIL" - "Polarization & Extremism Research & Innovation Lab" to measure "male supremacy." Having had to measure amorphous things like "male supremacy" myself in my economics research, I can appreciate the challenge the "PERIL" team had. But instead of sitting down and putting the effort into coming up with metrics and variables that would plausibly and logically measure people who actually believed men were superior, it was obviously just a lazy list of beliefs they wanted to define as male supremacy. Things like:

-Feminism is about hating men

-Modern society prioritizes women over men

-Feminists are unattractive

-Women are driven to find higher status males

-Women are attracted to high status men

Things many people believe (and often are true), but don't necessarily make you a male supremacist if you believe them.

I could go on. The vocabulary methodology was a joke and showed they put no effort into compiling, let alone understanding a comprehensive list of red pill terms. Their logic and conclusions were not consistent, and often strained to conclude what they wanted. Half the methodologies I couldn't understand what their point was because of poor writing and explanation. The blind assumption and accusation everyone's a misogynist allowed for them to avoid the hard work that would come with analyzing a complex topic, let alone accurately diagnosing it. And absolutely no effort was put into hiding their political bend at all (yeah, we got it, you don't like trump, and I found it particularly cute you capitalized "Black men" but not "white men"). All in all it was an intellectually lazy and dishonest effort and it showed.

Third, the premise of "Diverting Hate" is absurd. Not that we shouldn't be against misogyny, violence or terrorism, but that you're going to PAY TO DIVERT TRAFFIC FROM SITES YOU DON'T LIKE??? That sounds horribly inefficient. This reminds me of bullshit business ideas the wives of rich men would come up with when I was in banking. Ideas that didn't make a lot of sense and the money could've have been better spent elsewhere. However, just as I erroneously and naively assumed the wives of these rich men wanted to run a profitable business, it's an erroneous and naive assumption to think Diverting Hate wants to save marginalized men or protect women. The rich wife was bored and wanted something to do, Diverting Hate just wants the money. And they will go to the extent of falsely accusing people of hate, violence, misogyny, or extremism to get it.

When you factor in:

1. Everyone's work-avoidant/white collar panhandling bogus academic careers

2. The poor quality of research and work that belies their biases, laziness, motivations, lack of intellectual honesty, and one might even argue misandry, and

3. The dubious premise that to combat disenfranchized men, misogyny, and violence, redirecting traffic from a group of poorly selected sites is a viable strategy

I contend Diverting Hate and all people associated with it were primarily, if not, solely motivated by money and not anything as noble as fighting misogyny, protecting women, or helping out disenfranchised men.

WHY THE DHS SHOULD DEMAND THEIR MONEY BACK

I cannot emphasize enough that the people involved in this report do not care about at-risk men or the safety of women. They are merely using these people as a pawns to get funding. If they did actually care about the safety of women and marginalized men, an entirely different and infinitely more practical approach would have been used.

At minimum they should have at least tried to understand why different influencers and platforms are saying things they don't like. Why the red pill has become so popular among main stream culture. A sort of understand your enemy sort of strategy. Related, they would also make attempts to co-opt or turn these influencers to their side, or to at least understand it. If these influencers are so large and have such influence over large audiences, they already have the infrastructure and network to directly promote the message to the precise audience Diverting Hate wants to reach. It would seem to me these influencers would be a tremendous asset to Diverting Hate's cause, and almost the first people you would try to persuade to your line of reasoning or concerns. And it would be certainly more effective in "stopping misogyny" than paying social media platforms to "divert traffic." All Diverting Hate did was accuse these people of extremism and promoting violence, further alienating these people to their cause. Diverting Hate couldn't even offer to debate these people on a public platform.

However, since Diverting Hate's main objective is funding themselves and not fighting misogyny, none of these practical measures were taken, let alone recommended in the report. Furthermore, in not really caring about men/women, they have no incentive to accurately diagnose the root causes of the misogyny and violence they feign so much concern about. Because of this whatever progress the Department of Homeland Security was hoping to achieve in funding Diverting Hate will not be realized and the entire $700,000 will be wasted. None of Diverting Hate's strategies were practical. None of their research was intellectually honest, empirical, or based in reality. Men were certainly not consulted in any of this (nearly all the researchers are female). And consequently, all of their recommendations will likely fail.

To this point, all one has to do is look at the approved list of alternative men's sites Diverting Hate wants to redirect traffic to. To be perfectly honest, they're kinda shit. A third of the sites you can't find without some serious digging, and some I couldn't find at all. If you find them, many of their websites are also, well, kinda shit as as well. Those that do have a YouTube channel rarely have consistent material. And I don't want to speculate about what kind leftist, male-feminist, soy boy, vegan, emasculating, anti-male horseshit content these channels are likely to have. If these sites were so critical to the strategy of Diverting Hate, why are they so inaccessible and lame? It's reminiscent of the religious right trying to make "Christian rap" cool in the 90s - fake, dishonest, and inauthentic. It's also evidence Diverting Hate wasn't really serious about providing a viable alternative to red pill influencers for the men they so desperately claimed to want to save, providing further evidence this was a rank money grab.

However, if the Department of Homeland Security was serious about intervening with at-risk men, as well as lowering the risk of violence against women, all is not lost. There is a group of people they could enlist who are much more informed and intricately more familiar with these at-risk men. And those people are the exact same red pill/manosphere influencers "Diverting Hate" seems to...well...hate.

Red Pill influencers, for all their drawbacks, are much more familiar with the state of men and the individual men themselves than what is, frankly, a group of monolithic-thinking, privileged feminist academics who haven't lived a day outside academia. I would even go so far as to say that red pill influencers have already done more to lessen violence and misogyny against women by telling men the harsh truths about the sexes instead of pretty lies. This has led to an increasing stoic acceptance and better understanding of women, rather than generations of confused and frustrated men, seeking vengeance or retribution over something they don't understand and therefore lash out at. Because of red pill influencers' better understanding of at-risk men, their closer proximity to them, and their lack of an ulterior motive (unlike their feminist, politically-motivated academic-hack counterparts), the Department of Homeland Security should consider something radical. They should spend that $700,000 on red pill influencers instead. There would be more and better results. The advice coming from red pill influencers would be more effective in combating disaffected men and any violence against women. And to be perfectly honest most would probably do it free of charge, or in Rollo's case, a free guitar.

But regardless of whether the DHS listens to red pillers or to echo-chambered feminist professors, the $700,000 they gave to Diverting Hate was wasted. It did nothing. It helped no one. And that will be proven when the same people come around claiming they need more money to fight the problem the original $700,000 didn't solve. It will then be up to the intellectual honesty of the DHS to determine if they're going to continue wasting taxpayer money on politically motivated horseshit money grabs like this or more wisely and effectively spend the taxpayers' money.

IN DEFENSE OF MY COLLEAGUES

The mindless, blanketed, trumped-up charges of misogyny laid against my colleagues is both wreckless, ill-thought out, and in many cases inapplicable. Furthermore, it misses the mark. And while I do not know every one on the "Male Supremacy List," nor have I consumed every second of everyone's material, there is no doubt in my mind that in casting a wide-and-indifferent net, Diverting Hate has falsely accused some people of being misogynists.

This is largely due to the researchers' laziness or lack of desire in trying to understand the finer AND VERY REAL points being made by these red pill influencers. But it is also due to a fundamental difference in what these academics and red pillers believe. Mainly whether men and women are different.

This has resulted in a paradox that anytime red pill influencers point out differences between men and women, even if well-intended, it is immediately categorized of being sexist or misogynist since the nature of the observation is a difference between the sexes.

For example, every woman involved in the research and publication of this report wasted...well...pretty much their entire lives pursuing worthless, bullshit degrees. I have a LONG and ESTABLISHED record of promoting, even imploring young women not to waste their time on worthless degrees, so that they might be wealthy, financially stable, and happier instead. However, such a criticism would no doubt be met by accusations of "misogyny" even though it would be in the best financial interests of women everywhere and would be the single most effective thing women could do to close the wage gap. But because I dare criticize women, even constructively, it's "misogyny."

Another example of this is in the report itself. Where beliefs like:

-Women are attracted to high value men

-Women seek high status men

-Modern society prioritizes women over men

-Women hit the wall

are deemed misogynistic and "male supremacy" according to the authors of the report. Never mind they're all true. Never mind acknowledging these facts would tremendously help men and women understand each other. Because they are uncomfortable truths and women simply don't like hearing them we need to accuse any red pill influencer of saying such things of misogyny. Unfortunately no progress can be made between the sexes if we're not allowed to at least acknowledge the truth.

And as an intellectual exercise in understanding something you don't agree with, a third extreme example would be some of my colleagues' position that the right to vote should be taken away from women. Yes, on the face of it, that is misogynistic. No, I don't believe women should have their right to vote removed. But their position to revoke the right of women to vote does NOT in fact come from a malicious hatred of women or misogyny, but a concern that women voting has had a detrimental effect on society, including women themselves. Again, I don't believe in that position, but the hatred of women is not behind it. A desire to commit or promote violence against women is not there. Ironically, it is a desire to protect them. However, to political ideologues, blindly motivated by government funding, this fine-yet-important distinction is lost on them.

The already-complicated issue of misogyny within the red pill community is further complicated by the wide array of characters and personalities within it. Some influencers may be more bombastic or perhaps engage in shock jock tactics to get the clicks which could be construed as misogyny. Some have found a gold mine in bringing on delusional and confrontational women to talk about male and female dynamics (Fresh and Fit being the original ones to do this, but with follow ups such as "The Whatever Podcast"...which curiously was missing from the "Male Supremacy List."). There were more reserved, mature "William F. Buckley Jr." types, epitomized by the esteemed Kevin Samuels (may god rest his soul). Even women such as Pearly Things are part of the red pill community, presenting feminists a circle they can't square. And then there's just ho-hum elderly man types who dispense their folksy, old man wisdom such as Rich Cooper and Rollo Tomassi. Harmless, affable men who just tell you how women are and used to be "back in the day." And while in this colorful group of people there is a wide array of controversial opinions and serious criticisms about women, not a single one of them hate women or have these opinions out of malice. These people are not misogynists.

But the real issue I think most people take umbrage with in the Diverting Hate report is not the accusation of misogyny. That accusation, is frankly, so overused it has lost its meaning and no one in the red pill community takes it seriously. What really pissed people off was the accusation that we're advocating violence and the insinuation we're enabling domestic terrorism.

Let me make this abundantly clear.

Neither I nor any one of the colleagues I know have EVER advocated violence, let alone against women. Neither have we advocated domestic terrorism in any form. And while the topic of misogyny is gray enough we can all debate about it, the accusation that we are promoting violence or terrorism is one that lawsuits are made out of.

In short, I don't care how you worthless academics make your grift. And I don't care how desperate you are to avoid working a real job in the real world. But I do care if my tax dollars are used to finance your grift. And I DEFINITELY CARE if I'm falsely accused of promoting violence, along with the implication I'm contributing to domestic terrorism. And so does every other red pill influencer on that report and in the world.

I have had to waste 12 hours of my free time researching and writing this response. 12 hours I'm never getting back. 12 hours I could have been watching Gintama. 12 hours that could have made quick work of my spring cleaning. I strongly recommend to everyone involved in this report you don't make me waste a single second more.

SPECIAL THANKS AND RESOURCES

I wanted to thank a girl who is simply known as "BX" on Twitter who brought this to my, and other people's, attention. She has done tremendous work and research on Diverting Hate and the various entities affiliated with it. I will have a link to her Twitter account below.

Also, if the Department of Homeland Security is serious about helping disenfranchised men and lessening violence against women, you can find my consultancy at www.assholeconsulting.com. I do not charge $700,000, but I will deliver results. The site is also linked below. Additionally, the contacts I have within the red pill community would provide a real and valuable asset to the DHS if they are concerned about extremism within men.

I have also linked to a copy of thereport published by Diverting Hate. I have hard copies so if the uploaded version is taken down, it will be uploaded again. Again, I strongly recommend you read the report to see just what kind of people these people are.

And many thanks for those of you who took the time to listen to this long and belabored video. If you are interested subscribe to my channel. Or if you just hate what "Diverting Hate" has done, subscribe out of spite and share with your friends.

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