(2024-12-11) Limberg Sensemaking Luigi And Spectre Of Uncle Ted

Peter Limberg: Sensemaking, Luigi, and Spectre of Uncle Ted. A friend asked me to make sense of what's happening with the situation involving the suspected assassin Luigi Mangione.

Here are some perspectives:

Before his identity was released, leftists speculated that he might be an anticapitalist

After his identity was released, his social media accounts portrayed him as a “centrist tech bro” who went down a “techno-pessimist” rabbit hole, influenced by the Unabomber.

Of course, those with a good dose of paranoid awareness and skepticism of any “official narrative” see him as an MK-Ultra patsy

My take: There seems to be vibe shift after vibe shift happening these days. The old narratives are dead, and those who see themselves as having the power to introduce new ones—a.k.a. those with “narrative agency” (Substackers)—are emboldened to present them. Narrative agency involves making speech acts that not only describe reality but shape it. This sparks new “hyperstitions” (or unwittingly perpetuates the legacy of old ones): narrative spells that captivate minds and shape the world in the process.

What happens when a bunch of people are out there expressing narrative agency all at once, and in completely different directions? You can try to ideologically silo yourself, but with enough narrative-breaking vibe shifts, you will eventually become “schizo”—internet slang repurposed not to mean being schizophrenic, but to describe being overwhelmed by too many perspectives

Connected to this, I came across this meme years ago on a dissident-right Substack, and saved it as a good representation of an emerging view:

The PSYCHOPATHS, or what we can call “neoliberal pathocrats,” a.k.a. the power elite profiting from a system that is predatory and parasitic to the masses, easily manipulate the NARCISSISTS—useful idiots who virtue signal causes that serve as red herrings, diverting attention away from those who actually hold power and placing the NORMIES into a state of fear. The SCHIZOS, the rare few who dare to see the truth, identify systems of power, and recognize those who benefit from them, are held back by those who uphold societal norms but ultimately take action against true power.

The spectre of Uncle Ted lives on; by getting his manifesto published in The Washington Post he made himself into a meme. So has Luigi. Given his attractiveness, he has leveraged collective hybristophilia, which sets a violent precedent by inspiring copycats—more lost men, who feel abused by the system and those who profit from it, striving to become memes.