GeniesLoki

All tweets are fictional, but some tweets are more fictional than others. Don't ruin the joke.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Thread of threads to act as pinned tweet. An index of your all-time Genie favourites.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

@learning_sprite Congrats on joining the oldest profession!

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Nah

[Naman @yourtwtbro]

Screenshot and see what next 6 months you got

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

@djmicrobeads I'm sortof astonished this doesn't exist.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

@workingjubilee TBH so much of Kant is "here is an objective argument for why my extremely culturally specific prejudices are universal logical necessities baked into the very fabric of thought" that I think we can take this as a given.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Oh yes now I remember what I tweet here now: long deranged threads about feelings.

I've got a twenty minute wait so here are some thoughts on shame.

[Ben Landau-Taylor @benlandautaylor]

Actively evil people usually have better-sounding justifications for their actions than carelessly immoral people. This will fool you if you pay more attention to justifications than to actions.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

@lisatomic5 That's a great question Lisa let's delve into a couple possible strategies for answering it...

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

@Morgan_Anastasi "Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less."

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

People feel shame constantly they just call it imposter syndrome.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

He thinks we've lost shame because we've lost privacy. We've got this idea into our heads that presenting as anything less than our full self, animal complexities and all, is dishonest.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

And some guy, I forget who, said that shame is a failure of self-presentation.

The source of shame has shifted though. We're not ashamed that we're showing the wrong things, we're ashamed that we're not good enough to self-present as who we need to.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Velleman sortof thinks the same thing though and he thinks that that's bad. He thinks we're increasingly shameless these days (I think he's totally and utterly wrong about this, but is pointing at a real thing where how shame manifests is different).

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Seligman and co think that we've been moving away from the ritual mode as the predominant mode and increasingly embracing the sincere mode.

Honestly it's been long enough since I read the book that I don't remember how much they think that's good or bad.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

But you don't do that. You create your own mini subjunctive world of one where you present yourself to the world as a single coherent agent that has consistent wants, desires, etc. You ritually summon a person into existence to inhabit your body.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Self-presentation is a sort of ritual of one in this view. You're a big ol' complex animal, you can do animal things if you want. Nothing to stop you from tearing off all your clothes and running naked down the street screaming gutterally.

Some part of you might even want to.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Seligman etc. call this operating in a "subjunctive world" - you behave as if the rules of the ritual were inviolable, and this lets you operate in the ritual world where things you might not manage outside it (like not having a fight at dinner) are possible.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Like e.g. politeness norms. You say please and thank you and pass the salt instead of "oi, you, gimme some salt".

Nobody thinks you *can't* do the latter, you're clearly physically capable. Sometimes you'd even prefer too. But there's a collective agreement you don't.

[GeniesLoki @GeniesLoki]

Another interesting overlap is that this book is about the difference between the ritual mode and the sincere mode. The sincere mode is something like "acting as your authentic complete self" while the ritual mode you choose to put that aside and act in a restricted manner.