I’ve never looked at Gawker, because of their close link to the celebrity gossip culture, which holds nothing for me. But you are very much on to something with this commonality among perceived “marginal” or “outsider” status being somehow touted as strength or purity (Gawker, Reddit, Tea Party, etc), but without willingness to build or create or assume responsibility.

Is it unique to the internet?

Not the perception of marginality bringing a sense of self-righteous outsiderdom–that’s old–but rather, that this self-righteous outsiderdom can be so patently fake, because millions of people unite behind it (creating a de facto center of power)?

The only pre-internet “movement” or organization that comes to mind for me that is perpetually restless, cultivates an unending sense of persecution, an identity of outsiderdom, and unwillingness to compromise, and engages in a behind-the-scenes-manipulation-of-the-rules despite public protestations of ongoing marginality, an consistently refuses to assume responsibility,
is fascism.

So is the internet inherently fascist?

The real gut-punch for me is that substituting “higher education” or “the academy” or (most painful of all) “university faculty” for “Gawker” yields much the same results. When that burns down, I fear a cold long dark night ahead. I’m not optimistic about our chances for rebuilding. But I am optimistic–I find I must be–about education.

Thanks.

http://laurajmixon.com/2014/11/a-report-on-damage-done-by-one-individual-under-several-names/

Thanks for writing this– it solidified the idea that it’s very convenient to define oneself as having so little power as to have no responsibility.

I think part of what’s going on is a long revolt against the idea that people are stuck with unchosen responsibilities that require not caring about what they want. So, eventually you get people saying “I want what I want! Back off!”

Unfortunately, reversing a bad idea doesn’t necessarily get you a good idea.