The Intellectual Dark Web (IDW) is a loose alliance of people which has been described as a “gateway to the far right.” Members typically get money and attention by claiming to be oppressed or silenced by the minorities and progressive movements they criticize. This group includes many of the most strident critics of the 21st century transgender rights movement.
The term was proposed by American mathematician Eric Weinstein and popularized by American journalist Bari Weiss in 2018. A number of websites emerged profiling members, like the examples below.
Members and “friends of the program”
Evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker is the member that ties the IDW to last century’s Human Biodiversity Institute, a group created by Steve Sailer which promoted similar ideologies.
Numerous lists of IDW members and “friends of the program” have been created that include some or all of the following people:
- Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- Carl Benjamin
- Owen Benjamin
- Dan Carlin
- Mike Cernovich
- Nicholas Christakis
- Matt Christiansen
- Steven Crowder
- James Damore
- Alice Dreger
- Tim Ferriss
- Seth Godin
- Jonathan Haidt
- Sam Harris
- Heather Heying
- Heterodox Academy
- Stephen Hicks
- Coleman Hughes
- Alex Jones
- Claire Lehmann
- Glenn Loury
- John McWorther
- Stefan Molyneux
- Douglas Murray
- Elon Musk
- Adam Narkiewicz
- Maajid Nawaz
- Candace Owens
- Camille Paglia
- Jordan Peterson
- Steven Pinker
- Tim Pool
- Quillette Magazine
- Rebel Wisdom
- Joe Rogan
- Dave Rubin
- Ben Shapiro
- Lindsay Shepherd
- Michael Shermer
- Gad Saad
- Debra Soh
- Carl Benjamin
- Christina Hoff Sommers
- Peter Thiel
- Bret Weinstein
- Eric Weinstein
- Bari Weiss
- Milo Yiannopoulos
intellectualdark.website
realidw.com
Alice Dreger is a historian, bioethicist, author, and former professor of clinical medical humanities and bioethics at the Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois. Dreger is widely known for her academic work and activism in support of individuals born with atypical sex characteristics (or disorders of sex development) and individuals born as conjoined twins. She challenges the perception that those with physical differences are somehow “broken” and need to be “fixed”. She has opposed the use of “corrective” surgery on babies whose genitalia are considered “ambiguous”. She has criticized the failure to follow such patients in later life, and reported longer-term medical and psychological difficulties experienced by some of the people whose sex is arbitrarily assigned. Dreger received her Ph.D. in History and Philosophy of Science from Indiana University Bloomington in 1995. Dreger has taught at both Michigan State University, where she received a Teacher-Scholar Award in 2000, and at Northwestern University (2005-2015).
References
- Daum, Meghan (August 24, 2018). Nuance: A Love Story. My affair with the intellectual dark web. GEN. https://gen.medium.com/nuance-a-love-story-ae6a14991059
- Daum, Meghan (March 16, 2018). Op-Ed: A new movement to speak truth to identity politics is our best hope against regressive thinking. Los Angeles Times https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-daum-intellectual-dark-web-20180316-story.html
- Ribeiro MH, Ottoni R, West R, Almeida VAF, Meira W (2019). Auditing Radicalization Pathways on YouTube. arXiv.org (PDF) https://arxiv.org/abs/1908.08313
- Dickson EJ (August 28, 2019). Study Shows How the ‘Intellectual Dark Web’ Is a Gateway to the Far Right. Rolling Stone https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/youtube-far-right-radicalization-study-877061/
- Beres, Derek (March 5, 2018). These are the women behind the Intellectual Dark Web. Big Think https://bigthink.com/21st-century-spirituality/these-are-the-women-behind-the-intellectual-dark-web
- Weiss, Bari (May 8, 2018). “Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web”. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/opinion/intellectual-dark-web.html
- Brown, Elizabeth Nolan (May 14, 2018). The ‘Intellectual Dark Web’ Is Just Rehashing Old P.C. Controversies in New Media. Reason https://reason.com/2018/05/14/the-intellectual-dark-web-and-its-hereti/
- Robinson, Nathan J. (May 10, 2018). The real “dangerous” ideas. Current Affairs https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/05/the-real-dangerous-ideas
Resources
The Intellectual Dark Web (realidw.com)
- Members [archive]
Intellectual Dark Web (intellectualdarkweb.site)
School of Peterson (schoolofpeterson.com)
The Intellectual Dark Web (intellectualdark.website)
San Diego Public Library (sandiego.bibliocommons.com)