IN A May 8 op-ed article in the New York Times, Bari Weiss gushes about “a collection of iconoclastic thinkers, academic renegades and media personalities” known as the “Intellectual Dark Web” (IDW).
But despite Weiss’ claims that this group “sound[s] unlike anything else happening, at least publicly, in the culture right now,” the IDW represents the same old reactionary ideas, repackaged for a younger audience.
The Intellectual Dark Web moniker was coined by Eric Weinstein, a mathematician and managing director of Thiel Capital, during a January 5 episode of the Waking Up with Sam Harris podcast. During the podcast, Weinstein painted a picture of a group of public intellectuals shut out of the cultural conversation because of their willingness to challenge today’s “liberal consensus.”
Among the figures commonly associated with the IDW are Weinstein, Sam Harris, Ben Shapiro, Dave Rubin, Jordan Peterson and Douglas Murray.
The AV Club has accurately referred to the IDW as “the Bonehead Renaissance.” Its ranks are populated with pseudointellectuals, con artists and reactionaries.
Its success is primarily a marketing ploy, the ability to rebrand antiquated, ugly ideas — but it does demonstrate that there is an audience of people hungry for ideas outside of the mainstream political consensus, which the left must respond to.