My glossary

I often come across new words and concepts that I haven’t seen before, or words I think are especially interesting and want to jot down. I’ve decided to keep track of them all here. Order is reverse chronological.

k-rage n. latent rage or anger that appears to be present in many Koreans; often explained as being intergenerational and arising from centuries of Chinese or Japanese domination of Korea; related to hwabyeong, a disorder in Korean culture involving chronic uncontrolled anger or indignation. (2020-07-31)

Cold War 2 n. the emerging geopolitical rivalry between China and the United States: “It’s less and less plausible now that the old relationship with China could be resurrected, because the Chinese themselves are so obviously committed to Cold War 2” (Ferguson 2020) (2020-07-20)

cultural revolution n. a social movement where certain cultural elements are purged in favor of newer or more correct elements, encouraged by coersion and peer pressure; a genericization of the term Cultural Revolution from Chinese history; used in the American context to describe a phenomenon beginning roughly with the election of Donald Trump in 2016 and precipitated by the George Floyd protests of 2020, where woke values became more openly and explicitly enshrined in corporate and mainstream American culture; “Covid hit, and then the lockdown, and then the May 25 protests and cultural revolution that ensued.” (Hansen 2020) (2020-07-20)

boogaloo 1 adj. of or relating to the boogaloo movement, a pro-gun, anti-government subculture whose members show up at rallies wearing Hawaiian shirts over military uniforms. They may describe themselves as libertarian but hold various ideologies. They are considered by the mainstream to be far-right and adjacent to, or part of, the neo-Nazi movement. 2 n. a term, used on certain websites, for an impending second American civil war. “boogaloo” is short for “Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo”, a play on the movie title “Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo”, which has become a meme verbal template for any repeat event ("___ : Electric Boogaloo"). (2020-07-16)

breakdown or crackdown n. a situation where there is a choice between letting the system unravel completely, or imposing tight restrictions to preserve the system in a hardened state: "Breakdown or crackdown is the question being asked in the capital amid national mourning over five dozen of our young police cadets." (TheNews.pk, 2016) “Breakdown or crackdown–Wenceslaus Square or Tian An Men Square–that appears to be poor Mikhail’s unenviable choice.” (LA Times, 1990) (2020-07-13)

the Before (–Times) n. the time period roughly up to March 2020, before the covid pandemic restrictions that limited freedom of movement and association. (2020-07-13)

white fragility n. when a white person becomes uncomfortable or defensive on the topic of their perceived advantages in society. (2020-07-12)

anti-racism n. a system of beliefs that mandates an active, perpetual, personal struggle against racism in all aspects of life. (2020-07-10)

offense archaeology n. the act of digging up and publicly construing a person’s old statements as offensive, in order to discredit them. (2020-07-08)

ad feminam adj. (of an argument) 1 (original meaning) invalid because it merely attacks the character of woman who is the opposing speaker; corresp. to ad hominem. 2 invalid because of its appeal to the fact that the opposing speaker is a woman. (2020-07-08)

supervene v. (philosophy, of a fact or property) to be a consequence or implication of some other fact or property. (2020-07-07)

woke incel n. an involuntarily celibate person (incel) who supports woke causes, contrary to the stereotype of incels as misogynistic, racist or alt-right. “An incel who wants to donate to Black Lives Matter and covid-19—this is called the woke incel.” (Taibbi and Halper, 2020) (2020-07-05)

gamer n. (among other meanings) a person whose primary sense of identity is derived from video game culture, superceding any identification or group belonging based on profession, religion, ethnicity or nationality. (2020-07-05)

QAnon n. a conspiracy theory and emerging quasi-religious worldview based on the idea that the world is ruled by satanic pedophiles who control media and politics, and that Donald Trump is attempting to battle this evil force. This is all revealed through internet posts by an alleged anonymous observer named “Q” (hence the term). See: Wikipedia (2020-07-05)

BIPOC n. 1 black, indigenous, and people of color; includes non-black and non-indigenous people. 2 black (and) indigenous people of color. Both meanings contrasted with ‘POC’ to emphasize the oppression of black and indigenous people, implied to be greater than those of other people. (2020-07-05)

habitus n. (sociology) socially ingrained habits, skills and dispositions. (2020-07-05)

racialism n. 1 (traditional) the belief that the human species is naturally divided into races that can be determined scientifically. 2 (emerging) the belief that people are inextricably defined by their socially-determined racial category (esp. as seen by American culture); often used by opponents of this view. (2020-07-05)

axial revolution n. (John Vervaeke) the historical process, around 800–300 BC, by which Eurasian socities established their primary spiritual traditions following the Late Bronze Age collapse; “axial” in the sense of “pivotal” in reference to the term Axial Age. (2020-07-03)

relevance realization n. (John Vervaeke) the subconscious process by which a person discards information that is not relevant to a particular problem, while retaining and becoming conscious of the information that is relevant. (2020-07-03)

kenosis n. in Christianity, “emptying” yourself to become fully receptive to the will of God; see Phil. 2:7. (2020-07-01)

Baal n. an old Semitic word meaning “lord” that is used in the Bible to refer to a Phoenician deity, and by extension any false gods; its use is popular in the Protestant church especially when referring to Catholic traditions. (2020-07-01)

emergence n. in philosophy, when new properties arise in an entity whose parts do not have this property on their own; an emergent property need not be mysterious or unexplained; weak emergence is when new properties arise in the whole that can be explained by the independent functioning of each part (e.g. traffic jam); if parts do not retain independence (e.g. in a chemical reaction), this is called strong emergence. (2020-06-30)

potentiality n. (Jonathan Pageau) the state of possessing latent or dormant qualities that may later be useful; the state of having potential. (2020-06-30)

physicalism n. the idea that everything consists of, or supervenes on, the physical world; while often used synonymously with “materialism” (SEP). (2020-06-30)

Forms n. (Plato) the non-physical, real essences of all things, of which the physical word is merely a shadow or imitation; The Forms are abstract, perfect, unchanging ideas that transcend time and space. (2020-06-30)

hard left n. left-wing political movements outside the mainstream center-left; apparently originally a UK term that seems to be spreading to the US as a euphemism or “far-left”; US usage may emphasize the militant or aggressive nature of such movements. (2020-06-26)

liberal refugee n. (pejorative) a person who has moved from a blue state to a red state (oft. from California to Texas) to escape bad economic conditions suposedly created by liberal policies; they are mocked for continuing to believe in blue policies despite apparently being evidence of their failure. (2020-06-26)

investor class n. 1 (old) the broad class of Americans who own at least $1000 in stocks, estimated at about 40% of the country. 2 (emerging) the roughly 2% of Americans who are able to earn significant money from owning stocks (outside of retirement accounts), often contrasted with the “working class”. (2020-06-26)

platform v. to give (someone) access to some form of speech; to allow (someone) to reach an audience via some medium; orig. as the opposite of deplatform, from the phrase “to provide a platform”. (2020-06-26)