This is a question more directed towards our comrades here outside the US. There’s something I’ve always noticed about American liberals (though plenty of conservatives and others are not immune). They seem to have this extreme confidence in their opinions about broader global affairs and what is happening in the world, despite them being incorrect or having only a superficial understanding of the situation. Obvious examples would be how they are sure Ukraine is winning and Putin is just an irrational comic book villain, how Kim Jong Un insists everyone gets the same haircut as him (or no one), believing anything Zenz says about Xinjiang, or really any story at all that involves the global south.
Is this just phenomenon of US American liberals? Or is it rampant across the global north? My interactions with fellow Americans in general on anything geopolitical makes feel like they have this truly unearned sense that they really know what’s going on, when all they do is listening to and ardently defend State Dept propaganda. But I have never really interacted with liberals outside the US so idk.
I think this is a more general human condition. Leftists aren't inherently better, but having a counter-hegemonic position basically requires a much higher degree of literacy on the topic than the hegemonic position. The alternative is to have your voice continually completely disregarded.
As a clever leftist, you've probably never read any studies supporting the perspective that The Moon has no breathable atmosphere because you likely have no counter-hegemonic position on that. Everyone generally agrees and you have no reason to suspect the overall infrastructure of physical science is corrupted, so you just assume it's true and assume the counter-hegemonic position is incorrect.
Furthermore we should be careful to avoid falling into a cognitive trap that because we're more well-read than those with a hegemonic perspective (because we have to be) then we must be more correct. We may be, but not necessarily because we've read more.
:I-was-saying: cause there's a reproducibility crisis. But also that's a very enlightening point
Case in point: leftcoms.
Case in point: talk to any conspiracy theorist who isn't experiencing mental break
:gold-communist: