American and Canadian social-media users just experienced an interesting mass hysteria, which helps to illustrate several of the trends I discuss for National Review and in my academic writing: the idea of “my truth,” common problems with risk assessment, the tendency of empathic people to “simp” for photogenic but crazy ones, the base-rate and per capita fallacies, and more!
Prompted by a one-off post from a feminist X user (now gone forever in the e-mists), dozens of Twitter/X and Facebook accounts began asking their largely female audiences whether — while walking alone in the woods — they would rather encounter a man (say a solo male hiker) or a wild bear. Collegiate and professional women hurried to announce that, for Very Serious Logical Reasons, they would gladly pick the grizzly over Mr. REI.
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