An Anthropology of the Nerd Right’s Emerging Sexual Morality

Today on Based Camp we examine three recent scandals in the new right online space and what they reveal about emerging standards for sexuality, relationships, and online personas. We discuss Ethan Klein’s separation and infidelity, the Ember Paradox VTuber gender reveal, and attempts to cancel Powdur over past content.

The conversation explores broader questions around VTuber personas, marital expectations, personal fantasies versus involving others, and the distinction between harmless yearning and problematic behavior. We also address community responses, power dynamics, and how these events shape norms in right-leaning spaces.

Episode Transcript

Malcolm Collins:Hello, Simone. I’m excited to be here with you today. Today, we are gonna be talking about something that has been anthropologically really interesting for me in the last couple weeks. There have been three attempted cancellations slash major scandals that came out this past week. And the way that each of them has spun out and ended up working out for the people involved has shown that the new right online space is settling on an ideology of what is appropriate behavior and what is inappropriate behavior in regards to sexuality, gooning, and yearning. Specifically, we’re going to be talking about the instance of Ethan Klein being in a relationship where it appears his wife hadn’t had sex with him for years and then deciding to cheat on her, which is interesting in terms of how people are going to react to that. Then we have the case of Amber Paradox, who was a female presenting VTuber who turned out to be a male. Then we have the case of Powder and somebody attempting to cancel her for past horny posting. Not like that, but but, you know, twerking and stuff like that and working on projects that had horny related stuff in it and horny stuff on her Discord. And just for the sort of scorecard at the end of this, the Powder situation has, if anything, helped

Simone Collins:her.

Malcolm Collins:It’s increased her reputation. It really reminds me of the in praise of shadows attempted attack on Windigo. Oh. Hilarious. It made in praise of shadows look horrible and Windigo look great in terms of when everybody did all the reactions. Hers was even worse than that because the key piece of evidence that he led the entire attack with was that she had an OnlyFans account, which was a link to a Rickroll that she had done on April first fools day, like, a number of years ago. And, I mean, to his credit, she said she lost. She said that she only had 15,000 followers back then, and she lost a thousand of them when she did this. Oh. Because so many people believed it.

Simone Collins:Oh, they got mad that it wasn’t mad.

Malcolm Collins:Yeah. That’s why you’re really careful about

Simone Collins:Wow. I’ve never heard people to take a rickroll that bad. I thought, you know, you just... You chuckle. You keep going.

Malcolm Collins:Yeah. The... So, like, let’s go into each of these. The Ember Paradox situation has been perhaps the most interesting to me. Are you familiar with it, Simone?

Simone Collins:Vaguely. You know?

Malcolm Collins:So in the past, we have said there is not a lot of drama in, like, the new rights space or mini scandals.

Simone Collins:Right. Now And then when this came out, they’re like, Malcolm. Malcolm. What’s this about there being no drama? In Three in

Malcolm Collins:a row. Well, I think, one, it’s a lot of the drama in this space is stirred up by a single individual. and at first, when the Amber Paradox thing happened, I was more upset with this individual than I was at Amber Paradox. Same, unfortunately. The the individual is Straub.

Simone Collins:I’m chalking it up to postpartum sleep deprivation and, angriness because it... It’s tough sometimes. I could see someone expressing extra displaced aggression.

Malcolm Collins:She did the same thing where she crashed out on Yuki and Powder for their views on Well, first date of birth. Do you

Simone Collins:know how mean I am to you when I’m It is true.

Malcolm Collins:Yeah. Okay. We’ll we’ll chalk it up to that. But

Simone Collins:I’m trying to give her an out here. I I... Because because I I I think, you know, I think they’re a great power couple. You know, Rev says Destiny.

Malcolm Collins:Well, no. Hold on. I’m actually going to... As more information has come out, I think she was a more in the right than I originally realized.

Simone Collins:Okay. Because it did seem like she was stirring up nonsense and causing conflict when she really didn’t need to. But, also, I’m like, look. I get it. I do a lot of things I don’t... I shouldn’t do when I’m under the influence as it were.

Malcolm Collins:Of of women juices.

Simone Collins:Of being female.

Malcolm Collins:This is what... This is the problem with bringing women into our community. I’m

Simone Collins:so sorry. Yes.

Malcolm Collins:But... Yeah. So she ends up dropping this because some fan found some DMs that showed a connection, and, then he admits it. and, my initial thought in relation to all of this is, oh, no. Did you know that my good friend Leaflet isn’t a real slime girl? Like, big drop. I I I have completely undermined her trust in me. and then worse, I’ve really been, because the takes that have gone most viral on it have been Yukiyara’s takes. And her takes focus on the idea of, well, even privately to me as your friend, you didn’t tell me, which led me to engage with you in private conversations as if you were a woman, to which I understand why that can be hurtful, but this is Amber Paradox’s entire career. Right? They could be blown up over this. And you’re, like, kinda friends, but apparently, like, not so good of friends that, like, I I would... You wouldn’t share that if you were faking your gender.

Simone Collins:Classic, gender bent anime scenario where either a boy or girl ends up having to go to school, and as a as a boy, but, you know, she’s really a girl, and she’s going to an all boy school. And then they all have crushes on each other and blah blah blah, and it gets very confusing. It’s one of those situations where, like, you start to really care about these people, and then the lie gets deeper, but you can’t tell them because of... Insert plot point.

Malcolm Collins:No. That’s not why you can’t tell them. You can’t

Simone Collins:tell them because career was gonna be lost if it came out well.

Malcolm Collins:It’s your entire career. You can’t tell everyone you collab with that your your real gender. Point being, this was all outed because he told somebody. Right? Like, did did somebody dug something up, swirling?

Simone Collins:That’s true. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins:You got nothing. Secondary point is is if Yuki really did share such personal information with him because she thought he was a girl, then he, despite the attacks from her, hasn’t released it, which is

Simone Collins:No. It’s just... Look. There’s some stuff that I don’t bring up with you that I bring up with other people

Malcolm Collins:who are True. I’m... Yeah. What I’m saying, it probably wasn’t anything that egregious. So it sounds like it’s more of a... Or he’s just uniquely moral, but that’s not what I think is really going on here. The real reason, I don’t care that he lied to fr