Among their number is political correctness scourge Jordan Peterson and controversialist Milo Yiannopoulos – and they feel shut out of mainstream political debate. Unfortunately, some people are listening to them

Name: the Intellectual Dark Web.

Age: Nobody knows.

Appearance: Not much to look at, although they have a website.

Is it dark? No. It has quite a bit of white space, actually.

OK, what is the Intellectual Dark Web? It’s a loose affiliation of individuals who believe their free-thinking embrace of “dangerous conversations” has shut them out of public debate. Adherent and commentator Dave Rubin told the New York Times: “We’re fighting for our ability to agree to disagree before it’s taken away from us.”

By whom? Politically correct academia, the mainstream media, that lot.

How do they hold their dangerous conversations? Through some kind of shadowy underground network? They go on Rubin’s YouTube show, which has 700,000 subscribers. Or they host popular podcasts, attracting thousands in monthly donations.

Talk about being sidelined. Who are these people? Among those often included are former Breitbart editor-at-large Ben Shapiro; husband and wife “professors in exile” Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying, who resigned from Evergreen State College after denouncing a planned Day of Absence, where white students were asked to leave the campus; and psychologist and political correctness scourge Jordan Peterson.

You mean it’s all just ... terrible people? Professional controversialists, I would call them. They come from both the right and sometimes left extremes of the political spectrum, but they all tend to combine some form of hardcore libertarianism with an unfortunate manner.

And this is popular? Oh yes. IDW members expound their dangerous ideas in front of packed houses – out of necessity, having been denied the more direct public forum of a professorship at a college you’ve never heard of.

It must be hard to to talk about being no-platformed in front of so many people. The bigger problem is that the movement is so ill-defined. Its free-thinking, “anything goes” nature means that mainstream intellectuals such as Steven Pinker are often included alongside cranks and show-offs including Milo Yiannopoulos and Alex Jones.

Wow. They don’t care who they hang out with. It is, if nothing else, a coalition of strange bedfellows.

It sounds as if the only thing they share is a knack for being pissed off about the wrong stuff. That, and a taste for the limelight. Which they’ve been denied, don’t forget.

Do say: “They have the guts to say what I would only dare think, if I ever thought anything.”

Don’t say: “Hey Kanye! Check these guys out!”