Non-normie.com

Non-normie.com was a website run by one Jack Thomas.

Central idea
The premise of the site is a nominally valid one: well-rounded, satisfied people without emotional issues don't do political or religious extremism. He defines a "non-normie" as, "[an] adult person who is fueled by intrinsic anger from childhood and is thereafter controlled by hate." He further posits that this anger from childhood manifests in five "dysfunctional choices": crime, crutches, cults, causes, and crises. Crises ("usually manufactured", says Thomas), mean end of the world apocalyptic type stuff; crutches include things like alcoholism. The other three are self-explanatory.

So far, so good (although, even here this seems to be a dumbed-down distillation of Eric Hoffer, Alcoholics Anonymous 12-step programs, and possibly Transactional Analysis, all of which (even AA) are far more nuanced than the oversimplified version presented by Jack Thomas.)

An underlying message
Unfortunately, a quick reading of the site reveals that one of his main purposes seems to be to use this valid observation as a cover for global warming denialism. To Jack Thomas, belief in global warming is prima facie evidence of non-normieness because it involves both causes and crises. His conclusion on global warming: "Those obsessively promoting this myth are extremely sick emotionally." Uh-huh.

Under his list of "crutches" (addictions), he includes "sexaholism (including homosexuality, sadism, transvestitism, voyeurism, exhibitionism, child abuse and every other form of sexual deviancy)". . . . So we know that he lumps together most forms of sex that are non-heterosexual and/or outside-of-marriage with predatory practices like peeping, flashing and child sexual abuse.

Worse, his inclusion of cults on the dysfunctional choices list appears to be only at the expense of every other religion in the world, but not his own, Christianity. He goes on to exhibit the very non-normieness he is against, when he writes: "I believe, contrary to a lot of people, that Satan is a real spiritual person and I have determined that his greatest tool on earth is non-normieism because he is able to control and direct the sinful desires of non-normies through the rudder of their intrinsic anger. Today he is having a field day because of the ever-increasing number of non-normies present on the face of the earth and in ever-escalating positions of their power.  As this accelerates, Armageddon cannot be that far off.  The only good thing about all this is that it hastens the return of Jesus Christ."

It is not clear how belief in "Satan" and impending "Armageddon" are not textbook examples of both cults and crises (usually manufactured).

Pseudoskepticism
All in all, a good example of pseudoskepticism if there ever was one. Yet, despite this his main premise is valid. What he does not seem to understand is that objective reality does exist, and it is found in science and the scientific method. Somebody who is "non-normie" using his own definition would be more inclined to reject and deny scientific fact, including global warming, and instead turn to cults (such as the Jesus-and-Armageddon-are-coming-soon one), causes (such as denialism), crutches (such as denialism), etc. By his own definition, he fails.

Take the test
There is also a non-normieness test on the site. It has 100 questions, and the test appears to be completely one person's (Jack Thomas) subjective opinions on what constitutes non-normieness.

While interesting, it also illustrates the problems inherent in one person formulating a sociological or psychological theory and presenting it as truth without first subjecting it to peer review and testing falsifiable hypotheses against empirical data.

Some of the questions appear to be drawn from existing, peer-reviewed psychology, and some of them are potentially provable, but many of them appear to just reflect the author's personal biases. For example, wearing either Birkenstocks or camouflage clothing both count toward "non-normieness", as does being in certain careers like nursing, teaching, religion, or politics.

In other words, as currently written the test is completely unscientific.

Similar non-peer-reviewed tests with these sorts of questions designed to gauge personality disorders are also given by, among others, the Dianetics/Scientology folks, and Bob Larson's church.

Status
As of January 2009 the website is down, and the related blog posts on Townhall.com have also been taken down.