>someone just tried telling me that Ben Shapiro's books

Because he talks fast and destroys da ESS jay debuus

For the same reason normies are impressed by your typical left-wing professor. It's mostly about eloquence.

>>9378822

But Ben Shapiro is a short jew with a nasal girly voice

>>9378826
And leftists usually are effeminate. Eloquence overcomes this.

Because he's immodest enough/shameless enough to actually put his meager knowledge and rhetoric out there where people can hear it.

Normies are legitimately blown away by demonstrably brilliant people. The trouble is that most of these people are reserved at best and shy at worst. Even further, most truly brilliant people are self-aware enough to be modest about what they know and do, leading them to disdain the kind of showmanship that would get them attention.

People like Shapiro aren't as smart as the sort of people I've just described. However, they're still smarter than a lot of normies, and unlike the brilliant people, people like Shapiro don't have the reserve and modesty to keep quiet about the things they know. So they readily display and broadcast their modest intelligence, and it gets them legions of fans.