Nicker on 22/7/2020 at 20:42
Quote Posted by heywood
Yeah, but Trump is just the lightning rod, not the generator of electrical charge.
Yes and no. While he is a symptom of a greater disease he also has a unique talent for distorting and amplifying the weakness and corruption of others. Look how fawning Ted Cruz became, despite Trump humiliating him, his wife and accusing his father of killing JFK. Ditto Lindsey Graham and many others, who expressed enormous contempt for Trump before he was elected. I don't think this flip-flop is wholly due to self-interest. It seems to be something much darker at work.
This stuff is spreading in stranger ways too. On YouTube, I generally get my #45 news from lefty sources like MSNBC. There the Trumpists are in the minority. Not surprising, on Fox they are the vast majority. The odd thing is, on Canadian channels, like CBC or Global, more than half of the commenters are Trumpists. This is despite the fact that Canada is consistently about 60% social liberals to 40% social conservatives. We are certainly more socially liberal than the USA but why the huge representation of extreme right-wing talking points and attitudes on our left leaning media?
While many of the Trumpists on Canadian medial channels are openly American, just as many are Canadian (or perhaps pretending to be Canadian). This doesn't reflect the ambient liberalism of Canada and I am certain it isn't some previously silent conservative majority hiding here. It's seems like a deliberate, cross-border invasion and a blatant attempt to skew public perception of Canadian social values.
It's a mystery to me. Is it Trumpists looking for a place to vent without serious push back? Is it a USA based attempt to rally pro Trump forces in Canada for a cross border insurgency?
Any thoughts?
Starker on 23/7/2020 at 03:24
"Show me the death chart."
[video=youtube;9UGe4dVzExU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UGe4dVzExU[/video]
Starker on 23/7/2020 at 08:50
The story behind Lord Dampnut's most amazing ad:
Quote:
(
https://thebulwark.com/trumps-new-ad-is-amazing/)
[...]
The latest ad from the Trump campaign running on The Facebook is an attempt to get the olds worked up about their LAW & ORDER PRESIDENT.
[...]
Pretty standard stuff. With one exception. That picture on the right where the evil hippie scum from Stumptown are whaling on the gallant law enforcement officer who's trying to protect God and country?
It's from 2014.
That's not the bad part.
It's from Ukraine.
But that's not the bad part, either.
The “evil hippie scum” are actually pro-democracy protesters. And the policeman getting beat up is a member of the riot police who had been brought in to try to protect the authoritarian president, Viktor Yanukovych, who was attempting to turn Ukraine into a one-party state by extralegal means.
Still not at the bad part.
[...]
Gryzemuis on 23/7/2020 at 09:37
Quote Posted by Starker
That picture on the right where the evil
hippie scum from Stumptown are whaling on the gallant law enforcement officer who's trying to protect God and country? It's from 2014. That's not the
bad part.
Hippies. Always bad.
To quote a great philosopher from the era of the hippies: "Forget about music and concentrate on creating generation gaps. Call all hippies boring old farts and set light to them. Terrorize, threaten, and insult your own useless generation".
Couldn't agree more.
heywood on 23/7/2020 at 17:43
Quote Posted by Nicker
Yes and no. While he is a symptom of a greater disease he also has a unique talent for distorting and amplifying the weakness and corruption of others. Look how fawning Ted Cruz became, despite Trump humiliating him, his wife and accusing his father of killing JFK. Ditto Lindsey Graham and many others, who expressed enormous contempt for Trump before he was elected. I don't think this flip-flop is wholly due to self-interest. It seems to be something much darker at work.
This stuff is spreading in stranger ways too. On YouTube, I generally get my #45 news from lefty sources like MSNBC. There the Trumpists are in the minority. Not surprising, on Fox they are the vast majority. The odd thing is, on Canadian channels, like CBC or Global, more than half of the commenters are Trumpists. This is despite the fact that Canada is consistently about 60% social liberals to 40% social conservatives. We are certainly more socially liberal than the USA but why the huge representation of extreme right-wing talking points and attitudes on our left leaning media?
While many of the Trumpists on Canadian medial channels are openly American, just as many are Canadian (or perhaps pretending to be Canadian). This doesn't reflect the ambient liberalism of Canada and I am certain it isn't some previously silent conservative majority hiding here. It's seems like a deliberate, cross-border invasion and a blatant attempt to skew public perception of Canadian social values.
It's a mystery to me. Is it Trumpists looking for a place to vent without serious push back? Is it a USA based attempt to rally pro Trump forces in Canada for a cross border insurgency?
Any thoughts?
The right is becoming more politically active and more vocal, especially on social media, but you can see it in comments sections and on forums as well. They may be in the minority, but they are more unified, more rabid, and more active than the left. I've watched them act like missionaries, infiltrating the comments sections or forums on center or left-leaning sites I visit, pretending to be non-partisan while always taking a position to the right of the article or always highlighting problems with politicians on the left. Some have trouble keeping up the charade of being an independent, and once they've "outed" themselves as a wingnut they will disappear and come back later with a new Disqus profile but same old posting habits. And then you have other posters who spam forums with tons of posts just to drown out discussion, like jkcerda did here. A lot of news sites shut off comments because of it.
I'm not surprised to see it happening on Canadian media pages because I think it's happening to some degree almost everywhere. As you said, it's more than just Americans posting on American news stories. Right populism is a global movement and the people pushing it are connected. Canada may be more resistant to it than the US or Europe, but there's definitely interest there. Look how fast the Munk debate between Steve Bannon and David Frum sold out. The People’s Party of Canada went nowhere in the election, but that won't be the end of it.
We may vote Trump out in November, but that's just one (albeit powerful) office. We'll still have to contend with the increasingly rabid right after he's gone. I'm not looking forward to Ted Cruz vs. Joe Biden in 2024. I think Biden will get crushed.
Harvester on 23/7/2020 at 21:37
Quote Posted by heywood
The right is becoming more politically active and more vocal, especially on social media, but you can see it in comments sections and on forums as well. They may be in the minority, but they are more unified, more rabid, and more active than the left. I've watched them act like missionaries, infiltrating the comments sections or forums on center or left-leaning sites I visit, pretending to be non-partisan while always taking a position to the right of the article or always highlighting problems with politicians on the left. Some have trouble keeping up the charade of being an independent, and once they've "outed" themselves as a wingnut they will disappear and come back later with a new Disqus profile but same old posting habits. And then you have other posters who spam forums with tons of posts just to drown out discussion, like jkcerda did here. A lot of news sites shut off comments because of it.
I'm not surprised to see it happening on Canadian media pages because I think it's happening to some degree almost everywhere. As you said, it's more than just Americans posting on American news stories. Right populism is a global movement and the people pushing it are connected. Canada may be more resistant to it than the US or Europe, but there's definitely interest there. Look how fast the Munk debate between Steve Bannon and David Frum sold out. The People's Party of Canada went nowhere in the election, but that won't be the end of it.
We may vote Trump out in November, but that's just one (albeit powerful) office. We'll still have to contend with the increasingly rabid right after he's gone. I'm not looking forward to Ted Cruz vs. Joe Biden in 2024. I think Biden will get crushed.
Yeah, you see this over here too. Even among people I know and love. An uncle, a cousin, family of my deceased wife, a sister-in-law and her family. 50-100% of their Facebook posts are right-wing and conspiracy drivel. Anti 5G, anti vaxx, everyone is part of a pedophile ring now, we should leave the EU, no money to developing countries or European countries who got hit bad by Covid-19, New World Order rules all, face masks and Covid precautions are bullshit, close all borders & fuck refugees, MSM is corrupt and controlled by the cabal but conspiracy rag X and Cathy on YouTube can be fully trusted, muslims should either become just like us or they should leave the country, Black Lives Matter is bullshit because all lives matter and if you don't like it here then fuck off to your own country, fuck haters cause Trump is doing a good job, Russia is also great, etc. It's insane and relentless and I get demoralized by it and frankly a bit misanthropic lately. I focus a lot on my job now, and I try to relax in the evening and I get most of my news from a fairly balanced newspaper with insightful opinion pieces. I still use Facebook because I don't want to lose contact with people I'd otherwise not talk to. But more often than not I get this queasy, worrying feeling in my stomach about where we're all headed as a society and the human race in general.
Tomorrow I'm visiting a birthday party of my late wife's brother. Last time I met these people politics were discussed and I absolutely hated listening to their loudly voiced and poorly informed talking points. My wife's dad and me are the only ones actually picking up a newspaper now and then and getting our news from a balanced variety of sources, but we can hardly get a word in edgewise. If this happens again tomorrow, I'm thinking of not going to these parties anymore because I don't want to come off a full, busy work week only to be subjected to this insanity and arrive back home depressed and demoralized. This kind of stuff is actually affecting my mood on a daily basis now. I never discuss politics online anymore because I seriously cannot find the energy of arguing against this unceasing wave of bullshit.
IDK guys, I'm worried. And our government, while far from perfect, isn't even displaying the kind of fascist tendencies like the current USA administration does. But I feel we're headed in the wrong direction.
Nicker on 23/7/2020 at 22:33
It makes one wonder if Trump hasn't been good in the sense of exposing the radical-right and expending some their unhinged outrage before it gets worse (if that is imaginable). Perhaps 4 years of Hillary might have made the right that much more resentful and dangerous, yet hidden. That needs to be weighed against how much Trump has empowered and emboldened tyrants and their followers around the world.
It doesn't help that in Canada, Justin Trudeau is a bumbling twat, mired in petty corruption. He has done nothing to prove his conservative critics wrong and everything to alienate the further-left by lying about being an environmental champion and for doing less than nothing to resolve the historical abuse of First Nations people. He inherited his dad's charm but none of Pierre's savvy or courage.
Starker on 24/7/2020 at 00:29
Quote Posted by heywood
We may vote Trump out in November, but that's just one (albeit powerful) office. We'll still have to contend with the increasingly rabid right after he's gone. I'm not looking forward to Ted Cruz vs. Joe Biden in 2024. I think Biden will get crushed.
You should be so lucky. At this rate, it's going to be Tucker Carlson on the ticket and I'm not even joking.
Tocky on 24/7/2020 at 00:39
But how much of it is created in the countries it is posted in and how much a result of The Internet Research Agency of Russia? I've traced (and when I say traced I mean looked on a list) and a fair number of the memes are Macedonian in origin and those are just sub contracted from Russia. They seem to be ground zero of the new right movement. It's true there are a lot of loons who just eat it up to stoke their hate but it seems to be well organized.