Why Won't Twitter Treat White Supremacy Like ISIS? Because It Would Mean Banning Some Republican Politicians Too. (vice.com) 925
Joseph Cox, and Jason Koebler, reporting for Motherboard: At a Twitter all-hands meeting on March 22, an employee asked a blunt question: Twitter has largely eradicated Islamic State propaganda off its platform. Why can't it do the same for white supremacist content? An executive responded by explaining that Twitter follows the law, and a technical employee who works on machine learning and artificial intelligence issues went up to the mic to add some context.
With every sort of content filter, there is a tradeoff, he explained. When a platform aggressively enforces against ISIS content, for instance, it can also flag innocent accounts as well, such as Arabic language broadcasters. Society, in general, accepts the benefit of banning ISIS for inconveniencing some others, he said. In separate discussions verified by Motherboard, that employee said Twitter hasn't taken the same aggressive approach to white supremacist content because the collateral accounts that are impacted can, in some instances, be Republican politicians. The employee argued that, on a technical level, content from Republican politicians could get swept up by algorithms aggressively removing white supremacist material. Banning politicians wouldn't be accepted by society as a trade-off for flagging all of the white supremacist propaganda, he argued.
With every sort of content filter, there is a tradeoff, he explained. When a platform aggressively enforces against ISIS content, for instance, it can also flag innocent accounts as well, such as Arabic language broadcasters. Society, in general, accepts the benefit of banning ISIS for inconveniencing some others, he said. In separate discussions verified by Motherboard, that employee said Twitter hasn't taken the same aggressive approach to white supremacist content because the collateral accounts that are impacted can, in some instances, be Republican politicians. The employee argued that, on a technical level, content from Republican politicians could get swept up by algorithms aggressively removing white supremacist material. Banning politicians wouldn't be accepted by society as a trade-off for flagging all of the white supremacist propaganda, he argued.
Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
If it walks like a duck, looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, ...
Re:Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
segregation court cases settled that.
Re: Well... (Score:5, Funny)
I don't know, you have, YallQaeda , Vanilla ISIS, YeeHawdists, and YokelHaram. Christian Taliban just doesn't rate up there with those gems.
a terrorist is a terrorist (Score:5, Insightful)
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Does that also apply to black supremacists, mexican supremacists, jewish supremacists, islamic supremacists, and other non-White racists, or just Whites?
I jest. We all know the answer to that.
Re:a terrorist is a terrorist (Score:4, Insightful)
Does that also apply to black supremacists, mexican supremacists, jewish supremacists, islamic supremacists, and other non-White racists, or just Whites?
Yes.
Re:a terrorist is a terrorist (Score:4, Insightful)
Can someone tell me what Republican positions and policies are 'white supremicist'?
TFA doesn't give a single example of a tweet by a politician that would be stopped by any reasonable filter.
Seriously, this is a bullshit statement by twitter....
Actually, it isn't. This is ONE low level employee, speaking only for himself, and not making any official statement.
Re:a terrorist is a terrorist (Score:4, Insightful)
Can someone tell me what Republican positions and policies are 'white supremicist'?
Seriously, this is a bullshit statement by twitter....
And this is a bullshit statement by you. Just exactly which Twitter statement are whinging about? Neither the headline nor the article mentioned Republican positions or policies as being 'white supremicist'. If you want examples of tweets by Republicans that would get someone banned for being 'white supremicist' then just RTFA.
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The organizers' stated goals included unifying the American white nationalist movement and to oppose removing a statue of Robert E. Lee from Charlottesville's Lee Park.
And Hitler's stated goal was to "unite Germany" and "fight Marxism".
"Stated goals" don't mean SHIT.
Re:a terrorist is a terrorist (Score:4, Informative)
Fair enough, but we also need to be clear about what qualifies as white supremacy. If a person is generally conservative, is a white man supporting a white man for president, or wants some common sense immigration limitations, that does not make them a white supremacist. So let's treat them equally, but we have to stop painting any and all of our Caucasian mal political opponents as white supremacists.
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When their definition of "common sense" includes specific terms like "Muslim Ban" and their list of common-sense countries of concern has a tech term of "shitholes", in reference to all of Africa and South America; and Norway is held up as the good one, the "quacks like a duck" criterion is applied.
Re: Well... (Score:2, Insightful)
I bet you also believe that DPRK is a thriving democracy. I mean it says people and democratic right in their name.
Re: Well... (Score:5, Informative)
Historically correct.
Woodrow Wilson was a white supremacist, as was William Jennings Bryan. But that was a long time ago.
Since FDR's New Deal coalition, and especially since Nixon's Southern Strategy [wikipedia.org], WS has shifted to the right.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
From TFA: "In March, [Iowa Republican] King promoted an open white nationalist on Twitter for the third time. King quote tweeted Faith Goldy, a Canadian white nationalist."
Seems like little conflation going on here - it is more like calling a spade a spade.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Informative)
You are confusing the origin of the phrase with the racist perversion of it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_a_spade_a_spade [wikipedia.org]
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We're against fascism so let's dress all in black, put on masks, and beat the shit out of some people who are not like us. Totally not exactly like something fascists would do.
Re:NAZI FAGGOT LIVES WILL NEVER MATTER, KILL THEM (Score:5, Interesting)
Nazi faggots have always been the enemy of America.
Except for that time after WWII where the US brought a bunch of Nazis over, gave them sanctuary, and put them to work making rockets and weapons.
Re:NAZI FAGGOT LIVES WILL NEVER MATTER, KILL THEM (Score:4, Informative)
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The media doesn't have to conflate much. Politics, especially current US politics, involves a lot of semi-secret codes. Dog whistles which let politicians subtly signal to their followers while maintaining plausible deniability.
You will seldom catch a Republican openly proclaiming 'Mexico is sending us their rapists and murderers.' That only happened once. What you do see is a lot of selective referencing to stories - every notable crime committed by an illegal immigrant gets plenty of mention from them, bu
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
Politics, especially current US politics, involves a lot of semi-secret codes. Dog whistles which let politicians subtly signal to their followers while maintaining plausible deniability.
The concern I have with the whole "dog whistle" theory is that it's non-falsifiable, and thus effectively can be used to put just about whatever words one chooses into the mouth of just about whomever one chooses.
But maybe you've put the finger on why people are having so much trouble designing these filters: they're literally impossible to train properly when each speaker is evaluated under an ad hoc standard based on what certain people feel like they're REALLY saying.
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Sorry, but hanging an entire worldview on a soundbite of one person's opinion from 35+ years ago is truly an Illuminati-level conspiracy theory.
And applied even-handedly, that (among other things) would brand the entire Democratic party as a bunch of ambulance chasing opportunists [youtube.com], right?
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That is just the thing about the whole immigration debate. The science says that immigration, legal and illegal, is a net positive for the country. The science also says that the enforcement measures already in place at the Mexican border is sufficient. (We could totally crack down on visa jumping, but that isn't what Republicans talk about, is it?) Border crossings are way down too. There isn't a lot of noise about Canadian border crossings either. If it isn't racism that is driving the animus towards ille
Twitter has already been forced to admit (Score:5, Interesting)
It's their system. They can make their own rules. But we should at least call out the hypocrisy when we see it.
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Re:Twitter has already been forced to admit (Score:5, Insightful)
It is not reasonable to make an exception for the President, it is entirely objectionable to the whole point of this nation, where the Executive is subordinate to the people.
There is a reason why we don't have a king or monarch, why you do not refer to the President of the United States with any kind of honorific.
Therefore, to treat the supposed resident of the White House as being beyond the rules is a gesture that shows how empty your supposed virtues are.
If you can't play by the rules as everyone else, why should people not treat you as the clearly demented fuck-up you are?
Explain that.
I disagree (Score:2, Insightful)
At a certain point Twitter is enabling him. Do I think Trump is a racist? No, he's an opportunist. But he's fanning the flames for cheap political points. Left unchecked he'll be followed by worse and worse leaders. We saw this when the overton window shifted u
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Trump refused to call out the Charlottesville rally [go.com].
Yeah, what a monster! Here's the transcript [twimg.com] of what he said.
Re:Twitter has already been forced to admit (Score:4, Interesting)
They can deny him THEIR platform.
They could also plaster a "WARNING: Hate Speech" banner above his tweets. Or if they don't want to risk being inflammatory, they could go with a more neutral "WARNING: In violation of one or more rules in our TOS".
Re:Twitter has already been forced to admit (Score:5, Insightful)
So yes, it strikes me as simultaneously both a disturbing and a pathetic thing to do with "regular" folks, but it somehow becomes more disturbing and more pathetic if they try to do it to wag their fingers at national politicians. It's like... well you have to understand, their hate speech rules have been nowhere near anything like concrete, easy to understand, widely acceptable cultural norms. At least a couple years ago it was all hazily defined, bluntly applied and openly partisan, openly SJW-y (ffs, they even appointed Anita Sarkeesian to their "Trust and Safety" council.)
Inspired and outraged leftists try to make these culture wars out to be something much simpler and clearer and more reasonable than what they actually are. This isn't about "banning trolls" or banning words that most sane people from (let's say) the 1990s would have recognized and labeled as hate speech. I'm not actually sure what Twitter's full motivations are or whether controversial bannings help or hurt them in the short and medium term (it would hurt them badly if and when a pro "free speech" competitor builds up some real steam, but it's really hard to dethrone a platform as entrenched as Twitter.)
Censorship of politicians because you think they are communicating hate speech is fucking insane, even if they are voicing actual hate speech (not just Anita's definition of hate speech.) Actually, *especially* if they are communicating hate speech. It's much, much more important for people to know exactly what their politicians are saying and thinking that it is for Twitter to puff out their chest and tell us how they're helping police us from the bad elements of our own culture.
It's got nothing to do with censorship (Score:3)
It's like the old saying goes, you don't have to go home but you can't stay here. Freedom cuts both ways. If I don't like what Trump says then I have both the right and the obligation to deprive him of my venues as a platform. If I give him those venues and allow him and his ideas to flourish then all principal goes out the window and I'm just yet another sell out.
As
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As much as I hate the Orange One, PLEASE don't ban him from Twitter! I watch his feed for the huge lulz.
Incredibly entertaining watching others flame him to a crisp in the responses to his tweets......
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It's their system. They can make their own rules. But we should at least call out the hypocrisy when we see it.
They certainly have a very different standard for left- and right-wing tweets. Trump gets tolerated like the lefties do. Is that hypocrisy?
If you're idea of "white supremacist" includes "anywho who wants less immigration" or "anyone who doesn't like Islam", you're so far off the left end we're no longer really speaking the same language. And that's the only measure by which I know of any prominent "white supremacist" politicians: people who oppose immigration, or who oppose Islam.
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IOU 1 (one) upvote
That is objectively false (Score:3, Insightful)
Another question (Score:4, Insightful)
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Because if you do ... what the hell would be left?
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Have you reported it?
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Freedom of speech. ISIS are terrorists and actively trying to attack western countries. Identity politics is just politics you don't like, which is protected free speech. They are not remotely the same thing.
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IS is all about identity politics. So is white supremacy.
Their only difference with leftist identity politics is the identity of the enemies and the allies. Other than that, they are in complete agreement on methodology.
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And the murder. Don't forget the murder.
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I'm not. Far left is by far the most murderous ideology we have. Far right comes quite far behind, followed by islam and christianity.
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Nazi faggot. Is that like an islamist jew?
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They are not remotely the same thing.
I'm not so sure that's the case. After all, one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. If you want to use a strict textbook definition, then Samuel Adams and other American founding fathers would almost certainly qualify as terrorists for some of their actions. You could also make the argument that radical identitarians (whether from the left or the right) could do as much or more to undermine or damage western countries as terrorist groups like ISIS that are more or less confined to acting withi
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It's because I don't equate opinions I dislike with terrorism.
Re:Another question (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, legally they are. Some other laws directly discriminating against them along with widespread corporate policy being allowed to stand is purely a function of widespread radical bias.
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No, I think you don't know what a protected class is. Protected classes include race, religion, gender, age, and disability. White and male are both federally protected classes, it is unlawful for government and employment to discriminate against them. Is that protection being applied and especially in a consistent and equitable manner? No, in fact measures in the current climate all you have to do to get widespread public and political support for discriminating against white males and to say it is for emp
Re:Another question (Score:4, Insightful)
Are men or are white people a protected class?
Why should that matter? And why is anyone a "protected class"? The whole idea smacks of "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." Twitter can do what it wants, but unless it wants to alienate entire segments of users, it should have consistency in it's rules.
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History.
In an ideal world, everyone is treated equally, but we don't live in anything close to an ideal world. The hard truth is that there are groups of people who have been systematically excluded and marginalized for long periods of history. The whole concept of a "protected class" is a ham-fisted way to try to address these issues.
Re:Another question (Score:4, Insightful)
Only morons think the solution to a racist person is to institute racist laws.
"A person was racist, so now everyone has to hire an equal number of all races, regardless of qualifications"
What better way to MAKE people racist than to give preferential treatment to under qualified people of another race and make the other races sit and watch as they get screwed.
The fact that white people with better qualifications in EVERY metric can lose a less qualified candidate for medical school at a public university is not only disgusting but should be questioned. These policies actually breed situations where other races are literally, by law, the dumbest people in the room and then we wonder why "stereotypes" exist. These policies actually breed racist thoughts and views because it systematically places dumber people into jobs, across all job skill levels. Its not that all people of that race are dumb, its just how they get allocated... that the dumb ones can get farther. So RELATIVE to their peers they will always be of inferior intelligence.
Imagine you allocated normally distributed numbered rocks to numbered buckets. For every black rock you allocated it to the bucket equal to the number on the rock + 1. Even if all the rocks are "the same" the black rocks in a given bucket will always have a lower number than the other rocks. Now change the numbers to any measure of intelligence.
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I assume you meant this sarcastically since being ethnically Jewish and anti-semitic isn't mutually exclusive.
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If you are white, you likely have a sense of where your parentage came from. Would you be willing to trade that up for a month of the year? I wouldn't.
I would. I'm white and I honestly don't give two shits and a Popsicle about where my ancestors came from. I just happen to know because it matters to another member of my family, but I could care less. I'm willing to bet 80% of Americans don't know where they came from, and most of them could care less.
You're American by ideal, not by birth.
Twitter doesn't ban muslim calls for death (Score:4, Insightful)
This is B.S.
How many times has Louis Farakhan tweeted to kill whites or Jews ?
They also took no action against Black Lives Matter calling for cop killings.
I can't even begin to guess how many times people on the left have called for harassing men in general or white women and twitter does nothing.
Hell they don't even remove the blue checkmarks of know racists as long as you are racist the right way
Sarah Jeong anyone ?
https://www.washingtontimes.co... [washingtontimes.com]
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RWNJ? Republican Whites from New Jersey?
it's a Fox hole talking point (Score:2)
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Breitbart? Dailywire? Not unbiased sources you think?
reparations
Reparations were PROMISED by the government at the end of the Civil War. 40 acres and a mule, look it up:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Land/real estate is the asset that helps keep white people economically advantaged. It's Collateral that can help start a business, or get a loan to pay for college. Without fair access to land, racial equality was doomed from the end of the Civil War.
White Supremecist the new boogieman (Score:3, Insightful)
First it was the Russians (who have no proven do have done nothing more than the expected dirty tricks using social media), and now it is "white supremacists".
Despite what you might read - there aren't any consequential "white supremacists" in the USA. There are a few pathetic neo-Nazis, who understand the basics of socialism/Fascism about as well as they understand quantum mechanics. They think wearing swastika armbands are cool because it shocks people, and are generally, and for good reason, threatened by anyone with even a spark of initiative. But they are utter and complete non-players in politics, they have exactly zero influence on anything, and are roundly condemned by everyone, universally.
This attempt to link them with Republicans is another tedious example of playing politics with sophistry. They (and most of the readers here) want to have it drag in Republicans because that's their political goal. Republicans are generally, and in fact, almost never, "white supremecists" and are only caught by redefining the concept.
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Despite what you might read - there aren't any consequential "white supremacists" in the USA.
How many people have to be victims of hate crimes perpetrated by white supremacists before they are considered "consequential"?
Re:White Supremecist the new boogieman (Score:5, Informative)
Re:White Supremecist the new boogieman (Score:4, Informative)
Re:White Supremecist the new boogieman (Score:5, Insightful)
This attempt to link them with Republicans is another tedious example of playing politics with sophistry.
The massive majority of Republicans are not white supremacists.
... but, the massive majority of white supremacists are voting Republican. Clearly, something in the party appeals to them.
... and sometimes, it seems like Republican voters are okay with voting in politicians who are clearly bigoted or at least unwilling to take a stance on bigoted groups.
This isn't a little outlier or a perception brought on by leftist propaganda. The Republican party has a problem.
Re:White Supremecist the new boogieman (Score:4, Insightful)
They've been turning a blind eye to racism/nativism and white supremacy for decades now. Nixon with the Southern Strategy. Reagan with his non-existent "welfare queen", Bush with Willie Horton. (the furlough scheme was Republican in origin! reduced recidivism!) Some have even been known to use "dog whistles" that are known to appeal to racists.
Know how a lot of rural (and southern) republicans LOVE to bash northern cities any chance they get? Well they KNOW that their supporters view those cities as "places where the minorities are". So a Republican can use racist dog whistle by talking about murders in chicago without actively saying racist things. His supporters don't know that murder in chicago is still much lower than it was in the past. Somebody says "650 people died in chicago in 2016" with the subtle dog whistle of "Chicago has gone to crap because the n-word people are running it" yeah, but 970 did in 1974! and 561 did in 2018, so it's dropped again.
I figure the gangs figured out the tricks the police were using and clamped down on people they think might be informants, killing them or intimidating them faster.
Also, Chicago might have been TOO successful against gangs in years past, taking down too many gang leaders, causing a bunch of murders when the remainder began jockeying for top positions.
The Republican party has a problem.
Even the Republicans know they have a problem!
https://www.theatlantic.com/po... [theatlantic.com]
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Nah, orange man funny!
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It's a rock worth living under, though, if it allows you to not deal with this bull.
Nuance is hard: News at 11 (Score:2)
FTFA:
Most people can agree a beheading video or some kind of ISIS content should be proactively removed , but when we try to talk about the alt-right or white nationalism, we get into dangerous territory, where we’re talking about [Iowa Rep.] Steve King or maybe even some of Trump’s tweets, so it becomes hard for social media companies to say all of this ‘this content should be removed
So it's fairly easy to block black and white, but not so easy to block only certain shades of gray? Shocking.
Just for grins, do we think we might see the same phenomenon in the parallel universe where some social media company wanted to ban black nationalism, but found it difficult to fully do so without collateral damage on other speech, including that of politicians? I'm sure that would be super-simple, but just checking.
A Better Headline (Score:2)
A better headline might read "Twitter Can't Ban Any Supremacists Because It Would Mean Banning Politicians Too"
Identity politics is a cancer that infects both the Far/Alt-Right and the Regressive/Alt-Left
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The modern Democratic party is far more overtly racist than the Republicans. The only way to disagree with that is if you go by a modified definition of racism which excludes any action targeted at whites, in which case yeah the Democratic party isn't racist at all.
Like look at the Democratic primaries... you can find articles in mainstream publications like the NY Times openly asking if a white man should represent the Democratic party. By the definition of racism 10 years ago, which is the definition that
You mean Steve King? (Score:2, Troll)
I think they are talking about Steve King of Iowa. I mean it sounds like they are talking about Steve King of Iowa. Yeah, we would likely lose Steve King of Iowa.
Re:You mean Steve King? (Score:4, Insightful)
And let's be honest here, there "anti-semitism on the left" is a non-issue to anyone viewing it logically. It's just an excuse for right-wing/russian trolls to go "see? both sides are the same!". One side is saying we should kick out minorities while the other is saying we should look at the influence of foreign countries in our politics. Not comparable.
What is "white supremacy" exactly? (Score:4, Informative)
White supremacy used to mean Democratic KKK members lynching black people. The world rightly condemned that years ago.
Nowadays, "white supremacy" means things like using math [cnn.com], milk [motherjones.com], making the OK sign [theoutline.com], or saying it's OK to be white [wikipedia.org].
David Duke has done *all* of those things, so there's no room for argument, that stuff is all permanently racist now. You're not allowed to do anything a racist does, or you're one of them too. I just hope he stops breathing soon, so I can start.
Re:What is "white supremacy" exactly? (Score:5, Funny)
I just hope he stops breathing soon, so I can start
Did you just culturally misappropriate Waiting to Exhale [wikipedia.org]? Off to the gulag!
Re:What is "white supremacy" exactly? (Score:5, Interesting)
The OK/white power symbol is an interesting one.
Started as a troll by 4chan it's become a real thing. The Christchurch terrorist used it in court, for example.
Functionally, what is the difference between a joke that white supremacists use unironicly and a non-joke one?
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White supremacy used to mean Democratic KKK members lynching black people. The world rightly condemned that years ago.
Nowadays, "white supremacy" means things like using math [cnn.com], milk [motherjones.com], making the OK sign [theoutline.com], or saying it's OK to be white [wikipedia.org].
Remember, ideologically those Democratic KKK members more closely resemble the Republican party of today. The Republican party today is the party of Lincoln in name only.
And, well, to go off your example of the "OK" sign symbols, gestures, and the like are constantly adopted, co-opted, etc. Throwing up a Nazi salute or walking around wearing a white hood creates an automatic association in people. So instead, (and these are made up examples) maybe you wear an all white hat or hold up a "number one" sign.
Can an entire Slashdot post be "-1 Troll"? (Score:5, Interesting)
I have a bad feeling about this...
How does Arabic Twitter look? Anyone here speak it (Score:3)
If they are actually holding Muslim hate speech to a higher standard than "white supremacy" in any language, I'll be pleasantly surprised. I mean it's true I've been out of the loop for a while, but this is a company that appointed Anita freaking Sarkeesian to their "Trust and Safety" council, and that was *before* Trump was elected.
(On a tangentially related note, I've always been of the opinion that ISIS social media accounts should be left open so that law enforcement could monitor them and infiltrate, set up honey pots, obtain search warrants, etc. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised too if that was the very reason why they were allowing any ISIS activity at all for a while there--was probably at the request of law enforcement or intelligence agencies. But my bigger point here was that Muslim "hate speech" certainly doesn't begin or end with ISIS.)
1. I considered trying to learn it myself at one point, but it's apparently one of the hardest languages in the world to learn. It's very slightly easier to manage if you focus on audio (the language is part of that semitic family that doesn't have explicitly written vowels)... except many of the sounds are hard for English speakers to make and the different dialects of Arabic are so different as to be mutually unintelligible. (Not sure if this applies to the written language as well.) I saw someone say that when Arabs from different countries try to communicate, they fall back on pidgin a mix of vocabulary and phrases culled from the Qu'ran with some Egyptian TV colloquialisms mixed in.
Why not just create a whitelist then? (Score:4, Interesting)
If the concern is specific politicians, why not create a whitelist of all politicians and not ban those regardless of what they say?
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"Anyone who wants to be in power is most definitely unfit for any office, high or otherwise".
need to define (Score:2)
There are laws against incitement to violence. If they need something more, they should start trying to define it.
Let ISIS and white supremacists tweet (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes both groups are horrible, so what?
Counter bad ideas with good ideas, not censorship.
I want the world to know what both of these groups actually believe.
An exception would be speech that is actually illegal. Child porn should be taken down.
If somebody advocates violence, track that person down and arrest him/her.
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Actually the problem with White Nationalism is that there are currently systemic problems that come into play. Various White Nationalists are protected because of their roles in society and how the rules are applied differently to them verses people of color.
White Supremacy does kill people all over the world. White Nationalists killed people in a church in South Carolina, in Christ Church, New Zealand, in Norway. A white supremacist was just put to death in Texas yesterday. They might not kill to the d
Re:Why ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most of the ISIS-related killings outside of the middle east have not been formal members of that group. Rather they watched and read propaganda online (this is now called "self radicalization"), and then often recorded a "I dedicate myself to the cause of ISIS" video immediately before setting off to kill people. In most cases they had never been in contact with anyone with an actual affiliation with ISIS. In others it was tenuous at best. There are exceptions (e.g.: the Bataclan killings were more involved), but there always are.
This is remarkably close to what many of those White Nationalists did: they read and watched things online and self-radicalized, then posted something before going on a killing spree. I think you are trying to make a distinction where there is none.
This sort of thing is the new norm, it appears that the recent killing in Northern Ireland by the "New IRA" is likely along the same lines. The internet has made it really easy for people to create and disseminate propaganda so that people can self-radicalize. Add to that easy access to weapons (guns, explosives, and cars), and the need for organized violent groups to get frequent violent actions has slipped away.
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Nope, they only blow up and kill people in the good old USof A. Oklahoma City, Charlottesville, Pittsburgh Synagogue, Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood, etc.
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Of course not, the Republicans and the Democrats are one party with two flavors of spin. The net result of what they pass is the same, central power for government, interests of the wealthy addressed, 99%+ of Americans harmed. The actual results (not what they say and propose, what they actually pass) varies only small highly emotional issues.
It doesn't really matter to them which party you are loyal to, as long as they keep everyone roughly divided and if not loyal to one side or the other, at least strong
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Co-equal yes, but the system is built on checks and balances. Congress checks the President, the President checks congress. You know who doesn't check the President? The FBI and AG, they work for him and therefore for us.
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No, you are just so rabidly partisan you can't hear me. I oppose your partisan bias so you can't help but see me as one of "them." Notice, the other person who replied up to now has the same problem but the opposite party.
Just like neither side is happy with a fair deal/compromise, partisans of either group feel attacked by non-partisan truth.
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Yes I do have a problem with banning someone because you or a rabble rouser with an army of SJW manlettes living in their mom's basement throw a label on them. Plenty of things you might think are "hate speech" might not be by a logical person's standards.
Re:no problem, here (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is what a lot of the left calls hate speech is simply speech they don't like, it isn't actually hate speech.
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Hate speech doesn't exist. Speech should be protected in the land of the free even if it doesn't suit you or it offends you. If you have a problem with that, go elsewhere.
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I'm not certain if that philosophy should be credited to Pol Pot, Dick Cheney [nymag.com] or Antifa.
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Re: She Persisted (Score:4, Informative)
Technically Hillary could still get the throne for 6-12mo due to Russian interference. But the courts would have to do a way better job.
Not really. There is no road that leads to the whitehouse for Hillary Clinton. The line of succession is clear in the Constitution. If Turmp and Pence where removed then the Nancy Pelosi would become President.
I guess, technically, there is a way for Hillary to become President. They would have to remove Turmp/Pence leaving Nancy at the helm. Nancy would have to pick Hillary as her VP, then croak, leaving Hillary as president. So, yeah, it could happen.
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Trump is protected so Pence can't become President. It is a VERY sad day when Trump is less nasty than the alternatives
This is what I've been saying for two years. Trump is now where near as bad as democrats think he is. But Pence is far worse than the democrats dream Trump is. Pence honestly thinks he is on a mission for God to put gays back in the closet and women back in the kitchen.
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The GP is most likely pointing out that neither Trump nor his VP and cabinet members are legitimately in the White House, so none of those people would be eligible. Yes it's a pipe dream that this fact will be followed by the correct remedy, but as much as I don't like Hillary she is the one who is supposed to be in the White House. Well really it should have been Sanders, but lets face it, when it comes to corruption Trump and Clinton both have it in spades.
You need to check the reality you live in son. Here lets correct it for you. Trump and his VP are legitimately in the White House. Please repeat till you come to that understanding.
Hillary lost. Repeat, Hillary lost. She doesn't belong in the White house.
Do we have understanding? Repeat till this till you do. "Trump is my President, Trump is my President. Trump won fair and square. Trump is my President."
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Not only was there "collusion",
Repeat after me. "There was no collusion, Muller said so." "There was no collusion, Muller said so."
Keep repeating till Nov 2020 or Nov 2024.
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"But Hillary got X million more votes than Trump!" - Really, Really, Really winning California doesn't get you any more electoral votes than winning California by 1 vote. We have never picked our President by popular vote, and a smart politician like Hillary knows that. That she had 6 million more people that voted for her is meaningless.
Well not really. Notice that the democrats, except for a few die hard, have stopped talking about the popular vote. That is because after they audited the votes in California they found about 5 million illegal votes. Once those votes where eliminated, and then factoring illegal votes in other districts, it turns out she probably didn't win the popular vote ether. It would have been very close, well with in the margin of error, but, yeah, she probably lost that one too.
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What exactly is a "walking piece of shit"?
Here's a question, and I ask this as a non Trump fan myself.
If most news sources, major news sources, were fairly openly against Trump: This would include most staff at Facebook, Google, et al; how did the magical Russian trolls manage to swing it alone?
In other words, how do these trolls amount to more influence than the major sources of news for most Americans.
Trump, in all his awfulness, won because his opponents essentially said "You are all morons, and if you d