This thread between RT and Noah is a fascinating example of today’s polarized arguments where some feel the need to personally attack the other and “draw first blood” in order to aggravate the response from other side making it impossible to have a civil discussion. This is a strategy commonly deployed now and a trap we have to be careful not to step into. It’s one I experienced firsthand:
I organized a community meeting with the police to create a scheduling plan for parents to patrol the forest immediately adjacent to our high school where drug users (evidence: many needles in their tents) were living. It was apparently out of the police’s district, so we would patrol and inform them of what we found. A young woman (who did not rsvp) showed up recording us and asking questions that were clearly meant to aggravate the group and its mission. She seemed to be following a script and seemed ready to record whatever she could incite. I am now more aware of this technique and will now be prepared to also record the lead-up to these meetings so others can see the whole context. My goal is to expose this strategy and render it ineffective. It’s counter productive as you can see from the discussion in this post.
Go back through their thread and see if you can find the point of personal attack that diverted a healthy conversation. Let’s try not to play into that game and stay focused on discussion vs name-calling. The good guys eventually win.
You told that story but you didn’t give the full context absolving Trump of inciting violence. I wonder why that is. Are you doing the thing Elon Musk claims you’re doing again? A foot in each camp?
The same people who hated Trump and would do anything, destroy anyone, in order to take him down were telling all of us how foolish and ridiculous President Tump’s tweets were, and how the tweets made him unelectable in the future.
If that were true, and Trump’s tweets were in fact eliminating any future possible election victory for him, the media would have done anything possible to have him tweet even more - not insisted he be banned.
They were knowing lying to the American people (as usual).
Time will tell about Twitter, but clearly the entire company was based on one fundamental concept: lying.
Lied about canceling.
Lied about deplatforming
Lied about politics.
They lied about shadow banning.
Lied about their biases.
Lied about bots
And Lied about protecting tots.
Most of the media is the same as social media. Their primary business value and mission: Effective lying and manipulation of the American people primarily to protect those elite who inherited their wealth, power and privilege - regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender - and attack and destroy anyone who would substitute a merit based system, with extra vitriol reserved for treacherous elite.
Nice and tidy. Factually correct. And the riot was A FACTOR in each case but not necessarily the cause. Thank you for referring to the event as a riot. Not an insurrection.
Your statement "The riot at the Capitol two days prior had resulted in five deaths" is erroneous and is presented in a context implying causation (Trump) that didn't exist. Blame, if any, should be directed at Capitol Police actions. For the record.
1. Four deaths, not five. Officer Brian Sicknick died of "natural causes" as determined by the D.C. Chief Medical Examiner.
2. "Unarmed Ashli Babbitt was murdered" by a police officer (per Police Use Of Force Expert Stan Kephart).
3. Roseanne Boyland fell on a step and was crushed as officers pushed protestors back. She had been sprayed by a noxious gas employed by police. Incredibly, the D.C. Medical Examiner found the cause of death to be acute amphetamine intoxication without any mention of extenuating factors. Boyland had been on Adderall (contains amphetamine salts) for years to treat A.D.D. So, if not due to Capitol Police actions, the riot certainly didn't result in her death.
4. Kevin Greeson's death was attributed to a heart attack with no mention of extenuating factors. Greeson had a history of heart problems.
5. Benjamin Phillips' death was attributed to a heart attack with no mention of extenuating factors. He too had a history of heart problems.
To me, the tenor of this article seems to be missing the point. Bari and her team seem to be alleging – with significant proof – that Twitter was not internally consistent in its ban of Trump. Essentially, he company wasn't following its own rules.
But we have to remember that outgoing President Trump wasn't following the rules of American democracy at this point in time. Instead of conceding that he lost the election (which he did lose), he insisted that he WON and malicious actors had stolen the victory from him. When the sitting President is breaking the rules, I don't see why Twitter should be forced to stringently adhere to its guidelines. Unexpected situations should allow for flexible solutions.
The point about Twitter not banning other Heads of State who were clearly inciting violence on the platform is well-taken. However, I'm not sure this inconsistency means Trump should have been allowed to stay; rather, it seems like these leaders should have been kicked off.
Outstanding coverage. As other have mentioned., For completeness I feel it is important to give the details and context of all who died on J6, otherwise it will be misconstrued. Keep going!!!
It's not an exaggeration---five people did die as a result of this riot. But they weren't murdered, at least not legally. Here are the five:
Officer Sicknick was hit by two strokes just hours after taking a full charge of bear spray into face and lungs. I call that murder. The state does not, ruling the strokes were "natural causes" and so murder charges will not be lodged against the rioter. I think the state is wrong, but the state didn't ask my opinion. Nonetheless, he is death No. 1 in the riot.
The second was rioter Ashli Babbitt, shot and killed trying to break through to the House chamber. She is death No. 2 in the riot.
The third was Rosann Boylan, who was hit by acute drug poisoning in the middle of the riot, fell to the ground gasping for air, and got trampled by fellow rioters. They didn't stomp her on purpose, and the trampling didn't kill her---the overdose did. But, death No. 3 in the riot.
Deaths Nos. 4 and 5 were the two police officers who committed suicide in the wake of the riot. Is it fair to count them as "riot deaths"? You can argue that one either way, but it's not an extreme exaggeration to count them as Nos. 4 and 5. it depends on whether you believe that the trauma that comes from surviving the brutality of a riot can lead you to kill yourself. They weren't murdered, but they did die, and I believe the riot was a factor in their decision. Nos. 4 and 5.
It’s baffling to me too Shane. I retired 5 years ago and what you say was very true then. But today, all you have to do is look on LinkedIn to see how executives grovel for their employees. It’s disgusting.
The trail of emails Bari released on the banning of Trump from Twitter after J6 revealed that the employees were furious. They had a “town hall meeting” to discuss it inside the company, which made the situation worse. The employees signed a full page ad published by WaPo seeking to ban Trump. And then the trail stopped. Someone at the top - caved, and made the decision to ban Trump. That’s how I see it. Others can disagree. But many of the real journalists covering this made the same observation as well. The nuts were in charge of the nut house.
I know, right? Employees at the New York Times make executives bow down to them. Employees at WaPo and Twitter, ditto. They use Slack to bitch and moan about their bosses and fellow employees, and execs do nothing except (occasionally) urge staff to play nice with others.
I never heard of such a thing in all my years in newspapering. If we had complaints, editors listened, sometimes took action, sometimes didn't. If that didn't work, the newsroom union would step in. But If we whined as publicly and noisily as the Times staff (for instance) does, we'd find ourselves rewriting press releases into one-paragraph shorts that somehow never made the paper, or proofreading racing results for the back of the sports section.
Media executives need to tell whiny employees, "Looks like you have time on your hands. Excellent! I want you to interview every sewage plant foreman from Manhattan to Canada and see if shit flows downhill. Then find a diner in The Heartland, God Bless It, and get the pulse of six guys named Moe who have Wise Observations. Take your time ..."
Problem solved.
To be clear, I'm a champion of workers' rights, and was a contract enforcement officer and then chairman of the newsroom union at the Chicago Sun-Times. I enjoyed righting wrongs and challenging bosses when they got abusive, and won most of my cases. But if this kind of nonsense had happened back then, and bosses told staff to shut up and do their work, I'd support their right to do so.
First of all congrats to Bari Weiss on such a successful trajection since leaving the NYT. The woke journos reacting to this has been a story in itself. Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi were slandered as "right wing" and "carrying water for the richest man in the word". Too many hot takes by these folks to list but for those of us who have been here a while the biggest complait people have of BW is that she isn't conservative enough.
Tragically, nothing new here. "moderation" is planted across the Western Media spectrum and has been growing for years. Comments i routinely published several years ago are routinely removed by WSJ, NYT, WAPO, AOL, Yahoo, etc because "they may offend certain groups."
The big mistake Trump and his followers made was that make america great again and drain the swamp are treason in the West. And, the Beltway swung back.
I would love for the FP for have someone smart and unbiased look in to the protections social media companies get from Section 230. I don't want the MSM spin, I want to hear the no shit implications. I'm not smart in it but it seems like social media companies use Section 230 as a one-way street...meaning they get immunity but have no standards to meet. Perhaps I am ignorant but I would argue that these companies shouldn't get immunity from content posted on their platforms if they're going to selectively censor certain accounts/opinions all while hiding how the algos work. If they want to be treated as essential, like a public utility, and worthy of protection, they should be forced to meet certain standards.
This thread between RT and Noah is a fascinating example of today’s polarized arguments where some feel the need to personally attack the other and “draw first blood” in order to aggravate the response from other side making it impossible to have a civil discussion. This is a strategy commonly deployed now and a trap we have to be careful not to step into. It’s one I experienced firsthand:
I organized a community meeting with the police to create a scheduling plan for parents to patrol the forest immediately adjacent to our high school where drug users (evidence: many needles in their tents) were living. It was apparently out of the police’s district, so we would patrol and inform them of what we found. A young woman (who did not rsvp) showed up recording us and asking questions that were clearly meant to aggravate the group and its mission. She seemed to be following a script and seemed ready to record whatever she could incite. I am now more aware of this technique and will now be prepared to also record the lead-up to these meetings so others can see the whole context. My goal is to expose this strategy and render it ineffective. It’s counter productive as you can see from the discussion in this post.
Go back through their thread and see if you can find the point of personal attack that diverted a healthy conversation. Let’s try not to play into that game and stay focused on discussion vs name-calling. The good guys eventually win.
Fight like hell?
You told that story but you didn’t give the full context absolving Trump of inciting violence. I wonder why that is. Are you doing the thing Elon Musk claims you’re doing again? A foot in each camp?
The same people who hated Trump and would do anything, destroy anyone, in order to take him down were telling all of us how foolish and ridiculous President Tump’s tweets were, and how the tweets made him unelectable in the future.
If that were true, and Trump’s tweets were in fact eliminating any future possible election victory for him, the media would have done anything possible to have him tweet even more - not insisted he be banned.
They were knowing lying to the American people (as usual).
Time will tell about Twitter, but clearly the entire company was based on one fundamental concept: lying.
Lied about canceling.
Lied about deplatforming
Lied about politics.
They lied about shadow banning.
Lied about their biases.
Lied about bots
And Lied about protecting tots.
Most of the media is the same as social media. Their primary business value and mission: Effective lying and manipulation of the American people primarily to protect those elite who inherited their wealth, power and privilege - regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender - and attack and destroy anyone who would substitute a merit based system, with extra vitriol reserved for treacherous elite.
Nice and tidy. Factually correct. And the riot was A FACTOR in each case but not necessarily the cause. Thank you for referring to the event as a riot. Not an insurrection.
Your statement "The riot at the Capitol two days prior had resulted in five deaths" is erroneous and is presented in a context implying causation (Trump) that didn't exist. Blame, if any, should be directed at Capitol Police actions. For the record.
1. Four deaths, not five. Officer Brian Sicknick died of "natural causes" as determined by the D.C. Chief Medical Examiner.
2. "Unarmed Ashli Babbitt was murdered" by a police officer (per Police Use Of Force Expert Stan Kephart).
3. Roseanne Boyland fell on a step and was crushed as officers pushed protestors back. She had been sprayed by a noxious gas employed by police. Incredibly, the D.C. Medical Examiner found the cause of death to be acute amphetamine intoxication without any mention of extenuating factors. Boyland had been on Adderall (contains amphetamine salts) for years to treat A.D.D. So, if not due to Capitol Police actions, the riot certainly didn't result in her death.
4. Kevin Greeson's death was attributed to a heart attack with no mention of extenuating factors. Greeson had a history of heart problems.
5. Benjamin Phillips' death was attributed to a heart attack with no mention of extenuating factors. He too had a history of heart problems.
I expect better from The Free Press.
To me, the tenor of this article seems to be missing the point. Bari and her team seem to be alleging – with significant proof – that Twitter was not internally consistent in its ban of Trump. Essentially, he company wasn't following its own rules.
But we have to remember that outgoing President Trump wasn't following the rules of American democracy at this point in time. Instead of conceding that he lost the election (which he did lose), he insisted that he WON and malicious actors had stolen the victory from him. When the sitting President is breaking the rules, I don't see why Twitter should be forced to stringently adhere to its guidelines. Unexpected situations should allow for flexible solutions.
The point about Twitter not banning other Heads of State who were clearly inciting violence on the platform is well-taken. However, I'm not sure this inconsistency means Trump should have been allowed to stay; rather, it seems like these leaders should have been kicked off.
Outstanding coverage. As other have mentioned., For completeness I feel it is important to give the details and context of all who died on J6, otherwise it will be misconstrued. Keep going!!!
I too think Bari is wed to the narrative of five people dying. It’s a gross exaggeration.
It's not an exaggeration---five people did die as a result of this riot. But they weren't murdered, at least not legally. Here are the five:
Officer Sicknick was hit by two strokes just hours after taking a full charge of bear spray into face and lungs. I call that murder. The state does not, ruling the strokes were "natural causes" and so murder charges will not be lodged against the rioter. I think the state is wrong, but the state didn't ask my opinion. Nonetheless, he is death No. 1 in the riot.
The second was rioter Ashli Babbitt, shot and killed trying to break through to the House chamber. She is death No. 2 in the riot.
The third was Rosann Boylan, who was hit by acute drug poisoning in the middle of the riot, fell to the ground gasping for air, and got trampled by fellow rioters. They didn't stomp her on purpose, and the trampling didn't kill her---the overdose did. But, death No. 3 in the riot.
Deaths Nos. 4 and 5 were the two police officers who committed suicide in the wake of the riot. Is it fair to count them as "riot deaths"? You can argue that one either way, but it's not an extreme exaggeration to count them as Nos. 4 and 5. it depends on whether you believe that the trauma that comes from surviving the brutality of a riot can lead you to kill yourself. They weren't murdered, but they did die, and I believe the riot was a factor in their decision. Nos. 4 and 5.
And there you have it.
The executives of Twitter were bullied by the employees of Twitter.
That’s what happened.
Any executive that makes decisions under duress like this, without exploring options and other points of views, should be fired.
ASAP.
Executives were bullied by employees? How does that happen, when executives can fire any employee for any reason they want, or none at all.
It’s baffling to me too Shane. I retired 5 years ago and what you say was very true then. But today, all you have to do is look on LinkedIn to see how executives grovel for their employees. It’s disgusting.
The trail of emails Bari released on the banning of Trump from Twitter after J6 revealed that the employees were furious. They had a “town hall meeting” to discuss it inside the company, which made the situation worse. The employees signed a full page ad published by WaPo seeking to ban Trump. And then the trail stopped. Someone at the top - caved, and made the decision to ban Trump. That’s how I see it. Others can disagree. But many of the real journalists covering this made the same observation as well. The nuts were in charge of the nut house.
I know, right? Employees at the New York Times make executives bow down to them. Employees at WaPo and Twitter, ditto. They use Slack to bitch and moan about their bosses and fellow employees, and execs do nothing except (occasionally) urge staff to play nice with others.
I never heard of such a thing in all my years in newspapering. If we had complaints, editors listened, sometimes took action, sometimes didn't. If that didn't work, the newsroom union would step in. But If we whined as publicly and noisily as the Times staff (for instance) does, we'd find ourselves rewriting press releases into one-paragraph shorts that somehow never made the paper, or proofreading racing results for the back of the sports section.
Media executives need to tell whiny employees, "Looks like you have time on your hands. Excellent! I want you to interview every sewage plant foreman from Manhattan to Canada and see if shit flows downhill. Then find a diner in The Heartland, God Bless It, and get the pulse of six guys named Moe who have Wise Observations. Take your time ..."
Problem solved.
To be clear, I'm a champion of workers' rights, and was a contract enforcement officer and then chairman of the newsroom union at the Chicago Sun-Times. I enjoyed righting wrongs and challenging bosses when they got abusive, and won most of my cases. But if this kind of nonsense had happened back then, and bosses told staff to shut up and do their work, I'd support their right to do so.
Good stuff !
It's remarkable how devoid of reasoning the hysterical anti-Trump arguments were. No coherent rationale, just "do the right thing!"
Very representative of the "We're on the right side of history!" camp. Pure question-begging, with zero introspection.
For everything that you do quite well, Bari, this is quite surprising and actually shameful:
"The riot at the Capitol two days prior had resulted in five deaths."
Like you did your research at Wikipedia?!?
First of all congrats to Bari Weiss on such a successful trajection since leaving the NYT. The woke journos reacting to this has been a story in itself. Bari Weiss and Matt Taibbi were slandered as "right wing" and "carrying water for the richest man in the word". Too many hot takes by these folks to list but for those of us who have been here a while the biggest complait people have of BW is that she isn't conservative enough.
Liek many other things these days, we see a total lack of "adults in the room".
Tragically, nothing new here. "moderation" is planted across the Western Media spectrum and has been growing for years. Comments i routinely published several years ago are routinely removed by WSJ, NYT, WAPO, AOL, Yahoo, etc because "they may offend certain groups."
The big mistake Trump and his followers made was that make america great again and drain the swamp are treason in the West. And, the Beltway swung back.
And, they will continue swinging unabated.
I would love for the FP for have someone smart and unbiased look in to the protections social media companies get from Section 230. I don't want the MSM spin, I want to hear the no shit implications. I'm not smart in it but it seems like social media companies use Section 230 as a one-way street...meaning they get immunity but have no standards to meet. Perhaps I am ignorant but I would argue that these companies shouldn't get immunity from content posted on their platforms if they're going to selectively censor certain accounts/opinions all while hiding how the algos work. If they want to be treated as essential, like a public utility, and worthy of protection, they should be forced to meet certain standards.
Exactly. Once they control content they should be responsible for it.
Sad that Americans would do this. Thankfully, we have a South African that understands freedom of speech.