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Friday, January 15. 2021The Woke Purge is BeginningParler being dumped by Amazon Web Services wasn't the first shot. Gab was in 2018. Gab is still around, though it is private now and subscription only. That may be the future for Parler and others like it which fill a need. But going private isn't the only solution, there are other solutions. But private is probably bes. However, being aware and adept at meeting the Progressive/Leftist challenges to free speech is essential. I am particularly fond of The Mises Institute's approach. This is a space in which I'm uniquely informed and aware. I've been seeing this slowly developing for years, and it's been a growing concern. I've been told for years "oh it will never get that bad" and now it really is that bad. Many said Net Neutrality was necessary because the provider of the pipes would throttle, reduce and limit ability for sites and apps to work. Ironically, the purported supporters of Net Neutrality are the very same businesses who are throttling free speech - you know, the free speech they felt Net Neutrality was required to prevent OTHERS FROM THROTTLING THEM. Except, they will argue, 'this is different'. It's not. And Net Neutrality would have given these tech oligarchs more power to do this very kind of thing. That said, because all this has happened slowly at first, then suddenly (due to the Capitol incident), Hemingway's description of bankruptcy fits these moves restricting the freedoms on speech very well. When it's taken, unlike bankruptcy - which is usually noticeable, this is going largely unnoticed and unmentioned. Or, at least, it's being done in a manner many consider 'acceptable'. Because the main beneficiaries are the very groups doing damage to free speech - the tech oligopolists. Who know 'better than you' about how things should be done, how you should live your life, and what you can or should say. Don't get me wrong. Tech in't bad. Social media isn't bad. It's not inherently evil. It is ambivalent to morality. But individuals themselves can be good or bad, and as a result can have overbearing and long-lasting impacts on our realities. I'm sure Gutenberg was not loved by leaders of the day and "War of the Worlds" certainly sent many scurrying to talk of the damage radio can do. TV was described as a "vast wasteland" and Bill Gates felt there was little commercial value to the internet. What is happening now requires individual awareness and action. It does NOT require fighting or violence. Just intelligence and smart, cordial and meaningful action. The Progessives are just starting, in my view. I don't believe violence will help solve issues - it will be used to justify positions. But being louder, smarter and more aware will make a difference. Trackbacks
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Well stated, Bulldog. I'm a fan of Ayn Rand, but I now realize that, while she was correct on the fundamentals, she was mistaken on a few particulars: Gun control was one. Although she was probably right when she wrote, "If society breaks down, your guns won't help you." Television was another. She wrote (back in the fifties when television was new), that "We're going to see some great things on TV." Well, we saw the moon landing in 1969, so that qualifies. But she never foresaw that TV would turn into a propaganda conduit for statism. I'm actually glad Ayn Rand isn't alive to see what has happened to her beloved Country.
Gab was always privately owned, but if by private you mean that they no longer depend on outside services to function then that is somewhat more true now. The true bottlenecks are services such as the ability to accept credit cards, and that has been taken away from Gab.
The libertarian argument that "private companies should be free to do as they please" stops being valid when the service in question is so heavily regulated that you or I couldn't go into that business tomorrow if we wanted to. And the internet, and communications generally, is becoming more and more monopoly-like with each passing year. 90% of the communications industry worldwide -- including not just the Internet but radio, TV, newspapers, magazines, books, movies, and recorded music -- is now concentrated in six multinational companies. We need to actively resist any further mergers and acquisitions by them, lest they gain the actual power to prevent dissenters from getting service at all. We also should try and undo Obama's handover of the Internet's domain name authority, ICANN, to the ITU, a UN agency which might very well decide to hand the "woke" people exactly that monopoly power. Ultimately, four boxes protect our freedom. But all four are in danger of being taken away. It is not an overreaction to be willing to use the ones we have left rather than allow this to happen. Gosh, Bulldog. You flip flop like a carp. Pick a position and stick to it. I guess you reserve the right to change your mind, but your shifting almost daily is making me sea sick.
The attacks will continue. The drive to censor and throttle speech will intensify, but not be limited to speech and ideas. The real thrust for the heart will be when the leftists start convincing the financial world - as they have done already, in certain cases - to forgo providing financial services to certain targeted groups. Like revoking their credit, calling in loans, or even better, disallowing credit card transactions to 'throttle' that little thing called cash flow.
How do you fight that? When corporations take up the Woke Mantel they are no longer institutions with their mission objectives being to maximize profit for the shareholders. They are now Social Justice Warrior corporations. For some it is just lip service, like oil companies saying they'll 'Go Green.' But others really do drink the KoolAid. Activist shareholders will have to engage. > I don't believe violence will help solve issues
It is unlikely to make things better, but if you're not willing to kill for it, and they are, then you're in quite a pickle. And they are ready to kill for it. I just don’t get the violence thing. What did violence solve for our first secession? The Revolutionary War? Wasn’t it a war? I just don’t get it Why. Is this different?
What did violence solve for our first secession?
A little thing called Independence, and the idea that the governed get to have a say in the process, and maybe even take part in the governing themselves. The problems wouldn't have been solved without violence, because the King wasn't amenable to discussion. You can find the list of issues here in this parchment Tweet: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Declaration-of-Independence/Text-of-the-Declaration-of-Independence You've nice ideals and I admire them.
Sadly, in the end, it will come to guns. Depend upon it. She didn't foresee media companies becoming critters of the swamp rather than going Galt.
I guess that's in no small part because of the way media companies were set up in her days, which was mostly small local operations rather than pan-global conglomerates. When your adversary only responds to power you gotta use power to protect yourself. Sad but true.
QUOTE: What is happening now requires individual awareness and action. It does NOT require fighting or violence. Just intelligence and smart, cordial and meaningful action. The Progessives are just starting, in my view. I don't believe violence will help solve issues - it will be used to justify positions. But being louder, smarter and more aware will make a difference. I hope you’re right, Bulldog, but I’m having a hard time seeing it right now. It would be useful to put some meat on the “smarter more aware” bones. "I don't believe violence will help solve issues - it will be used to justify positions. "
From "Starship Troopers" by Robert A. Heinlein -- But on the last day he seemed to be trying to find out what we had learned. One girl told him bluntly: "My mother says that violence never settles anything." "So?" Mr. Dubois looked at her bleakly. "I'm sure the city fathers of Carthage would be glad to know that. Why doesn't your mother tell them so? Or why don't you?" They had tangled before — since you couldn't flunk the course, it wasn't necessary to keep Mr. Dubois buttered up. She said shrilly, "You're making fun of me! Everybody knows that Carthage was destroyed!" "You seemed to be unaware of it," he said grimly. "Since you do know it, wouldn't you say that violence had settled their destinies rather thoroughly? However, I was not making fun of you personally; I was heaping scorn on an inexcusably silly idea — a practice I shall always follow. Anyone who clings to the historically untrue — and thoroughly immoral — doctrine that 'violence never settles anything' I would advise to conjure up the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and of the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee, and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk, and the Passenger Pigeon. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedoms." I remember a gentleman some years ago who said that storytellers were the best at entertaining and/or informing. Radio people were second best at doing that as the listener still had to provide the video in their minds. The least useful was the TV personalities that provided both audio and video. It required little thought from the viewer/listener. So here we are in TV world simply acting as receptacles for the ruling political/academic/media classes. Throw the tube out.
Here are my views.
I don't think violence is necessary. I didn't say it won't happen or that it can't happen. I believe it should be avoided until there is no other option. I do not believe we are there yet. At this stage, given the control of primary news outlets by the Left, any violence is overplayed - that is why it hurts our cause. The summer was 10X worse than the single event at the Capitol, but few people are willing to discuss this. Even Mrs. Bulldog is angry when I mention this, saying "Did you see what happened?" Yes I saw....but were YOU paying attention all summer when Democrats regularly called and supported violence and the news media called it "mostly peaceful" while the Capitol was "deadly"? Even during the summer, mob killing people was underplayed until Kyle Rittenhouse occurred - suddenly THAT was "right wing violence". Poor kid probably shouldn't have been there, and probably should have taken more care to avoid trouble but when trouble came looking for him, he did the right thing. Can't fault him for that - but the media did. When I say I don't believe violence will help solve issues, I do think violence now will work against what we're trying to achieve. If anything, we have to be careful to avoid it at all costs until we can prove it is clearly provoked and obviously driven by the Left. Part of them controlling Parler, Gab and other sites is so the Left CAN play Marat - urging their side forward in more and more absurdity and claiming the moral high ground. It is up to us to reclaim the moral high ground clearly and decisively and we are capable of doing that. But it requires clear vision and careful action. Continuing to mount violence will only lead to more crackdowns. In the meantime, it's best to prepare by privatizing more - like the Mises Intitute and Gab did - and keeping their hands off the reins of communication power. Sixtyville, Heinlein is one of my favorite authors, but he rationalized violence regularly and often for no apparent reason except to give support to reasons for violence. Great sci-fi and to a degree a reasonable political theorist. I haven't argued that violence never solves things. It certainly can and does provide 'solutions' - often by tiring people out so they realize their extremism is costly both economically and in terms of lives...not to mention how it drains one's morality. But it has brought an end, sometimes positive, sometimes negative, to many events throughout history. Understanding the nature and sources of violence is part of the problem, though. That is precisely why I stand where I do. Not supporting the gang of radicals (both left and right were there) in the Capitol and their thuggish behavior, but not at all accepting this past summer as a guide to what is 'good and right' regarding Progressive thought, which I consider the lazy person's ideology. It may very well come to that.
It's best to find as many ways to avoid it, right now, as we can. Rushing to that 'solution' is as lazy as Progressive thinking. "oh, it's going to get there so we may as well do it now." My POV is that there are still ways to convince people to change their minds. I've done quite a bit of that over the years. I have many firm Progressive friends who were ambivalent about the events on the Capitol, saying they agreed with me the summer was at least just as bad, if not worse. It's also worth noting that many of them are not Biden fans and are very worried about the extremism in their own party (as Republicans should be worried about extremists in theirs). They don't like how the media is handling all this, either. They are not unlike the people who supported Trump that I know. All saying the same things while having slightly different viewpoints overall. The vast majority of people are like that...but the media overplays the fringe, particularly the right-wing fringe and says "THIS IS NORMAL FOR TRUMP" When nothing could be further from the truth. Colbert said "Who didn't expect this?" after the Capitol, as if it WAS expected. Yet if it WAS expected, why were so few security and police available? There was no history of that kind of behavior, so of course it wasn't expected. But the pundits and comedians posing as pundits have got their platform to lie from. Goebbels and Colbert/Kimmel would all be best buddies in a modern world. I agree with you on pretty much all of that. Violence is a high risk proposition on several levels.
What I am most interested in are the “smarter more aware” options. From appearances, and maybe reality, it appears the DOJ and the Judicial Branch seem to be hostile towards us. Since the press is certainly not on our side, that leaves us with few options for getting our message out and defending our interests. "requires individual awareness and action. It does NOT require fighting or violence. Just intelligence and smart, cordial and meaningful action. " Care to give us a clue? Just what action do you think would be effective? On Inauguration Day I will be standing on a streetcorner in my local - very Democrat - county dressed entirely in black- including veil and Facemask - holding a large black wreath inscribed with the words "mourning the death of the Republic". On the reverse will be "Murdered by Cheating Democrats and their Chinese masters"
Will that do? |