Information Warfare Education, Propaganda, and How to Tell the Difference

Town Square
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Well, in this case, I’d say Tucker damned himself here. But yes, politicians on all sides of the political divide will always exaggerate the faults of their perceived political opponents. That’s why you have Gaetz and Greene calling everyone a “pedophile” these days, including members of their own party.

Oh man, that sounds bad, doesn’t it? Curious: are these same people just as concerned about Ivanka and Jared making up to $640 million in China, while actually working in the White House (unlike Hunter)?

If not, why not? Surely they must see Trump as magnitudes more “compromised” – if their moral outrage is consistent anyway.

They must have blown a gasket when Eric Trump said “Well, we don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.”

Can you imagine? A sitting President whose business relies on Russian funding, and whose kids were put into positions of power while allowing them to make up to $640 million in China?? Sounds like something out of a bad Tom Clancy novel.

Well, considering that jobless claims are the lowest they’ve been since 1968, and unemployment rates are down to pre-pandemic levels, they sure are doing a shit job of it!

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Carlson is more damned now than the damning last month or last year? Lol

There is a perverse fixation by the Left to have government employees teach very young children thing that would have been considered child abuse just a few years ago…

Regarding Gaetz, we still haven’t seen any charges against him and he claims the FBI has charged his blackmailer. At least that’s the story.

Surprisingly Fox isn’t reporting that. (That’s satire by the way)

Is this what SDNY and FBI are gathering evidence on? They’re pretty thorough and extremely motivated right now trying to out run the 1st Amendment shit storm they’ve created for themselves. This one will likely head straight to SCOTUS . Maybe Jackson can write the minority opinion.

And the economy is booming. Biden Admin is proud that sanctions have saddled Russia with 15% inflation. Glad Zero Carbon isnt so bad for US economy.

P.S. this is a pretty good run down on the Conservative narrative regarding grooming, pedophilia. There are also replays of the Pre K Trans Gender fluid videos making the circuit.
TRIGGER ALERT!

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Wanted to point out the 2 Republicans that voted to confirm Jackson are in your Ranked Choice states.
Interesting blending effect, I think, across party lines.

Wonder if any more states are looking at Ranked Choice implementation.

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So I see your Federalist article, and raise you one Tom the Dancing Bug :wink:

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What is perverse, I think, are GOP reactionaries like Kylee Zempel who pretend that liberals are teaching kindergartners the mechanics of sexual intercourse, rather than simply acknowledging that, you know, non-heterosexual people exist in the world. She even explicitly describes it as “discussing sexually explicit information”, which is an absolutely ridiculous comparison.

And of course, the law is written so vaguely, there’s a damn good legal argument that even acknowledging heterosexual relationships would be “inappropriate” according to this law. That would be teaching about sexual orientation, after all.

I have to say, I found this little piece of projection to be hilarious in its total lack of self awareness: “Have they not heard stories of young people who internalized backward notions about human sexuality during their formative years, were utterly failed by every institution that should have helped them correct course…”

LMAO Yes, we’ve all heard those stories. Usually they are the stories being told by the people who write the sorts of books that you guys want to ban :slight_smile:

And then, of course, I should let her complete her thought:

“then underwent destructive procedures that left them full of regret, just disfigured shells of the unique and beautiful people they were created to be?”

Yes, I have indeed heard of the 1% of cases that left folks with feelings of regret.

“A total of 27 studies, pooling 7928 transgender patients who underwent any type of GAS, were included. The pooled prevalence of regret after GAS was 1% (95% CI <1%–2%). Overall, 33% underwent transmasculine procedures and 67% transfemenine procedures. The prevalence of regret among patients undergoing transmasculine and transfemenine surgeries was <1% (IC <1%–<1%) and 1% (CI <1%–2%), respectively.”

I also love that the same folks who are completely unwilling to admit that “systemic racism” is a problem worth addressing, would then say something like teachers “are working in a pedophilic system designed to make kids more exploitable—both politically and sexually.”

Finally, when I read a line like this:

“Disney began ranting about their quests to inject sexual deviancy into children’s entertainment.”

…I just cannot take the author seriously any more, even while feeling grateful that they are saying the quiet part out loud. This is about framing any non-heterosexual relationships “deviancy”. Which, to my ears, is on par with saying something like “interracial marriages are a deviancy”.

Look, here’s what I know. My daughter is in elementary school, and they teach that black people exist and are just like everyone else, that gay people exist and are just like everyone else, that there should be no limits to how we express ourselves in the world (as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else), that we are all human beings, and therefore we need to be kind to each other.

I like that curriculum very much. Does that make me a “groomer” in your eyes? Would Greene and Gaetz and Zempel be justified in calling me a pedophile? Or are you simply trying to defend politicians you’ve already admitted are an embarrassment to your party, just because they are part of your team?

Here’s my theory: liberal extremists often take stupid and extreme positions, and this prompts conservative extremists to take stupid and extreme measures. Media on both sides then profit by driving culture war wedge issues deeper into the beating heart of the nation, making these groups more stupid and more extreme, while 98% of actual ordinary human beings suffer as a result. Sound about right?

As for Gaetz, justice has certainly been slow, at least partially because DeSantis has been dragging everyone’s feet. We’ll see what happens!

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Haha after seeing proof that it’s less necessary for representatives in RC states to toe the party line, I doubt we’ll see the GOP push for more ranked choice voting any time soon :wink:

Maybe it’s proof that the incentive structures are such that RC states end up electing more moderate candidates. What a blessing that would be.

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Obama’s take on Disinformation

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I agree. Maybe if we think of the ban like a restraining order where it’s simply “stop talking to 8 year olds about sex and gender”.
As an example, it would seem unusual if you had conversations on sex and gender with 5 year olds at the neighborhood BBQ. Whats the issue with saying “talk with your mom and dad about that”?

We could flip your percentage. 0.3% of adults are Trans affirmative, 3% are Gay/Bi affirmative. We could ask why we want to expose the remaining 96% to the morality, sexuality, ideology of a very small minority.
We can argue %s, but 96% of the population is happy being a boy or girl and happy being attracted to the opposite gender. If there were going to be a norm, I think +90% would be a strong candidate.
What IS the motivation on “educating” 8 year olds on sex and gender, if not to “groom” and “indoctrinate”?

How about if we used vegitariansim and Veganism as proxies? Is it OK for a grade school teacher to teach meat eating to a vegan child, when the parents have their own ideas?
Interestingly, percentages of vegetarians and vegans are similar to gay and Trans.

Corey, do you see any intellectual Swamp land in using percentages like this on one hand,

And then on the other hand completely discount how few Trans people (0.3%) you are espousing large scale societal shifts to accommodate?

This would seem to be application of Critical Theory where it matches your political views - OMG! even 1 is too many if at the hands of mainstream society- yet -its only 1 out of 100 so what’s your point?

Does this make sense?

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They already taught my daughter that carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores exists. They also taught her that some people only eat vegetables, and others eat meat and vegetables, and both choices are fine as well as we keep ourselves healthy. Cue the outrage!

Unless you imagine that “teaching meat eating” means physically shoving steak down a kids throat, which by proxy means you think that they are teaching kids about the pleasures of anal sex at kindergarten. THAT is a deeply perverse interpretation.

What IS the motivation on “educating” 8 year olds on sex and gender, if not to “groom” and “indoctrinate”?

To generate “understanding” that these people exist so kids know the importance of “kindness” and “acceptance” toward each other, no matter how different we may seem from each other. You know, “what would Jesus do” and all that.

Let me ask you a similar question. What if a grade school teaches that we should treat people from all races the same? Doesn’t that go against the family’s right to be racist?

If a seven year old boy wants to wear a dress to school, or a young girl wants to wear “boy clothes”, do you think that’s okay? Or should the state be allowed to dictate childrens’ fashion choices?

do you see any intellectual Swamp land in using percentages like this

No, because I was countering the author’s overstated and twisted logic:

“Have they not heard stories of young people who internalized backward notions about human sexuality during their formative years, were utterly failed by every institution that should have helped them correct course, then underwent destructive procedures that left them full of regret, just disfigured shells of the unique and beautiful people they were created to be?”

When you understand that only 1% of trans people end up regretting their personal decisions (which they have a right to make as individuals, right?) it becomes obvious that the goal here is to ignore the rest of the 99% of that group in the name of the author’s own beliefs about who they were “created to be”.

It is the author whose “internalized backward notions about human sexuality” are actively hurting people.

you are espousing large scale societal shifts to accommodate?

Yes, being allowed to acknowledge non-cis, non-herero people exist is such a large scale societal shift.

Sorry man, the “groomer” and “pedophile” language is absolutely deplorable, and it’s purpose is to frame all non-cis and non-herero people as deviants who are actively trying to molest our kids. Absolutely reprehensible, a perfect example of “disinfo wars”, and defending this sort of thing is beneath you. The article you shared is absolute trash.

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Corey, if you can’t listen more deeply than your own personal reactions to others likely personal reactions, perhaps we just let the bags of deplorables slug it out until we have a winner.

That’s kind of the beauty of a democracy. It shifts over time as the population shifts. We’ve just confirmed a Black Female Activist to the Supreme Court, that refused to define what a woman is. Most of Bidens nominees are the same. Nihilistic Relativism is on the march! Progress! Inner Zone Feelings ARE making progress.

In the US, the Leftists were given the keys to the kingdom and now we see they weren’t kidding on their agenda.

The pendulum swings perhaps to where white heterosexuals are not disparaged because of their race, religion, or sexual orientation. Perhaps there is a day when they can raise their children without government oppression of their religious values and cultural norms.

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Are you extending the same courtesy to all the people who feel personally effected and even threatened by laws such as this? Or are you simply devaluing their reactions as “nihilistic relativism” while reasserting your own superior reactions?

And yes, Justice Jackson is quite impressive, isn’t she? I love how she refused to fall into the BS culture war traps that the GOP was so cynically trying to impose on her.

How would you go about defining “woman”, knowing that gender is related-to-but-different-from sex?

Here’s my own working definition:

“A ‘woman’ is a constructed cultural role that is often — but not always — associated with the female typology in the upper right quadrant, feminine psychological typologies in the upper left, and particular social roles and preferences in the lower right. It is a culturally-defined role that individuals often internalize in their upper left as identity.”

The relationship between sex, gender, orientation, and social roles — yet another area where the Four Quadrants immediate resolve these conflicts. Extreme conservatives want to reduce everything to the upper right — your gender is inseparable from your sex — while extreme progressives want to reduce everything to the upper left or lower left — everything, including biology, is a social construct.

Integral says, “well, the good news is you’re both partially right, the bad news is you’re both painfully wrong.”

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In 99.7% of humanity “Woman is a constructed cultural role” that aligns both gender and sex.

Yes, you can apply Critical Gender Theory to that 0.3% and up attempt to overthrow the “cultural role”.

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Yes, that is usually how “cultural roles” are constructed — through a mutual understanding among the majority. And that mutual understanding tends to become more and more inclusive over time. Doesn’t make it any less of a cultural role.

It used to be that blacks were associated with a particular cultural role, and whites another — until we realized that this is a bad and immoral idea.

It used to be that little boys wore pink dresses. That was the gender norm 150 years ago. Just look at manly man Teddy Roosevelt’s childhood pictures. Now the opposite is true we associate “pink” with “girls” and “women”, and if a man wears pink he is often seen as un-masculine. That is a cultural construct — the sorts of fashions that we associate with these typologies, and the judgments that we form when people refuse to conform to traditional roles.

Yes, you can apply Critical Gender Theory to that 0.3% and up attempt to overthrow the “cultural role”.

Can you have these conversations without imposing these sorts of media-generated buzzwords? Saying “I think we should teach kids to be kind and accepting of each other’s differences” is hardly “critical gender theory” or whatever other Marxist boogeymen you want to associate me with.

And only conservatives seem to believe that “acknowledging non-cis and non-hetero people” is the same as attempting to “overthrow” cultural roles altogether. People aren’t “overthrowing” anything, they are expanding the parameters, and noting that these things are indeed cultural constructs, even while consciously participating with them.

You do know that the existence of homosexuals does not make you any less heterosexual, right? That gay marriage does not ‘devalue’ your straight marriage? That trans people existing in the world does not make you any less masculine? Nothing about your identity is being “overthrown” or threatened by the fact that other types of identity exist in the world.

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I like to think of it this way.

100 years ago, our “cultural roles” were such that women, 50% of the population, were excluded from our notions of human rights. The conservative position at the time was anti-women, until progressives won the day.

60 years ago, blacks (about 10% of the population at the time, among 15% total minority population in the U.S.) were excluded from our notions of human rights. The conservative position at the time was anti-black, until progressives won the day.

20 years ago, homosexuals (5.6% of the population, according to Gallup) were excluded from our notions of human rights. The conservative position at the time was anti-gay, until progressives won the day.

Today, transgendered people (~.4% of the population) are excluded from our notions of human rights. The conservative position today is anti-trans. Until progressives win the day.

At each step, we see an expansion of morality, justice, and dignity to include more and more people. This is reflective of the “long moral arc of the universe”, and is one of the genuine triumphs of our civilization. We are becoming increasingly more civilized, in terms of how we relate to each other and the sorts of rights and protections we expect to be extended to people who look or behave differently from us. And the fact that at every step, the group that needs protecting becomes smaller and smaller, is a testament to our collective moral progress.

And at every step, the conservative position was to resist this moral progress. Today is no different, it’s just a significantly smaller group that conservative extremists are choosing to scapegoat and portray as evil “groomers” and “pedophiles”. But there is always a clearly defined “us” and a clearly defined “them” — the bedrock of amber thinking — and “they” are always responsible for completely overthrowing our society, turning our cultural norms upside down, and corrupting our children. It’s the exact same narrative, every single time.

Which makes sense, because again, this is the very deep-structure bedrock of amber thinking, whether you are on the political right or the political left. We cannot have a sense of unity in here, if we don’t have a perceived enemy out there — in fact, their very existence “out there” is a perpetual threat to our wellbeing “in here”.

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How are Conservatives anti-Trans and Trans excluded from existing Human Rights?

Are you implying that parents that do not want government employees teaching sex education to 8 and under children are violating Trans teachers human and civil rights?

In Florida their bill is positioned as “Parents Rights”. Do you see the rights of parents as conflicting with and harming Trans peoples rights?

998

Why does government have to have clear definitions for gender in the first place?
Think about that for a moment.
Why should I ever have to identify my gender to a government agent except for the few circumstances like prison and military?

The primary reason agents of our government want to know gender is to deny, exclude or prefer one person or another based on gender. Men have to register for selective service. Women have preference for social benefits. And so on and on.

Now before someone brings up the bathroom argument - don’t be absurd. There are thousands and thousands of “family” or coed bathrooms (such as in my office), and people are able to figure it out without a government mandate.

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Is the state limiting free speech and an individual’s right to express themselves? Is it now illegal to say something as innocuous as “some girls love boys, some girls love girls, it’s okay to love anyone you want to love”? Is it now illegal to say “yes, Jimmy has two moms, and that is perfectly okay”?

Do we agree with DeSantis that it is not appropriate to tell kids they “can be anything they want to be”? Hell, I’m pretty sure that was like 60% of my kindergarten curriculum.

Again, is it a violation of parents right to teach kids that different ethnicities exist, and all people should be treated kindly and fairly, if those parents want to be racist?

Is it a violation of parents rights to teach kids that evolution is real, and that the universe has been here for billions of years, if the parents want to believe the earth is only 5000 years old?

Did Florida also pass a law that allows adults to perform “genital inspections” on student athletes? Seems awfully like a disgusting invasion of privacy. And you want to call us “groomers”?

And why do you keep calling it “sex education”? Do you think they are taking to kids about genitals? Again, sex =/= gender.

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Also, since transgendered people “only” make up .4% of the population — that’s over 1.3 million people in the U.S. who identify this way — why is the state of Florida making such a big deal out of this? Why create a set of laws that are defined so vaguely, even mentioning heterosexual relationships and traditional “he + she” pronouns can be seen as forbidden?

And why should we allow conservative outrage against this .4% group also restrict the freedoms of the 5.6% of gays (over 18 million people in the U.S.)?

If you go to a public bathroom, you only have a 1/250 chance of encountering a transgendered person. If your school has 500 people in it, there will be an average of 2 transgendered kids in that school, and 28 gay kids. Those kids absolutely matter, and have a right to be whoever they want to be, and identify however they want to identify. Why should we allow the state to interfere with that?

And again, my kid is in third grade. One of her best friends has two moms. And guess what? It is absolutely not a big deal IN ANY WAY for teachers to acknowledge this and let kids know that it’s okay to love anyone they want to love, and that we should always treat each other with respect and kindness despite our differences. And if god forbid that kid was ever bullied for having two moms, I want her school to be able to clearly communicate to kids why that is wrong. A quintessentially Christian message, really.

Which is now illegal in Florida.

Also, just to mention, statistically the vast majority of “groomers” and “pedophiles” are heterosexual family members. You know the best way to prevent kids from being sexually assaulted? Teaching them things like “don’t let anyone touch your private parts” — part of standard age-appropriate sex education since I was a kid. Also now illegal in Florida, because all it takes is one parent to say “hey don’t talk about private parts at all” and sue the district.

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While your questions are addressed to Corey, I’ll weigh in.

To start with, at least around 11% of US adults over 70 are childless, have never been parents (and as high as 18% or 19% in age brackets 55-70).

Of those who are parents, not all of them are concerned about their “rights” being abused around the Trans issue, in schools or otherwise. It largely breaks down along partisan lines.

So it is not a large-scale universal “parental rights” issue; it is a “parental rights” issue for just a particular segment of the adult population, maybe a majority segment of the adult population in Florida, I don’t know, but certainly not a majority of adults in the country as a whole.

I think and hope you know this, but the difference between ethnocentrism and worldcentrism is the former insists upon the preferences of their select group, their particular “us,” being dominant, while the latter (worldcentrism) looks to consider a much larger “us,” an “all of us.” In the movement towards worldcentrism, and in its enactment, conflicts do arise, and ethnocentrism in whatever form suffers, whether that’s around race or sex or gender. ‘Family’ can be viewed as more then a particular household of parents and children; it can be viewed as the entire world of people in their relatedness, their human kinship, and that’s what worldcentrism seeks to bring about, the valuing of “all of us.”

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By consistently calling it “deviancy”, such as in the article you yourself posted in order to support your argument. By repeating nonsense phrases like “there are only two genders”. By making constant hackneyed jokes about “identifying as attack helicopters”. By calling people who do not support fear-based conservative laws such as this “groomers” and “pedophiles”, as conservatives are actively doing, and as your own article actively defends.

That is anti-trans.

I am guessing you know that already :slight_smile:

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@corey-devos
That’s a lot of reply for fairly simple questions.

Are Conservatives Anti Trans or just don’t want Trans Ideology taught to small children?
How are Trans Human Rights being violated TODAY, in the present, in the real world?

If I didn’t know better I might think you’re grinding an axe (Win/Lose surface) for Conservatives and have little/no intention of viewing the discourse from a Transcend and Include perspective.

It seems to be a pattern with you Corey that you assume the most noble, angelic, righteous motivations and executions for “Progressives” yet have a sinister, malevolent, evil view of anything that might impede your “Progressive” agenda.

Are their malevolent Rightys, your Qanon Nazis? Of course.
Just as there are Woke Trans Pedophiles teaching in schools somewhere. Are you saying these don’t exist? Of course not.

So let’s get Meta or Post/Transcend for a second.

A majority of parents do not want civil servants on-the-sly teaching their children “avant gard” morality.
MOST of the US does not view the State, public schools in this case, as their moral authority to replace what parents and religions and chosen communities teach their children. Most of the US does not want a combined State/Church - they want to choose for themselves.
Most people want a limited and bounded State and that’s what they’ve elected in Florida.
You can elect a different model in Colorado or Arizona or California if you like.