TUESDAY, MARCH 28, 2023
The Washington Post reports: How did the culture war about public school instruction actually get its start?
To her credit, the Washington Post's Hannah Natanson recently tried to address that question. On the down side, Natanson tried to address that question, and she largely failed.
Natanson's report appeared in the online Post back on March 18. We don't know when, or if, it appeared in print editions.
Online, the headline on the lengthy report says this:
Covid changed parents’ view of schools—and ignited the education culture wars
Covid ignited the culture wars, Natanson said—and this wasn't just a reference to arguments about virtual learning versus in-school instruction during the high pandemic.
According to Natanson, one particular aspect of virtual learning led to further types of concern:
NATANSON (3/18/23): Concerns first emerged during the early phase of the pandemic, when parents facing school closures began showing up at school board meetings to demand in-person classes—or insist on continued virtual learning. Soon, membership exploded in Facebook groups that sought to end masking—or add new safety measures...
But as the covid case rates and death counts eventually abated, the anger and frustration did not. Instead, it morphed into conflicts over what schools should be teaching. Some conservative parents, granted an unprecedented glimpse into lessons during virtual learning, took issue with teacher-led discussions of race, gender and sexual orientation, arguing educators were promoting the views of the political left. They founded national organizations such as Moms for Liberty to promote greater parental control of education and eradicate books they deemed sexually inappropriate from school libraries.
During virtual learning, parents were "granted an unprecedented look into" what their children (and grandchildren) were being taught. According to Natanson, conservative parents sometimes didn't like what they saw.
In our assessment, Natanson's personal views with respect to such issues seem to tilt toward the left. For that reason, it seems to us that she's being admirably fair in suggesting that conservative objections, in some cases, came from honest reactions by conservative parents to what they saw in the online instruction offered to their children.
Before long, Natanson gives three examples of such objections—or at least, she tries to do so. Her report was focused on the public school culture wars as they have developed in the Mentor, Ohio schools.
Natanson offers three examples—but, alas! Two of the three complaints from conservative adults are much too vague to evaluate.
That said, one complaint was more specific. That said, for better or worse, this was Natanson's account:
NATANSON: Seventy-five-year-old Linda O’Brien, whose granddaughter used to attend Mentor schools, grew concerned after seeing a screenshot of a page from a training for Mentor teachers (also obtained by The Washington Post) that asked, “How can I be a co-conspirator while using a curriculum rooted in whiteness?”
According to Natanson's fuzzy account, O'Brien grew concerned after seeing "a screenshot of a page from a training for Mentor teachers." Presumably, this page was part of a document from some sort of training session.
According to Natanson's fuzzy account, the Post also obtained this "page from a training." According to Natanson, this is what it said:
“How can I be a co-conspirator while using a curriculum rooted in whiteness?”
Within the public school context, that sounds like a slightly strange question. Unfortunately, it's also completely unclear what that lone question actually meant.
Within what context did that peculiar-sounding question appear in whatever sort of document the Washington Post had obtained? Fuzzily, Natanson didn't try to explain.
Adding insult to injury, she eventually offered this:
NATANSON: Concerned Taxpayers says its advocacy helped convince the school district to discontinue its teacher training that asked educators to serve as “co-conspirators,” a change confirmed by Heath, the superintendent. Members also successfully petitioned for the removal of “George,” a children’s book about a young transgender girl. And the district is more careful in selecting curriculums these days, Heath said.
Everyone seems to agree! The Mentor, Ohio Schools decided to discontinue the teacher training that asked educators to serve as "co-conspirators" in some sort of undertaking which Natanson never described.
In what had that "teacher training" consisted? What was the "co-conspiracy?" Natanson never explained those points. The Post's readers were left to imagine.
This is the sort of thing that passes for major news reporting in the devolving Washington Post. The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but work like this makes little sense.
Natanson is a recent Harvard grad (class of 2019). She was managing editor of The Crimson. Today, she writes for the Washington Post about the public schools.
Our question goes like this:
Is this really the best the Post can do? Disconsolate minds want to know!
The media is still pretending the 501(c) political group members showing up at school board meetings are "concerned parents".
ReplyDeleteLook up Moms for Liberty on Wikipedia:
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moms_for_Liberty#:~:text=Moms%20for%20Liberty%20was%20co,has%20since%20left%20the%20organization.
Pay extra attention to the part where it discusses where their funding comes from. Notice that their nationwide expansion coincides with DeSantis's interest in running for national office.
Not only is the group, which calls itself non-partisan, thoroughly embedded in the Republican Party, but it began by opposing mask mandates and is now designated as a hate group. Also, the group was founded by and staffed by conservative former school board members, not teachers or parents or anyone with expertise in education.
To paraphrase the late Eric Boehlert (rest in peace), the political press in this country wakes up every day and asks the question, "what is the GOP whining about today and how can we help".
Delete
ReplyDelete"In our assessment, Natanson's personal views with respect to such issues seem to tilt toward the left."
There's no "left", dear Bob. There are normal ordinary working people, and then there are global-capital-serving liberals, who, on account of being brain-dead, are convinced of their superiority. You're one of the latter group, unfortunately.
"What was the "co-conspiracy?""
Not "co-conspiracy", dear Bob, but "co-conspirator". Co-conspirator in the liberal conspiracy to rule the world, obviously.
...nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more...
Think of how much better life could be, if you hadn't loved Trump for giving your precious Establishment Elites a HUGE tax break.
Delete"Natanson is a recent Harvard grad (class of 2019). She was managing editor of The Crimson. Today, she writes for the Washington Post about the public schools.
ReplyDeleteOur question goes like this:
Is this really the best the Post can do? Disconsolate minds want to know!"
Back when Somerby graduated from Harvard, without the distinction of editing The Crimson, he taught in the Baltimore public schools. Why so far from home? Was this the only place the would hire him or was he sent there by Teach for America? He had only 6 week summer training, during which they were mainly asked to read books critical of standard teaching methods, not anything that would be encountered in an actual college level education course. Not classroom management or curriculum development or child development or learning theory.
Was this the best Teach for America could do? Was this what those beautiful black kids deserved? Was it the best Baltimore could do? Those kids are now much older -- are they disconsolate too?
In contrast, Nathanson had several years more experience than Somerby, including on-the-job training in her profession. But Somerby has the nerve to imply that she is unqualified because she focused on the Moms for Liberty and the school controversy instead of what the teachers were being taught in those purloined teaching materials, viewed as Somerby himself notes, entirely out of context.
A normal person would blame the critics of the school for getting upset without knowing what they were reading. Somerby instead blames the journalist for not immersing herself in the specifics of an obviously bogus conservative complaint used to justify attacks on the school system itself.
Instead of defending public education and the efforts of hard-working teachers and those who train them, Somerby sides with the nihilistic conservative attackers -- and he knows no more about what co-conspirator refers to than they do. But he knows whose side he is on. And that makes me wonder what Somerby learned while a teacher, that he now sides against teachers, against normal reasonable parents, and with conservative activists, even when they don't know what they are talking about.
What did they do to Somerby in those Baltimore schools? Or was he just a poor fit for an inner city school, lacking the ideals (motivated by draft dodging) and the skills to be helpful to kids, but blaming it on others. And that would make him just right for conservative recruiters. A guy with a grievance, seeking to displace blame, and not really appreciating the needs of those black kids who he ultimately abandoned to indulge his narcissistic urges in a one-man show about all the bad things his mother did to him.
Disconsolate readers want to know how Somerby can justify attacking Natanson over such a petty offense and miss the larger crimes of the parents rights mob.
The answer to that question is simple. She is young, female and has excellent credentials. He stalks them.
Delete"Concerning the start of the public school wars!"
ReplyDeleteNathanson is saying that the wars started with anti-mask and pro-health parents both coming to school board meetings. But if that is true, why did there only develop right-wing parent organizations now attack the schools, and not any left-wing ones? If this was truly the origin, there should be groups formed on both sides, not just the right.
And Nathanson entirely ignores the ongoing war against public education by the right that preceded covid. Somerby sort of praises her for focusing on what he considers to be the cause, but is it really? I don't think so. Dinesh D'Souza was busy attacking the schools before covid.
Here is the NEA's take on the subject. They blame social media and well-funded conservative activists:
https://www.nea.org/advocating-for-change/new-from-nea/who-behind-attacks-educators-and-public-schools
"KEY TAKEAWAYS
1. As the nation continues to reckon with the role racism plays in society, a tiny but extremely vocal minority is determined to turn our classrooms into battlegrounds for their vicious culture wars.
2. The peddling of misinformation has led to a sharp increase in threats aimed at educators and school board officials, many of whom have been intimidated and threatened.
3. However, many candidates who ran on "anti-woke" platforms lost their elections. It is critical that educators and parents continue to support candidates who reject false narratives and support public schools."
They go on to talk about manufacturing outrage, misinformation on social media, the silencing of teachers, the influx of dark money, and ways of rebuilding trust in public education.
Somerby has notably been working to undermine trust in public education, undermine trust in journalism and sources of information to combat social media and disinformation, and assist the conservative attack on schools and teachers nationwide. Why would a former teacher do that?
If this blog is any indication of his teaching style the term does not apply. Has this dude ever convinced anyone in his small audience of anything? First day of class in front of a bunch of inner city third graders: "Hey kids, we're all in this together! Just to set the tone, I'm gonna be reminding you on a daily basis of how dumb we are. This is because my skill set requires me to disparage my audience." Poor kids. The unsung victims of the Viet Nam war.
DeleteUnamused, your hurt feelings aside, Somerby would have had no reason to tell his elementary students that they’re “dumb”. He’s never given any indication that he would do such a thing to any child.
DeleteGrow a set.
Journalists are undermining trust in journalism. Somerby is just pointing some examples.
DeleteCecelia: here's A new English word for you: analogy. The only hurt feelings are apparently yours. The rest of your commentary suggests that you have a uniquely intimate understanding of Somerby's psychology. If so, my condolences.
Delete"Journalists are undermining trust in journalism" OK, be specific. How about your top three unreliable news sources.
DeleteUnamused, oh, so you’re saying that you’re analogous to 3rd graders.
DeleteCarry on.
Unamused - won’t say they’re the highest, but three are the New York Times, FoxNews, and MSNBC
DeleteBob had demonstrated a lack
Deleteof self awareness that suggest real
mental problems. So Bob ranting
invective at kids is hardly beyond
The imaginable. Same, really,
for Cecelia, who enjoys name
calling and taunting others on
The comments board.
Anonymouse 11:13pm, no, we can’t realistically preface an accusation of cruelty to children based upon what Bob has said about the adults in your tribe and my tribe.
DeleteHowever, we can surmise a ton of unpleasant things about you and Unamused due to your willingness to go there.
Cecelia: "a swing and a miss" is an analogy to describe your last post. I am not claiming that you are a baseball player. It is only as difficult as your intellect makes it.
DeleteUnamused, and I’m not claiming that you’re actually a third grader.
DeleteThat would be a slander of third graders.
Somerby is the one who claimed here that the top black student at her high school would fail in a competitive college and shouldn’t have been given the chance. That amounts to calling her dumb and unmotivated. That’s the kind of thing David in Cal would say, not someone who cares about black kids. And no, he didn’t know her and had no basis for saying such a thing. As a teacher myself, I found it shocking.
DeleteSomerby buys into the argument that if head start and other early learning program results disappear by high school it is a waste of resources to help black kids. He said that in 2010 while attacking Chait’s lack of familiarity with NAEP scores, as if every non-educator should have them memorized. I found it shockng that someone who rver worked with black kids would say that. Every child deserves to be educated to the best of their ability.
DeleteWouldn’t a teacher like yourself actually supply a link to the quotation?
DeleteAnonymouse 11:54 pm, if the results of early learning programs don’t carry on past the grade school level isn’t that salient information?
DeleteSomerby has only ever mentioned the middle school black girls who he was especially close to while teaching. That’s not creepy at all. Why no stories about the younger kids or the little boys in his classes? He seems to have kept in touch with those girls, as he told us how their lives turned out. Too bad he didn’t care as much about the boys.
Delete"An accusation of cruelty to children..." That would unfortunately be the nature of my schooling you here. Sorry that you've taken this to the typical completely phoney aggrieved place that is your snowflake comfort zone. A ludicrous corner you have painted yourself into.
DeleteAnyone familiar with those results knows that the benefits were nonacademic, fewer drop outs, higher job aspirations, less discipline problems later on, less involvement with police. That is considerable benefit to kids, unless you’re a Republican and only care about NAEP scores.
DeleteAnonymouse 12:02am, could it be that he devised a system early in his career with these particular children that was helpful to them and therefore make them particularly memorable to him and certainly make him special to them?
DeleteLook at your maliciousness.
Cecelia, I’ve been reading this blog for over 20 years. No, I’m not going to search the archives for something like idealism and empathy that I know aren’t there. Go read any actual blog on education and the difference will be starkly obvious. And Somerby has the gall to claim that liberals don’t care about black kids, as he’s been saying for decades! what a fraud.
DeleteLook at Somerby’s maliciousness and your invention of some special magic that might redeem him. It is better that he no longer works with kids, given his obvious bile.
DeleteUnamused, it’s not a philosophical construct or intellectual exercise to imagine that a teacher called his elementary students dumb because he thinks your dumb adult butt is dumb. It’s the height of grievance and snowflakiness.
DeleteYou own it.
Anonhmouse 12:12am, when you try to prove you point as to how Somerby maligned a student, you need a link.
DeleteAnonymouse 12:25am, I don’t need no special magic from you as to your accusation. I need a link.
DeleteAnonymouse 12:08pn, so within the context of a blog on NAEP scores, you’re a “no contest” on the helpfulness Head Start on academic achievement?
DeleteLet me break this down for you. Somerby has decided that the best way to convince an audience of his argument includes addressing them as dumb. To make that palatable he disingenuously includes himself in that group. My original statement was "If this blog is any indication of his teaching style..." . What followed was a hypothetical example of how that would play out in a classroom. What followed that was Cecelia appropriating Bobby's mindset and explaining to the audience what that entails, that no, Bobby would never treat children like that, as if blessed with claivoyance. Followed by "her" purposeful and completely manufactured grievances. I submit that the only person knowledgeable about what Bobby would or wouldn't do is Bobby. Cecelia claiming this knowledge may very well be a confession.
DeleteUnamused, it takes clairvoyance, maliciousness, and idiocy, to think that someone bemoaning the intellectual blinkers of political bias, would also attribute that to kids who might be struggling with fractions.
DeleteI didn't think it was possible but now you're making even less sense. Explain yourself just for grins. You have someone accusing Bobby of attributing intellectual blinkers to third graders? You are quite the performance artist here.
Delete“You have someone accusing Bobby of attributing intellectual blinkers to third graders? “
DeleteNot someone. You.
David in Cal. I actually went to the dictionary to be clear about the term journalism here. And you can indeed call cable outlets sources of journalism, although I don't value them as such. They sell themselves on commentary. Why bother with them when there are still TV channels, or the far less politically motivated BBC. Unless you find them left biased as well.Then, unless being fed biased commentary by cable outlets is palatable and print sources like the NYT or Wash Post or LA Times are too left biased, you have few options, the WSJ being most obvious. McClatchy on the internet as well. As far as can be surmised from this blog the WSJ never make journalistic errors. I personally think that the accusation that print journalism has become disreputable is right wing nonsense.
DeleteCecelia, your modus operandi commonly is to purposely misread comments in order to find offense with them. As you have done here. Or maybe it's not purposeful but merely the detritus of a fractured intellect. Keep responding and we will certainly sort that out.
DeleteUnamused, no one could misread your offensive “analogy” where you used Somerby’s former students as props for your blogboard invective.
DeleteYour anonymouse defender certainly didn’t, as she went straight to justifying your remarks by citing Bob’s distain for his black students.
What a tag team. You should be proud.
"Props". I've got an idea: get me their names and I will issue apologies. For you and your soulmate/doppelganger. Because as is common, the accusation of a right wing troll is a confession. Here's an example of a school child as a prop: someone 1/2 a century ago spends a little time in a classroom with minimal training as a means of avoiding the draft and henceforth uses that experience to prop up his credentials as an authority on education. From the get go those kids were a means to an end. Props.You can now go on a rant about how you know his feelings and how hard it must have been to leave those children for a higher calling as a stand up comic.
DeleteUnamused, despite your protestations, I know YOUR feelings.
DeleteAs your rant proves.
Cecelia,
DeleteDoes Unamused not get your approval for using children as props? Asking because you sure do love when 501(c) Right-wing political groups use children as props to undermine teachers unions..
BTW, crickets from the Right about those three school children in Nashville, slaughtered by a gun-owner. Those kids must have deserved it.
Cecelia, here is your citation:
DeleteAVOIDING THE GAPS: At Central High!
WEDNESDAY, MAY 28, 2014
It was the article by Nikole Hannah-Jones about D'Leisha Dent at Central High in Tuscaloosa, who graduated at the top of her class and took AP classes but who Somerby cannot imagine doing well in college, because of those racial gaps.
Hannah-Jones argues that integration would decrease the gaps. Somerby defends segregation and says the gaps exist because liberals don't care about black kids. Then he says he wants to hear the kinds of discussion that he himself won't initiate.
Colleges nationwide are abandoning the entrance exams like the SAT and ACT. Why? Because they correlate only with family income, not academic achievement after admission to college. Somerby never mentions those facts. He thinks the gap is immutable because there aren't enough white kids to allow black kids to attend better integrated schools, as if it were the whiteness and not the spending resources that are important. Those gaps are always going to exist, even among the best black students, says Somerby as he pooh pooh's the integration that helps increase black students scores, just as he continually argues against integrating access to NYC's science high school and its feeder middle schools for more black kids.
We have all been here as Somerby has expressed such ideas. Cecelia asks for cites but that is her delaying tactic. We all know Somerby's position on integration and we know the stats on how it raises scores for black kids -- mh has posted links here often. But Somerby tells us nothing can change those black gaps in scores because liberals don't care about black kids.
Cecelia: of course you do dear, and for the record, I've got you sorted.
DeleteAnonymouse 9:31am, the people (parents) who are in 501(c) organizations that try to influence school systems either way are different from anonymices who try to sabotage a blog.
DeleteUnamused and anonymices are basement level apparatchiks. I’m here to read Somerby. You’re here to counter any influence he may wield. That says something.
As to the recent school shooting, three adults were also slaughtered.
Obviously, you are politically cloistered. Not only that, you’re so use to jumping out of the gate with a rhetorical Gatling gun that you can’t fathom a wait to weigh the rhetoric on April 1.
And here we hear Somerby mocking and distrusting the accomplishments of a school with mostly black kids who cannot be doing what it claims, because of those gaps:
Delete"We're not sure how to react to other parts of that profile. The school uses an International Baccalaureate curriculum? That sounds extremely good, of course, but is that curriculum appropriate for kids who may be years behind in school?
The students read the Junior Great Books? That sounds extremely good too. But do those books work for kids who may be struggling to read at all?
Make no mistake! You want those little girls to be swimming in a sea of books, especially books they'll actually want to read, perhaps out loud to each other. But are the Junior Great Books the best choice at this particular school? Presumably like those Times reporters, we have no idea.
We make that unpleasant remark for an important reason. Neither of the Times reporters is an education specialist. Indeed, the Times has such contempt for public schooling that it doesn't really employ such reporters at all.
Instead, it does what other papers have typically done since roughly forever. It sends well-intentioned non-specialists into schools, possibly lacking a serious background.
It isn't the fault of the reporters that they're sent on such missions—on standard trips, perhaps to schools which are allegedly bountiful. It's the fault of an upper-class press establishment which has shown, for decades now, that it doesn't give the first flying fig about important little girls like the ones you see in that photo."
Somerby doesn't know that those kids aren't succeeding, but he is sure that the press got it all wrong, because how could they be succeeding with those gaps! He blames the press for not investigating further and telling us the real story of failure in that Chicago school.
http://dailyhowler.blogspot.com/2018/06/gaps-and-lavizzo-as-seen-in-one-chicago.html
Anonymouse 9:39am, this isn’t a “citation”.
DeleteIt’s a theatrical Anonymouse interpretation.
and if anyone knows performative theater, it's Cecelia.
DeleteCecelia,
DeleteThe people in 501(c) political groups use children as props.
Their complete and total disregard for children shot in schools gives the game away.
BTW, now is the time for you to retort with an insult, because I pay attention.
Cecelia,
DeleteVirtue-signaling (thoughts ad prayers) to you and yours.
Somerby says that God wants some kids to be tracked into lower classes and others into advanced classes, because God created those NAEP scores, including the gaps:
Delete"God wants tracking in public schools. Those Naep scores basically prove it.
God didn't produce a planet full of kids who are all the same. For better or worse, God created a planet of kids with different ability levels—and with vastly different achievement levels by the end of fifth or eighth grade.
It's possible that better instruction, earlier on, would lead to fewer "struggling students." But the New York Times doesn't burden itself with complex questions like that. Instead, the New York Times wants to make minor adjustments in the demographics at certain schools, ignoring the fact that kids will then be tracked into "advanced classes" where white kids and Asian-American kids sit in the bulk of the seats.
The Naep reports scores by percentiles for a reason. That said, we can guarantee this—no one at the New York Times has ever examined such data.
In its public school reporting, the Times is a bunch of pretty people tinkering around the edges of reality. We'd call it "legalized child abuse," but Homey don't play that game."
Somerby says it would be legalized child abuse to put struggling black kids into classes with white kids who do better, despite the evidence that integrated classrooms lead to large score increases for black kids. It is one of the interventions that works but Somerby thinks it is just "tinkering around the edges" to implement it. Those gaps are God's way, after all, and black kids cannot do any better because they are black, God wills it.
http://dailyhowler.blogspot.com/2018/06/gaps-and-tracks-god-wants-tracking-in.html
Today would be a great day for all those elected republican senators and congressmen to proudly display their AR-15 lapel pins, don't you think Cec?
DeleteAnonymouse 9:55am, does your proclamation on 501(c) organizations include liberal ones?
DeleteAnonymouse 10:06am, lapel pins? Why not their legally obtained weapons?
DeleteThey didn’t shoot up a school.
What would you have to do to a kid at school to make them want to come back years later with a gun?
Delete“Somerby says it would be legalized child abuse to put struggling black kids into classes with white kids who do better, despite the evidence that integrated classrooms lead to large score increases for black kids. It is one of the interventions that works but Somerby thinks it is just "tinkering around the edges" to implement it. Those gaps are God's way, after all, and black kids cannot do any better because they are black, God wills it.”
DeleteAnonymouse 10:03am, how good that is for the majority of the lower achieving kids (black and white btw) is debatable. What constitutes “large score increases” is relative.
That it might do more harm to most of the kids (high achievers and lower achievers) IS also debatable.
Because you wish to frame Somerby’s position as being fatalistic is not much of an argument, That you can’t wage that argument without attacking Somerby personally is what makes you an anonymouse.
@10:21 AM
DeletePump her up with testosterone.
...is this the answer you're expecting?
Anonymouse 10:21am,, I’ve never asked that question of anyone who shot innocent people.
DeleteUnamused, you’ve got me “sorted”. Good for you.
DeleteI’ve got you screwed, glued, and tattooed.
Somerby has consistently opposed integration, one of the interventions that produces meaningful score increases for black kids. Calling those score increases "relative" is something a moron would say.
DeleteYou asked for cites and I provided them. You aren't prepared to discuss them intelligently. I am done talking to you, but thought perhaps others here might like to see what Somerby has been saying about black kids over the years.
"Why not their legally obtained weapons?"
DeleteSure, Cec. Other than the fact that it would be extraordinarily insensitive, sounds like a marvelous idea with the added benefit of owning the libs during this period of national division.
Anonymouse 10:44am, of course it’s relative as to level of improvement and the cost in time and progress for the high achieving kids.
DeleteAnonymouse10:47, a display of gun ownership was your idea in the first place.
DeleteYou're real cute, Cec. It was my idea to mass produce AR-15 lapel pins and distribute them to your barbaric GOP congressional caucus? That was my idea? Those repugnant displays of gross insensitivity to the families of mass shootings by killers wielding a military assault rifle which your representatives were proudly modeling not too long ago. I ask you, what kind of sick mind would do something like that?
DeleteAnonymouse 12:00pm, oh, no, if we’re going to go with your idea, we’re going with the wielding of the actual weapon. None your cutesy business.
DeleteConservatives are not necessarily nice people. Take this for example. Why would any human being think it is funny to post stuff like this on social media:
ReplyDelete"A long-running hoax is back, pushed by right-wing internet trolls, and circulated in various forms for almost a decade after major mass shootings, PolitiFact reported on Tuesday.
"Hours after the March 27 school shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, social media users began to speculate about the identity of the shooter who killed six people," reported Loreben Tuquero. "'Sooo the school shooter was a trans female identified as Samantha Hyde,' read one Facebook post. The post included a few photos, including one of a blond-haired person holding a gun, and another of a person wearing glasses and smiling. Another Facebook post read, 'Formerly Audrey Hale, Nashville Christian grade school shooter was a transgender female identified as Samantha Hyde, 28… transgender or not I hope it rots in hell!' It featured the same photo of the person wearing glasses and smiling."
In fact, the picture is altered, and not of Hale, the actual suspect in the shooting. Internet trolls have circulated the name "Sam Hyde" as a suspect in a number of mass shootings since 2015. Sam Hyde is actually "a comedian whose name and photos have repeatedly been used by internet hoaxers," said the report.
Moreover, Tuquero continued, the invocation of Hyde is not limited to mass shootings. "PolitiFact has debunked several claims mentioning Hyde and other variations on his name, related to the downing of jets in Ukraine, explosions in Beirut, and even the Chinese spy balloon’s appearance in U.S. airspace earlier this year."
It’s an internet meme among gamers and 4channel types who aren’t all conservatives.
DeleteI will believe Politifact before I believe you on that.
DeleteInteresting. Here is another Youtube video about fact checking pseudonyms.
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9FXRE7Z0fM
The second amendment is evil.
ReplyDeleteMike Pence has brought his situational
ReplyDeleteloyalty to Country over to Newsmax and
Scientology kook Greta Van S.
That it wasn’t so long ago Fox dumped
her not being a babe and She took
a run at MSNBC would be a rightfully
embarrassing thing to tweek the
Network with. Alas, Bob would then
have to be paying attention.
And here is a very relevant Youtube video on the Fox fallout. I think this is the right link.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9FXRE7Z0fM
"The Washington Post reports: How did the culture war about public school instruction actually get its start?"
ReplyDeleteHard to say, Boobie.
Scopes Monkey Trial? (1925)
The Great Kanawha County Textbook War? (1974)
Glen Youngkin's Sweater Vest telling me I am anti-parent? (2020)
The State of Florida going batshit insane? (ongoing)
I think the Ignorati, afraid of knowledge, will always be with us.
And we will always how the demagogic politicians willing to fan the flames in order to obtain and keep power.
Delete