WEDNESDAY, JUNE 7, 2023
In search of the raucous board meeting: We may not post for the rest of the week. It will be Friday at the earliest before we post again!
In our absence, we'll leave you with a warning from Thomas Edsall. But also, with a chance to stage an eight-hour hunt in The Case of the (Allegedly) Raucous School Board Meeting.
First, the warning from Edsall:
The warning appeared on May 31, in Edsall's weekly guest essay for the New York Times. In a nutshell, Edsall's warning dealt with the impulse to tribal otherization and its subsequent misconceptions.
Headline included, the essay started as shown:l
The Politics of Delusion Have Taken Hold
There are very real—and substantial—policy differences separating the Democratic and Republican Parties. At the same time, what scholars variously describe as misperception and even delusion is driving up the intensity of contemporary partisan hostility.
According to scholars, a type of misperception, perhaps even reaching the state of delusion, is driving partisan hostility. As he continued, Edsall started to flesh out that clain:
Matthew Levendusky, a political scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, described some of these distorted views in his recently published book, “Our Common Bonds: Using What Americans Share to Help Bridge the Partisan Divide:”
Seventy-five percent of Democrats said Republicans were closed-minded, and 55 percent of Republicans said that Democrats were immoral (Pew Research Center, 2019). Nearly eight in 10 say that the two parties “fundamentally disagree” about core American values. More than 70 percent of all voters think those in the other party are “a clear and present danger to the American way of life.”
Where's "the politics of delusion?" you might ask at this point. In fact, some people "in the other party" really are a potential threat to the American way of life. It isn't crazy, and it isn't delusional, to say that some such people actually do exist.
As Edsall continues, he quotes an array of scholars offering variants of his claim. These scholars describe some of the ways in which partisan feeling leads blue and red tribe members alike to misperceive their degree of difference with the other tribe—with the perceived tribal enemy.
Indeed, as Edsall continues from the passage above, he instantly offers this:
At an extreme level, James L. Martherus, Andres G. Martinez, Paul K. Piff and Alexander G. Theodoridis wrote in the July 2019 article “Party Animals? Extreme Partisan Polarization and Dehumanization,” “a substantial proportion of partisans are willing to directly say that they view members of the opposing party as less evolved than supporters of their own party.”
How about it, friend? Are members of the other party "less evolved?" than members of yours?
On the one hand, everything is possible—and the statement by those scholars is imprecise in various ways. On the other hand, it's hard for a major nation to function when members of its two major parties view each other that way.
Edsall quotes a gaggle of scholars describing this otherization. As a general matter, our question for today will be this:
Does our own, largely infallible blue tribe ever "otherize" the reds? Do we ever succumb to the temptation to see red tribe members as fundamentally Other—as subhuman all the way down?
To some extent, we may sometimes be so inclined! Consider this Washington Post opinion piece about a recent school board meeting in Hernando County, Florida.
Hernando County has been involved in an ongoing dispute about so-called "book bans" in its public schools. On June 1, an Opinion piece by Sargent and Waldman started off like this:
In a deep red Florida county, a student-teacher revolt shames the right
By now, it’s obvious that the reactionary culture warriors who want to reshape American education are inspiring a serious liberal counter-mobilization in response. Remarkably, this backlash to the backlash is gaining momentum in some of the reddest parts of the country.
A raucous school board meeting in Hernando County, Fla., on Tuesday night captured what’s striking about this new phenomenon. The scene featured teachers pointedly declaring that right-wing attacks are driving them to quit, even as parents and students forcefully stood up on their behalf, demanding a halt to the hysteria.
“I have never seen such fear from my colleagues as I have seen in the last two months,” social studies teacher Victoria Hunt told the board.
The whole affair really put the culture-war-mongers to shame. Not that they’ll see it that way; as the meeting also showed, scenes like this—with maximum rage, fear, tension and suspicion surging between parents and educators — are precisely the outcome they want.
The writers describe a "raucous" school board meeting attended by reactionary culture warriors.
Right-wing attacks by the culture-war-mongers had created hysteria in the county. It was obvious at the raucous meeting that maximum rage and fear were precisely the outcome the warmongers want!
Were Sargent and Waldman overstating? Were the others really that bad?
Meanwhile, just how raucous was that raucous school board meeting? According to Sargent and Waldman, the raucous school board meeting was as raucous as this:
At the meeting, right-wing parents and a minority of the school board amplified the usual attacks: Pornography in classrooms, indoctrination, wokeness. Watching them, it was impossible to avoid the sense that they were relishing every second of the tumult they’ve unleashed.
Right-wing parents were relishing the tumult they had unleashed. It was impossible to avoid that sense if you watched them at the meeting.
Reading that passage, that question came to mind:
Just how raucous was it? How raucous was the raucous school board meeting? We decided to click the link the writers provided and make an attempt to find out.
In fact, the writers had linked to a videotape of the entire meeting—and the raucous school board meeting had lasted more than eight hours!
The videotape to which they linked was a full eight hours long! But as we clicked around the eight hours of tape, watching bits and pieces of the meeting, we saw no sign that the raucous school board meeting had been raucous at all.
Based upon that videotape, you could practically hear a pin drop in the room as citizens with differing views made statements to the board. Attendees had even agreed to refrain from applauding or cheering. Instead, they waved their hands in the air to signal agreement with whatever was being said.
As such, we leave you today with an eight-hour assignment. Your assignment, if you choose to take it, will of course be this:
See if you can find someone being raucous at the raucous school board meeting! We clicked around, then clicked and clicked, and we weren't able to find the rage.
Sargent and Waldman were trashing the warmongers hard. In the process, were they possibly creating the Other?
Can a very large nation function this way? Is this sort of thing actually good for the soul?
For the record, this isn't about which side you're on regarding the question of "book bans." This is about the claim that a bunch of Others, true to their warmonger nature, had staged an extremely raucous school board meeting, one marked by maximum rage.
As we clicked and clicked through eight hours of tape, it's always possible that we missed the raucous parts of the meeting! Your assignment, should you accept it:
See if you can find them.
As we have noted for maybe twenty years now, Bob has no problem with tribalism. He only has a problem when he sees it on the left. If Bob has no problem with Trump’s rape of our Capitol, and there is no reason to believe he does, can we really trust his take on the problem or lack of them, at school board meetings?
ReplyDelete"If Bob has no problem with Trump’s rape of our Capitol, and there is no reason to believe he does, can we really trust his take on the problem or lack of them, at school board meetings?"
DeleteThis is a classic strawman fallacy and use of guilt by association. It fails to address the specific arguments or evidence regarding school board meetings.
The attack on the Capitol was raucous.
Delete7:32 is a very lazy and uninteresting troll. Intellectually speaking.
DeleteThis is a real dilemma for me. I don't know if I should vote for Pence or hang him. Any thoughts?
Delete7:56, I’m glad you think you are very clever to have learned the term “strawman fallacy” and think you have won the argument when you throw it in. But who is the strawman, and what is the fallacy? You seem to have no idea what you are talking about. “Trump’s rape is the Capitol” is certainly rhetoric, but I don’t think you want to go into it, because that would mean actually going into what he actually did, and you and Bob would sure rather ignore that!! As for Bob only criticizing the tribalism of the left, please, explain how that’s not true! Enlighten us, you sad nincompoop. Your bullshit is your own. Get lost.
DeleteThat the best you got at 8:50? Ha. Bob’s sad defenders long ago ran out of steam.
Delete@7:32 is pointing out that if Somerby didn't find the Capitol attack raucous, how will he find a school board meeting raucous? That is not a strawman at all. McCarthy gave Tucker Carlson the tapes so he could look for any quiet moments. He didn't find any, or he would have put together a reel of them.
DeleteThe strawman is the representation of Bob's position on tribalism. The response claims that Bob has no problem with tribalism, but only when it's seen on the left. This misrepresents Bob's actual views, simplifying and distorting them to make them easier to criticize.
DeleteThe issue is the reporting about the school board meeting, not the rape of the Capitol. Stick to the issue instead of invented strawmen.
Delete
Delete"If Bob has no problem with Trump’s rape of our Capitol, and there is no reason to believe he does, can we really trust his take on the problem or lack of them, at school board meetings?"
There is no indication that Bob was supportive or dismissive of the Capitol riot in any way.
Somerby approaches the 1/6 from
standpoint of it being the hallmark of a nation divided by the democrafication of the media and disinformation via social platforms. THAT is his personal concern and area of interest. The more voices , the better, in my book.
There are a gazillion blogs that endlessly say precisely what you think is pertinent and in the terms that wish them to use.
Go there. Stop demanding that there be no deviation from your focus, your terms, and your priorities.
If I were at a conservative blog, I’d barf if conservative made a speech/stink on precisely what true conservatives are supposed to be focusing upon, what and how they are supposed to communicate it, or on how conservatives would have gotten the fax (email, text, zoom) on all of that if they truly were conservatives.
That’s why, aside from mh, the only liberals here are anonymices.
Your peers get sick of your angry militancy too.
"A straw man fallacy (sometimes written as strawman) is the informal fallacy of refuting an argument different from the one actually under discussion"
DeleteThe question is whether that school board meeting was raucous or not -- a question raised by Somerby. The argument that Somerby wouldn't recognize a raucous meeting if it bit him on the ass is part of that discussion of whether the school board was raucous or not. That means it is NOT a stranwman argument. Get it, or are you being deliberately obtuse, like Somerby?
"There is no indication that Bob was supportive or dismissive of the Capitol riot in any way."
DeleteThat's the point. He didn't say anything about the Capitol riot, never discussed it. The only people who behave that way are the ones on the right who fomented the attack. Every liberal on the planet did talk about it. Somerby repeatedly claims to be liberal and yet he behaves like a conservative.
But the larger point is that if Somerby didn't consider the attack worth mentioning, he is the last person to assess whether people were angry and upset at a school board meeting.
Anonymouse 10:41am, you can wage an argument that Somerby doesn't think it was “raucous”, let alone violent, to break windows and otherwise deface the Capitol, to throw punches and objects at the CP, to kill someone via a stampede, bullet, etc.
DeleteYou can argue that, but you’re knowingly misrepresenting Somerby in order to make a simpleton’s point against Bob’s current blog.
Take a bow. You are an anonymouse.
Anonymouse 10:43am, your claim is that Somerby has never referenced 1/6?
Delete10:41
DeleteTo accurately refute Bob's claims about the reporting of the school board meeting, it would be necessary to provide counterarguments that address the specific points he made in a logical and evidence-based manner. Attacking his alleged hypocrisy regarding another unrelated event would not be a valid refutation of his claims about the school board meeting.
The counterargument is that Somerby would not recognize raucousness if it were actually occurring. The evidence of that is that he never acknowledged the raucousness of the capitol attack.
DeleteObtuseness, like you and Somerby are both showing, is not an argument.
As I recall, Somerby objected to the 1/6 Committee televised hearings, but not the riot itsef.
DeleteI believe we all realize that is your counterargument. The issue is that it is inadequate, unjustifiable and doesn't address Bob's specific points.
Deleteto the above anon TDH attackers - the issue in today's TDH post is that school board hearing. Did the WaPo writer distort what happened at the meeting. There is a link to an 8 hour tape of the meeting. TDH didn't watch the whole thing (8 hours!). he looked at random parts of it and says he didn't see anything where the anti-woke side were raucous, wild out of control. as characterized by the WaPo writer. He challenged anyone to view the tape to point out where any of those raucous behaviors occurred. TDH isn't denying that such behaviors occurred - he didn't see any on what he looked at. (and it's not clear how broad a sample he viewed). TDH's argument, as always is - is it the possible that "our side" distorts the truth, like the other side does. Maybe if we recognized that, we could get somewhere in reducing all the hostility that is going on. Whether TDH' failed to condemn the Jan 5 riot in a manner to your satisfaction is irrelevant as to whether what the WaPo writer's characterization of the meeting was objective and fair. You probably don't want to view the entire 8 hour meeting - I don't blame you - but all TDH says is that whatever he looked at seemed polite and he is asking anyone if there is something that he missed or ignored that proves the contrary. You don't want the WaPo or other media to distort the truth in order to make the "other" side look bad, do you?
DeleteThe reporter didn't say the anti-woke side was raucous. He said the meeting was raucous (in the sense of contentious) because of the complaints by parents and teachers addressing the school board. AC/MA please don't distort what was said. Somerby himself did not say he was looking for anti-woke raucousness either.
DeleteThere was certainly conflict, opposing viewpoints, heatedness at the meeting. The report is correct that parents and teachers expressed fear and disapproval of DeSantis and the changes made in their school district (which was the one that suspended a teacher for showing a Disney film).
No one needs to view the entire meeting to understand the reporter's intention in using the word raucous, which Somerby takes way too literally. No one believes the reporter whipped up the controversy either. It exists because of political interference in school administration.
Do you really NOT understand that someone can say controversial things in a civil way and still be no less confrontational than someone who is shouting?
Somerby's idea that there must be violence or shouting in order for there to be a raucous meeting is silly and stupid. This is another non-issue that Somerby has manufactured to attack the media.
I hope no one will waste their time watching the entire 8-hour meeting, but if they do, I suggest that they listen to what is being said and especially to the grievances of the parents and teachers who are supporting their teacher and opposing DeSantis's anti-wokeness in their school.
What did you think of the stats I posted about the huge increase in vacancies among teachers and staff at Florida schools? Is it a surprise that parents and the remaining teachers are concerned about the damage to education in their state? The reporter is trying to say that the attendees at the board meeting care deeply about what is going on. Somerby claims that no one cares, but here are people showing that they DO care, a lot! It may be that Somerby will not admit the meeting was raucous because it would directly contradict what he said yesterday, about no one caring except him.
There are huge increases in vacancies among teachers and staff at schools in all America states.
DeleteNot on the same order as those in FL. Other states have 2-3000 vacancies not the 5294 in FL. DeSantis had around 2000 when he took office. But note also that other states are enacting some of the same anti-woke measures as FL, which are also anti-teacher and now resulting in increased vacancies in those other states.
DeleteAnonymouse 12:26pm, you argue that Somerby’s treatment of 1/6 shows that he wouldn’t know raucousness if he saw it. Now you accuse me of the same even though I expressly referenced destruction and desecration of public property, violence toward the CP, a shooting, and trampling.
DeleteYou’re right. I wouldn’t call that stuff raucous. I called it violence.
No one is obtuse in this. Certainly not you.
You’re disingenuous and dishonest.
Cecelia, you identified a few of your comments, but the original discussion was with someone who didn't use your nym. My response, when I said both you and Somerby, was aimed at that person. I did not accuse you of anything because my comment wasn't aimed at you, but at the original person who started the discussion you later joined.
DeleteI am glad you are revulsed by violence, but I am not being disingenuous or dishonest because I wasn't talking to you at all.
Anonymouse 1:34pm, so the idiotic argument has flipped from Somerby not being able to recognize raucousness at the school board meetings…because Bob couldn’t even recognize outright violence during 1/6…to Bob ONLY views outright violence as being raucousness.
Deletesheesh.
Anonymouse 2:45pm, duly noted. We all need to directly reference the post to which we are responding.
DeleteI guilty of not doing that and it wasn’t my first mistake and it won’t be the last…
Somerby referenced 1/6 by making blog posts defending those who characterized the day as merely “legitimate political discourse”.
DeleteSomerby no longer has the audience he once held, but that original audience was built on supporting the blue tribe, largely by attacking media that countered the blue tribe.
Somerby’s initial shift right started when he defended Bush’s justification for the invasion of Iraq by claiming that Sadaam was developing nuclear weapons. As it turns out, Bush and Somerby were wrong.
Later Somerby did a complete shift to the right when Trump ran for president.
Even so, now Somerby has a very small audience, and most are of the blue tribe, but he does have a few fanboys, and they all are right wingers.
Somerby built his audience using the blue tribe, and has since turned against them. In America this is perfectly legal, and Somerby won’t be hauled off to jail, etc. At worst, he will face some criticism.
Criticism does trigger right wingers, as they presuppose superiority.
Aside from one pretending to be a woman in a smug and sad attempt to own the libs, while crucifying others for wanting to be their natural selves, aside from that nonsense, Somerby and his fanboys fail to understand:
when right wingers attack the blue tribe as subhuman and the like, that is actually NOT the reason why right wingers fail to convince the blue tribe to vote Republican. Not even close. If Somerby stopped calling the blue tribe dumb morons, if Cecelia stopped spewing his hatred and bitterness, that would not convince a single blue tribe member to switch their views nor their votes.
This is a bone simple, trivial point. Yet Somerby ostensibly bases his blog on supposedly failing to understand this obvious circumstance.
Sir, “democrafication” is not a word. Maybe you meant “democratization”?
Anonymouse 6:34pm, I do mean .democratiz… what you write…
DeleteYou can spell it, but you can’t accept (or even fully glean) that the cultural shift denoted by the word is a focus for Bob.
That’s not allowed. Anonymices dictate the priorities, the ideas, and the terms.
Everyone else must dance.
Somerby has never mentioned that word but you claim it is his focus?
DeleteI forget what time this was posted, "but not the riot itsef." It was not a riot, 1/6 was a coordinated autogolpe.
DeleteCecilia demands that everyone play along with bad faith arguments! What is the point of the intwewebs if it is not to pointlessly respond to and tackle bad faith arguments. Plus the fun of anonymous cecilia making personal attacks because other people are also anonymous on an internet message board. Sometimes bad faith is all you got and you have to fill the time of the day.
DeleteThere are not very real or substantial policy differences separating the Democratic and Republican Parties on issues of:
ReplyDeleteImperialism
Neoliberalism
Support for Israel
Military Industrial Complex
Support for Wall Street
Increase Police Funding
Mass Surveillance State
Let Money Rule Politics
Suppress Third Parties
Crush the Left
That is why one must look out for partisan news sources that obscure and hide this consolidation of power that fuels the violent international war machine that our tax dollars pay for.
The left is the other.
DeleteThere is an extremist right wing too. It doesn't spend its time attacking its own Republican party, except for the dirty RINOs singled out by Trump.
DeleteA commenter who pretends to be super-left and then tells us that the Democrats and Republicans are interchangeable may ot be left wing at all, but part of a so-called centrist party that is not actually centrist but fringe, or part of a Russia-funded effort to disrupt American politics coming into another presidential election.
One clue is the parting comment about funding a violent international war machine. That is pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine talk that is likely coming from Russia-funded trolls disguising themselves as beyond the left, in that area where the far right and far left meet.
If you want to be a pacifist, fine. Just remember that Russia started the current war by invading Ukraine. And the US didn't put Putin up to it, although it seems likely Trump made him some promises.
As far as basically ignoring defense spending in reporting, that would include about everyone, that situation happened gradually over time. It obviously didn’t eminate from the left, but it is where we are stuck. That said, progressives like the creepy Cornel West should go to Ukraine and explain to them how they should give their Country to Putin because they don’t like war.
DeleteAside from the Ukraine conflict, Republican presidents have increased defense spending, while Democratic presidents have lowered defense spending.
DeleteUnder Trump, Putin flourished; under Biden, Putin is getting his ass handed to him.
Without Bush and Trump, we would not have invaded Iraq and we would not have a right wing Supreme Court dismantling our society.
The difference between the two parties is very significant and directly impactful on people’s lives.
Damon Linker reviews "Regime Change:Toward a Postliberal Future" by Patrick J Deneen.
ReplyDeletehttps://quillette.com/2023/06/06/america-doesnt-need-regime-change/
Somerby needs to read this:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/07/opinion/resistance-black-advancement-affirmative-action.html
Notice how Edsall refers to scholars and then actually identifies one (Levandusky). Somerby should try this himself, although it would be impossible to find an actual anthropologist living in a cave or tree.
ReplyDelete"In fact, some people "in the other party" really are a potential threat to the American way of life."
ReplyDeleteYesterday, Somerby favorite Kevin Drum wrote this:
https://jabberwocking.com/the-far-right-is-responsible-for-half-of-all-terrorist-attacks/
I think this qualifies as evidence of the truth of Edsall's statement. When there are facts backing up a point of view, then that view no longer qualifies as blind tribalism.
"Does our own, largely infallible blue tribe ever "otherize" the reds? Do we ever succumb to the temptation to see red tribe members as fundamentally Other—as subhuman all the way down?"
ReplyDeleteSomerby shifts from seeing political opponents (a better term than "red tribe") as less evolved (morally) to considering them as subhuman. I have never ever read anything written on the left that characterizes Republicans or right wingers as "subhuman". Somerby uses this kind of bait and switch often. Not even Kyle Rittenhouse, who shot protesters for no reason, and the jury who acquitted him of murder, are "subhuman," although they clearly do not share the values of the left and they are misguided and ethically suspect for letting Rittenhouse, now a hero of the right, off the hook for his deliberate shooting of unarmed people (two of whom are dead). And there are many other examples of moral malfeasance by the right. And yet no one calls such people "subhuman."
Perhaps Somerby thinks that the left behaves like the right in that respect. It doesn't. The right calls people pedophiles at the drop of a hat, with no regard to the actual meaning of that word. The left does not. The unfairness of this accusation by Somerby shows that he has no interest in a meaningful discussion today -- this is more name-calling against liberals, using the serious discussion of scholars to attack his own political opponents with false accusations.
Go back and look at who is shooting whom for political reasons and then tell liberals we are the problem!
anon 9:02 - "shot protesters for no reason." He was being attacked, kicked, and one of the victims had a gun. The case against hm was weak, and the not guilty verdict was not unreasonable, given the "beyond a reasonable doubt standard." You corroborate TDH's point that our side can be as irrational as the other side.
DeleteNo, he was not "being attacked". He taunted a mentally ill man, then ran away from him. There is video showing him do it. The victim who had a gun was trying to stop him and take his gun -- AFTER HE HAD ALREADY KILLED TWO UNARMED PEOPLE.
DeleteThe judge was clearly biased against the prosecution. Just as the right wing has made a hero out of Rittenhouse, there are no doubt people in WI who would want to exonerate a vigilante for killing mentally ill people and protesters, targets of right wing animosity. Rittenhouse wasn't the only vigilante on the scene that evening. All he needed was a fellow-traveler on the jury and he got one.
Per witnesses, Rosenbaum was shot by Rittenhouse after Rosenbaum verbally threatened him and then started to chase him.
DeleteHuber was shot by Rittenhouse after he started beating him with a skateboard.
Grosskreutz testified that he had pointed his gun at Rittenhouse when he was shot.
This was night-after-night of utter civil unrest that should have been stopped by the police, or if necessary, the National Guard.
https://apnews.com/article/kyle-rittenhouse-wisconsin-shootings-george-floyd-homicide-cbd8653c42406417c2d3d8559632e3bb
Cecelia, this has been discussed at length here before. Before Rosenbaum approached Rittenhouse (which wasn't "chasing" based on the video shown), Rittenhouse had taunted Rosenbaum and tried to take his dumpster. That is shown too on video. Rittenhouse could have left Rosenbaum alone -- there was no reason for him to taunt the man. Huber was shot because he was trying to take Rittenhouse's gun after he had already killed Rosenbaum. People saw that happen and were trying to stop him from shooting anyone else.
DeleteNight after night of civil unrest that Rittenhouse, age 17, made a considerable effort to join, sought out with his gun in hand. After Rittenhouse shot two men and wounded a third, the cops waved him through their police line (with his gun still in hand). But the police didn't shoot three people -- Rittenhouse did that -- and you defend him.
Anonymouse 4:02pm, the AP piece says that witnesses reported that Rosenbaum threatened Rittenhouse and lunged for his gun. They said that Rosenbaum was “hyper-aggressive” and agitated. Being verbally taunted would be no excuse for that sort of deadly aggressive behavior.
DeleteHuber went after Rittenhouse and used his skateboard as a deadly weapon, which it was.
Grosskreutz, who was armed, pointed his weapon at Rittenhouse.
All these men wanted to be there. All the people there either wanted to wreak havoc or told themselves that they were there to prevent such things.
Why don’t you try asking questions of the people in charge for allowing all the burning, looting, and scrapping between sides to go on in the first place.
Rittenhouse went to Wisconsin to protect racial hierarchies.
DeleteRosenbaum was mentally ill. If the skateboard was a deadly weapon why wasn’t Rittenhouse dead? Rittenhouse was obviously more aggressive than those he killed, even the man who was armed but didn’t shoot him. No one shot or killed anyone else at that protest except Rittenhouse.
Delete"our side can be as irrational as the other side."
DeleteEqually so? Stop being a useful idiot.
anons, you make your points with the same objectivity as the North Korean propagandists.
DeleteAnonymouse 5:35, if I come after you with a hammer, but you're better armed with a gun, that doesn’t mean that I am not the aggressor and that you must let me hit you.
DeleteRosenbaum was “armed” with a dumpster. If you taunt a mentally ill person, you are the aggressor. If you shoot a man and then turn on someone armed with a skateboard (a means of transportation not a weapon) you are the aggressor. If you encounter an armed person who has done nothing to you, they are not the aggressor, especially if you have just shot two other people. Rittenhouse got away with murder.
DeleteAC/MA Try using arguments and facts instead of name-calling.
DeleteA single witness testified that Rosenbaum was being “hyper aggressive” towards others, not towards Rittenhouse, and that Rosenbaum shouted at him, the witness, that he was “going to fucking kill” him after someone prevented Rosenbaum from lighting a fire in a dumpster, but that Rittenhouse was standing near him when Rosenbaum shouted in anger.
DeleteA different single witness testified that he saw Rosenbaum lunge at Rittenhouse’s gun, then fall to the ground, and then saw Rittenhouse fire four shots at Rosenbaum.
Both of these witness were in fact part of the same group of right wing disrupters that Rittenhouse was engaged with.
No other witnesses testified to hyper-aggressiveness nor threats from Rosenbaum.
Rittenhouse did not testify that Rosenbaum lunged at him, but did testify that he knew Rosenbaum was unarmed.
Video shows that Rosenbaum did not lunge at Rittenhouse just prior to the murder. Video also shows that what led up to the murder was Rittenhouse taunting and chasing after Rosenbaum, up until they both encounter a man with a gun, at which point Rittenhouse drops a fire extinguisher and points his gun at the man and Rosenbaum, says something to Rosenbaum, after which Rosenbaum runs towards Rittenhouse and throws an empty plastic grocery bag, to which Rittenhouse responds by turning and murdering Rosenbaum.
There was nothing reasonable about what Rittenhouse did, he is a psychopath and a cold blooded killer, who celebrated his indictment by having beers with the Proud Boys while flashing white supremacy hand signals.
Last week Somerby was objecting to the word "miracle" applied to improvement in reading scores in MS. Today he objects to the word "raucous" applied to the emotion at a school board meeting at which it was stated that many teachers are quitting because of the culture war on their schools. Does it matter whether the board meeting was "raucous" or merely "heated" when teachers are genuinely concerned about being accused of being pedophiles, indoctrinating and grooming children? Teachers are quitting everywhere this is happening. We have seen the reports from FL about teachers who have been fired for teaching. But Somerby thinks this all hinges on the word "raucous"?
ReplyDeleteraucous definition -- "making or constituting a disturbingly harsh and loud noise"
Obviously, the word is not meant literally but figuratively. The parents and teachers are making noise to push back against so-called anti-woke laws that interfere with their work and cause them to fear for their jobs. But Somerby thinks that description is the problem -- not the laws apparently.
Somerby examines 8 hours worth of videotape of a school board meeting and cherrypicks moments of quietness, so he concludes it was not raucous. He entirely ignores that eight hours is a highly unusual length of time for a school board meeting to last. Whose leg is Somerby trying to pull with this ridiculous analysis?
Raucous is what happened outside of the Glendale School Board yesterday when the Proud Boys showed up. It was on national TV.
DeleteWhat happened at Bob's citation was clearly not "raucous." So Bob was once again correct -- it was a media embellishment.
Except Somerby didn't establish that as true. He skipped through an 8-hour meeting, so he doesn't know what part the reporter was referring to and doesn't know what the meeting was like during the times he didn't watch. That isn't a very thorough analysis -- it is an accusation based on an assumption.
DeleteIf Somerby clicked and couldn't find the rage, could he find the fear? Why did he think those parents and teachers were there, if he looked and looked and couldn't find the problem?
ReplyDeleteSomerby has been reading and reading Einstein and just couldn't understand his theory, even when stated in the simplest terms. Today Somerby looked and looked for the noise and couldn't find it at an 8-hour long school board meeting. Maybe next time he should try listening to what the dissenting parents and teachers were saying.
You can't make Somerby understand anything he doesn't want to hear. He has a point to make and he will cram his own idea into the facts, even though it doesn't fit. The meeting was raucous because of the dissent voiced to the board, not the literal harshness of the voices.
It was clearly not a raucous meeting.
DeleteIs Somerby actually trying to pretend that the animosity at a board meeting was whipped up by the media and not a genuine expression by the people who took the time and made the effort to attend a board meeting that lasted for eight hours?
ReplyDeleteEvery time Somerby says something exceptionally foolish, I think he cannot get any worse, and then he outdoes himself, as he has done today.
DeSantis is not the bad guy in this situation -- it is those ratty journalists using those big words they learned in their ratty elitist universities, driving people who otherwise would agree into their separate corners, and if teachers are actually leaving their jobs over this issue, that is just an illusion because the real problem is the media and their cursed adjectives. Right.
No, he's trying to say that the media embroiders so many of these stories to fit a lazy, dumb, obvious, shallow, pre-arranged narrative. They make a big effort to encourage divisiveness and -- yes -- hatemongering. And so many people on the Left fall right in line.
DeleteSomerby is saying the media, which is owned by corporations, can't be trusted. Somerby, is what the Right like to call "a Marxist".
Delete"As we clicked and clicked through eight hours of tape, it's always possible that we missed the raucous parts of the meeting! Your assignment, should you accept it:
ReplyDeleteSee if you can find them."
Meanwhile, Somerby will giggle over the thought that his readers here are sitting through eight hours of a board meeting.
Does anyone here think Somerby spent eight hours watching the entire meeting? Is it a surpise that he could find quiet moments during that meeting? The only way he could have missed the "harsh" comments by the parents and teachers opposed to anti-woke school laws is by watching with the mute button on. But he thinks it would be fun to make his critics here find examples of complaints. He will then argue about whether they are harsh enough, which is way beyond the point those teachers and parents were making at that meeting. Just like Somerby entirely ignored the positive changes in reading instruction and teacher training made in MS in order to quibble over the word "miracle".
This is Somerby's newest trick. It is his shiny new toy. It is a better exercise to look up the figures showing how many teachers have left their jobs in states enacting such laws, and what the teacher shortage is shaping up to be nationwide.
On April 12, 2023 Newsweek reported:
"Florida has 5,294 teacher vacancies, the state education association says, compared with 2,217 vacancies in January 2019 when Gov. Ron DeSantis took office. Teachers say they are leaving because of low pay and DeSantis' education policies, dubbed the "war on woke."
On May 17, 2023 Tampabay.com reported:
"A Hernando County fifth grade teacher continues to get international attention after being reported to the state Department of Education by a school board member for showing the Disney movie “Strange World” to her class. The movie includes a gay character as a secondary plot."
That eight-hour meeting was perhaps part of the investigation promised in response to that incident. Somerby doesn't say.
On Feb 23, 2023 Newsweek reported:
"Brian Covey, a teacher who was fired after posting a video of empty bookshelves that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis denounced as misinformation, told Newsweek that he will continue to share "the reality of public schools" in the state.
Covey was a full-time substitute math teacher at Mandarin Middle School in Jacksonville. He posted tweets that went viral at a time when Florida school districts are removing or covering books in classrooms and libraries to comply with new state laws."
Is this raucous enough for Somerby?
1905 was a miraculous year for Einstein: quantum theory, statistical mechanics, relativity (including mass-energy equivalence). But he was never raucous.
DeleteHe dumped his wife to fuck his cousin, that seems a little raucous.
DeleteHe did later marry his cousin. Apparently familiarity does not always breed contempt.
And to clarify what happened in 1905, from Wikipedia:
“In 1905, Einstein published four groundbreaking papers. These outlined the theory of the photoelectric effect, explained Brownian motion, introduced special relativity, and demonstrated mass–energy equivalence.“
Einstein was not a supporter of quantum mechanics, but he was a supporter of socialism. Some things he got wrong, other things he got correct.
He explained the photoelectric effect with quantum mechanics. He explained Brownian motion with statistical mechanics. He explained mass-energy equivalence with relativity.
DeleteIn his private life he wasn’t always a nice guy.
It was not a raucous meeting. So Bob is correct.
DeleteIn the Jim Crow days in the South, civil rights efforts were not attributed to black people wanting equality but to outside agitators, later commies, stirring up the happy black people and creating trouble.
ReplyDeleteSomerby's version of those outside agitators is the press. There wouldn't be red and blue tribes if there weren't journalists using words like "raucous." Black people didn't know enough to be angry on their behalf without someone telling them they were oppressed, said the segregationists. Similarly, parents and teachers wouldn't be upset about anti-woke legislation if the press weren't making such a fuss about it.
Political scientists have documented that the right wing has become steadily more conservative while the left has stayed where it was ideologically. Perhaps todays gulf between red and blue is due to right-wing extremism that is being opposed by a left that correctly perceives it, not some manufactured sense of grievance based on media hype. The rest of the nation does not want to become fascist and sees DeSantis as a warning of what will happen without partisan opposition. That is real, not a matter of words, as Somerby suggests. Real teachers have been fired. Read teachers are quitting. Real parents are upset about the school problems created by DeSantis. Somerby has tended to support parent rights, but not when they go against right-wing activism apparently.
Bob's not blaming the Press for fomenting trouble. He's blaming them for misreporting stories. These arguments are much more civilized -- and yes, even nuanced -- than some people want to hear.
DeleteIn that there's hope. But there's not much hope in encouraging easy tribal hatreds.
Criticizing the media (corporations) is also "tribal".
DeleteOf course, paying your bills, used to be "tribal" too, until Biden reached across the aisle and convinced McCarthy it isn't.
It's way past time for liberals to stop playing pattycake with morons and fight back.
ReplyDeleteYou are sounding positively raucous.
Delete“We clicked around, then clicked and clicked, and we weren't able to find the rage.”
ReplyDeleteWas he looking at the naep website again? Just wondering.
Hint for Somerby -- you have to listen to the words.
DeleteSome folks got raucous in the parking lot outside the school board in Glendale CA.
ReplyDeletehttps://finance.yahoo.com/video/fists-fly-protesters-clash-outside-040754918.html
Apparently, social media told its conservative readers that an agenda item about teaching LGBT+ to kids was being discussed at the meeting. Actually, the school board had no such agenda item (or intention) and merely designated June as pride month, as it does every year.
DeleteIn this case, it was right wing social media riling up the masses with a lie, not journalists who eventually set the record straight.
No good can come of right wing activists who tell their followers that satanic forces are at work and that children are being forced to be gay by the public schools.
Why doesn't Somerby speak out against that?
https://www.tampabay.com/news/education/2023/05/31/hernando-school-board-meeting-john-stratton-shannon-rodriguez-lgbtq-moms-for-liberty/?outputType=amp
DeleteAnonymouse 1:22pm, that’s not how this area news report describes it;
“Political action committees from the right and left urged followers to show up and make their voices heard on an agenda that included book bans, LGBTQ+ student rights and the overall direction of the Hernando school district and its closely divided board. Heeding the call were local teachers, students and residents, as well as visitors and activists from across the state.”
Cecelia, the comment @12:58 was about a fracas in Glendale CA, not the FL school board meeting. Please read more carefully.
DeleteAnonymouse 2:26pm, my bad. Sorry.
DeleteYes. Now THAT was raucous. But the meeting itself was pretty civilized.
DeleteThere is big media news today, with the dismissal of Chris Licht at CNN. Somerby said nothing about the rumors on Monday and of course, nothing today, even though his concern here is supposedly the media.
ReplyDeleteWhy is this dismissal important? Licht's efforts were to rid CNN of reporters who would question Trump's lies as false, challenging him on the facts as part of their interviewing and reporting duty. The reporters who did that were fired as one of Licht's first acts. Licht then gave Trump a townhall with a moderator who would not challenge him on his false statements. The townhall was in real time (live) so that no editing or insertion of warnings could be included when Trump told a lie. There were at least 20 such major untruths told by Trump without any pushback. Even so, CNN did not manage to attract conservative viewers, while losing liberal and moderate viewers. Licht's idea that having "neutral" reporters (in the sense of not taking partisan sides by calling out lies) would attract more right wing viewers didn't work.
Some are blaming CNN's troubles on the slow demise of cable news in general. Others are blaming Licht for having a right wing bias and trying to become the new Fox news. Licht thought he was trying to get reporters to be more neutral by firing the ones who were critical of Trump's lying. Some blame an Atlantic magazine article in which the complaints of CNN hosts and on-screen talent against Licht were reported. Ultimately, the loss of revenue may be the cause of his firing.
Somerby has taken a position similar to Licht's about the role of reporters. He has called for pushback by reporters during live questioning, but we have all seen how Trump evades such questions. In his CNN interview, Trump called his own friendly interviewer a nasty person. Somerby also has said that lies shouldn't be labeled as lies as long as there is doubt about what Trump believes and whether he knows his statements are untrue but is telling them deliberately, a knowing lie. Confronting someone with contradictory facts doesn't work either with Trump. A liar has no respect for truth, so why should he back down when confronted with the facts? He simply calls those alternative facts, and moves on, steamrolling the reporter.
CNN couldn't figure out how to report Somerby's way. In the process, they came across looking like another MAGA mouthpiece, losing audience and advertisers and sinking the station. Just as Somerby has trashed his own reputation with his ridiculous attempt at centrism or whatever it is he has been pushing here.
Because this is a media-musing blog and because Somerby himself has advocated exactly the route Licht took with CNN, Somerby owes his readers some comment on the obvious failure of that approach.
I won't say that Somerby is taking a few days off here because of this situation, but I'll bet he doesn't talk about it when he gets back either. And if Somerby won't discuss a major media development like this one, how can he go on pretending this is a media blog and not a partisan propaganda outlet?
Licht's efforts did not include ridding CNN of reporters who would question Trump's lies as false, challenging him on the facts as part of their interviewing and reporting duty. That is a baseless assertion at this point.
DeleteLook at who got fired first. Also, read the Atlantic Magazine article, which includes an interview with Licht in which he talks about his goals at CNN.
DeleteDan Froomkin said:
"Licht has tried to make CNN neutral political territory, most notably by firing bold truth-tellers like Brian Stelter and John Harwood who minced no words when it came to calling out the tornado of lies spawned by Trump, Fox News, and the rest of the MAGA ecosystem.
Licht made it clear to the remaining CNN staffers that they should shove the contentious talk about Trump, in an attempt to appeal to more conservative voters; that they should not “take sides”."
https://presswatchers.org/2023/05/lessons-for-chris-lichts-successor-at-cnn/
Tom Sullivan say, quoting Jay Rosen:
"It turns out The Market wasn’t buying the View from Nowhere. And journalism is poorer for still peddling what NYU associate professor of journalism Jay Rosen warned about in 2010:
When MSNBC suspends Keith Olbermann for donating without company permission to candidates he supports– that’s dumb. When NPR forbids its “news analysts” from expressing a view on matters they are empowered to analyze– that’s dumb. When reporters have to “launder” their views by putting them in the mouths of think tank experts: dumb. When editors at the Washington Post decline even to investigate whether the size of rallies on the Mall can be reliably estimated because they want to avoid charges of “leaning one way or the other,” as one of them recently put it, that is dumb. When CNN thinks that, because it’s not MSNBC and it’s not Fox, it’s the only the “real news network” on cable, CNN is being dumb about itself.
In fact, American journalism is dumber than most journalists, who often share my sense of absurdity about these practices. A major reason we have a practice less intelligent than its practitioners is the prestige that the View from Nowhere still claims in American newsrooms. You asked me why I am derisive toward it. That’s why. "
https://digbysblog.net/2023/06/07/ceo-chris-licht-out-at-cnn/
@2:11 You are denying what was an explicit policy enacted by Licht at CNN, and yes, he did fire those who were aggressive about challenging Trump's lies, and it was done to peel away Fox viewers, which didn't work.
Read some of what is being said about this around various websites.
All of it does. Try reading some of it.
DeleteIt wasn't an explicit policy stated by Licht though. You made an overstatement, that is all. You mischaracterized his actions and intentions to fit your partisan framework.
DeleteI feel so sorry for people who expose themselves to these partisan advocacy blogs and DNC related propaganda outlets. They are treated so horribly. I guess the same is true for Fox News watchers ... or gullible partisans anywhere.
Delete@3:23 Read the Atlantic article with the interview with Licht. Read his public statement and apology to his staff. I didn't write any of the stuff I quoted from. That is from independent media experts. You need to address that stuff, not my motives.
DeleteI read the Atlantic article. There's nothing in it about the explicit policy stated by Licht you invented.
DeleteLicht's had an explicit policy to rid CNN of reporters who would question Trump's lies as false in the same way Trump was colluding with Russia. Both are made.up stories distributed by propagandists.
DeleteLicht means light, as in let there be light— es werde Licht!
DeleteHere are some of the statements from the Atlantic article, based on a interview with Licht:
DeleteLicht refers to his new policy about remaining neural when interviewing Trump: "We’ve had discussions about this. We know that we’re getting played, so we’re gonna resist it."
"One year into the job, Licht was losing both battles. Ratings, in decline since Trump left office, had dropped to new lows. Employee morale was even worse. A feeling of dread saturated the company. Licht had accepted the position with ambitions to rehabilitate the entire news industry, telling his peers that Trump had broken the mainstream media and that his goal was to do nothing less than “save journalism.”
The Atlantic article explains that his view was that calling Trump a liar revealed journalists as not neutral, partisan, taking sides. Licht wanted journalists to expose Trump's lies by confronting him with facts. The actual townhall revealed the futility of doing that. The people he initially fired were the ones who were most aggressive about exposing Trump's lies, the ones Licht considered most biased against Trump.
This is not only said in the Atlantic article but also in many other pieces written about Licht's tenure at CNN, at Mother Jones and at the New York Times.
The idea that I invented this view of Licht's goals is ridiculous. But it is also now pretty obvious that you are just trolling.
Yes, one must remain neural.
DeleteSorry, neutral
DeleteIs it really "news" that a mediocre white man, who never would have been hired if "merit" was the basis of hiring, failed at his job? This happens every day of the week in the USA.
DeleteI’m a mediocre white man, I’ve failed at everything thing I tried, and I retired comfortably.
DeleteCongrats on your retirement.
DeleteAre you saying that Zaslov canned Licht because of the pro-Trumpish leanings?
DeleteThat's ridiculous. He canned him because of the interview.
He canned Licht, because Licht lost the newsroom.
DeleteAnd because CNN trying to cozy-up to Magats is a losing proposition.
Licht gave Trump a HUGE microphone at his Town hall, and larded the audience with trump sycophants, and Magats still say CNN is a liberal-bastion, which can't be trusted.
Pandering to magats is not a winning move.
Licht has claimed that he wasn't being pro-Trump but was trying to return journalism to a neutral non-partisan stance. In practice, Trump rode roughshod over the interviewer (not allowed to call him on his lying) and the entirely pro-Trump audience loved it.
DeleteThe consensus seems to be that Licht was fired because he lost both viewers and advertisers, affecting the bottom line financially. The Atlantic article gave the pretext for firing him, largely because he was trashed by his on-screen talent.
Licht began his attempt to transform journalism at CNN by firing those reporters who had been calling Trump on his lies. That looked like a partisan cleaning house in favor of the right, but Licht claims he was trying to return CNN to non-partisan reporting. They look the same to most of us and that doesn't explain why the townhall audience was so pro-Trump.
Somerby seems to be saying that the gulf between red and blue is not a matter of values or different beliefs, but something created by the media using words like raucous.
ReplyDeleteHere is an example of the wide gulf in values between red and blue when it comes to gun ownership, rights of homeowners and treatment of neighbors and their kids:
https://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2023/06/fox-commenters-think-dead-black-mother.html
The important part of this essay is the comments to the news report. People on the left do not react like these people did, both the shooter and the commenters. That can be seen here too, where the right wing commenters say unthinkable things that no liberal would say. These are real differences in values, not filtered through media and not CAUSED by media either. I don't know what made Cecelia the way she is, but I do know that she would not be among my circle of friends in real life and no one I know personally would say the things she does, or behave the way she does here. She out-Boeberts Boebert, and Boebert may be admired for her pluck but she is not the kind of person most people in Colorado would want to be around. She is the kind that would shoot through the screendoor after throwing something at the neighbor's black kids.
People associate with those who share their interests and values, not those who are described a particular way by journalists. Somerby needs to get out more and spend less time contemplating people instead of his pear tree.
" Somerby needs to get out more and spend less time contemplating people instead of his pear tree."
DeleteSomerby needs to get out more and spend more time contemplating people instead of his pear tree.
What values are shared by liberals that are not shared by conservatives?
Delete1. respect for all individuals
Delete2. equality of opportunity
3. equal treatment and access before the law
4. government exists to serve the common good
5. value of education in a democracy
6. separation of church and state
7. need for civil rights activism
8. right to a living wage, freedom from poverty, right to health care and shelter, including in old age or disability
9. rights of workers to bargain collectively and be free of employer abuse, including children
10. protection of the environment as the birthright of future humanity (environmentalism & measures to address global warming)
11. protection of society from abuses of power and wealth, including coercion
12. freedom of behavior that does not infringe on others, including right to be nonconformist, engage in individualist behavior and differ from norms
13. elimination of violence to people and animals
14. right to privacy, security in one's own home, lack of intrusion by others (govt, corporations, individuals), including freedom from electronic surveillance
15. right to bodily autonomy, including making health decisions, modifying one's body, eating and drinking choices, weight and exercise, sleep, use of psychoactive substances, engaging in risky behavior (car racing, rock climbing)
You have respect for conservatives then. Good to know.
DeleteI am civil and respectful to all people unless they behave badly. I have bridge partners and friends who are conservatives. All people deserve to be treated with courtesy and kindness. I find the meanness among conservatives, reflected by Cecelia here and sometimes Somerby himself, to be dismaying.
Deleteanon 3:52, i'm pretty sure that most if not all conservatives would say they believe the almost all of the things you have on your list,
DeleteAnonymouse 4:27pm, yes, you’re treated horribly as you denounce others as being Russian hirelings, poseurs, bigots, and “unkind”.
DeleteAnonymouse 3:53pm,
Delete#2-Equal opportunity, not equity (equal results).
#8- Not a right. Public assistance dependent upon the age and the circumstances of the applicant.
#10- Dependent upon the prudence of the policy.
#15- Adults only.
After you’ve said something horrible…
DeleteSee, you don’t agree.
DeleteIt should be illegal to wear high heels. They’re bad for your feet.
DeleteAC/MA — take #1, how is calling those you disagree with pedos respectful of anyone? Where is the respect for minorities of various types when you boycott Target for respecting Pride month?
DeleteI get it that conservatives might agree that these are positive values but there are too many examples of ways they betray these values to say they support or adhere to them in their behavior or political actions.
So liberals have respect for all conservatives unless they commit some kind of subjective offense for which there is no standard measure.
DeleteThat's a shitty value system.
Anonymouse 6:48pm, saying something “horrible”:
DeleteGender is determined by biology.
Horrible and also ignorant. This falls under #12 on the list, which you clearly do not support.
Delete@7:07 I am not nice to people who hurt me or others. Liberals don’t have to be doormats. Conservatives like to be mean because they confuse that with strength, so they may not get to see people’s good sides.
Delete“Gender is determined by biology.” Thanks to the armchair biologist named Cecelia. Humans are capable of feeling and being complex things. Why is “biology” so fucking important to you to want to legislate based on it?
DeleteBiology produces 41 ways of being intersex. Shouldn’t the law account for those who are anomalous biologically?
DeleteCrickets. No answer from Cecelia.
DeleteThe left/right divide is egalitarianism and equality versus hierarchy and dominance.
DeleteThe rest is just footsie.
Equity means justice and fairness, the meaning of the word is not “equal results”.
Sex is biological, gender is a social construct.
As Jordan Peterson once absentmindedly pointed out, there are as many genders as people. Moments later he came to his senses and continued with his right wing grifting.
The reason why it’s important to identify certain genders and races is because of those suffering from oppression.
Those on the left tend to fight against unjust systems and institutions, while understanding that individual oppressors emerge from trauma.
Those on the right have no ideology, just a trauma-borne obsession with hierarchy and dominance, that manifests through oppression of others and submission to authoritarians; therefore there is no integrity with respect to values, yet servile fealty to cult of personality style leaders.
"The left/right divide is egalitarianism and equality versus hierarchy and dominance."
DeleteThat's not true but if it was it would be easy to see who would win.
Look what’s happening in the House. No one wins unless our govt works together.
DeleteHierarchy and dominance subverts and destroys egalitarianism and equality in our species. It's never been not like that. Any initiative to engage in politics using egalitarianism to fight hierarchy and dominance is beyond naive and could only be undertaken by someone who has no knowledge whatsoever of human history. But fortunately, it's not the case that either of our two corrupt, corporately controlled political parties come anywhere close to having a platform of egalitarianism and equality.
DeleteWhat's "biological" about being a 'woman" if you have a male body, or vice versa? isn't it a psychological or psychiatric condition, the "cure" for which is through surgery and/or medication changing your physical characteristics to appear like a gender you weren't born with? What is it to mentally feel like a female when you have male physical characteristics? You have a biological desire to wear dresses, lipstick, and talk in a higher, effeminate voice? isn't that psychological, not biological? is there some type of gene that causes that? Isn't the whole dispute political or moral as opposed to biological "science?" Why the insistence that there aren't just two sexes, as up until recently seemed to be taken as a given? are there transexual cats?
DeleteThanks for the long response. I don't deny I'm ignorant on the subject, but I am skeptical, and you haven't dispelled my skepticism. It seems you are making an argument, not stating an objective scientific viewpoint. Science is about hypotheses that can be disproven. Is this whole subject all cut and dry, with no room for doubt? You don't seem to deny that there is no way to examine a person physically and determine that they are a woman trapped inside a man's body. You don't explain how wanting to be a man when you are physically a woman is anything other than psychological, and perhaps pathological, as the cure seems to call for radical medical procedures. This whole thing that gender and sex are completely unrelated is a radical cultural change and is bound to be controversial. I'm not saying you are wrong, just am skeptical about the whole thing,
Deletealso 10:10, what's with these trans cats (and maybe other mammals like armadillos and porcupines)? Do their vets provide them with gender conforming treatment? how do you tell when a cat is trans? maybe the biologically male cat yowls like he/she is in heat?
DeleteAC/MA, you are entitled to your own opinions but not your own set of facts. I quoted sources. Go read them.
DeleteCats are spayed or neutered as pets. Unless you are a cat yourself, their personal experience is irrelevant to you and inaccessible unless you speak cat. I suppose you think this is funny, but the way people mistreat each other in real life is not at all funny.
Anonymouse 6:54pm, because we all know that drag culture is as divorced from sexuality and sex as wet is from dry.
ReplyDeleteAnonymouse 7:22pm, homosexuality is not synonymous with drag culture.
DeleteHomosexuality is about sexuality.
Adults can celebrate and feel pride in their sexuality without demanding that children be exposed to facts of life concepts that are above their pay grade.
Children are aware of their sexuality at a rather young age. Most kids know they are gay or straight relatively early. You imply that gay pride is just about sexuality. It’s no different than the old fashioned teaching about “straight” role models, which is dependent on “sexuality” in your sense Cecelia. Every year I see the annual fire department calendar, showing firemen (men) with bare chests and muscles gleaming. Children see this stuff too.
DeleteAnonymouse 7:28pm, disagreeing with you is not synonymous with being mean…or being a Russian spy…or a stealth conservative.
DeleteBeing mean is firing a teacher for tweeting a picture of covered library shelves. It is misgendering a person deliberately to make a political point, which has happened to me three times in the South. It is telling your kids they can’t play with the biracial kid down the block because *those people*. It is calling Democrats spawn of the devil or pedophiles when we aren’t. It is driving your pickup through a crowd of protesters from the local community college, which happened in my small town while I stood watching. Even these endless stupid boycotts are intended to hurt a business for supporting people conservatives hate. That hate wears on me.
DeleteAnonymouse 7:52pm, you can give me a litany of mean stuff all day long as meted out by political junkies or plain old creeps and I am going to remind you of what you read that is said about Bob and the red tribe on a daily basis.
DeleteI don’t cast aspersions upon the blue tribe en masse. I don’t think anonymices are representative of the average blue tribe member.
I used to refer to people by their chosen pronouns, but I decided to stop because it became too much of an imperative and the heated arguments and demands got too crazy.
It got to the point where it reminded me of this:
"In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it ...
And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works?
Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable.. what then?"
The more tyrannical you get with this cultural shake up, the more resistance you’re going to encounter.
You’re going to have go thru the unspeakable - dissent from your brilliance and great humanity.
However, you’ll win.
mh, my reply eerily disappeared.
DeleteSuffice to say that as pro bare-chested fireman as I am, for all the wrong reasons, you’d do better sticking to waitresses at Hooters.
Now tell if your argument is tu quoque or straw man?
I’ve never had anyone tell me or demand I use any pronouns. Your fantasy about that is right wing fiction. So many pronouns! The horror! I did meet a guy from FL who said woke was out of control. He hadn’t encountered any pronoun demands either You guys are making this stuff up.
DeleteBob has become a ludicrous figure. It would be mean to simply say that without pointing out why. But mostly we do.
DeleteAnonymouse 8:29pm, misgendering was one of the mean things that Anonymouse 7:52pm equated to racism and driving your car over people you don’t like.
DeleteTake it up it with him or her.
Because you aren’t actually female, you can’t know how it feels when a man calls you “sir.”
DeleteAll of these things hurt people. As they say about Trump, the meanness is the point. Republicans are mean people and proud of it. Your callous jokes here mark you Cecelia, as does your doubt that misgendering hurts.
I guess Cecelia agrees with MTG, that being gay is merely about sex acts, whereas being straight is… something else. Blah blah blah. It’s all bullshit Cecelia.
Deletemh, being heterosexual is about being attracted to the opposite sex. Being homosexual is about being attracted to the same sex.
DeleteThey have flags, parades, school celebrations, arguments equating misgendering to murder, for the latter.
Who is celebrating sex acts?
Cecelia, you said “ Homosexuality is about sexuality.” So is heterosexuality. But gay people have historically been ostracized and punished. Traditionally, kids were exposed to “heterosexuality” at an early age, whereas homosexuality was taboo. Your tribe is engaged in a war against LGBTQ that has nothing to do with the “children.”
Deletemh, why would kids be “exposed to heterosexuality” foremost, at any age?
DeleteWhich sexuality resulted in you (or me)?
The sexuality that matters most to kids is not the one that created them, but their own. That is true for all of us.
DeleteAnonymouse 10:26, it is, indeed.
DeleteYet the sexuality that created us all is the one that supports our species.
How chagrined should we feel over that?
Again. which sexuality gets parades, flags, celebrations, arguments equating misgendering to murder?
It’s not enough to tolerate an alternate sexuality, we have to insist that grade schoolers salute it?
Every day celebrates heterosexuality. Gays are about 10-12% of the population so one month is proportionate. More than that, no one is asking you to celebrate. Tolerance is enough. Just live and leave those who are different from you to their celebrations. Stop the harassment, bullying, persecution, and murder. No one is asking you to be gay and no one is trying to turn kids gay (it doesn’t work that way). Teaching all kids to respect (not salute) others is an important lesson for kids and our society.
DeleteAnonymouse 11:17pm, no, we don’t celebrate the continuation of our species at all. We take it for granted as the biology that it is. That’s only natural.
DeleteHowever, that normal inclination has been politically morphed into a suspect one.
Now, we’re supposed to teach our kids to celebrate alternatives rather than to tolerate differences and exceptions.
We have to have drag queen story hour in public libraries and schools. We have to have school auditorium celebrations of drag.
That has been extrapolated into insisting that biological boys should share bathrooms and locker rooms with girls and that transwomen are the legitimate competitors of biological women.
It’s only normal that every day we unconsciously “celebrate” (live out) the benefit of heterosexuality . By law, we should tolerate the alternative.
That’s as much as anyone should expect.
anon 9:17, you give us a real example of "misgendering."
DeleteIt is just as "real" when someone who is trans is misgendered by a person who ignores their presentation of their sexual identity and applies the wrong term to them. No one has the right to tell another person they must be a different gender, on any basis (including so-called biology). This is compounded when a stranger does it, without knowing anything about that person's medical history or actual physiology. When a woman looks mannish by birth, does anyone have the right to kick her out of the bathroom or call her "sir" or be suspicious that she may be trans? Tall, stocky women encounter this situation without having made any transition at all, because conservatives think women must conform to a stereotype of femininity. The underlying principle is that it is no one else's business what someone's physiology is. They should be accepted on their own terms, not someone else's confused notion of who they must be.
DeleteWhen my daughter was 12, she had her hair cut in a very attractive asymetrical style. Later that day, one of my adult friends asked her whether she was a girl or a boy. She has never worn short hair since then, all because a jerk who didn't understand how to be polite to children asked a jerky question that would be rude under adult circumstances. He didn't need to know and shouldn't have asked. The same is true in nearly all situations in life.
ok 12:39, you agree with me that 9:17 is wrong for always calling Cecilia a "man." What if someone's own terms constitutes confusion of what they are?
DeleteYes, it would be hurtful and impolite to misgender Cecelia here, except that she is a nasty troll who comes here and says awful things, which means she is asking for it. Anyone, regardless of nym, can be anyone online -- there is no way of knowing who anyone is. Claims about being an actuary, having a Democratic spouse who oddly thinks Republican, being Hispanic, working in a steel mill, having voted for Biden but not going to do it again because of Hunter, etc. are all unprovable and irrelevant online. People choose nyms for various reasons that may have nothing to do with who they are in real life.
DeleteSome hypothesize that Somerby himself comments here using a nym. It could be Cecelia or it could be that Somerby stopped blogging a long time ago and his next-door neighbor has been doing it (the woman who keeps complaining that his pear tree branches are in her yard).
If someone doesn't make the effort to clarify their gender, you can either ask for their pronouns (or offer your own, which they may reciprocate), avoid pronouns altogether or use they, them, which is often the way to address someone who is gender ambiguous or expressing both genders.
anon 2:57, I'm sure I disagree with many, perhaps most things, with Cecilia. But she is intelligent, polite, rational, and has a sense of humor - something basically absent from the indeterminate number of anons (and non-anons) who obsessively follow this blog, even though they can't stand the blogger. To characterize her as a "nasty troll" who deserves the awful blood-libel of being "misgendered" seems over the edge of rationality. All your evidence-devoid speculation, about these "hypotheses" that supposedly some people have are silly.
DeleteI’ll bet you think your blood-libel reference is funny and not obscene. You are no better than she is.
Delete"she is asking for it".
DeleteThis claim is a classic self-serving justification for unethical behavior. It's the behavior of a childish bully.
More name calling. After being repeatedly called a mouse, who cares about being called a bully? Misgendering is one thing, but dehumanizing others, as Cecelia does all the time, by calling them another species, is arguably worse. And she thinks it is funny or cute. Like MTG when she waves guns around after teens are shot at Parkland and elsewhere. These Republican women do what they want without a thought for others, because they define their mission as disruption. That's what Cecelia is about here. She often defends Somerby without even reading him. And now you argue that she should be treated with consideration that she does not show to others? No, I don't think so.
DeleteWaitresses at Hooters are your idea of good models of sexuality for children?
ReplyDeleteAnonymouse 8:32 pm, no, they’re my idea of where you shouldn’t take your kids.
DeleteWhy? What’s wrong with Hooters?
DeleteAnonymouse 9:23pm, gluten.
DeleteWhat’s that supposed to mean?
DeleteHooters serves bread. Apparently Cecelia doesn’t like bread.
DeleteAnonymouse 10:40pm, what does Anonymouse 8:32pm not like about Hooters?
DeleteTheir required undress is demeaning to women and conveys to children that women are objectified sex objects not respected workers. The reactions of male customers reinforce that message. It is a woman’s right to work that wat but that doesn’t make it good for kids.
DeleteI like bread and I like noodles. Gluten doesn’t bother me.
DeleteAnonymouse 11:56pm, what’s your feelings about halter tops and short-shorts?
DeleteI don’t like them. I prefer whole-wheat bread.
DeleteWell, you’d need the roughage.
DeleteFiber.
DeleteCecelia,
DeleteThe people who shout "Let's Go Brandon!" at public events aren't as concerned about what children are hearing as the 501(c) political groups cosplaying as concerned parents would have you believe.
Children are likely to see women in bikinis at beaches or pools.
ReplyDeleteWhy would women wear the equivalent of swimwear to serve food?
DeleteYou’re right. That would be better than T-shirts and shorts.
DeleteUnless you were barefoot. Can’t have that in Hooters.
DeleteFlat shoes, not high heels.
DeleteCecelia always tries to dominate the discussion. Whatever gender she was assigned at birth, she’s a man.
ReplyDeleteBecause women are naturally unassertive.
DeleteYes. Now act like it.
DeleteI was raised by a widower.
DeleteIs that any recompense?
I’m sorry for your loss. Keep up the good work.
DeleteShe always wants to have the last word, until people get tired and quit for the evening.
DeleteThere is no more (or less) reason to believe she was raised by a widower than that she is female. People can say anything on the internet.
Anonymouse 8:05am. Oh, thanks.
DeleteKnow that I’ve never suffered anything.
9:46,
DeleteHow to use your inner strength to not break down over a beer can with a rainbow on it. We could use more strong Americans, like you.
Beer?
DeleteMojitos, bro.
People who have suffered trauma are less likely, not more likely, to empathize with others. Doing that would revive their own pain, which they have not learned to cope with and thus suppress. Not only do such people avoid seeing the pain of others, but they push it away by blaming the other person for their misfortune, protecting themselves from the idea that they might experience bad things themselves. Their sense of superiority over the suffering other gives them protection from fear of what may happen in their own lives.
DeleteIt is people who have dealt with their own pain who are best able to help other people because they can allow themselves to feel empathy for others without being threatened by other people's pain. How do you deal with pain? By learning coping skills and visiting a therapist when it becomes too much.
People who cannot deal with pain often become drug or alcohol addicts. The drug or alcohol takes the edge off their sense that if they allowed themselves to truly feel their emotions, they might be overwhelmed. They don't believe they can "hold it together" and thus dull the pain chemically as their way of coping with it. Such people often start drinking or using drunks as young teens, and as a result fail to learn coping skills they will need as adults. This is why the goal of childhood should be to support children through their troubles using encouragement and empathy, without trying to overprotect them or remove whatever is upsetting them.
If Cecelia cannot stand to empathize with anyone, and she truly did lose her mother in childhood, it may be that the adults around her did not help her to deal with her pain effectively, so she is someone who must push away and avoid sources of pain in her daily life. It is hard being such a person because one must be vigilant for pain-causing situations, and it makes it hard to connect with other people who are themselves struggling, as one must do in an adult relationship or when raising children (or working with them as a teacher).
Anonymouse 12:07pm. I hope that everyone will read your post and gauge your motives in light of the slight info that I’ have shared about me.
Delete"Beer?
DeleteMojitos, bro."
This is worth reading to understand the long history of right wing attacks on public schools:
ReplyDeletehttps://curmudgucation.blogspot.com/2023/06/twelve-education-activist-groups.html
Leave public schools alone, parents. Take your complaints elsewhere.
ReplyDeleteThese are political attacks disguised as parent concerns. Organized.
Delete"“President Joe Biden will host the largest White House Pride Month celebration in history on Thursday, in a deliberate contrast to a cascade of Republican legislation and other attacks targeting LGBTQ+ people,” Reuters reports."
ReplyDeleteCecelia is reportedly not invited.
Anonymices and I are there in spirit.
Delete"A man walked up to a 13-year-old girl who was with her mother at a South Carolina Walmart and randomly shot her, WSB-V reported.
ReplyDeleteAccording to a witness, the shooter walked straight up to the girl on Wednesday night and shot her while she was shopping for clothes. “She was with her mom, she was actually looking at a pair of shorts, and out of nowhere a guy just walked up and shot her and it actually went through her arm and into her abdomen,” Kari Johnson told WJBF.
Stephen Foreman, 32, was arrested by police, who say he had no relationship to the victim. The victim was identified as Ashton Rickard.
Her mother says the bullet lodged in her back and broke her arm. She underwent one surgery for her injuries and may need another.
Foreman has been charged with attempted murder and possession of a weapon during the commission of a crime. Police still do not know a motive for the shooting."
Children should be able to shop at Walmart without being shot by random gun owners like this. When this kind of thing is happening, no one is safe anywhere.
I support Gavin Newsom's proposal for a 28th Amendment to the Constitution, to control gun ownership.
Supreme Court unexpectedly upholds provision prohibiting racial gerrymandering
ReplyDeletehttps://www.npr.org/2023/06/08/1181002182/supreme-court-voting-rights#:~:text=Press-,Supreme%20Court%20upholds%20Voting%20Rights%20Act%20in%20Alabama%20redistricting%20case,the%20law%20as%20racially%20discriminatory.
Somerby can’t win them all:
CLARITY ISN'T US: A racist under every bed!
http://dailyhowler.blogspot.com/2022/10/clarity-isnt-us-racist-under-every-bed.html?m=1
Asian Americans are leaving the Democratic party.
ReplyDeleteTrump is indicted again. Yay yay yay yay yay! No one is above the law!
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, Marjorie Taylor Greene is herself showing disregard for America's secrets:
ReplyDelete"By closely allying herself with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California), Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) has become much more of an insider than she was a year ago. But Greene is no less a conspiracy theorist than she was in 2021 or 2022, and that includes bribery claims she has been making against President Joe Biden.
The far-right MAGA congresswoman is claiming, without proof, that the FBI is covering up bribery she alleges Biden committed. During a Thursday night, June 8 appearance on Fox News, Greene told host Laura Ingraham that she read a Biden-related document inside a sensitive compartmented information facility (SCIF).
Greene's critics, however, are saying that instead of making Biden look bad, she may have admitted to committing a federal crime.
READ MORE: Laughter breaks out on House floor when Marjorie Taylor Greene calls for 'decorum'
Greene, known for promoting QAnon's conspiracy theories and claiming that "Jewish space lasers" were responsible for wildfires in California, told Ingraham, "This is a document that all of America should be able to see. But the FBI is stonewalling us, and they would only let us see it in a SCIF. Well, what I did after reading the document is I made notes when I walked out and I went to the table. And I wrote down everything that I had just read so that I could come out and tell the American people what I read."
A SCIF is used for highly sensitive information, and in most cases, members of Congress are not allowed to repeat information they see inside the facility.
Attorney Mark S. Zaid, in response to Greene's comments on "The Ingraham Angle," tweeted, "Hey @FBI, if this information was classified sounds to me like the Congresswoman is admitting to a crime. And if it was not, @SpeakerMcCarthy should remove her privileges for violating the trust she was afforded as a Member of Congress to review sensitive information."
Retired law professor Christopher G. Moore stressed that taking notes on information viewed inside a SCIF and later discussing it on cable news is a violation of federal law."
More Republican family values:
ReplyDelete"Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) “has been accused of ‘seducing’ another woman’s husband into an ‘inappropriate relationship’ that speeded the end of the marriage and ended in the congresswoman taking out a restraining order against the man’s irate wife,” the Daily Mail reports."
China and Russia are better countries than the United States.
ReplyDeleteSomerby likes to blame Al Gore's 2000 loss on the media, but he has never mentioned that Gore came out as a strong proponent of gun control during his campaign. Beyond that, his position on guns was a major flip flop from his previous positions before running for the presidency:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/2000/02/07/gun.html
We forget such things, but even Bush was urging gun control in the aftermath of the Columbine shooting, but it is difficult to run for president without giving lip service to the right to own guns for hunting. While Somerby blames the media, a combination of such issues probably made Gore's election close enough for the Republicans to finagle a victory (aided by the Supreme Court) in FL.
Steve M. at No More Mister Nice Blog disagrees with Somerby's complaint about othering the others. He says we are not doing enough to other those who create bizarre conspiracy theories targeting the left. Now, right wing wackos are claiming that the fires in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada were caused by Directed Energy Weapons. While the "moderate" Republicans are trying to pin a manufactured charge of bribery by China on Biden. The crazy is everywhere on the right, and removing Tucker makes no difference to the noise level over there. While Somerby begs the left to make nice. Truth is worth defending.
ReplyDelete"I wish it were more widely understood today that Republicanism is rife with extremist freakishness of all varieties. It's not just Marjorie Taylor Greene. The party won't magically become "normal" if Tim Scott or Chris Christie somehow wins the presidential nomination. I wish Republicans had a reputation -- outside liberal circles -- as whackjobs who want to rewrite America's laws to conform to their own paranoia. We're not doing enough to "other" the right. We need to do more."
https://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2023/06/but-were-extremists-right.html