Good Breitbart article on the tactics of the political left

[Zinco]

www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/07/23/nolte-mens-health-wants-joe-rogan-blacklisted-for-vile-transphobia/

"We all know how this bullshit of “safetyism” works on the fascist left. You fascists accuse someone you disagree with of making you or POC’s or whoever feel “unsafe,” and suddenly expression that speech become “violence” and that physical act of violent speech must be blacklisted and canceled.

Meanwhile, according to the left, the terrorists in Black Lives Matter and Antifa who are burning, looting marauding, and toppling are not committing violence. Their actual violence is speech."

"When you accuse someone of “putting lives in danger” over a perfectly reasonable and science-based discussion about transitioning, especially when just a few years ago these arguments were treated as mainstream; when you accuse someone of “fanning the flames of hate” and being “dangerous,” that is way beyond a debate.

That is about silencing someone, about accusing them of being responsible in some way for a suicide or hate crime they had nothing to do with."

Good luck with cancelling Joe Rogan. It's been tried a few times. He is independently wealthy and has a huge following who hold no truck with this kind of bullshit. He's up there with JKR when it comes to ability to cancel. And he just doesn't GAF. I love it when they overreach like this.

But hey, they are the wrong kind of women and minorities, as they clearly have the wrong opinions.

I'm reminded of this article:
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/feb/27/how-did-british-indians-become-so-prominent-in-the-conservative-party

In certain far left circles, there is almost an incredulity when 'oppressed' demographics hold 'incorrect' views. I think it betrays that they don't view members of those demographics as individuals or true equals.

I'm a conservative leaning libertarian feminist (if I have to be concentrated down to a series of categories, which I object to really)
Please can I read the Guardian, New Statesman, listen to Laurie Taylor, follow "lefty types" on Twitter? Can I see my Remain voting Avowed Leftist friends next week? Can I disagree with other conservatives, other free marketeers, other EU leavers, other feminists?
If the quality of debate is to improve in this country and we are to avoid political violence then we need to listen in good faith and disagree with courtesy and reason.

There's definitely a line of thought out there that warns women off certain sites and publications lest we be confused or corrupted and, when we voice an opinion, asks us who put that idea into our heads, as if we were incapable of observation, reading comprehension, analytical thinking and coherent thought.

I got a breath of it from my adult son a couple of weeks back and I taught him to read; heck, I taught him how to question what he read. Why would he suddenly think I can't browse the internet without being 'turned'?

My DH has always been like this. When he asks, suspiciously, what I'm looking at online, I have two stock answers: I'm either browsing knitting patterns for baby bonnets or being dangerously radicalised by a group called HateMen.com. The first one is sometimes actually true. 😆

Absolutely it is useful to critically read a wide variety of sources. But reading is not the same as recommending.

Bandying around phrases like fascist left and terrorist BLM is not journalism.

I do think there is an unpleasant strand of thought on here which is comfortable snuggling up with the far right and is as intolerant of debate as the people they accuse of being intolerant.

@WineIsMyCarb

I'm a conservative leaning libertarian feminist (if I have to be concentrated down to a series of categories, which I object to really) Please can I read the Guardian, New Statesman, listen to Laurie Taylor, follow "lefty types" on Twitter? Can I see my Remain voting Avowed Leftist friends next week? Can I disagree with other conservatives, other free marketeers, other EU leavers, other feminists? If the quality of debate is to improve in this country and we are to avoid political violence then we need to listen in good faith and disagree with courtesy and reason.

You go and read whatever the hell you want, I'm saying please don't be dumb and think Breitbart is credible. Read all the flat earth literature you want, but don't expect people to believe your opinions on science hold equal consideration with those who who know better than to look to Flat Earth Monthly for guidance.

I also find it interesting that a feminist is happy to throw the BLM protesters under the bus

I'm very happy to throw violent, criminal Marxists under a bus -or in jail. I'm singularly unimpressed with Black Lives Matter , its extreme leftwing agenda and the totalitarian left. There is a world of difference between black lives matter and BLM.

@Bishybarnybee

Do you never worry about the company you are keeping?

Do YOU? I find it demoralizing that fucking Breitbart is a voice of sanity on this issue and people I thought were my allies are trying to usher in a Stalinist Handmaid's Tale dystopia. I no longer trust anyone.

I'm still not sure this isn't a trap laid by Steve Bannon that leftists stupidly and self-righteously plotzed into.

Yeah, I'm also singularly unimpressed by the Black Lives Matter organisation. Spending £1m of their donation money on their campaign to defund the police - money which was almost certainly donated to fight racism.

And police cuts in the UK have only lead to increases in crime thus far....

Hmm, very good article.

Not sure many of the U.K. posters here are properly aware of Breitbart’s overall positioning/stance in the US.

I’m all for reading more widely but wouldn’t post an article from here or say RT, unless I was sure it was true, important and impossible to find similar content elsewhere.

Daily Mail is one thing, Breitbart quite another IMO.

Also agree with SetYourselfOnFire

@nauticant

I view reading a wide variety of sources akin to exposing yourself to a wide variety of germs in order to build up a healthy immune system.

Also, you've got to read the original stuff too. Reading the view of the Right filtered via The Guardian or those of the Left via Fox News is no good.

👍 My dad insisted on reading a right and a left wing paper, encouraged me to do the same, said it would improve where my viewpoint settled

^When you accuse someone of “putting lives in danger” over a perfectly reasonable and science-based discussion about transitioning, especially when just a few years ago these arguments were treated as mainstream; when you accuse someone of “fanning the flames of hate” and being “dangerous,” that is way beyond a debate.
That is about silencing someone, about accusing them of being responsible in some way for a suicide or hate crime they had nothing to do with^

This tactic, which is becoming synonymous with a vocal chunk of the left wing on both sides of the Atlantic, is an existential threat to freedom of speech. It is profoundly authoritarian. It is manipulative and runs in parallel with denouncing the media source, instead of engaging with the argument. This is a top down imposition of an agenda expressed through simplistic slogans which require immediate compliance. Anyone who questions the slogan is denounced. The people who promote these tactics want total narrative control. They don't believe in freedom of speech. They don't believe in debate. And they are apparently incapable of grasping why these tactics continue to alienate voters and result in shock and awe in every recent election when Twitter told them Team Robespierre would get a landslide victory.

@Bishybarnybee

Do you never worry about the company you are keeping?

Do you? I mean do you ever think about the relentless death threats, rape threats, racism, physical attacks and wonder whether you really want to be associated with them? Or is it just women who have to pass an impossible purity test to be allowed to speak? Ooh, Goody Zinco posted a Right!! Wing!!! Link!!!!

Yours, a radical far-left feminist who understands feminism is for all women and only women, no matter what their political persuasion is and regardless of the personal disagreements I might have with some viewpoints

I understand you feel strongly @Delphinium20 but Brietbart and such show us a perspective of how other people think. You and I may disagree with all or most of what is written there, but with a view to the comment sections (which are the only bits I've read before, and not for a while as it happens) they are another person's POV and as such aren't any more or less credible than your opinion or mine, or a Guardian or Telegraph writer's.
Not sure what the link is to flat earth belief. Could you explain that please? Are you saying that an article is factually incorrect or are you arguing that an opinion with which you disagree is incorrect and that means the person who holds that view should not rightly be included in debate?

YY porkerface. Linking the drive to defund police, a movement almost exclusively run by privileged white people, to BLM is highly problematic. The inevitable pushback will affect ordinary people of colour who are against defunding because they're as law-abiding and in need of protection as anyone else and not the white architects of it who will walk away from any consequences. But now the narrative will link black people as a group to the idea of widespread anarchist criminality when it has nothing to do with them.

I've expressed my concerns really badly I know but that's the gist of it.

This tactic, which is becoming synonymous with a vocal chunk of the left wing on both sides of the Atlantic, is an existential threat to freedom of speech. It is profoundly authoritarian. It is manipulative and runs in parallel with denouncing the media source, instead of engaging with the argument. This is a top down imposition of an agenda expressed through simplistic slogans which require immediate compliance.

What always strikes me about these attacks upon the freedom of speech is how profoundly fascistic they are; the attempts to silence others are not the acts of people who believe in democracy or a free society. I think it’s easy for people to believe that they are kind, generous, decent people because they read the Guardian, vote for the Labour Party, and donate to the right causes. And yet they would destroy the cornerstones of democracy in order to support what they see, erroneously, as the “right side of history”.

I am interested that some feminists are happy to consort with the far right as long as it supports their agenda on one issue

I knew this would come up as soon as I saw the headlines. Don’t blame Breitbart for reporting the story, blame mainstream media for abdicating their responsibilities and ignoring this issue or promoting only one point-of-view.

Where are we to find stories on this topic if most media outlets won’t cover it?

I also find it interesting that a feminist is happy to throw the BLM protesters under the bus

BLM is a Marxist organisation, they are not hiding
this at all. They are also against what they call ‘cisgender privilege’ right in their guiding principles, fwiw.

You might not have a problem with either of these stances but many of us do.

The place I'm actually coming for sanity and carefully-reasoned feminist argument is here! Not all threads, not all posts, of course, but yes, this site with its cosy name and domestic reputation. Who knew?

Its more concerning that Breitbart is one of the few outlets that will publish articles from "our" side of the debate.

Concerning because the rest of the media have been cowed by cries of "hate speech!" by the TRAs and/or simply can't be bothered to deal with any fall out from publishing opposing views.

So maybe the question should be, are you happy with the way the media has been captured to the point where only carefully curated and pre-approved opinions are allowed to be published?

The UK currently has the most diverse cabinet ever I think. Which is a good thing in and of itself.Their politics are still dreadful though.So I'm not sure what point is being made about Breitbart 'news' here?

It's an interesting point that reading articles from the other end of the political spectrum might 'turn' you.

I question myself about it regularly, but am fairly sure my underlying principles haven't changed: the left have, as a PP noted, lurched firmly towards Gilead.

And yet they would destroy the cornerstones of democracy in order to support what they see, erroneously, as the “right side of history”

Absolutely. It is an assault on classic liberal values by people who see debate and freedom of speech as an inconvenient obstacle in the flight path of the revolution. A Labour MP is on Twitter repeating a lobby group's talking points and warning against debate. It would be laughable. But none of this is remotely funny.

Do you never worry about the company you are keeping

Judge people on the basis of their actions and their behaviour alone, not purely on the basis of their belonging to your tribe. All manner of bad and wrong behaviour will be excused if you use tribal belonging, alone, as the method of judgment.