Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Geoff's avatar

I remember the chortling over the banning of Alex Jones and the worry by a few sincere anti-war folks that anti-establishment left sites would get the boot too. This proved true, but needless to say the VOX readers of the world saw no reason to be bothered.

If Biden is elected, there will soon be a call for military action in Syria. And there will be an accompanying effort to screen out anti-war people as subversives working for Russia, be they right or left. And people like Matt Taibbi will be appalled, wondering if the left realizes what it has done with its promotion of state-encouraged tech-driven censorship. The left and right wings of the military industrial complex, though, will quietly open the champagne and celebrate how concessions won to sideline the far left and far right allow the state to control the most powerful communication tool in the world in the United States. And the same people who denounce China and/or Russia will laud the muzzling of dissent in America.

Expand full comment
Mike Eyre's avatar

"...a recent Washington Post warning that we are being targeted by a foreign campaign of “perception hacking,” or “manipulating people into thinking they are being manipulated,” represent just a few examples of Approved™ nonsense."

I'm related through marriage to a very smart, analytical person who nevertheless believes every bit of nonsense that is produced by these major journalistic institutions. When I fact-checked him on the convention week fiction that Melania cut down Jackie Kennedy's cherry trees, a story he regurgitated uncritically, I was told I was being petty. He has told me that reality is the exact opposite of what I think. I know I'm in good company.

How can we have a conversation when most people would rather believe lies that support their chosen narrative, and instead of objectively settling the score, the Fourth Estate is often the source of untruth, and anyone who dares to question it gets accused of gaslighting?

Expand full comment
445 more comments...

No posts