On 8/15/2011 10:29 AM, andrel wrote:
> I don't doubt these examples exist, and indeed I know a couple myself.
> Yet there are also examples of fabricated stories and rushing to
> conclusions by right wing politicians and columnists. I don't deny your
> right to be angry about things, just pointing out that you have to be
> very careful to avoid selective anger. You are more likely to
> disseminate a story where left wing people (say) make mistakes to your
> friends then mistakes by the other side. They will be similarly biased
> in what the send you and when the group is large enough, for all of you
> the counter examples will be drowned out completely by those that are in
> favour of what you already think. It is a general group bonding thing
> that has always worked this way. The new element might be that google
> and facebook are actively promoting such bonding. That is not what it is
> meant to do, but it may be the effect.
>
This is hardly a surprise, and only feeds into the existing, "I 
bookmarked all my favorite crazies, so I don't accidentally read 
something from someone else's site.", phenomena. Not that long back 
there was this crazy law in place called the "fairness doctrine". It 
meant that you had to at least make a vague, if possibly fake, attempt 
at representing both sides in the press. If it hadn't been overturned, 
primarily by radio hosts, who in the US are like 99% conservatives (at 
least on AM) now, it might have instead been extended to internet sites 
that deal with political positions. Instead it was done away with, then 
when brought up again later, not reinstated. Just one more chink in the 
armor of unity, in favor of false "freedom of speech", right up there 
with the success of putting enough conservative, pro-business, people in 
SCOTUS for them to come up with the insane idea that money = speech, 
companies = people, therefor unlimited spending of money by companies = 
free speech.

Then again, this is hardly surprising, given the moron I am discussing 
things with on a long thread recently about what needs to be done to fix 
some of the shit in the economy, who recently came up with two **huge** 
laughs -

a) Ones own "internal truth" trumps reality, other opinions, or the vast 
number of contradictions in the guys own religion, which he uses to 
defend some of his ideas. Yep, self centered, circular, references to 
your own inability to understand a problems is "so" much better than 
paying attention to what qualified people are trying to tell you...

b) Everything that isn't Biblical is "experimental", and all that 
experimental stuff, where you try to actually understand how the real 
world works, and real people think, is all useless and is going to 
destroy the world. Because, like.. claiming you have the one and only 
true religion, and arrogantly thinking that, if that where even true at 
all, your own personal choice on which one of the flavors of it is truer 
(never mind which way that group rewrites/reinterprets the contents of 
the Bible) is the "solution" to every problem.

Needless to say, the rest of his politics are much of the same. He 
"feels" that certain things will solve the problem, so those must be the 
right solution. The fact that all he seems to be doing is ignoring 
everyone else's opinions, to spout the talking points of various 
politicians, and thus can't even claim that his "internal truths" are 
his own, doesn't seem to get through his skull.

But, I am sure he has some place on Sunday to get the same BS, and web 
sites he goes to (he is a Wallbuilders fan, it seems), and politically 
bent TV shows, which only present one side of things, and, it wouldn't 
surprise me to find he had his own favorite right wing (there being 
almost no radio presence from the left, even in "liberal" states and 
cities, according to a study from a while back), to tell him he is right 
about all of it.

And this is someone who is just unwilling to listen to other opinions 
(even if he pretends to, by showing up places where his are not shared, 
to tell everyone they are wrong), not someone filled with hate, anger, 
and a sense of unrequited justice over total bullshit, like the sort of 
people you are talking about.

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