Discussions on difficult subjects

[inchemwetrust]

Just saw that video where that lady got shot when she was told not to enter, including the rest of the idiots trying to do photo-ops inside the capitol.

This the same place where congress have met since 1800, laws have been written, and presidents sworn in, only to be desecrated by those with a false belief of their 'patriotism'! The politicians that let and allowed this monster to grow beyond their control within the last 4 years and are now just barely asking for his removal!!

I hope twiiter and Facebook sack him on Inauguration Day. I just wish they would've muzzled him way earlier before.

Ryno, I'm happy that you ran into some great moments (and people) on your visit.  Those are the kinds of thing alot Americans don't see everyday but here's to hoping that we start seeing more of those exact sights, sounds,and tourism, to more parts of this country after what happened today.

Stefan! Your exactly right. If I came within an inch of reaching the front door at the capitol with a taco in hand, I probably would've had a riot shield up my ass.

Damn America! What in the hell happened to ya?

[Enjoyed]

Some of those who work forces, are the same that burn crosses.

The cops knew. They let it happen. Because they are fuelled by the same insanity gas that the Red Hats are breathing in every day. I'm generalising, of course, but you only have to look at the video of the cops LETTING THE PROTESTORS THROUGH THE BARRICADE to see that this was not only expected, but readily aided and abetted by a large number of our 'boys in blue'.

Embarrassing doesn't even cut it.

[Bosco]

12h is nothing, way to short. He goes to bed, sleeps a couple of hours and can go on like nothing happened. And to be honest, social media, espacially twitter, should have reacted weeks, months and maybe years ago. I think they too have blood on their hands.

I don't disagree with you, but as much as we hate or dispute everything he says, we have to remember Twitter (and other social media platforms) are not a literal news source, it's a glorified manifestation of a worldwide AOL chatroom. If you are receiving bad information, offensive information, false information within the medium... that's on the user, and a reminder that the freedom of free speech is a bit challenging most of the time.

His senatorial and congressional colleagues are the ones to hold accountable. They failed to be truthful and failed to have the best interest of the public in mind. This entire administration was a damaging waste of time.

Punk-Ass Bitches

[ThePumisher]

we have to remember Twitter (and other social media platforms) are not a literal news source, it's a glorified manifestation of a worldwide AOL chatroom. If you are receiving bad information, offensive information, false information within the medium... that's on the user, and a reminder that the freedom of free speech is a bit challenging most of the time.

They closed his account forever...

https://twitter.com/TwitterSafety/status/1347684877634838528

[Csar]

They closed his account forever...

https://twitter.com/TwitterSafety/status/1347684877634838528

This will hurt him more than his lost election. It will hopefully make things a little less stressing in the months to come as he can't further poison the public climate with his incendiary drivel - at least not as easily. He can now exercise his First Amendment rights somewhere else. Maybe they should errect a Trump Speaker's Corner around Mar-a-Lago.

[Bosco]

They closed his account forever...

https://twitter.com/TwitterSafety/status/1347684877634838528

Happy to see it. Twitter's a private company and definitely is in it's right to make this happen.

But if I can look at this objectively, rather than the symbolic lynching we have been waiting for, what exactly does this do? Are we banning Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rudy Giuliani, Trump family members and his countless other constituents from twitter, too? Seems like it mutates the problem rather than address it. Maybe there's more to come, I don't know...

Visuals of him having a hissy-fit over his Twitter banning will have to do for now.

[Stefan]

@Csar: I totally agree with you, Trump will be incredibly angry about this. For probably the first time in his live, his bad actions led to serious consequences. To somebody not using Twitter or social media much, this might not seem that important, but being a media personality was the only thing Trump ever had any success in (He never was a successful businessman). Trump made his wealth by inheritance, tax evasion/fraud, and, in the last two decades or so, as a reality-TV personality. There his act was the strong and tough boss and businessman and his erratic behaviour was what brought him the audience rating.
He did pretty much the same in his presidency, building what can only be described as a personality cult around him. And now, his media outlet was taken away from him.
Sure, it is relatively easy to move to another platform, but he will never be able to rebuild the outreach he had on Twitter.

Glorified AOL chatroom it may be, but official accounts of elected officials should probably be held to higher standards.
Also, I'm anything but a free speech or American law expert, but aren't Twitter, Facebook etc. privately owned companies, and, as such, they can choose whichever content to allow or block?
Is the free speech/censorship argument applicable here?


@Bosco: yeah, it would be bad if Trump were the only one to face consequences now. Too many on all levels and branches of gouvernment fully endorsed or simply ignored Trumps actions. It would send a terrible signal if they could just continue their jobs as if nothing has happened.
I do think any consequences for Trumps supporters and enablers should be more political, that blocking their social media won't do much now that the central figure is gone there.

[Ben_j]

So, among the 4 dead during the Capitol attack, one man had a taser concealed in his pants and accidentally tased his balls multiple times until he had a heart attack, and one woman who was carrying a "Don't tread on me" flag was trampled to death... I mean you can't make this shit up. If God exists he's got a dark sense of humor

[Bosco]

@Bosco: yeah, it would be bad if Trump were the only one to face consequences now. Too many on all levels and branches of gouvernment fully endorsed or simply ignored Trumps actions. It would send a terrible signal if they could just continue their jobs as if nothing has happened.
I do think any consequences for Trumps supporters and enablers should be more political, that blocking their social media won't do much now that the central figure is gone there.

Oh definitely the consequences should come outside of social media. I just was putting it in the scope of Twitter.

But yeah, to go a bit further about my point.. I think the banning of his account is a bit meaningless under the current circumstances. Without his account, there is plenty of minions to spread his lies and cries of being victimized. Twitter has essentially martyred him according to his followers. Unless there is more action by Twitter (particularly towards his associates), this smells like damage control for the company and not some moral stand.

And now I hear he tried circumventing the ban by posting using the Presidential account. LOL

https://www.theverge.com/2021/1/8/22221683/trump-tried-to-evade-his-ban-with-potus-but-those-tweets-were-instantly-deleted

[Wolkenkrabber]

Freedom of speech is one thing, but with great power comes great responsibility. If you abuse that power by spreading lies about a "rigged" election and by inciting an insurrection, then you may lose that power and freedom.

Btw the first 3 or 4 mins of this footage is incredible. Imagine being a newsman and *going in* with the MAGA mob. Well actually don't imagine, just watch.
https://twitter.com/MattGarrahan/status/1346959244051013634

This is the danger of living in an echo chamber. This forum may be a bit of an echo chamber - but that probably just results in us being mildly more obsessed with big beats than we might otherwise be. But if you believe everything "political" you read in your social media bubble...well you end up like these guys who seem to blame everyone else.

https://twitter.com/susie_dent/status/1346915538698727428

Is it wrong to look for humour in all this? DJ Artwork's Jamiroquoi comment on twitter was quite good.
Also:

https://twitter.com/Luiseach/status/1347235892784746502

https://twitter.com/eoinburgin/status/1346946053082378245

This is the first time a sitting president has been banned from Twitter going back to 1812!

[Conn6orsuper117]

Its 4 am, where I am a right now.

Spoiler

I've been awake for almost an hour now. I can't sleep, and am shaking as I type this. I had a nightmare that somebody in my friend group ended up ratting my family out to the KKK. In that nightmare they started leaving Burnt crosses and dead birds and cats on our front lawn. then it started getting violent, like broken windows, our car getting keyed and slashed, and our poor dog going missing, yanked from our own back yard. and then the final night, they got brave, they surrounded my house with me and my mom inside, the leader had a megaphone and kept telling me my sister and stepdad are dead, our dog is dead. Every time I looked out the window I see them standing outside, as goats and weird pitch black creatures circle the house. when we try calling the cops, they hacked our phone lines and 911 kept rerouting us to a phone number saying "You have reached 666 all our lines are busy at the moment, would you like to talk to our supervisor, the devil?" We had no weapons to fight back, no guns, no knives. they kept throwing rocks in our windows, and telling us we're just delaying the inevitable. the last thing I asked was why are they doing this, and the leader told me "Because you were born a half blooded [mexican slur], as they began charging into my home. then I woke up. never have I ever been this scared for my life, or my family's. every 2 minutes I keep hearing things outside my window, and I think its them.

I have violent nightmares, but usually there's some aspect to them that makes me realize they're fictitious but this felt too real. this is the first time, that I can remember, waking up sweaty. I'm sorry if I disturbed anybody on here, but I feel like I can trust you guys in saying this.

[Bosco]

^There is plenty of nightmare juice to go around these days. Can't speak on your individual case, but I would say you're not alone sleeping with stressful thoughts.

[satur8]

Conn6orsuper117 - I'm sorry that this history and reality has affected anyone ever, and that it still does at all. I'm also sorry that you carry this additional stress and fear for your loved ones due to the hate and ignorance of others. I can never relate to your experience through anything but empathy in that I can imagine what that must be like, but I can never truly understand what it IS like. And  I agree, this is a great group of people here that seem to function on a higher level. Thank you for your bravery in sharing.

There will always be hateful and violent people, be it mobs of racists, militarized police forces, or even suburban housewives that will shrug their shoulders as brown children are separated from their asylum seeking parents and thrown into mass cages with no futures. If we didn't like the American taste we saw over the last 4 years, just wait until climate change starts feeling real to most people. Nevertheless, THEY are the minority and the people have chosen against them, and hopefully the masses will continue to loudly and proudly demand justice, equality, and equity for all those who have suffered through color, heritage, religion, gender, or sexual preference. There are more of us and we are growing, and we WILL make them hide their faces again and fear our numbers.

As a father, I am doing my part to raise a conscious, kind, and intelligent young man: I can't take all the credit, he's naturally pretty great. Just know that some of us are working overtime on this.

[Ben_j]

My grandmother just passed away. In itself, this news brings me a lot of sadness, but it's exacerbated by the fact I was about to announce to her that I'm going to have my first child. She had a big health issue a month ago, and had been recovering in a nursing home since, which depressed her a lot. I was hoping this kind of good news would hopefuly cheer her up and help her hang in there, but now she'll never know. Later today we're going to get the first ultrasound of the baby, so today is really as much as a rollercoaster of emotions as can be...

[ThePumisher]

Sorry on your loss and at the same time congrats on your child

[Csar]

Oh Benji, this is so sad to read. I hope you are ok and I hope she didn't have to suffer for too long. Having been a guardian for my grandma for 8 years now, I know how difficult this is. She's started to become less and less healthy since the pandemic (she even had Covid at one point and recovered). Three weeks ago she even had to undergo surgery where I had to make the decision to have one of her toes amputated.
It's so heart-wrenching to see someone you love gradually fade away.

Congratulations on your first child! It's really sad your grandma will not be there to see and experience it. But I believe as sad as this is, your child will be bringing you the greatest happiness.

[Bosco]

Ben J, congrats! We knew you could do it

But yeah, I'm sorry to hear about your Grandmother. It's sad seeing the senior members of our families and society go. Even though you never got to deliver the news, I'm sure she would been delighted with it, and really proud of you no matter what.

Best wishes to you and your family.

[MadPooter]

Sorry to hear about your grandmother Ben_J. My absolute condolences to you and your family.

I hope that the spark of the new life will help to balance out the grief from the loss of another of your family. Congratulations.

[satur8]

I'm sorry for your loss, Ben_j. The situation is heartbreaking.

However, conrgats on your good news! I did not become the man I am until I became a father. It sounds cliché and I would have rolled my eyes as a younger man hearing it, and I know people can achieve happiness without children...but know that your best will become better with this life change.

[Ben_j]

Thanks for your messages <3