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[–] 152 points 1 year ago

There is no requirement to take part in this whitewashing campaign, and refusing to join in doesn’t make anyone a bad person. It’s a choice to write an obituary that begins “Joseph Goebbels was a gifted marketer and loving father to six children.”

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  • [–] 120 points 1 year ago* (7 children)

    I also enjoyed this perspective, a bit long form as its a substack post, but well written. Authored by Fear and Loathing: Closer to the Edge.

    A couple of months ago, Laura Loomer was shrieking into her phone that Charlie Kirk had stabbed Donald Trump in the back. MAGA’s attack dog had him marked as a traitor, an apostate, another soft-boy conservative who wasn’t vicious enough for the blood cult. Then Kirk gets shot, and suddenly Laura is draped in black, clutching pearls, wailing like a widow at a mob funeral. That’s how fast the MAGA spin cycle runs: enemies are canonized, heretics become martyrs, and yesterday’s punching bag is today’s sacred cow. Loyalty isn’t about consistency. It’s about whatever Trump’s mood demands.

    PETE HEGSETH, HALL MONITOR OF THE REPUBLIC

    Now comes Pete Hegseth, a man who wears the title Secretary of Defense but operates more like the comment-section sheriff. Instead of worrying about actual defense — China, Russia, Iran, cyberwarfare — Pete’s priority is disciplining soldiers for making snide jokes about Charlie Kirk.

    Yes, the Pentagon is now a glorified Facebook moderation team. Hegseth isn’t projecting strength; he’s enforcing pity. Soldiers aren’t preparing for war — they’re purging their timelines, terrified Laura Loomer will screech their names into his ear. This isn’t civilian control of the military. It’s civilian coercion, where MAGA influencers call the shots and the brass salutes like nervous interns.

    THE BLACKLIST WITH A SEARCH BAR

    Enter the grotesque centerpiece: CharliesMurderers(dot)com. A site so dystopian it makes J. Edgar Hoover look subtle. A searchable database of Americans whose “crime” is failing to sufficiently mourn Kirk.

    They claim it’s not doxxing, it’s “education.” Bullshit. This is McCarthyism with HTML. It’s a digital scarlet letter, a witch hunt in the cloud. Post the wrong meme, roll your eyes at the wrong martyr, and congratulations: you’re on the list. Employers can search you, neighbors can shame you, trolls can harass you. Your livelihood isn’t safe because Laura Loomer needs another dopamine hit.

    CANCEL CULTURE WITH A MAGA LOGO

    Remember when these people howled about “cancel culture”? When they cried that a comedian losing a Netflix special was tyranny? Now they’ve built the most efficient cancellation machine in modern America. Only this time it’s not corporations doing it — it’s the government, the Pentagon, and a mob of red-hat lunatics demanding loyalty tests. You don’t just lose a sponsor. You lose your job, your security clearance, maybe your entire career. And it’s not because you committed violence. It’s because you laughed at violence. Thoughtcrime, MAGA edition.

    GRIEF AS A WEAPON

    This isn’t mourning. It’s weaponized grief. Kirk spent his career spitting on empathy, mocking victims of shootings, and treating compassion like weakness. Now the same movement that rejected empathy is demanding you show it on their terms — mandatory, performative, unquestioning. Don’t mourn? You’re purged. Don’t post a sad-face emoji? You’re dangerous. Cruelty has always been the point, and now grief is just another tool of cruelty. Charlie Kirk didn’t believe in empathy, and his allies are proving they don’t either. What they believe in is obedience.

    THE BLUNT EDGE OF FASCISM

    Let’s stop pretending this is theater. It’s not play-acting, it’s raw authoritarianism. Trump is the wannabe strongman. Loomer is the megaphone of madness. Hegseth is the hall monitor with a badge he didn’t earn. Together they’ve taken the death of a professional troll and spun it into a loyalty purge. They’ve turned the Pentagon into an instrument of political grievance and a martyr into a weapon. And they want the rest of us to treat this clown show like sacred history.

    The only thing sacred here is the grift. The only thing holy is the purge. And the only thing growing is the list of Americans marked as enemies because they refused to cry on command. This isn’t about honor. This isn’t about respect. This is about power — stupid, brutal, authoritarian power clawing for control under the guise of grief.

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  • [–] 41 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Yep, fuck these nazis, I don't really need any more reasons to hate them, but they keep coming up with them

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  • [–] 17 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

    At this point it's not just the Nazi leadership .... it's the citizenry that just sits on the sidelines waiting for it all to go away.

    The country needs to stand up and shut things down. Not violently or to cause a civil war ... strike, stop work, refuse and picket everything and everywhere until things change or are brought under control.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    I think the thing that terrifies them about communism the most is that the people wouldn't be so beholden to neo slavery via technocracy. It would be communities helping one another, mutual aid. Instead the greediest motherfuckers have sucked so much down that the people are getting wise to it, so they have to grasp at the straws they can. Don't get me wrong, it's working very well for them, but I'm seeing the house of cards getting higher every day.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    I think you're right, but they're wrong. Trying to establish a communistic regime was never any obstacle for the elite when it came to turning it into a slavery - it can be uses as a tool and guise to do exactly that, as we've seen many times before.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    You're not wrong, the soviet Union has become the scapegoat of how communism doesn't work, but I think that they missed the part that it was the authoritarian regime that gave it the bad name

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  • [–] 71 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

    I do not believe anyone should be murdered because of their views, but that is because I don’t believe people should be murdered generally, regardless of who they are or what they’ve done. I am against the death penalty, pro–gun control, and believe war is a failure of humanity, not a necessary byproduct of it. Kirk was fine with murder as long the right people were dying.

    Well said, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy a bit of schadenfreude at his passing.

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  • [–] 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    specifically, pleasure from his death, or pleasure that he is no longer alive?

    the angry right wingers on the internet seem unable to understand the difference between the two

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  • [–] 66 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    Honestly great article that summarizes my thoughts on this exactly. I live in the south and I am seeing a lot of people I really respect lose their fucking minds about this and start frothing at the mouth mourning this guy that they didn't know existed two weeks ago because all they know was that he was a "Christian activist" shot for his beliefs, either not realizing or not caring that the dude was racist as fuck and spent his whole life being a right wing internet troll but in real life.

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  • [–] 47 points 1 year ago (11 children)

    Joseph Goebbels was a gifted marketer and loving father to six children.

    lol

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  • [–] 12 points 1 year ago

    Full sentence for anyone who is confused by the comment:

    It’s a choice to write an obituary that begins “Joseph Goebbels was a gifted marketer and loving father to six children.”

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (6 children)

    Who also killed all of them rather than let them live in postwar Germany...

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  • [+] 40 points 1 year ago (7 children)
  • [–] 32 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    even more to the point, he got what he wanted.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    So I guess he wasn't proven wrong, good for him, right all the way to the grave

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  • [–] 23 points 1 year ago* (3 children)

    Of course he was proven wrong. He shouldn't've been afraid of the left, when the far right are the extremist terrorists responsible for almost all domestic terror the over 20 years.

    He was a nazi shouting about you should kill a peaceful gay hippie because they're so dangerous, when a nazi killed him.

    That's called being very fucking wrong

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Exceptionally so. It may even qualify as some of the most divine irony I've probably witnessed

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  • [–] 36 points 1 year ago

    more articles like this should include the bit about how "[Biden should get the death penalty]"

    the dude openly stated that a political figure he disagreed with should be killed. the right must acknowledge this statement while they whitewash his legacy of hate.

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  • [–] 33 points 1 year ago

    The best thing about events like this is it helps me identify more or less trustworthy news sources by how they react to it. The Luigi case culled many

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  • [–] 59 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    "It is rude of me to say all of this, because we live in a culture where manners are often valued more than truth." This is a really good quote actually

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    [–] 29 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Promoting hate just to get rich. Conservatives are ugly on the inside & the outside.

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  • [–] 20 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    it's not to just get rich. They hate you, and want you to die. Things like that make them happy. Your suffering, pain, and those of your family. You're either them, or you deserve to die for not being them. That's how nazis work. The religion doesn't matter, but we've all seen how catholic nazis work in nazi Italy, and how christian nazis work in nazi Germany. All nazis fully supported by their hate churches, of course.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    Except that one guy, who was fine with the hate against communists, labor unions, romani, jews, and disabled people. Until they came for him, and then he was really upset that nobody stood up for him. He was a church person too, but eventually became the wrong type of church person. Many such cases.

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  • [–] 16 points 1 year ago

    The nation seems to be the only big paper with any rationality.

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  • [–] 38 points 1 year ago (25 children)

    Every civilized country on earth has figured out that there needs to be acceptable limits to free speech and that freedom of speech does not equal freedom from the consequences of saying something.

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  • [–] 21 points 1 year ago (17 children)

    freedom from the consequences of saying something.

    Freedom of speech in the US protects you from consequences from the government, not anyone or anything else. You can still get fired, or at, for your free speech.

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  • [–] 0 points 1 year ago (15 children)

    No because that would be murder.

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  • [–] 9 points 1 year ago (8 children)

    Murder isn't a violation of the US definition of free speech, unless the government does the murdering.

    Still a crime, but not a constitutional free speech violation.

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  • [–] -3 points 1 year ago (7 children)

    Op implied that free speech does not protect you from being murdered, which is technically true, but it's nonsensical unless he believes murder to be an acceptable response to free speech. It might happen, and in fact it did happen, but it's not ok so why even bring it up? Unless you think it's ok, in which case you are an absolute moron.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    Nowhere( in response to your post ) did anyone say murder was an acceptable response, just that if you murder someone , nobody is charging you with a violation of free speech because that would be nonsensical.

    And the only reason they had to say that much is because your argument was incorrect.

    If you want to argue proportional response, have at it, but you didn't, you argued :

    no because that would be murder

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (5 children)

    Society cannot allow or justify murdering someone for free speech. Op implied that murder was a response to speech, and I am saying murder should not be allowed or considered as a response. It shouldn't be hand waved away like "ah well what did you expect", or fafo or whatever. It should be condemned unanimously.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (4 children)

    Society cannot allow or justify murdering someone for free speech.

    That's a nice soundbite.

    Op implied that murder was a response to speech, and I am saying murder should not be allowed or considered as a response.

    So those are two different things you have right there.

    "Op implied that murder was a response to speech" , indeed he got shot because someone thought he deserved it.

    "Murder should not be allowed or considered as a response"

    This is where is goes off the rails a bit.

    OP wasn't saying (or implying) he should have been shot for talking , just that it seems reasonable to assume he had.

    "I don't care that this person is dead" isn't the same as "this person deserved to die"

    If you can't see how those two things are different i can see why you're struggling.

    It shouldn’t be hand waved away like “ah well what did you expect”, or fafo or whatever. It should be condemned unanimously.

    Subjective but you're entitled to your opinion.

    "He's dead and the world is a better place overall" is also an opinion to which people are entitled (unless you've been arguing some other kind of free speech? )

    And as it seems you are having a hard time with this i'll add the explicit context:

    " He's dead and the world is a better place overall ( this doesn't mean i wanted him dead, but i'm not sad that he is ) "

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (3 children)

    You can argue that it's a better place with him gone, but it's a much worse place because it happened and because people are celebrating, because it implies that society accepts murdering people who express differing opinions.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (2 children)

    You can argue that it’s a better place with him gone

    I wasn't arguing that, but that is my subjective opinion.

    but it’s a much worse place because it happened and because people are celebrating

    That's more complicated, i partially agree but I'll reserve final judgement for a while to see how it pans out.

    because it implies that society accepts murdering people who express differing opinions.

    I'm not sure how to tell you this, but open pretty much any historical book of any era and you'll find the same.

    I'm not saying it's ideal and each to their own but i am saying i think it's naive to ignore the entire history of humanity (and pre-humanity) and expect this current society to be different for some reason.

    A large part of the entire history of our species is built on murdering the "other".

    This society and all almost all societies, past and present have accepted/encouraged murdering other groups for stuff and power.

    In fact, I'd argue we are better at it than ever.

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  • [–] 0 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I agree that it's human nature and always will be. But that doesn't mean it's ok or that we should shrug and say oh well. It means that we need to always be guarding against it and condemning it when it happens. There are times in history where ideological violence has gotten way out of hand, and i believe we can avoid that if we try. And if we instead encourage it then we will have another cultural revolution or holocaust like in China or Russia or Germany.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago

    I agree that it’s human nature and always will be. But that doesn’t mean it’s ok or that we should shrug and say oh well.

    Agreed.

    It means that we need to always be guarding against it and condemning it when it happens.

    Agreed, in principle, but i suspect our definitions of what qualifies as "it" will differ greatly.

    There are times in history where ideological violence has gotten way out of hand, and i believe we can avoid that if we try.

    I think that's naively optimistic, though having it as a goal isn't the worst thing we could be doing.

    Also there are times in history where blind optimism has let toxic and harmful ideologies fester and take root.

    Think "Paradox of tolerance".

    And if we instead encourage it then we will have another cultural revolution or holocaust like in China or Russia or Germany.

    That's a hard, giant leap in logic, you'd need to at least have some evidence of direct causation before I'd even consider that as a reasonable line of thought.

    But that is only my opinion, with all that entails.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago (5 children)

    Reread that comment and not seeing how anything in it can be considered murder

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago (4 children)
  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    Getting fired isn't being murdered?

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  • [–] 5 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    freedom of speech does not equal freedom from the consequences of saying something.

    Exactly.

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  • [–] 12 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    I've seen it summed it up thusly: "If your speech incites violence, don't be surprised when people use violence in response."

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  • [–] -5 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    So I guess fights at professional sports games are justified violence, since someone probably incited it by insulting an opposing player.

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  • [–] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    You're confusing incitement and provocation.

    Incitement involves actively encouraging action.

    "you're bad at hockey and your mother is large" might be provocation

    "It is time for us to take up arms against the enemy" is incitement

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  • [–] 21 points 1 year ago (8 children)

    Just one of thousands of hate preachers indoctrinating the local population (and children) with the exact same extremist religious propaganda. Only religious extremists do this, and there are only religious extremists of religions that exist. Stop supporting religions. ALL of them.

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  • [–] -2 points 1 year ago (7 children)

    Not really sure what you are trying to say, but it sounds like you are way too focused on religion being a source for extremism in the world. Yeah there are religious extremists, but every movement has them, or at least has potential for extremists who indoctrinate kids or even advocate for violence against the detractors or enemies of the movement. Always has been and always will be.

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  • [–] 7 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    I think the reason it looks like religion motivates violent extremism is because the demography of the people most vulnerable to extremist propaganda are also more likely (statistically) to be more religious.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    What about the demography makes them more vulnerable? I assume you are referring to a study of some kind.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03071840308446849

    There are numerous analyses which show the same link between economic vulnerability, high birth rate, and extremism. Which is why the right wing are always chopping away at support programs, economic development, and birth control.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    I was only allowed to read the first page, but it was really focused on poor Islamic countries. But hold on, are you suggesting that the right wing policies are intentional, with the goal of making extremists? Seems really simplistic and narrow in scope.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago* (1 child)

    "Too focused" on the original Us vs. Them indoctrination machine? Are you high, naive, or just that stupid? ("All of the above" is also an option, of course.)

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  • [–] 9 points 1 year ago

    Killing Kirk sure did put that Epstein shit way over to the side. Hmm...

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    Well-written and surprisingly thoughtful commentary given the heat so far

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago
    [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    The Newspaper the Country Needs.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Not as strong as it should be. Some speech should be exterminated. Divisive lies for hatred and anticonstitutional genocide makes democracy dysfunctional. Trump having been jailed during last Presidency was both deserved and more democratic. Reaction to the shooting that is criticism of Kirk has an extermination movement ranging from cancel/firings to calls for civil war and genocide of everyone threatened by Kirk. There will be no political retributions for Americans cheering Putin's death, and establishment would get ultra aggressive if in Hitler's death someone pointed out his love of dogs. Discussion of a person's political views should never be exterminated.

    2 specific areas of speech that need extermination:

    1. Replacement theory. If you have/are allowed to have children, then you will challenge the "ultimate deserved ethnic supremacist" power to control democracy. Structural or individual violent repression of undesirables is validated. GOP establishment must go along with this, as voter suppression has always been a requirement of their corruption.

    2. Christofascist justification of ZIonazi first rule over America. Zionazi supremacist speech is establishment speech. DNC (Zionazi) "donor pressure" is against criticizing Christofascism because it is subservient ally to Zionism. Kirk was always granted establishment cred because Israel supremacy was the actual centeral purpose of his platform. Just as Chuck Schumer views his job as to "gaslight the left into being pro Israel" Kirk was gaslighting the right into doing the same. Nick Fuentes, whose speech is said to have inspired the murder, gaslights the right into thinking "Trump is not the most Zionazi supporting US demon in history". Christofascism's demonization of Islam, and "godless abomination freedom", in addition to bribing pastors to emphasize bible passages/revelations, both support genocide, and demonize those most likely to dislike genocide.

    Opposing Zionist supremacist rule over America is the actual speech that establishment exterminates from America. It is fundamentally treasonous and inhuman to protect and normalize genocide, and supremacy of another nation. Another 9/11 would only strenghten our loyalty/committment to Israel's blame for the next 9/11. They will once again "only hate us for our freedom".

    When establishment speech is the one that should be exterminated, it obviously complicates exterminating anti-constitutional and demonic evil speech.

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  • [–] 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    Some speech should be exterminated. Divisive lies for hatred and anticonstitutional genocide makes democracy dysfunctional.

    Ok, but who defines what these divisive lies are? Allowing for any sort of speech to be systematically exterminated is allowing every sort of speech to be systematically exterminated.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago

    Divisive lies for hatred and anticonstitutional genocide

    who defines what these divisive lies are?

    its one of those "I don't know where the line is but I know it when I see it" things, but with some easy math. Given our rights should stop only when it can risk someone else's life or liberty, does the speech in question go past that?

    How do we adjust our thinking for hundreds of million people; for resources and concerns that go beyond personal obligations under the social contract; for protecting things we need 3 generations from now?

    It falls apart without handoff to some kind of ethical framework and a team of elders to review cases against it and evolve that framework -- and look how easy it was to subvert America's legal elders in just a decade.

    But will even that decide whether there's a difference between a zygote and a tumour? Will it prioritize the person or what may one day become one? Will it take responsibility for dying in a controlled fashion when there is no future due to terminal illness, a non-viable body or an unredeemable crime?

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    It can't be establishment that decides. Current establishment requires disinformation to be protected speech. We have always had to say Eurasia is evil.

    There needs to be a layer independent of establishment, and/or a much stronger constitution that protects truth/values from supremacist lies and direct abuses of constitution.

    The 2 absolute evil examples I gave are absolute. OP spent too much energy on speech that is similar to "blacks can't swim and whites can't jump." As long as it doesn't lead to establishment policy that restricts sports team enlistment by race, it is just "relatively innocent" racism that may or may not have a grain of truth in stereotypes, and doesn't matter. Speech that doesn't matter is the only type that is allowed by establishment, but it would be overly broad to interfere with it. Speech/disinformation for antihuman establishment demonism shift is the critical speech, and whether establishment welcomes it or not, has no basis in whether it be permitted.

    More on Christofascism.... religious organizations will typically purpose themselves for demonism. Using idealist principles to capture souls in order to sell them to the most demonic evil powers/establishment. The commonality between Christofascism and (Christo)Humanism is classifying production (children, work) as good. The humanist approach instead of punishing women for failing their 28 baby quota, is positive family planning decisions made easier by easier access to prosperity, which unfortunately for the christofascists, means much freer alternatives to the requirement of listening to demons' sermon for salvation before getting soup.

    By embracing both Zionaziism and Replacement theory, Christofacsist "ambassadors" are also serving White fascism above Christianity. When Black Christians making positive family planning decisions are "acts of war" against US establishment, then the white part is necessarily more important to the fascists than the Christian demonism.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago

    Charlie Kirk is dead. Oh well.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 year ago
    [–] -2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    There is no such thing as original sin. The chaos of words spoken by those in power doesn't conjure evil; it merely exposes the darkness that already dwells within us all—darkness that is readily available, waiting to be awakened. The fear surrounding Kirk is nothing short of madness. We can’t allow ourselves to be crushed by the petty outrage over mere words and fleeting pixels. Instead, let's recognize that this fierce energy, this intense emotion, often stems from a deeper place—an unspoken pain or frustration rooted in a world that too easily dismisses genuine action and truth, especially when faced with the complacency of the indifferent. It’s time to wake up, to feel, to stand against the silence that enables the real injustice to flourish.

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