Its too late to stop QAnon with fact checks and account bans – MIT Technology Review

The traditional understanding of QAnon was that its ideas are spread by a relatively small number of adherents who are extremely good at manipulating social media for maximum visibility. But the pandemic made that more complicated, as QAnon began merging more profoundly with health misinformation spaces, and rapidly growing its presence on Facebook.

At this point, QAnon has become an omniconspiracy theory, says DiRestaits no longer just about some message board posts, but instead a broad movement promoting many different, linked ideas. Researchers know that belief in one conspiracy theory can lead to acceptance of others, and powerful social media recommendation algorithms have essentially turbocharged that process. For instance, DiResta says, research has shown that members of anti-vaccine Facebook groups were seeing recommendations for groups that promoted the Pizzagate conspiracy theory back in 2016.

The recommendation algorithm appears to have recognized a correlation between users who shared a conviction that the government was concealing a secret truth. The specifics of the secret truth varied, she says.

Researchers have known for years that different platforms play different roles in coordinated campaigns. People will coordinate in a chat app, message board, or private Facebook group, target their messages (including harassment and abuse) on Twitter, and host videos about the entire thing on YouTube.

In this information ecosystem Twitter functions more like a marketing campaign for QAnon, where content is created to be seen and interacted with by outsiders, while Facebook is a powerhouse for coordination, especially in closed groups.

Reddit used to be a mainstream hub of QAnon activity, until the site started clamping down on it in 2018 for inciting violence and repeated violations of its terms of service. But instead of diminishing its power, QAnon simply shifted to other mainstream social media platforms where they were less likely to be banned.

This all means that when a platform acts on its own to block or reduce the impact of QAnon, it only attacks one part of the problem.

Friedberg said that, to him, it feels as if social media platforms were waiting for an act of mass violence in order to coordinate a more aggressive deplatforming effort. But the potential harm of QAnon is already obvious if you stop viewing it as a pro-Trump curiosity and instead see it for what it is: a distribution mechanism for disinformation of every variety, Friedberg said, one that adherents are willing to openly promote and identify with, no matter the consequences.

Steven Hassan, a mental health counselor and an expert on cults who escaped from Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church, known as the Moonies, says that discussing groups like QAnon as solely a misinformation or algorithmic problem is not enough.

I look at QAnon as a cult, Hassan says. When you get recruited into a mind control cult, and get indoctrinated into a new belief system...a lot of it is motivated by fear.

"They've had three years of almost unfettered accessto developand expand."

People can be deprogrammed from this, Hassan says. But the people who are going to be most successful doing this are family members and friends. People who are already close to a QAnon supporter could be trained to have multiple interactions over time with them, to pull them out.

If platforms wanted to seriously address ideologies like QAnon, theyd do much more than they are, he says.

First, Facebook would have to educate users not just on how to spot misinformation, but also how to understand when they are being manipulated by coordinated campaigns. Coordinated pushes on social media are a major factor in QAnons growing reach on mainstream platforms, as recently documented by the Guardian, over the past several months. The group has explicitly embraced information warfare as a tactic for gaining influence. In May, Facebook removed a small collection of QAnon-affiliated accounts for inauthentic behavior.

And second, Hassan recommends that platforms stop people from descending into algorithmic or recommendation tunnels related to QAnon, and instead feed them with content from people like him, who have survived and escaped from cultsespecially from those who got sucked into and climbed out of QAnon.

Friedberg, who has deeply studied the movement, says he believes it is absolutely too late for mainstream social media platforms to stop QAnon, although there are some things they could do to, say, limit its adherents' ability to evangelize on Twitter.

They've had three years of almost unfettered accessoutside of certainplatforms to developand expand, Friedberg says. Plus, QAnon supporters have an active relationship with the source of the conspiracy theory, who constantly posts new content to decipher and mentions the social media messages of Q supporters in his posts. Breaking QAnons influence would require breaking trust between Q, an anonymous figure with no defining characteristics, and their supporters. Considering Qs long track record of inaccurate predictions, thats difficult, and, critical media coverage or deplatforming have yet to really do much on that front. If anything, they only fuel QAnon believers to assume theyre on to something.

The best ideas to limit QAnon would require drastic change and soul searching from the people who run the companies on whose platforms QAnon has thrived. But even this weeks announcements arent quite as dramatic as they might seem at first: Twitter clarified that it wouldnt automatically apply its new policies against politicians who promote QAnon content, including several promoters who are running for office in the US.

And, Friedberg said, QAnon supporters were poised to test these limitations, and already testing these limitations. For instance, Twitter banned certain conspiracy-affiliated URLs from being shared, but people already have alternative ones to use.

In the end, actually doing something about that would require rethinking the entire information ecosystem, says Diresta. And I mean that in a far broader sense than just reacting to one conspiracy faction.

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Its too late to stop QAnon with fact checks and account bans - MIT Technology Review

What is deplatform? – Definition from WhatIs.com

To deplatform someone is to remove their access to a channel for delivering messages to an audience. Deplatforming may involve not just banning the user or discontinuing service but also removing any existing content the user previously created on the site or service.

The term is usually used in reference to social media platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, where site owners have banned users whose communications have been deemed unacceptable for some reason. Deplatforming can also refer to removing users from other types of services. Cloud providers and ISPs, for example, may be said to be deplatforming someone when they remove a user to prevent them from disseminating a particular type of content, such as hate speech.

Deplatforming may also refer to a more global approach in which the user is removed from multiple large platforms. In early August 2018, Facebook, Apple, Spotify and YouTube all removed Alex Jones, creator of Infowars, a right-wing political website. Twitter followed suit a few weeks later.

Potential reasons for removing a user from a given service may be specified in terms of service (ToS) so that the provider cannot be accused of denying any offending users right to free speech. However, the effectiveness of deplatforming a user is questionable. Many people who had never heard of Alex Jones, for example, are likely to hear about him being deplatformed, become curious and seek out his content, bringing him a potentially wider audience than he previously enjoyed.

This was last updated in September 2018

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What is deplatform? - Definition from WhatIs.com

Nearly half of Americans think cancel culture has gone TOO FAR… but 2 in 5 admit participating in it – RT

Most Americans familiar with cancel culture deplatforming or firing people due to public outcry over a supposedly offensive or objectionable comment or action believe its done serious harm to society, a new poll has found.

Some 46 percent of Americans think cancel culture has gone too far, according to the poll conducted earlier this month by Morning Consult and published on Wednesday.

While just over a quarter (26 percent) of respondents claimed to have no opinion on the matter, those who thought cancel culture had overstayed its welcome dramatically outnumbered the 10 percent who suggested it hadnt gone far enough. Indeed, many of those surveyed across all demographics disapproved either somewhat or strongly of people participating in cancel culture.

Notably, just 27 percent were willing to state that the phenomenon had had a positive effect on society and of those, just a few (six percent) would say that effect had been very positive. Just shy of half the respondents thought its effect had been negative overall, with most answering very negative.

Overall, 40 percent of poll respondents admitted to participating in cancel culture.Young adults aged 18 to 34 were much more likely (55 percent) than those over 65 (32 percent) to acknowledge their participation, and while half of Democrats acknowledged theyd participated, only a third of Republicans said they had.

Defined for the purposes of the poll as the practice of withdrawing support for (or canceling) public figures and companies after they have done or said something considered objectionable or offensive, cancel culture has been front and center in the media in recent months, as a flurry of high-profile firings have been accompanied by a seemingly endless parade of cringeworthy celebrity apologies for past transgressions on social media.

But a growing public backlashagainst the phenomenon gave rise to an open letter published earlier this month in Harpers Magazinecondemning the increasing constriction of the free exchange of information and ideas and the rise of forceful ideological conformity.

Its credibility was dealt something of an ironic death blow when signatories began pulling out due to the presence of some problematic names essentially defeating the purpose of standing together against cancel culture.

Indeed, several of the leading lights of the anti-cancel-culture movement have been gleeful participants in cancel culture in the past, one of the most notable example perhaps being Bari Weiss, the New York Times op-ed writer who resigned from the paper earlier this month with a melodramatic letter decrying constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with [her] views. Weiss herself led a campaign while enrolled at Columbia University to smear Arab professors critical of Israel as racists with the intention of getting them fired, a scorched-earth operation decried as a witch hunt by the New York Civil Liberties Union.

However, Morning Consults poll revealed a sizable chunk of Americans are utterly disconnected from the cancel-culture ecosphere, with 35 percent claiming they were not familiar at all, or only minimally familiar, with the practice.

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Nearly half of Americans think cancel culture has gone TOO FAR... but 2 in 5 admit participating in it - RT

How QAnon Will Fight Back Against Twitters Ban And What Happens Next – Observer

On Tuesday Night, Twitter announced an extensive crackdown on the QAnon movement, in line with its policy to take strong enforcement action on behavior that has the potential to lead to offline harm.

The QAnon movement has grown radically over the last four years. It began in obscurity in 2017, when someone known only as Q posted a series of conspiracy theories about Trump on the internet forum 4chan, positing that a deep state satanic cabal of global elites was involved in pedophilia, sex trafficking and supposedly responsible for all the evil in the world; it has since grown into a global movement that has recently seeped into mainstream popular culture and shown up in person at events, harassed people online and off, and spread conspiracies at a rapid pace, aided by celebrities and the President of the United States.

Twitter further stated that it will be suspending accounts found to be tweeting about topics related to QAnon that are engaged in violations of Twitters multi-account policy, coordinating abuse around individual victims, or are attempting to evade a previous suspension. In reality, this mostly means that the platform is simply enforcing existing policies on QAnon after seeing an increase in violations of policies by QAnon in recent weeks.

NBC News subsequently reported that approximately 7,000 QAnon accounts have been taken down; Twitter added that the platform will be limiting 150,000 additional accounts by no longer recommending content and accounts associated with QAnon in its trends and recommendations, ensuring that those activities arent served up in user searches, and blocking URLs linking to QAnon-associated websites. Twitter stated that these will be rolled out comprehensively this week, though QAnon already started blocking QAnon accounts that have the popular Qmap website linked to their profile, as it was a Twitter policy violation.

Many observers of the QAnon movement greeted the decision by Twitter with excitement and relief. It was essential, they believe, to eliminate the recommendation algorithm that continuously spread QAnon-driven disinformation and acted as an indoctrination pipeline.

Undoubtedly, this will help curb access to this toxicity on Twitter. QAnon is not simply a few influencers who are spreading disinformation or hate speech. Based on my social media analysis of QAnon activity on Twitter, over the past 30 days there have been approximately 150,000 unique authors posting about QAnon daily. Therefore, the actions that Twitter will take will likely impact almost all of the daily active QAnon community.

At the same time, these are not all faceless drones or bots tweeting QAnon content. As Alex Kaplan from Media Matters has reported, there are currently 66 congressional candidates that have supported or given credence to QAnon, 15 of whom will be on the ballot in November. According to Oliver Darcy at CNN, a Twitter spokesperson told him that currently (QAnon) candidates and elected officials will not be automatically included in many of these actions broadly.

However, if they are campaigning on QAnon-related topics or had a QAnon consistency, limiting the reach of QAnon content, hashtags and URLs may have an impact on the electoral process. There will be a delicate balance that Twitter will need to uphold; how that will be done and what the impacts will remain to be seen.

Twitter further stated that they are taking action on behavior that has the potential to lead to offline harm. What is unclear at this time is how Twitter will judge what may or may not lead to offline harm. Though there have been QAnon adherents who have been charged with or have allegedly perpetrated murder, arson, uttering terroristic threats, kidnapping and vandalism, there are others who have consumed the same content and not taken any violent action. Paradoxically, if we take a look at Twitter actions from the perspective of a QAnon believer this will confirm their ideological framework, as has been expressed by some QAnon influencers following last nights news.

QAnon believes they are fighting an information war against the deep state and that Twitter is where the war is happening. If they are being beaten in the information war, is that something they will continue to fight? Will they redouble their efforts on other platforms? Or will they find another outlet? Initial reactions from the community highlight some of the challenges of combatting a movement like QAnon, whose members believe that this is simply a tactic used by their enemies in the war they are already fighting.

Some users have already started pronouncing digital martyr narratives for the social media accounts that have fallen in the digital war, while at the same time stating that this is what QAnon adherents have been trained for and it is mission forward. Others simply turned to prayer, asking the Good Lord to help and protect QAnon soldiers from being de-platformed in this information war. And then there are threats of class-action lawsuits from Q members who have no interest in leaving Twitter.

Deplatforming will not change the ideological beliefs nor the human behavior of QAnon adherents, rather it will likely reinforce them. If you take the digital soldiers off their digital battleground, most may choose to fight from another platform, but potentially for a small minority of disenfranchised QAnon believers, offline action may appear to be their only solution.

It is a good approach from the platforms perspective, and many may see this as a positive thing (and it may well be in the short term). Thinking of the long-term impact is where it gets tricky, especially from a societal perspective. Deplatforming can work on an individual level, as was the case with Milo Yiannopoulos who lost his source of income and his toxic platform. However, QAnon is not an individual, not only is it membership global and decentralized, it is a movement that has found a voice in the halls of power. It is a movement that Trump has amplified over 185 times, Michael Flynn (Trumps first national security adviser) participating in the QAnon TakeTheOath trend. Additionally, some in QAnon formalized religious practices and formed a church.

Twitter is also not the only platform in the game.

If QAnon influencer and content creators are banned, the movement will simply move to another platform. If Facebook does not follow in the footsteps of Twitter, they are a likely home for QAnon along with the new conservative-focused network Parler. There is also a small number of QAnon accounts sharing their profiles on Wego.Social, congressional candidate Darlene Swaffar being one of them.

Though many QAnon influencers and adherents have expressed they will be moving to Parler, the platform functions differently than Twitter; there is no trending topics to react to and the timeline is quite restrictive with regard to exploring new content compared to Twitter. Parler is very much echo chamber based and it will lack the community feel that many QAnon adherents need, it will also lack the opposition QAnon found on Twitter, which is essential to feeding the movement. In the long term, there is a chance Parler could not sustain QAnon.

Another option for QAnon would be a large migration to Telegram, where there is no content moderation, and there is an existing and thriving transnational QAnon community that already tops 100,000 members. Telegram chats can provide the interaction the community needs. Furthermore, Influencers can have their own channels which may sustain a large following like on Twitter.

Telegram is also a haven for more extreme groups such as anti-government, neo-Nazi, and white power movements. With so many birds of a feather flocking together, the chance of some QAnon followers cross-pollinating with hardened extremists is a concern.

With such a diverse and active community the only option for QAnon will be migration. Where they end up in the digital ecosystem will determine what the possible societal impact may be and how the community will change and evolve.

At this point, I still think it is important to be cautious about the potential outcomes of Twitters crackdown and some serious thought and analysis still needs to be put into the potential fallout (both good and bad) this decision will have.

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How QAnon Will Fight Back Against Twitters Ban And What Happens Next - Observer

Goodbye Compromise – The Organization for World Peace

The U.S.A. is splitting down the middle. On political, social and economic matters, people are flocking away from the centre away from compromise and diplomacy and towards the extremities of the political spectrum. In their wake, the political landscape has become a hotbed for tension and violence, and a vacuum for progress.

Americas political landscape has long been polarised, with Republicans and Democrats in a constant scrap for possession of the White House. Since 1852, they are the only two political parties to have won the popular vote. Yet despite their duopolisation of the Senate, neither party has held on to power for an extensive period of time, so the Presidency has switched hands in 17 of the last 41 elections.

This demonstrates that historically, American people have been open to changing their political allegiance, based on the evolving promises of the two parties. Such open-mindedness allowed the Republican Bush to take office in 2000, with a needed commitment to National Security, and for Democratic Obama to take it back in 2008 on the grounds that Bushs security campaigns were not working and needed reform. Such open-mindedness allowed progress.

However, such open-mindedness is under threat. Political allegiance is becoming less dependent on what people believe is best for the country at a certain time, and increasingly rooted in self-identification with the ideals of one of two diverging parties. Political preferences risk becoming core to individuals identities, and thus dangerously unmalleable.

The Pew Research Institute has been tracking this issue since 1994. They regularly pose a set of 10 questions to samples of American people; the questions span political and economic issues, so responses capture the state of public opinion. Recently, the results have been bleak. The average partisan gap has increased from 15 percentage points to 36 points., their latest report reads.

It is easier to understand the implications of this by focusing on one question: respondents were asked whether they agree that Immigrants strengthen the country with their hard work and talents. In 1994, partisans of both political parties said yes just as often; now, double the proportion of democrats agree (84%) as do republicans (42%). Likewise, the partisan gap in acceptance of homosexuality, concerning the role of government and concerning racial equality have all grown over the last quarter-century. And where there is division, political headwinds blow stronger.

A different study by the Pew Research Institute highlights how this new adoption of politics taints day-to-day relationships. Political preference is now a serious consideration for single Americans seeking a partner. 71% of Democrats claim that they probably or definitely would not consider dating a Trump voter, whilst 47% of Republicans say the same about Clinton voters.

Amidst this diaspora from the political centre, extremism in politics remains marginal. But the signs suggest it is growing. Consider the two Ds: disinvitation and deplatforming, both of which have gained notoriety on U.S. college campuses. Both involve revoking the right of a speaker to address an audience on-campus because of disagreements with their views. Disinvitation means un-inviting the speaker, because their presence would create harmful backlash, and deplatforming involves drowning out the speaker during their talk (e.g. by chanting or storming the stage).

In 2019, there were 39 attempts at deplatforming or disinvitation across U.S. campuses, which is 33% more than the same time a decade ago. Most targeted speakers are from the political right. One example was in Boston University, where students attempted to deplatform ex-journalist Ben Shapiro who was there to deliver a speech on slavery. They invoked his stances on gay marriage and abortion, as well as his comment in 2002 that One American soldier is worth far more than an Afghan civilian, as their motivations. A selection of students also launched a petition for the University to deny his entrance, saying that Shapiro is a racist, far-right zealot whose aim is to incite hatred and bigotry on our campus and in the larger society., and on the evening of his talk, a small number heckled him.

Left-wing speakers are not exempt from deplatforming. Last year, students at Southern Georgia University surrounded the accommodation of Cuban activist Jennine Cap Crucet, after she criticised white privilege. A video then circulated of university students burning her book.

You can argue for or against the two Ds. You can claim that certain speakers, whose views are harmful, do not deserve a platform. You can also claim that everyone should be allowed to speak, and suppressing this quells the first amendment. Either way, hate speech and speech-stifling promote the same thing: a fear of being called out or silenced. 53% of Democrats and 47% of Republicans say that discussing politics with someone they disagree with is stressful or frustrating (an overall rise since 2016). In turn, this denies people the chance to challenge or develop their views, propagating polarity.

It is also concerning because political leaders have adopted this attitude. For example, in 2018 a cohort of Democrats refused to applaud Trump during his state of the union address. Trump fired back by calling them un-American and treasonous; he undermined the oppositions concerns rather than thinking to address them.

Despite the disagreement, there is one thing that Republicans and Democrats consistently agree on: political debate is deteriorating. Partisans of both parties are equally likely to say that political debates have become more negative (86% of Republicans and 86% of Democrats agree). A similar percentage also believe that debates have become less fact-based (76% of Republicans, 79% of Democrats) and that debates have become less focused on issues (60% of Republicans, 62% of Democrats). In other words, both parties are equally concerned about splitting from each other. Thats fortunate. To stitch Americas middle back together, hands on both sides will be needed.

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Goodbye Compromise - The Organization for World Peace

Churchill: Troy preacher has the right to offend – Laredo Morning Times

Reverend John Koletas preaches on Troy, New York street corner at 4th and Broadway. July 26, 1990 (Arnold LeFevre/Times Union Archive)

Reverend John Koletas preaches on Troy, New York street corner at 4th and Broadway. July 26, 1990 (Arnold LeFevre/Times Union Archive)

Photo: Arnold LeFevre, Times Union Historic Images

Reverend John Koletas preaches on Troy, New York street corner at 4th and Broadway. July 26, 1990 (Arnold LeFevre/Times Union Archive)

Reverend John Koletas preaches on Troy, New York street corner at 4th and Broadway. July 26, 1990 (Arnold LeFevre/Times Union Archive)

Churchill: Troy preacher has the right to offend

TROY John Koletas has been testing this city's First Amendment resolve for a very long time.

Three decades ago, the controversial pastor of the Grace Baptist Church in Lansingburgh was best known as a street preacher who tried to save the souls of passersby in downtown Troy. In a not-quiet voice, he'd demand that they repent for their sins.

The shouting wasn't always appreciated, unsurprisingly, and Koletas was repeatedly charged with disorderly conduct. Eventually, Koletas filed a lawsuit arguing that he had a First Amendment right to preach on the street and that his repeated arrests amounted to unconstitutional harassment. Two national TV shows Fox's "A Current Affair" and NBC's "Inside Edition" even came to Troy to report on the controversy.

Koletas ultimately lost in court, when the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 1995 that police did nothing wrong by arresting him.

Had I been a columnist for this newspaper back then, I generally would have been on Koletas' side. I would have argued, in other words, that he did in fact have a free speech right to preach outside, at least within reason.

No, a person shouldn't be allowed to holler on the street at, say, midnight. People do need to sleep, after all. Laws against unreasonable noise are justified.

But certainly, the city needed to accommodate the preacher's free speech rights without needless harassment. Koletas had the right to preach, even if few passersby wanted to hear it.

Fast forward three decades, and Koletas is again attracting attention. AR-15 rifle giveaways at Grace Baptist and Koletas' consistently hateful rhetoric toward Blacks, Jews, Muslims and Catholics have attracted Black Lives Matter protesters to the Fourth Street church in recent weeks.

As I noted in a column published Sunday that focused on Koletas' attacks on Catholicism, protesters aren't coming to Grace Baptist to attack Christianity or religion, as some in conservative media would have you believe. They're protesting what Koletas says, and justifiably so.

As has been well documented by bloggers and others, Koletas has referred to Blacks as "termites" and "savages." He has described himself as a racist who "believes the races should be kept separate as much as possible." Koletas says Catholicism, like the Muslim faith, is incompatible with democracy and the Bill of Rights.

In response to Sunday's column, a few supporters of Grace Baptist claimed I was attempting to silence or "cancel" Koletas' freedom of religion or speech. But I suggested no such thing.

I believe strongly that Koletas has the First Amendment right to pray and preach as he wants, assuming he stops short of advocating violence. Likewise, his followers have a First Amendment right to listen. And yes, protesters, columnists and Facebook commenters all have a First Amendment right to object to what Koletas says.

Free speech for everybody! What a concept.

Freedom of speech seems to be falling out of fashion, though. We increasingly hear that some words are too harmful to be spoken or that listeners have the right not to be offended. On college campuses, even relatively dull speakers such as economist Art Laffer can find themselves "deplatformed" for supposedly offensive views.

The shift, if widely accepted, will redefine free speech rights as we've long understood them. Actually, it would all but eliminate true freedom of speech. After all, if you can't say something that somebody might find offensive, you can hardly say anything provocative. You're limited to a fairly narrow range of expression.

The result would be a stifling monoculture of thought, devoid of intellectual diversity or compelling debate. And as any good gardener can tell you, there's nothing interesting about a monoculture.

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear, wrote George Orwell in an essay planned as the introduction to "Animal Farm" that also included this gem of a line: "People don't see that if you encourage totalitarian methods, the time may come when they will be used against you instead of for you."

Had I been walking down a street in Troy in the early 1990s, I suppose I wouldn't have wanted to hear Koletas' call that I repent for my sins. I wouldn't want to sit through one of his sermons today. (Happily, I don't have to.)

But we allow Koletas to speak so that we all may speak. We counter his words with our own words.

Freedom of speech for everybody! It's a crucial concept.

cchurchill@timesunion.com 518-454-5442 @chris_churchill

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Churchill: Troy preacher has the right to offend - Laredo Morning Times

Is Cancel Culture Butchering the Centre? | Jonathan MS Pearce – Patheos

Cancel culture is the talk of the town. What is it, for those uninitiated?

The act ofcanceling, also referred to ascancel culture(a variant on the term calloutculture), describes a form of boycott in which an individual (usually a celebrity) who has acted or spoken in a questionable or controversial manner is boycotted. [source]

This might take shape in boycotting a brand or, more likely to upset the right, de-platforming people: cancelling talks that usually right-wingers are due to give at, say, universities. It involves supposed silencing of voices who arent politically correct enough, like JK Rowling on her views about trans people.

One of the latest stimuli for inspection came in the form of an open letter to Harpers from an eclectic set of signatories, some of whom have previously advocated truncating speech (on the right) and others who have been victim, such as Noam Chomsky. Some have argued the irony of people on the right demanding their safe spaces.

There are all sorts of articles thrown around at the moment, some claiming it is plaguing modern society, and others saying it is overblown or even non-existent. I have selected a number of different articles to get your teeth into should you so desire. Happy reading.

Michael Hobbes at HuffPo starts us off:

Anecdotes are not data, free speech is not under attack and elite journalists should find something else to write about.

The American left, we are told, is imposing an Orwellian set of restrictions on which views can be expressed in public. Institutions at every level are supposedly gripped by fears of social media mobs and dire professional consequences if their members express so much as a single statement of wrongthink.

This is false. Every statement of fact in the Harpers letter is either wildly exaggerated or plainly untrue. More broadly,the controversy over cancel culture is a straightforward moral panic. While there are indeed real cases of ordinary Americans plucked from obscurity and harassed into unemployment, this rare, isolated phenomenon is being blown up far beyond its importance.

The panic over cancel culture is, at its core, a reactionary backlash. Conservative elites, threatened by changing social norms and an accelerating generational handover, are attempting to amplify their feelings of aggrievement into a national crisis. The Harpers statement, like nearly everything else written on this subject, could have been more efficiently summarized in four words: Get Off My Lawn.

The first question to ask when determining whether youre falling for a moral panic is whether its really a Thing. Societal freakouts over razor blades in Halloween candy, strangers in vans kidnapping kids, and teenagers hosting rainbow parties turned out, in hindsight, to be based on tiny numbers of confirmed cases or none at all.

Cancel culture has the same characteristics as previous episodes of pearl-clutchery. Nearly every example cited by the Harpers letter turns out, upon scrutiny, to be something else entirely.

Take the letters ominous warning that editors are fired for running controversial pieces. This is almost certainly a reference to James Bennet, the opinion editor of The New York Times whoresignedlast month after printing anop-ed by Sen. Tom Cotton(R-Ark.) calling for the military suppression of Black Lives Matter protests.

While the op-ed did inspire widespread criticism, Bennets resignation is not a case of social-media censorship. The Times itself admitted that the piece fell short of our standards and represented a breakdown in the papers editorial process. Bennet eventually admitted that he hadnt even read it before publishing it.

And beyond Bennets incompetence, there is the simple question of accountability. Even before the Cotton op-ed, Bennet hiredclimate change deniers,neglected fact-checkingand printedpro-mercenaryarticles by private military contractors. Are the signatories to the Harpers letter really saying that Times readers and employees should not have expressed their frustration with these obvious breaches of ethics?

Dozens of journalists, including several at the Times and HuffPost, made this point ina Friday response to the Harpers letterspearheaded by journalists of color and co-signed by members of the academic and publishing communities.

The Harpers letter also says, in its oblique way, that in todays America, professors are investigated for quoting works of literature in class. This is, in a purely literal sense, true: Last month, a professor named W. Ajax Peris wasinvestigatedby UCLA for reading Martin Luther King Jr.s Letter From Birmingham Jail aloud in class.

Thats not why Peris was investigated, though. He was investigated because he read excerpts of the letter containing the N-word without warning his students first. He alsoshowedgraphic footage of lynchings in his class without content warnings. When students complained, heinsistedthat he should be allowed to use the slur.

Even if you think the complaint against Peris was overly sensitive, he was not canceled in any meaningful sense. The UCLA investigation was resolved with acritical letterfrom his department head. He was not subject to widespread calls for termination and will be teaching classes in the fall.

In other words, Peris case was utterly routine. Students complain about their teachers for justifiable reasons and silly ones thousands of times per week in America. These complaints dont just come from left-wing students: After the 2016 election, a professor at the College of Charleston wastargeted by conservativesfor dedicating a class to discussing Donald Trumps victory. The far-right advocacy group Turning Point USA has aProfessor Watchlistwhere Republican pupils can report professors who advance leftist propaganda in the classroom.

America is a big country. Sometimes employees disagree with the decisions of their bosses and sometimes 19-year-olds do things that adults disagree with. Simply because these cases happened does not mean that they are new or important.

The comeback being a data analysis by the Heterodox Academy (a group ofprofessors, administrators and grad students ofHeterodox Academypromote open inquiry, viewpoint diversity and constructive disagreement):

The Skeptics Are Wrong Part 2: Speech Culture on Campus is Changing

Six essays in March asserted that there is no campus free speech crisis, as Acadia U. political scientist Jeffrey Sachs put it in the Twitter thread that launched the wave of skepticism. In ourfirst post responding to the skeptics, we argued that they went wrong by basing their case primarily on GSS data about the Millennial generation. We explained why the debate hinges not on Millennials but on the generation after themiGen, or Gen Zwho began replacing Millennials in college in 2013. In this post we draw on five other datasets to show that there are reasons for concern about the speech climate on campus, and there are reasons to think that it is changing since 2015. We address three questions: 1) Is the speech climate (i.e., willingness to speak up) worsening on college campuses, overall, in recent years? We show that it is. 2) Is there a politically correct range of viewpoints on campus? We show that there is. 3) Which side of the spectrum is the bigger threat to free speech on campus? We show that students on the left and right used to be similar in their desire to disinvite speakers or shout them down, but since 2013 the right has used those tactics much less often while the left has used them much more often. In conclusion, the skeptics are right to demand evidence for claims about change, but wrong to say that there is no such evidence.

Check it out for some data, though most of it is poor data (notably, just not enough of it!). Indeed, abalanced critique of this piece and the data was done a couple of years ago on the podcastTwo Psychologists Four Beers, which I think is well worth a listen to. Whilst the data, for the most part, is not good enough to properly defend the claims of those criticising cancel culture, it concludes that there does seem to be something in it.

Janice Turner, in The Times (paywall), just wrote a piece attacking the woke left:

The woke left is the new Ministry of Truth

Yet their safety is the very reason that bestsellers like Malcolm Gladwell and Margaret Atwood can speak out. The secure can best protect those in peril: the untenured academics or mid-list writers or even the teacher at your childs school.

The worst of cancel culture is not a high-profile career assassination but what follows. Silence: the deadening effect upon institutions or individuals scared into self-censorship in case they too face an angry throng. The Orwell Foundation tells me that when I was shortlisted in 2018, because my submitted articles included an investigation into the global spike in teenage girls identifying as trans, it was warned of trouble, feared a picket and considered hiring private security to protect staff. So this year it had to formulate a plan in case of fallout because I had won.

With Nick Cohen at the Guardian also seeing this as an issue for the left:

The spectre of censorship and intolerance stalks todays left

According to the supposedly tough-minded view, signing a letter toHarpersprotesting at the stifling of debatecan only weaken our side. A defence of the signatories should begin by noting that they were telling the truth when they complained that writers, artists, and journalists fear for their livelihoods if they depart from the consensus, or even lack sufficient zeal in agreement. Note the precision. The signatories were not saying it is wrong for people to lay into others: freedom of speech is the freedom to criticise or it is nothing. Their point was that many live in fear of campaigns to destroy them if they dont mouth the right opinions.

Im surprised such a statement of the obvious could be controversial. No honest observer can deny that the dominant factions in the modern progressive movement reject freedom of speech. They punish opinions they disagree with when they have power; and the more power they have, the more they will punish. You may think the censorship justified, but to deny its existence is absurd. Tellingly, few bother to deny it now. Occasionally, you can see them raise the exhausted excuse from the grave that only the state can censor. On this reading, Islamists killing cartoonists atCharlie Hebdo,or CEOs firing whistleblowers, are not censoring because they are not civil servants. More popular in the past week has been the claim that writers with the reach ofMargaret Atwood, Noam Chomsky, JK Rowling and Salman Rushdie cannot take a moral stand because no one can suppress their thought even though their critics give every impression of wanting to do just that.

Legendary British protest musician Billy Bragg countered with:

Cancel culture doesnt stifle debate, but it does challenge the old order

Over the past decade, the right to make inflammatory statements has become a hot button issue for the reactionary right, who have constructed tropes such as political correctness and virtue signalling to enable them to police the limits of social change while portraying themselves as victims of an organised assault on liberty itself.

The latest creation in their war against accountability is cancel culture, an ill-defined notion that takes in corporate moves to recognise structural racism, the toppling of statues, social media bullying, public shaming and other diverse attempts to challenge the status quo.

Although free speech remains the fundamental bedrock of a free society, for everyone to enjoy the benefits of freedom, liberty needs to be tempered by two further dimensions: equality and accountability. Without equality, those in power will use their freedom of expression to abuse and marginalise others. Without accountability, liberty can mutate into the most dangerous of all freedoms impunity.

We look down on authoritarian societies because their leaders act without restraint, yet in Trump, we see a president who has never been held to account in his personal life or professional career, and his voters love him for it. Boris Johnsons supporters, when faced with examples of his lack of responsibility, shrug and say its just Boris being Boris. Impunity has become a sign of strength. You could see it in the face of the former police officer Derek Chauvin as he kept his knee on Floyds neck for eight minutes and 46 seconds.

In response to this trend, a new generation has risen that prioritises accountability over free speech. To those whose liberal ideals are proving no defence against the rising tide of duplicitous authoritarianism, this has come as a shock. But when reason, respect and responsibility are all under threat, accountability offers us a better foundation on which to build a cohesive society, one where everyone feels that their voice is heard.

And Ricky Gervais has got his tuppence worth in saying the Office couldnt be created now, given cancel cultures prevalence:

Ricky Gervais Says The Office Couldnt Air Now Because of Cancel Culture

I think now it would suffer because people take things literally, he said of the mockumentary sitcom. Theres these outrage mobs who take things out of context. This was a show about everything. It was about difference, it was about sex, race, all the things that people fear to even be discussed or talked about now in case they say the wrong thing and theyre canceled, Gervais said.

He added, And the BBC have gotten more and more careful and people just want to keep their jobs. So people would worry about some of the subjects and some of the jokes, even though they were clearly ironic and we were laughing at this buffoon being uncomfortable around difference.

Four writers then responded in The Guardian:

Is free speech under threat from cancel culture? Four writers respond

Nesrine Malik: Dont confuse being told youre wrong with the baying of a mob

The idea of cancel culture, the obvious, albeit unnamed, target of this letter, collapses several different phenomena under one pejorative label. Its puzzling to me that a statement signed by a group of writers, thinkers and journalists, most whom have Ivy League or other prestigious credentials, would fail to at least establish a coherent definition of what it believes cancel culture is before seeming to condemn it.

To those unaccustomed to being questioned, this all feels personal. They have confused a lack of reverence from people who are able to air their views for the very first time with an attack on their right to free speech. They have mistaken the new ways they can be told they are wrong or irrelevant as the baying of a mob, rather than exposure to an audience that has only recently found its voice. The world is changing. Its not cancel culture to point out that, in many respects, its not changing quickly enough.

Jonathan Freedland: The reaction to the letter has shown the need for it

Any letter that carries the signatures of both the formerGeorge W Bush speechwriter David Frum the man who coined the phrase axis of evil and Noam Chomsky is bound to get attention. It takes some doing to get, say, New York Times columnist Bari Weiss and Bernie Sanders advocate Zephyr Teachout to join forces, and there are dozens of similarly unlikely ideological match-ups to be found among those who signed the letter published by Harpers Magazine.

Instead, as one signatory, Anne Applebaum, conceded onBBC Radio 4s Today programmethis morning, it consists of a series of statements that are, in themselves, quite anodyne. Its not disparaging to say that the document, like many open letters, represents a lowest common denominator, a bare minimum that would be acceptable indeed, obvious to the likes of both Frum and Chomsky. The letter declares, for example, that: The way to defeat bad ideas is by exposure, argument, and persuasion, not by trying to silence or wish them away. Are there many who would disagree with those words, who would want to make out loud the case for wishing away what they dont like?

And yet the statement has not been received as a boilerplate recitation of the case for free expression, but has become controversial. Thats partly because of the text itself which some have read as brimming with thin-skinned privilege, seeing it as a coded attack on marginalised minorities for having the gall to criticise people with power and platforms but also, as happens often with open letters, because of the names at the bottom. One name in particular has provoked fury: that of JK Rowling, because of her writings on trans rights and gender. At least two signatories havedistancedthemselves from the letter since its publication.

Its clear that a number of people believe Rowling should not be included in such statements, that her views have placed her outside the bounds of acceptable discourse. As it happens, the letter speaks of this phenomenon when it describes a vogue for public shaming and ostracism. It seems the Harpers letter might be a rare example of the reaction to a text making the texts case rather better than the text itself.

Zoe Williams: There is no such thing as pure freedom of expression

What we do know is that there is no such thing as total tolerance: it cannot logically tolerate intolerance. And there is no such things as pure freedom of expression either: the expression of some views necessarily encroaches on the dignity and freedom of others. This is partly a failure of speech itself, which has the facility to raise impossible propositions Eagletons unstoppable force meeting an immovable object but not to resolve them. Mainly its a failure of humans. We should think carefully before lining up behind an abstract, on either side absolutes have a tendency to dissolve on contact with reality. And its in reality, of course, with its compromises and discomforts and competing demands, that we actually live.

Samuel Moyn: Abuse of the power to cancel is why I signed the letter

Recent events have, in my opinion, proved that a successful movement one with which I sympathise can err and undermine its further inroads into opinion. Mill was wrong about a lot. But he was right that the wellbeing of mankind may almost be measured by the number and gravity of the truths which have reached the point of being uncontested. Recent abuse and overuse of our power to ban and cancel, put simply, have sometimes hurt the continuing normalisation of truths we care about.

I dont have the standing to talk down to or tutor those angry about the letter. But it is also correct that some of the chief victims of excessive policing of speech in history have been those with progressive politics like mine. I didnt know who else would sign it when I did, but I reserve the right to criticise many of them, not just for their own hypocritical patrolling of speech in the past but also for their regularly disastrous ideas. Supporting economic and geopolitical catastrophe is far worse than participating in evanescent Twitter mobs or even more harmful censorship. And we will have missed an opportunity provided by those now honourably calling for free speech if we do not continue to indict the world their speech has made.

Finally, UnHerds article by Giles Fraser (The historical amnesia of culture warriors) points out the chronocentrism of the whole debacle, and our ability to forget that this is nothing new at all:

The phrase cancel culture might have been coined by the Devil to ensure maximum rancour and confusion. It is currently both ubiquitous and uselessly vague. The offences under its rickety umbrella range from an unguarded line in an interview to serial sexual assault; the punishments stretch from a rough week on Twitter to career annihilation; the prosecutors might be a powerful institution or a few powerless tweeters.

As if that werent muddled enough, the current debate is largely taking place in a state of historical amnesia, as if the issues were as novel as the terminology. The sociologist Jib Fowles called this fallacychronocentrism:the belief that ones own times are paramount, that other periods pale in comparison. The author and academic Philip Seargeant suggeststhe narcissism of the present.

And this video does a pretty good job of describing the moral panic from the left (the part about Louis CK is absolutely spot-on):

My opinion, for what its worth, is this:

Attacking the cancel culture woke left is a moral panic largely instigated by the right in a fight for the centre. In these sorts of fights, the hard-right are unaffected and continue doing what they do, the hard-left are the ones supposedly getting all hot under the collar, all the while the centre is being jostled this way and that in being asked to side with one or the other. My view is that the right is much more conspiratorial in working together (see how Ben Shapiro has been operating) to deliver a highly dubious narrative. The left is a herd of cats with little interest in a concerted effort to deliver an organised project. The right, with its huge funding, is a different kettle of fish.

As ever, my opinion is that there is/should be a line but that no one will agree on it. This makes matters very difficult. Freedom of speech is a notoriously difficult quagmire. As ever, who arbitrates it? Especially when talking about things like inviting someone to speak at a public space. I think someone like Charles Murrayshould probably be invited to speak at places and then challenged really robustly on everything they say. It depends on how well things are managed. Its interesting with people like Milo Yiannopolous because his fame depended on people cancelling him. He is an actual troll in every aspect of his existence and, when he gets cancelled, that is exactly what he wants because, as he has admitted openly that its how he makes his money. There is really no scenario where he should be invited anywhere, in my opinion. But someone more academic should be invited but should also be allowed to be openly challenged as robustly as possible.

And so I see the whole thing as misplaced worry.I think it is overestimated exactly how many places in the world are even susceptible to such left-wing academia, and how often this really is happening on our campuses and elsewhere.

The world has swung hugely to the right.Now, thats not to say there isnt a trend towards this cancel culture in some way. Universities are overwhelmingly liberal and conservatism will be a minority viewpoint on some of these campuses, and that provides a challenge for someone from within that group.

This is shouting about a minor issue and making it sound way worse than it is and either explicitly ignoring or allowing ignoring of the far worse threats from the right. What is worse, having a woke culture, or society run by bigots like Ben Shapiro and, well, Trump? This is shouting about often minor issues (as in, not as commonplace or pervasive as they are claimed to be) and making it sound way worse than it is and either explicitly ignoring or allowing ignoring of the far worse threats from the right.

There will always be bumps on the road on the journey to progress. There may be mistakes. But beware the people who shout about those mistakes so loudly and claim (by hasty generalisation) that they are representative of a decay in (liberty) liberal society. They are usually not the (liberty) liberals you think they are. Most people shouting about freedom of speech will somewhere along the line want to take your bodily autonomy away, or dictate who you sleep with, or disbar you on account of the colour of your skin.

Beware the wolf in sheeps clothing.

Dont let these smoke and mirrors scare you off from the project to make this world a better and more equitable place for all, or provide an illusion for society so we fall down the hidden trap door into a dark cellar of intolerance that might take years to reason and vote our way out of.

When the mouthpieces of the right gain so much traction by blowing this stuff up to curry favour with the centre (and this really works), I worry. I do submit that the cancel culture battle doesnt affect the far-left or far-right but butchers the centre. And Im fairly sure that, when the dust settles, it will most certainly have favoured the right, this being the intention of their more cunning cabal members.

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Is Cancel Culture Butchering the Centre? | Jonathan MS Pearce - Patheos

WUWT is being deplatformed service interruptions the subsequent few days – The Shepherd of the Hills Gazette

Weve been given notice by our hosting provider that we need to move off the site. The reason is that we were suddenly faced with a big increase in hosting costs, and it wasnt tenable. (Wheres big oil when you need them?) So they told us we had to move.

Therefore we are moving back to wordpress.com, where we started back in 2007. We will be picking up where we left off when we moved two years ago and migrating all the content of the last two years back to the original site (which I retained in case of just such an emergency).

So, if WUWT becomes flakey or offline at times over the next few days, dont worry. We have it all backed up.

Thanks for your understanding and patience. Anthony

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July 15, 2020 in Announcements.

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WUWT is being deplatformed service interruptions the subsequent few days - The Shepherd of the Hills Gazette

Best and worst of this week’s headlines: International students, sexual abuse – GW Hatchet

President Donald Trumps administration backed down from its plan to deport international students taking all-online classes this fall semester, after facing near-universal backlash from universities, students and other politicians. With this plans rescission, foreign-born students at GW face one less obstacle as they navigate COVID-19 in pursuit of their degrees.

But this weeks series of sexual assault allegations against current and former students was yet another demonstration of the widespread problem of sexual abuse on college campuses.

Heres the best and worst of this weeks headlines.

Thumbs up:

After national outcry, the Department of Homeland Security reversed its plan to deport international students whose college classes had switched to an entirely online format.

The introduction of the plan was met with immediate and furious pushback by students, their institutions and political leaders across the country. Petitions circulated at GW that urged administrators to take a stand against the visa policy. In response, GW submitted an amicus curiae brief to a lawsuit filed in federal court by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that challenged the policy change.

In the face of this righteous anger from the public, DHS quietly reversed course and canceled the deportation policy.

International students, who do not deserve to be denied entry to the country for a decision partly out of their hands, can breathe a well-deserved sigh of relief at this policys rescission. For its part, GW did the right thing by voicing opposition to this policy and signing on to Harvard and MITs lawsuit. But in the future, it would be great to see the University lead the charge against draconian policies that affect students, instead of following in other schools footsteps.

Thumbs down:

Dozens of sexual abuse survivors at GW shared their harrowing stories on social media this week, reminding us of the issues prevalence on campus and how hard it is to achieve justice for survivors.

What began with a series of Twitter posts accusing a former student of sexual assault soon turned into more than 60 students sharing stories of their own experiences. Students reposted Instagram stories showing support for their peers and cautioning followers to deplatform sexual abusers.

The University, for its part, released a statement directing students to campus resources, including the Title IX office. But these limited resources are about to become even more toothless, as nationwide rules about Title IX offices that protect the accused are set to take effect within months. It needs to become easier, not harder, for survivors to get justice and GW should take action in pursuit of that goal.

It is unambiguously positive that survivors have been able to find support and empowerment from their peers. But this week is still a reminder of how common sexual assault is on college campuses and how hard it is for justice to be appropriately served.

Andrew Sugrue, a rising junior majoring in political communication, is the contributing opinions editor.

This article appeared in the July 17, 2020 issue of the Hatchet.

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Best and worst of this week's headlines: International students, sexual abuse - GW Hatchet

9 weeks till NZ election what does the political landscape look like? – thedailyblog.co.nz

So we are now 9 weeks until the 2020 NZ Election due on September 19th. The pandemic has generated an unforeseen unprecedented universal event that has generated a solidarity and a genuine gratitude of Jacindas leadership which is translating into political loyalty. That loyalty is being tested however by a resurgent National Party led by a toxic politician like Judith Collins who if elected would usher in a Government of Dirty Politics.

August 6: The House will rise

August 12: Parliament will be dissolved

September 2: Overseas voting starts

September 5: Advance voting starts

TDB Recommends NewzEngine.com

September 18: Advance voting ends and all election and referendum advertising must cease the night before election day with signs taken down by midnight.

September 19: Voting places will open from 9am until 7pm that night when election results will be released progressively.

October 2: Preliminary results for referendum votes on cannabis and end of life choice will be released.

October 9: Official results including special votes for the 2020 General Election and referendums declared.

The complacency of a Muller leadership must be replaced with genuine shock and horror at someone as toxic as Judith Collins becoming Prime Minister.

This election goes from rewarding Jacinda for her leadership through the terrorism, volcanism and pandemic, this election is now about stopping someone as dangerous as Crusher becoming PM and that means EVERY option of keeping Judith out of power must be on the table.

If the Greens and National look like they are slipping beneath 5%, then deals must be made in Northland and Auckland Central, the prospect of Crusher Collins as Prime Minister, highly unlikely as that is, can not be tolerated.

Labour have no choice but to fight back with policy that will actually fix problems rather than simply manage them.

National builds roads.Labour builds a Nation.

That must be the message Labour takes to the people in September.

In their moment of desperation and fear, National have selected a politician they cant control.

Crusher has sold a softer image of herself, but its just shallow re-branding. The truth is that she is the dirty politics player she has always been. Malice, spite and divisiveness, thats what is her political DNA so expect a campaign where she wont be able to help herself.

It wont be the policy that offends, as it will be made so loophole ridden National can define it any way they like, it will be Judith who wont be able to help herself.

The millisecond she loses the election, she will be dumped as leader, so she knows this is her one and only chance and that will in of itself create a pressure where she wont be able to help herself but go back to the dirty politics she is infamously known for.

Winston held his party launch in Auckland yesterday and his speech was interesting but not an election winner. The most extraordinary thing he had to say was todouble down on Oranga Tamariki child uplifts! Sweet Christ, of all the issues to champion????

Winston is busy in his speech fighting 20 year old battles it seems desperate and I cant see them gaining 5% off the back of this.

Which means Shanes run in Northland is crucial. The inclusion of the Brexit Dirty Politics team might inadvertently spark the angry white male vote via micro targeting adverts on Facebook, but the bile they will inadvertently release will become too politically noxious for the Greens and Labour to tolerate so could ultimately force Winston with no where else to go but National & ACT.

Now theres a terrifying thought National + NZ First + ACT as the Government?

Jesus wept, shoot me now.

I have argued the Greens are irrelevant because Labour are heading towards 50%+, but that was before Crusher and her skill set to arouse the worst angels of our nature, so the Greens getting back into Parliament is essential to keep Jacinda in power.

To this end Labour must consider handing Auckland Central over to the Greens if they arent looking likely to cross 5%. That call would need to be made at least a fortnight out from election day to have any impact on the day.

NZ First, ACT and National will all be attempting to goad woke green activists in social media to lose their shit over some petty micro aggression policing cancel culture deplatforming nonsense in the hope that the backlash spooks middle voters across to NZ First, ACT and National.

The Green Party need to come up with some positive busy work strategy to keep their Emerald Stormtroopers too distracted with some nothing online project in the hope to distract them from saying or doing anything alienating in these remaining 9 weeks. Try a Sunshine Project for the election where the Party urges social media supporters to hashtag why the are grateful for the Greens, anything to keep the woke too busy to say stupid shit.

When you twerk with the Devil in the pale moonlight, the Devil doesnt change, you do. ACTs flirtation with the gun fascists has ended with them taking his Party hostage the way Trump did with the Republican Party. The NZ NRA want to repeal the gun laws and are anti-1080 conspiracy fetishists.

Some of the anti 1080 stuff they believe is really Chem trail. Its glorious.

ACT have walked away from any ideological pretension that they are free market purists by going redneck on law and order with an appalling policy that would see the already outrageous proceeds of crimes act remove any safeguards and allow Police to seize private property. Who woulda thunk David Seymour would support State stormtroopers taking private property with no checks or balances other than the balance of probabilities?

Crusher Collins will take some of the shine off ACTs recent rise as the angry Right vote are excited by Judith.

My guess is that in their haste to cut a deal with the Gun Nuts, ACT hasnt spent much time on vetting their new NRA candidates. If I was a betting man, Id bet that information came out about 4 weeks from election day.

If I was a betting man.

Exploiting the deep sense of resentment by Mori towards the neoliberal welfare agencies the Government havent been able to tame, they stand to gain 2% plus a win in both Tamaki Makaurau and Te Tai Hauuru.

Sadly they havent built the momentum when they needed it. Risk getting a lower result than the New Conservatives.

Strip away any rationality, compassion and gentle sensibilities within Christianity and you have the New Conservative Party. Hateful of abortion, solo mothers, gays, solo mothers, cannabis and solo mothers, the New Conservatives love guns, patriarchy and more guns. Paranoid and frightened of any idea post the renaissance, the New Conservatives would represent a great leap backwards for New Zealand. Its political thinking is so inbred, I suspect they would want to relax laws around cousins marrying. Banjo playing with your toes and burning books is mandatory to be a candidate. I suspect Solo mums are not allowed to vote for the Party.

Hates all the same things as the New Conservatives but hates Muslims most.Brian Tamaki claimed yesterday at his central Auckland protest that Labour will make NZ a Socialist country and Ive NEVER been so excited & happy in my life. Reading through their policy, you suspect they consider eclipses to be inspired by Satan and believe Jacinda is the daughter of the Devils third cousin. I think Libraries and clitorises would be banned if Vision NZ came to power.

Now, you would have thought Vision NZ and the New Conservatives had covered off the entire spectrum of right wing crazy Christian, but lo and behold, theres another schism and its the ONE Party. They talk ALOT about The Kingdom which is bizarre for a democracy. Under ONE Party, I think Jesus becomes the Constitutional Head of State and God has to personally sign off on legislation. The NZDF would be given spirit spears to fight Satan with and anyone caught working on Sunday is put to death. I think under The One Party, Gay Conversion treatment is mandatory for anyone who watches Glee. I think electricity and any singing that isnt praising Jesus is also banned.

Desperate for political relevance, Jami Lee Ross, the former Machiavellian Svengali of the National Party, has started his own Party for the advancement of Jami Lee Ross. Under Advance NZ, Jami Lees Ross advances his own interests and anyone who wants to donate vast sums of money to the right while being recorded for it. Advance NZ wants freedom, sovereignty and independence for Jami Lee Ross. Think of it as a really expensive public rebranding exercise so JLR can get a job in Banking somewhere.

Wants to be the kingmaker of politics with lots of middle of the road opinions. Its that ugly blue green colour you have when environmentalism gets hit by capitalism. Has the kind of Mori buzz words you get when Wellington Bureaucrats are opening a sustainable pet crematorium.

Fresh from his tilt at the Auckland mayoralty, John Hong, NZs most active cheerleader for China, has formed his own Party and is aiming at the enormous Chinese diaspora in NZ to propel him into Parliament. For all the tea in China, Im not sure the Tea Party has read the tea leaves here. If the Tea Party syphons off votes from National and they dont reach the 5% threshold, Hong damages National and wastes all that vote. Its a win win for the Left, so I for one say, Keep going Mr Hong.

I love this Party, sure the Chinese puppet party is funny, various religious right wing nutters are entertaining and the vanity projects are a great self deluded laugh, but for pure insanity, the NZPP can not be surpassed. Their policy platform are a bunch of QaNON conspiracies all rolled into one vast narrative. The Covid-19 virus is a bioengineered weapon spread by 5G technology that is aimed to bring about a shadowy one world Government inside the UN. I cant satirise this, because it seems to be what they actually believe. The existence of the NZPP is an indictment on our public education system.

With the enrolment rule changes and booths in supermarkets and malls, I think we will see a large turnout.

I think overseas votes will go overwhelmingly to Labour and not the Greens.

I think with the huge number of fringe parties we will see more wasted vote than ever before.

I think the Government will be Labour + Greens

I think National will be 35%+

NZ First wont be politically relevant.

ACT will suffer rapid growth pains.

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9 weeks till NZ election what does the political landscape look like? - thedailyblog.co.nz