Friday, February 18, 2022

Every now and then The Guardian is worth a read

Usually when it has a scrumptious European recipe in its culinary section.  Otherwise?  I'll stick to supermarket tabloids for a more accurate take on current events. 

For instance, right here. Here is the ominous headline:


Heh.  Because the lack of stories about actual violence and destruction proves this warning needs to be published. 

And here is my favorite part in the whole darn so called "article": 

An early report, dated 27 January, Itac concluded that “a coordinated, complex terrorist attack or planned storming Parliament or other federal locations is unlikely”.

But it concludes that the potential for violence remained very real.

I loved that.  The report concludes a coordinated, complex terrorist attack is unlikely.  But then the Guardian "article" adds that the potential for violence remained very real.  

This is more fun than Pippi Longstocking.  Again, the only problem is that people lap this up like a thirsty dog.  Not because they're stupid enough to believe this bilge.  It's because they don't care. As long as their enemies are crushed, any means possible -  true, false or stupid - will do. 

UPDATE: Yet it works:


Mark accepts that narrative to give himself a blank check to simply ignore what he doesn't want to deal with.  An old trick to be sure. 

As I've said, propaganda works on both the weak and the willing minded.  Often the two being the same.  I know.  It's Mark.  But still, Mark's belief that the Left's enemies must be destroyed is just what this sort of drumbeat propaganda is meant to achieve.  And it isn't just Mark.  If it was, it would be funny.  But throughout history, there are plenty of Marks who will show up to fill the boxcars when the call goes forth that it's time. 

8 comments:

  1. Quote of the Day (saw it on Ace of Spades but didn't figure out the source).

    "Once one's political opponents have been blamed for all the ills the nation is suffering, and one is freed from the need to obtain court orders or respect due process, what remains to restrain the unscrupulous?"

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    1. I would say nothing is left. And those who want it to eliminate those things the most are the most unscrupulous of the lot. Consider Mark mocking them for comparing the Canadian government to Nazi Germany when all he did was compare the protesters to Nazis and racists. Absolutely no scruples there, and the kind such restraints were supposed to protect people from.

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  2. I'll never forget Mark Shea's support for the "Solar Freakin' Roadways" scam. He introduced the idea by linking to a video and saying that there are probably people who "mysteriously and instinctively oppose" it but he can't understand why.

    Commenters point out the many, many problems with the idea (the cost of materials is insanely high, you'll never get as much solar energy as claimed since most roads are not in direct sunlight, the claims that they will be able to melt all snow on the roads would require so much energy as to make the project pointless, etc.) Every time Mark responds either by saying that those problems could easily be ironed out given a little research, or that the commenters are instantly and irrationally dismissing the idea.

    Because it was non-political, it gave me a clearer insight into Mark's thought process: he just latches on to an idea, comes up with a narrative for why people would support or oppose it, and then ignores all evidence and arguments from that point onwards. There's really no substantial difference between him saying that there is no reason to oppose "Solar Freakin' Roadways," even immediately after being told the problems with it, and with him saying that there is no good reason for a Catholic to want to defend the legitimacy of the Death Penalty, even immediately after the theologian Dr. Feser explains to him why there is.

    But with something like Solar Freakin' Roadways there is no real support for it now, so he looks obviously like a loon for acting like that. When he supports a popular woke cause of the left he can easily find dozens of other prominent Catholics supporting the same thing, and thus he seems less crazy, even though his actions and reasoning are exactly the same.

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    1. That really has a ring of truth to it. Shea's problem really does seem to be a demonic pride, which inevitably bears other vices as fruit. By no means is he alone in this, but the progression has been clear for all to see. That said, it's also old news. It is a mistake to cover him because some poor misguided souls might think he speaks for the Church, just as it would be a mistake to cover Playboy Magazine in the fear that some poor misguided souls might think that, if you took out the nudity, it would be just like the New Oxford Review.

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    2. That's a great analysis of that part of Mark's problems. Long before he went barking mad left, I remember a debate on his old blog. It was to do with something about the Church and its alliance with science. Someone posted a lengthy comment about a million paragraphs on how the simplistic understanding of flight and imagining it just evolving on its own didn't hold up to actual science, much less common sense. I think the individual claimed to be a scientist, or at least quoting one. In any event, Mark fired back that he was just arguing 'God of the Gaps', which the Church rejects. The commenter - and others - said agree or disagree, he isn't saying anything about God of the Gaps. But Mark just responded with the same statement again and again. I think everyone gave up. That's when I realized Mark had serious limits when it comes to discussing things.

      That simply repeat the same thing over and over again, and assume worst motives for anyone who dares even correct him, much less disagree, has become his main approach to online discourse.

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    3. @Rudolph, spot on. Yeah, for me it was his "gun-control" posts. Namely that he believed we should work towards a smart gun future where all old guns would be obsolete and all guns in society would be "smart" and never useable by criminals.

      Any attempt at pointing out that guns are absurdly simple machines and that trying to implement this would be like trying to implement "smart" tire swings while ensuring nobody ever hung one on their own. His replies were always "give up, won't work" in a snarky tone. The most substantial rebuttal was that if we could go to the moon, we could do this.

      Even though he would often say something like, "I'm an English major, not an engineer but..." and some of us would respond with, "Yeah, and we're ACTUAL engineers so..."

      He really lived down to the stereotype of why other majors get mocked by STEM majors.

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    4. Nate, I remember that crazy. I remember after the awful Sandy Hook shooting. Granted we were all a bit shaken by that, and I'll give a pass to a degree. But he really went over the top with variations on 'you don't care about murdered children/you would have us live in caves' in his discourse. What I think about is that someone he admired - I can't remember who, but it was one of those Mark's Circle people - basically stepped in and said what so many of us were saying about the various ideas Mark was promoting. At that, Mark posted his argument and sang its praises as the kind of arguments gun people should make. Several of us pointed out we were making the same exact arguments, at which Mark again unloaded on us.

      The point being, Mark condemned those who weren't Mark Approved while giving someone who was Mark Approved a pass, or even outright praise. A very bad way to do arguments, much less Christian morality.

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