Tuesday, September 22, 2020


Spare me this sanctimonious Facebook and Instagram boycott by hypocritical liberal celebrities who want to have their abusive hateful violent cake and eat it

By PIERS MORGAN

Today, a large number of celebrities are boycotting Facebook and Instagram, which Facebook now owns.

Reality TV wastrel Kim Kardashian West led the ‘movement’ by posting the following message to her gazillions of followers: ‘I love that I can connect directly with you through Instagram and Facebook,’ she wrote, ‘but I can’t sit by and stay silent while these platforms continue to allow the spreading of hate, propaganda and misinformation – created by groups to sow division and split America apart – only to take steps after people are killed. Misinformation shared on social media has a serious impact on our elections and undermines our democracy. Please join me when I will be ‘freezing’ my Instagram and FB account to tell Facebook to #StopHateForProfit. Link in bio for more info on how to preserve truth.’

Powerful words, and ones that were quickly embraced by scores of other famous names.

One of them was comedian Sarah Silverman who is also very keen to #StopHateForProfit. Ms Silverman knows all about spreading hate on social media.

In the past few years she has tweeted that Donald Trump is a ‘pathological nasty pig’ and a ‘c*nty fear monger’, and called his father a ‘racist c*nt.’

When the President mocked former democratic presidential candidate Amy Klouchar for talking about climate change while ‘standing in a virtual blizzard of snow’, Silverman tweeted him directly to say: ‘No point in explaining how mind blowingly stupid this tweet is so I’m just gonna go with F*CK YOU, and also add that you are a smelly p*nis hole with balls that touch water. Eat sh*t, you greedy tw*t.’

She expanded on her thoughts about Trump’s genitalia after he criticized his predecessor Barack Obama.

‘I’d love to see Trump say any of this sh*t he’s saying about Obama to his face,’ she tweeted. ‘There’s no way he’d have the labs to even do just that. He’s an oozing shriveled p*nis hole of a man.’

It’s not just Trump who annoys Silverman. ‘I don’t mean this in a hateful way,’ she once tweeted, hatefully, ‘but the new bachelorette’s a f*ggot.’

On another occasion she tweeted a photo of herself in blackface with the caption ‘I’m having minstrel cramps.’

And she posted this ‘joke’: ‘I used to go out with a guy who was half black who totally broke up with me because I’m a f*cking loser. I just heard myself say that. I’m such a pessimist. He’s half-white.’

Perhaps the real reason Silverman wants to get rid of ‘hate for profit’ is because she herself is a nasty foul-mouthed homophobic racist?

Another of the stars to join the boycott is film director Judd Apatow, who is also very active on social media, and has repeatedly called Trump things like a ‘malignant narcissist’, and a ‘pig’.

Apatow once tweeted – and then deleted after it sparked outrage – footage of left-wing activists rioting violently outside University of California-Berkeley to stop far-right political commentator Milo Yiannopoulos making a speech – and said: ‘This is just the beginning. When will all the fools who are still supporting Trump realize what is at stake?’

Hmmn, how does that open call for violence sit with wanting to stop violence?

Apatow also objected to People magazine, one of the world’s least offensive publications, from running a positive story about Trump’s family, raging on Twitter: ‘F*ck People magazine. How disgusting. Selling their soul. Sell those mags! F*ck your employees.’

Lovely!

Movie star Amy Schumer has also joined the boycott. The woman who once said: ‘I used to date Hispanic guys, but now I prefer consensual.’

And who tweeted: ‘Enjoy skyfall f-gs. I’m bout to get knee deep in Helen Hunt #thesessions.’

It would appear that being a racist homophobe may be a specific requirement for stopping hate and division…

As for Ms Kardashian West, perhaps she should focus on the constant stream of hateful guff that spews from the unhinged Twitter mouth of her husband Kanye West (he was at it again all last night) before lecturing the rest of us?

Even by the standards of celebrity virtue-signalling during this pandemic-ridden year, the new Facebook/Instagram boycott seems particularly pointless and self-serving.

These valiant crusading heroes are all doing this for … one day.

Yes, their sacrifice will last precisely 24 hours.

Then the fearless campaigners will go straight back to aggressively and cynically using Facebook and Instagram to boost their own profiles and profits, with many of them also going back to spewing the same vile hate that they profess to loathe in others.

Make no mistake, every single one of the big names taking part in this farce makes a fortune from those social platforms.

Leonardo DiCaprio wrote: ‘I do use Instagram and Facebook, but I want it to be a force for good – not hate, violence, and disinformation.’ Olivia Wilde wrote, ‘These platforms are profiting off becoming a dangerous tool of discrimination’

Kardashian-West has ruthlessly exploited it to such a successful extent that she can now charge firms up to $1 million for a single Instagram post.

A one-day boycott will thus have zero impact on her ability to keep coining it in from the very same people she claims are failing the American people so badly by causing so much hate and disunity.

If she and her famous pals REALLY believe Facebook is such a malevolent force, then they should quit its platforms completely.

But they won’t, because that would cost them millions.

Facebook now employs 35,000 people whose only job it is to remove hateful material. They’re not going to stop it all, because that would be impossible, but they certainly can’t be accused of turning a blind eye to it.

But what these protesting liberal celebrities really want is all material removed that THEY hate, not any hate that comes from their own mouths.

They demand Trump and his supporters be censored, for example, whilst reserving the right to be as viciously hateful as they wish towards them without any censorship.

And by publicly boycotting Facebook and Instagram like this, they’re trying to use their celebrity power to bully and shame a company that defends free speech a hell of a lot more than they do.

If I were Zuckerberg, I’d call their sanctimonious bluff and announce that any of the stars involved who don’t start posting again by 6pm tonight will be permanently banned from Facebook and Instagram.

Trust me, they’d all come scuttling back faster than Kim Kardashian-West rakes in dollars by posting topless bird-flipping selfies.

SOURCE

Today and Yesterday

by Walter E Williams

In matters of race and other social phenomena, there is a tendency to believe that what is seen today has always been. For black people, the socioeconomic progress achieved during my lifetime, which started in 1936, exceeded anyone’s wildest dreams. In 1936, most black people lived in gross material poverty and racial discrimination. Such poverty and discrimination is all but nonexistent today. Government data, assembled by Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation, shows that “the average American family … identified as poor by the Census Bureau, lives in an air-conditioned, centrally heated house or apartment … They have a car or truck. (Indeed, 43 percent of poor families own two or more cars.)” The household “has at least one widescreen TV connected to cable, satellite, or a streaming service, a computer or tablet with internet connection, and a smartphone. (Some 82 percent of poor families have one or more smartphones.” On top of this, blacks today have the same constitutional guarantees as everyone else, which is not to say that every vestige of racial discrimination has been eliminated.

The poverty we have today is spiritual poverty. Spiritual poverty is an absence of what traditionally has been known as various human virtues. Much of that spiritual poverty is a result of public and private policy that rewards inferiority and irresponsibility. Chief among the policies that reward inferiority and irresponsibility is the welfare state. When some people know they can have children out of wedlock, drop out of school and refuse employment and suffer little consequence and social sanction, one should not be surprised to see the growth of such behavior. Today’s out-of-wedlock births among blacks is over 70 percent, but in the 1930s, it was 11 percent. During the same period, out-of-wedlock births among whites was 3 percent; today, it is over 30 percent. It is fashionable and politically correct to blame today’s 21 percent black poverty on racial discrimination. That is nonsense. Why? The poverty rate among black husband-and-wife families has been in the single digits for more than two decades. Can anyone produce evidence that racists discriminate against black female-headed families but not black husband-and-wife families?

For most people, education is one of the steppingstones out of poverty, and it has been a steppingstone for many black people. Today, decent education is just about impossible at many big-city public schools where violence, disorder, disrespect and assaults on teachers are routine. The kind of disrespectful and violent behavior observed in many predominantly black schools is entirely new. Some have suggested that such disorder is part of black culture, but that is an insulting lie. Black people can be thankful that double standards, and public and private policies rewarding inferiority and irresponsibility, were not broadly accepted during the 1920s, ’30s, ’40s and ’50s. There would not have been the kind of intellectual excellence and spiritual courage that created the world’s most successful civil rights movement.

Many whites are ashamed, saddened and guilt-ridden by our history of slavery, Jim Crow and gross racial discrimination. They see that justice and compensation for that ugly history is to hold their fellow black Americans accountable to the kind of standards and conduct they would never accept from whites. That behavior and conduct is relatively new. Meet with black people in their 70s or older, even liberal politicians such as Charles Rangel (age 90), and Reps. Eddie Bernice Johnson (85), Alcee Hastings (83) and Maxine Waters (82). Ask them whether their parents would have tolerated their assaulting and cursing of teachers or any other adult. I bet you the rent money their parents and other parents of that era would not have accepted the grossly disrespectful behavior seen today among many black youngsters who use foul language and racial epithets at one another. These older blacks will tell you that, had they behaved that way, they would have felt serious pain in their hind parts. If blacks of yesteryear would not accept such self-destructive behavior, why should today’s blacks accept it?

Black people have made tremendous gains over the years that came as a result of hard work, sacrifice and a no-nonsense approach to life. Recovering those virtues can provide solutions to many of today’s problems.

SOURCE

‘He’s a Man of His Word’: Michigan Woman Sounds Off on Why She Supports the President

Donna, a resident in the Saginaw, Michigan area – one of the areas that went for President Barack Obama in 2012 and President Donald Trump in 2016 – said she is absolutely supporting the president in November.

“He’s a man of his word. He’s helped the economy. He’s helped create jobs. He’s done everything he said he was going to do,” Donna told Townhall. “If he had more support, he’d probably be able to get more done.”

According to Donna, President Trump’s status as a Washington outside is an asset. In her eyes, politicians inside the Beltway “stick together” as part of the “Good Ol’ Boys Club.”

“He’s an outside and he doesn’t care what they think. He’s a businessman first and knows how to take care of business,” she explained.

Both Donna and her husband, Bill, said that their life has greatly improved under President Trump. Their investments, including their stock market picks and 401(K)s have skyrocketed.

“We’ve done so much better and, being retired, that’s a big thing,” Donna said.

The unfortunate part, however, is that the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic has taken its toll on small businesses. In Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) locked things down rather quickly and implemented a statewide mask mandate. She came under fire for keeping stores from selling things like gardening seeds. Whitmer even went so far as banning people from traveling between two residences, specifically if their main residence is in the Detroit area. But, in her mind, her orders were “one of the nation’s more conservative” stay-at-home orders.

Donna, however, said Whitmer’s orders are “Communist tactics” that are used to “control the masses.” She believes some of these lockdown orders were part of Whitmer’s attempt at becoming former Vice President Joe Biden’s running mate.

“That obviously didn’t work for her because she’s not his veep pick,” the Michigander said.

SOURCE

DR MAX PEMBERTON: Instagram is so damaging for teen girls it should be for over-18s only

Kim Kardashian, the reality star, has joined a host of celebrities and suspended her social media accounts for a campaign called #StopHateForProfit. The aim is to highlight the inadequate action taken by social media bosses to tackle the pernicious aspects of these platforms.

But hang on, Kim Kardashian? Sorry, I’m not buying this sanctimonious, hypocritical tripe. How dare celebrities like her lecture anyone on the evils of social media, when they have made fortunes from posting tweaked, airbrushed or stage-managed images which directly contribute to the epidemic of poor self-esteem and mental health problems gripping young women.

Not only are they corrupting and warping the minds of an entire generation of innocent young people, they are getting paid in the process. And then they feel at liberty to lecture us. The whole thing stinks.

And yes, I’m angry about this because day in and day out at my NHS clinic I see the effect of social media on the young.

For ten years I specialised in treating eating disorders and literally every single one of hundreds of teenage patients mentioned social media as a contributing factor. Every. Single. One.

But there’s absolutely no doubt that social media has created a hyper-critical environment when it comes to body image and this can trigger issues with food.

This should concern every parent and grandparent because it’s not just confined to those at risk of eating disorders.

There’s also the general gnawing effect social media has on self-esteem and self-worth, the slow, steady rubbing away of self-confidence that being bombarded with unrealistic images of people’s bodies has on the mind.

We worry about the effect of things such as porn and violent films and video games, but I worry more about Instagram and Facebook precisely because they seem so innocuous. What’s bad about keeping in touch with friends?

What some fail to appreciate is that these platforms have morphed into a monster, and the effect of seeing a steady stream of artificially perfect bodies is enormous.

Instagram and Facebook require you to be 13 before you create an account, but I firmly believe they should be banned for under 18s.

Between 14 and 18 youngsters are at a key developmental stage when they start to look outside of themselves and at their peers to develop a sense of identity.

They are particularly impressionable and susceptible to malignant messages about their bodies, yet on sites like Instagram they are inundated with images that set up unrealistic ideas about physical appearance. There’s no escaping it: it promotes feelings of inadequacy and anxiety.

It’s not just young girls. I’ve seen a steady rise in young men using steroids in an attempt to replicate the chiselled torsos they now think are perfectly normal. I’m convinced all this is fuelling the epidemic of conditions like anxiety and depression we are now seeing.

I constantly go on about this to my younger patients, trying to explain that what they see online isn’t real. But in truth it has little effect.

And there’s no getting away from it — for the younger generation, social media is now an integral part of their lives.

Netflix’s chilling new documentary, The Social Dilemma, shows what a firm grip social media has on the minds of the young. It features a series of top tech experts issuing stark warnings about the addictive qualities of social media, how it is designed to keep users coming back for more and manipulates emotion.

It’s inevitable the drip, drip of images will take its toll: Celebrities wearing skimpy summer dresses and wan smiles, insist their bodies are the results of cutting out entire food groups and omit to say they also spend hours in the gym, have good genetics and — most importantly — rely on carefully photoshopping their images.

Research suggests Instagram is one of the worst social media platforms for mental health precisely because of its disconnect from reality, and, from what I see in my clinic, I have to agree.

This site is made up of contrived, manipulated images designed to get likes and clicks. And celebrities are some of the worst offenders not least because young people look up to them and hang on their every word.

Young people believe these images are real, that their favourite influencers would never sell them a lie.

Which is why we need to be stricter about the user age — and raise it to 18. If celebrities really cared about social media’s toxic effect, this is the campaign they’d get behind.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American “liberals” often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of other countries. The only real difference, however, is how much power they have. In America, their power is limited by democracy. To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already very powerful: in America’s educational system — particularly in the universities and colleges. They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did: None. So look to the colleges to see what the whole country would be like if “liberals” had their way. It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and DISSECTING LEFTISM. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here. Email me (John Ray) here.
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