Seeking Truth in a World of Propaganda. Links do not necessarily indicate agreement with stories or perspectives.
“Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood, let alone believed, by the masses.” - Plato
Thursday, July 25, 2019
Wednesday, July 24, 2019
YouTube Bans Dave Collum's "Conspiracy Theory" Podcast For "Violating Its Hate Speech Policy"
YouTube Bans Dave Collum's "Conspiracy Theory" Podcast For "Violating Its Hate Speech Policy"
Tuesday, July 23, 2019
MH17 Evidence-Tampering Exposed: Cover-Ups, Hiding Records, Witness Misreporting, & FBI Seizures
MH17 Evidence-Tampering Exposed: Cover-Ups, Hiding Records, Witness Misreporting, & FBI Seizures
Taylor Swift’s Soviet Style Humor
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In the music video for her most recent single, “You Need to Calm Down,” Taylor Swift portrays religious Americans as toothless, hateful know-nothings who irrationally oppose the fun and individual autonomy enjoyed by the liberated gay community.
Sunshine on the street at the parade
But you would rather be in the dark age
Just making that sign…
We figured you out
We all know now
We all got crowns
You need to calm down.
In her video, Swift reclines in a colorful lawn chair as a crowd of religious bigots scream at her from the other side of a drag queen’s fabulous runway. At the end of the video, Swift asks her fans to sign a petition to put a bill before congress that would legislate against the rights of Christian businessowners, non-profits, and churches.
This kind of derision – bold political action packaged as light entertainment – is a common technique used by the propaganda ministries of totalitarian regimes. Just as totalitarian regimes manufacture fake news, they also promote fake satire.
The Soviets had a state-sanctioned “satire” magazine called Krokodil that was the comedic branch of the state’s newspaper, the Worker’s Gazette. Krokodil smeared ethnic groups that allegedly did not support the communist regime. Like the Worker’s Gazette, the Krokodil never criticized the Soviet regime itself, which is typically the subject of comedy in a free society. Instead, Krokodil aimed its jokes, humor, and entertainment at those backward groups throughout the Soviet empire rumored to not have fully supported the Revolution.
The point of the Krokodil magazine was not to illicit genuine laughs, it was to intimidate and instill fear. Krokodil emphasized the idea that those who opposed the regime were too weak to resist for long. This kind of propaganda plays to the masses’ cowardice and herd mentality. Most men take the path of least resistance and would rather stand behind the schoolyard bully as he mocks the weak than resist him. A schoolyard bully is often followed by a cowardly entourage that will laugh compulsively at his jokes.
You might think that comparing pop music videos and American pulp media to the Soviet regime is a bit much, but it makes perfect sense when we acquaint ourselves with the concept of Cultural Marxism – a postmodern branch of communist theory that calls for a revolt against the traditional moral norms of Western Civilization. Cultural Marxism essentially holds that sexual repression is a class issue, and in order to make everyone equal, the masses of misfits must smash the patriarchy and every one of its rigid and repressive rules.
This is clearly the underlying message of Taylor Swift’s video. This isn’t satire about religious Americans. This is an effort to marginalize them as an “other.”
Swift’s “satirical” video stands in sharp contrast to earlier portrayals of Christians in American satire. Take the Evangelical “Ned Flanders” character from “The Simpsons” as an example.
Matt Groening portrays Flanders as dorky, a bit out of touch, and perhaps a bit overzealous from time to time. However, Groening gives Flanders credit for being moral and upright in a culture of moral anomie. For every dozen dorky Christian jokes, Flanders has a moment or two of moral insight and demonstrates his compassion.
Real satire is marked by its capacity and eagerness to critique the existing regime and culture. The Simpsons portrayed Christian conservatives as an integral part of American society. Swift’s video portrays religious Americans as a backward minority, a group of outsiders that “we” ought to legislate against.
Entertainment that dares not critique the the status quo and instead targets groups that don’t fit in is top-down bullying. When this type of crocodile humor is bound up with political action, as in the music video, “You Need to Calm Down,” it’s quite obvious that the goal is not to critique but to bully and affect political action and cultural revolution.
[Image Credit: YouTube]
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Monday, July 22, 2019
America, Google and me: My Senate speech
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Last week, at the invitation of Sen. Ted Cruz, I spoke to the Senate Judiciary Committee about Google’s having placed more than 60 Prager University videos on its restricted list. Any family that filters out pornography and violence cannot see those particular videos on YouTube (which is owned by Google); nor can any school or library.
This statement is as much about what I and PragerU stand for as it is about Google. Those interested in viewing the presentation can do so here:
It is an honor to be invited to speak in the United States Senate. But I wish I were not so honored. Because the subject of this hearing – Google and YouTube’s (and for that matter, Twitter and Facebook’s) suppression of internet content on ideological grounds – threatens the future of America more than any external enemy.
In fact, never in American history has there been as strong a threat to freedom of speech as there is today.
Before addressing this, however, I think it important that you know a bit about me and the organization I co-founded, Prager University – PragerU, as it often referred to.
I was born in Brooklyn, New York. My late father, Max Prager, was a CPA and an Orthodox Jew who volunteered to serve in the U.S. Navy at the start of World War II. My father’s senior class thesis at the City College of New York was on anti-Semitism in America. Yet, despite his keen awareness of the subject, he believed that Jews living in America were the luckiest Jews to have ever lived.
He was right. Having taught Jewish history at Brooklyn College, written a book on anti-Semitism and fought Jew-hatred my whole life, I thank God for living in America.
It breaks my heart that a vast number of young Americans have not only not been taught how lucky they are to be Americans, but have been taught either how unlucky they are or how ashamed they should be.
It breaks my heart for them because contempt for one’s country leaves a terrible hole in one’s soul and because ungrateful people always become unhappy and angry people.
And it breaks my heart for America because no good country can survive when its people have contempt for it.
I have been communicating this appreciation of America for 35 years as a radio talk show host, the last 20 in national syndication with the Salem Radio Network – an organization that is a blessing in American life. One reason I started PragerU was to communicate America’s moral purpose and moral achievements, both to young Americans and to young people around the world. With a billion views a year, and with more than half of the viewers under age 35, PragerU has achieved some success.
My philosophy of life is easily summarized: God wants us to be good. Period. God without goodness is fanaticism and goodness without God will not long endure. Everything I and PragerU do emanates from belief in the importance of being a good person. That some label us extreme or “haters” only reflects on the character and the broken moral compass of those making such accusations. They are the haters and extremists.
PragerU releases a five-minute video every week. Our presenters include three former prime ministers, four Pulitzer Prize winners, liberals, conservatives, gays, blacks, Latinos, atheists, believers, Jews, Christians, Muslims and professors and scientists from MIT, Harvard, Stanford and a dozen other universities.
Do you think the secretary-general of NATO; or the former prime ministers of Norway, Canada or Spain; or the late Charles Krauthammer; or Philip Hamburger, distinguished professor of law at Columbia Law School, would make a video for an extreme or hate-filled site? The idea is not only preposterous; it is a smear.
Yet, Google, which owns YouTube, has restricted access to 56 of our 320 five-minute videos and to other videos we produce. “Restricted” means families that have a filter to avoid pornography and violence cannot see that video. It also means that no school or library can show that video.
Google has even restricted access to a video on the Ten Commandments … Yes, the Ten Commandments!
We have repeatedly asked Google why our videos are restricted. No explanation is ever given.
But of course, we know why: because they come from a conservative perspective.
Liberals and conservatives differ on many issues. But they have always agreed that free speech must be preserved. While the left has never supported free speech, liberals always have. I therefore appeal to liberals to join us in fighting on behalf of America’s crowning glory – free speech. Otherwise, I promise you, one day you will say, “First they came after conservatives, and I said nothing. And then they came after me. And there was no one left to speak up for me.”
Thank you.
The post America, Google and me: My Senate speech appeared first on WND.
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