MelodicAthlete
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User ID: 1861
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Based on these notebooks, we're not looking at another Unabomber. "Retarded Angry Kid" seems correct. Extremist rhetoric sometimes trickles down to these types and has tragic results. Various shootings have been done by Alt-Right Retarded Angry Kids in recent years.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
The biggest surprise to me is that it doesn't really mention being discriminated against for being trans.
Steven Crowder released it, so a possibility is that there are 100 pages and he only released the 3 that indicate anti-white and anti-Christian bigotry. Of course all of this can be resolved by making the diaries public.
Also semi-surprising to me is their repeated use of the word "faggot" as an insult.
This makes me believe it's real. If someone forged this to make a trans shooter look bad, an anti-gay slur is the last thing they would think of. It's bizarre and seemingly out of place, which puts it in "schizo ramblings" territory.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Saying that it's protected expression is correct in both cases. This is different than celebrating the guy who ran over Heather Heyer, which is the equivalent of what many on the pro-Hamas side ("this is what decolonization looks like" sentiments) did the day after the 10/7 attacks. I'm sure you can find people who supported the Charlottesville driver, and I agree they shouldn't get jobs at big law firms and should be deplatformed from social media.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
The mirror here would be mainstream conservatives saying that KKK/Neo-Nazi types are a negligible % of the right. If you're a mainstream conservative, you find these people embarrassing and don't want to be associated with them. It's psychologically easier to pretend they just don't exist rather than acknowledging that a troubling group that votes the same way you do.
A problem here is the disparate treatment in mainstream culture. After Charlottesville, nobody on the right defended the tiki torch people. Media falsely attributed the Fine People quote to Neo-Nazis in an effort to tie them into the broader political right. Contrast that with rediscovered staunch free speech principles and special support groups set up for people literally celebrating terrorism and cheering on Hamas. "Stupid college kids" are a very important group when it comes to mobilization, so in theory it should be easier to albatross the political left with their existence.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Yes it does. Unless you mean the following: Jews are unsafe in Gaza. But if Hamas were to take over Israel, they would change their behavior.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
What makes you think "hospital workers" will be given the freedom to come up with an authoritative statement that is independent of Hamas' messaging on this? Did Hamas allow 3rd party investigators in to survey the blast, collect shrapnel fragments, etc? If this were an Israeli strike, isn't it in their interest to allow outsiders to investigate the site?
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Hamas is either covering up evidence or they're missing a golden PR opportunity.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
This is the point. There is no way this becomes a major international story that dominates discourse if we knew what we know today about the location and size of the blast. But the misinformation got out and we're dealing with the fallout.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
There is no way this event would have been front page news, knowing what we know now. "Parking Lot bombed, 30 killed" doesn't have the same ring as "Hospital bombed, 500 killed".
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Anyway, I'm sure if a Tamir had hit the hospital, Hamas would be parading the pieces through the streets by now.
This is really is the most important piece of evidence. Within minutes of the blast, this was international news. If it had been an Israeli missile, wouldn't Hamas be highly incentivized to allow Western investigators full access to the debris the next day? Have they done anything like this? If instead, they hastily scrubbed the area of any evidence, that points to them being responsible.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
The big picture here is that Hamas claimed a hospital was bombed by Israel and 500-800 people were killed. Mainstream outlets, including NYT, ran with that narrative. A hospital was not bombed and I don't think there is a credible estimate on deaths. The downstream effects of this misinformation included widespread anti-Israel demonstrations in the Middle East and cancelled meetings between Arab and Western countries. The NYT faced a lot of backlash over this and isn't exactly a disinterested party. Israel being responsible for the blast would help them save some face.
Let's say the NYT knew everything it knows now. Would "parking lot bombed, 30 people killed" have caused this much ruckus. Instead, ISRAEL BOMBS HOSPITAL is what is anchored in the minds of Middle Easterners.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
For what it's worth, you're right on the nose with his career earnings in the NFL: https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/carolina-panthers/michael-oher-5484/cash-earnings/
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Part of me is stunned that he isn't cancelled due to the extreme nature of his old posts. However, Richard has God-tier levels of cunning. If you look at his latest twitter posts, he's still referencing racial issues, ADA scams, and even retweeted Steve Sailer. This has to be endlessly frustrating to his would be cancellers.
How did he thread the needle? Some assorted thoughts:
- He apologized but didn't grovel. He owed an explanation to his readers. He didn't seek forgiveness from Cristopher Mathias or the NAACP or whoever. This latter strategy never works because they just want to make an example of you.
- Pointed out the political nature of the cancellation and Mathias' affection for Antifa. Makes it hard to support the cancellation if you're on the right.
- Not panicking. He didn't automatically assume he's getting cancelled and must go into exile. He put it in his supporters' mind that the cancellation will fail.
- Gave a plausible reason for his change in views. "I came back from extremism" is something that is broadly appealing to more centrist politicos.
- He avoided the cascade effect of cancellation where cancellers will pick the weakest target and get them to capitulate. This provides Social Proof for the cancellation, leading to a domino effect. On twitter, he reposted people who supported him, downplayed getting dropped from UT, pointed out his skyrocketing book sales, and promoted the idea that he was getting a lot of new job offers. This is social proof in his favor: "Look at everyone who sympathizes with me!"
Richard isn't the most sympathetic cancellation target, but this episode is heartening in that it shows that there are ways to avoid cancellation and that it's not inevitable that the left will always define the boundaries of political debate.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Yeah my comment was mostly alluding to this. He has no influence over conservatism, but perhaps progressives who read the NYT might think he speaks for "the conscience" of conservatism.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
This is like "other ways of knowing" for the wealthy.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
The progressive hissy fit over the end Affirmative Action continues to be hilarious. A few assorted thoughts:
- The sense I get is that progressives want to take a scalp as revenge for AA being over, but I don't think I've ever seen a widespread effort by conservatives to defend legacy admissions. The primary beneficiaries seem to be a handful of wealthy/connected applicants and the administrations of elite colleges, who get dump trucks of cash and connections to powerful people.
- The top 0.1% getting a significant bump has a marginal effect on overall admissions, and I doubt the beneficiaries skew conservative.
- Turning off a major source of funding for higher education seems like something progressives should avoid doing. Conservatives are already hostile towards higher education due to academia's dominant leftist political orthodoxy. If you believe in the signaling theory of education, then crude cuts to funding are the best first step.
- Similar to (3), ending legacy admits seems to be a good step toward reducing the prestige/social cachet of elite higher education.
- The smartest strategy for conservatives might be to have David French types write op-eds defending legacy admits. This way progressives think we care about it a lot, spend a lot of time and effort ending legacy admits, and removing influence/money from an important liberal institution.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Anyways, shoutouts to this whole debacle for rekindling my fear of women, and quenching my fear of missing out.
Meet women in real life, they're not crazy IRL like they are on reddit.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
That's true, but now it's unconstitutional and a violation of Civil Rights.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Right, and with this decision there will be a lot of pressure for UC to become less enthusiastic about skirting the law because it just takes one admissions officer or dean of whatever to say the quiet part out loud in an email.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
There will continue to be bias, but I think the difference now is that there is actual clarity in the law and monetary consequences for the losers. Any kind of wink-nod policies are going to have to survive potential whistleblowers and legal discovery.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
Admissions offices are ideological, I just don't think they're this suicidal. I don't think this decision is some silver bullet, but any "tinkering" that Universities will do will make them targets for lawsuits. Affirmative action will continue in some form, but it's going to be much more marginal as opposed to a heavy thumb on the scale. There is only so much Universities can accomplish without explicitly using race as a criteria.
I'm pretty cynical, but many posters here are taking it too far. If you're opposed to affirmative action, this is a good day not only for the decision but for the embarrassingly bad arguments put up by Harvard, UNC, and the dissenting justices. It's also a wildly unpopular policy, so the public will back up the decision.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
That's correct, there was a lot of coordination. Today's decision had the following text from UNC admissions officers:
"[P]erfect 2400 SAT All 5 on AP one B in 11th [grade].”
“Brown?!”
“Heck no. Asian.”
“Of course. Still impressive.”
Do anyone think this will be allowed going forward?
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
I know these institutions seem like hiveminds, but there has to be some level of actual coordination to pull off affirmative action as it has been practiced. If Universities attempt an end run around the ruling, then the whole admissions process will be open to discovery and one email or whistleblower will blow the whole thing up. I know Middlebury and Harvard PR teams have put out statements to this effect, but I think cooler heads will prevail. University endowments are a big fat target for lawsuits and alumni donors won't appreciate it being ransacked for progressive brownie points. Universities won't be able to operate in the shadows knowing that they will need to meet a strict scrutiny standard for their admissions process.
MelodicAthlete
1yr ago
There is going to be a lot of legal scrutiny for any institution that tries to implement the old system by other means. How does a University actually implement this policy without incriminating texts/emails? A University can't have emails to their admissions officers that "being from a black community is hardship wink" or they'll be violating the Civil Rights of other applicants.
In your own quote, he says "I ultimately concluded that antisemitism was not the core of the problem" and then continues his 5000 word post calling DEI racist and explicitly condemning white racism as equal to all other types. Take the W, what else do you want?
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