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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 9, 2024

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The emphasis on the cats and ducks has a strong potential to backfire, it can be dismissed with questions like yours. The better approach would be to focus on the human element. Maybe the woman in that clip is a secret Alt-Righter with an explicit agenda.

By the way, the only reason we are talking about this is because Elon Musk bought Twitter. The clip I just linked has 11M views. Without Musk allowing this discourse on Twitter the only indication of this all happening would be through the lens of the Corporate Press.

It looks like it is backfiring.

right now, the most common claims on the issue are turning out to be false

And frankly, it should backfire. When most prominent stories that conservatives are sharing are false, then why should I not be skeptical of the whole thing? You'd think the onus would be on them to come up with the most easily-verifiable, most rock-solid claim.

Because there is plenty of evidence for the most important reasons you should be opposed to the mass resettlement of Haitians into your community? Like an 11 year old boy who was killed by a Haitian immigrant in that community?

"The Kitten thing was a Twitter meme, so now I'm not sure there's at all a problem with flooding a town with Haitians" is going to be the response by people like you.

JD Vance's office reports direct eyewitness testimony of residents from local wildlife being abducted by Haitian immigrants. Beleeb witnesses. Although, that's not even a significant reason to oppose this compared to the other reasons.

Do you know what's confirmed? That a child was murdered by a Haitian migrant who had no right to be here. That local health services have been overwhelmed. That communicable diseases--like TB and HIV--have been on the rise. That local schools have struggled to keep up with newcomers who don't know English. That rents have risen so fast that many Springfield families can't afford to put a roof over their head.

Are there really ~20k new Haitian immigrants in Springfield though? If so, I didn't know this before, and probably neither did you.

So it's not backfiring.

You don't need to spread fake news in order to get people to be aware of the new Haitian immigrants in that city.

You don't need to get on a plane to get to New York City either, but it's certainly convenient and effective.

That'd be nice if true, but I'm not sure if it is. Vance gave a speech mentioning the immigration itself in early July, and Moreno was not long behind him. Right-wing and especially local media have been focused on it for at least two months.

It's not even the first version of the 'big jump in immigrants compared to local population', if somewhat higher in size, nor the first time it isn't happening turned into its happening and good. It's just that normally the path is local media covers it at all, Red Tribe media talks up some of the actual issues, and then Blue Tribe media has a nice whitewash, no one actually cares except if they're stuck listening to NPR while driving.

That's not a normative thing -- if these claims are false, that is bad! -- but it points to some Bad Incentives. And I'm not sure they can be meaningfully shown to be false, even if they are.

I’m willing to believe that woman. I believed the original speaker. I just take their conclusions, their assessment of the scope, with a grain of salt.

If I were running a partisan Twitter account, I’d be cherry-picking a different set of clips and photos. Maybe show you kids in cages or quoting Rebekah Jones.

“This discourse” sucks. It reflects more about the accounts one follows than about reality. Twitter delenda est.

“This discourse” sucks. It reflects more about the accounts one follows than about reality. Twitter delenda est.

Yup, you would prefer if the Corporate Media were the gatekeeper of the narrative surrounding all of this, as it has been for demographic replacement going back decades.

Anyone who wants to convince me otherwise ought to try harder instead of whipping out their one data point.

I’ll give you credit for bothering to provide a second.

The emphasis on the cats and ducks has a strong potential to backfire

Not at all. It's a brilliant psy-op. Why do you think Musk is posting images like this?

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1833220440254513243/photo/1

Is it because Elon Musk is actually a moron? Does he think that Haitians are raiding back yards to eat cats? Of course not. This is the Streisand Effect in action. Every time someone "debunks" this, the story only grows.

Let's say you are a normie, just trying to grill. You read this: "Actually, no the 20,000 Haitians who moved into the small town in 4 years are not hunting and eating cats".

What is your reaction? Do you think, "haha dumb Republicans". Or do you think, "Holy shit, this town just got taken over by Haitian immigrants. Is my town next? Why does the person who wrote this article think this is totally normal?"

This is a winning issue for Republicans. The Democratic position on immigration is lunacy. Anything that brings this to the forefront is good for Trump. There is nothing good or okay about what happened to Springfield, cats or no.

Let's say you are a normie, just trying to grill. You read this: "Actually, no the 20,000 Haitians who moved into the small town in 4 years are not hunting and eating cats". What is your reaction? Do you think, "haha dumb Republicans". Or do you think, "Holy shit, this town just got taken over by Haitian immigrants. Is my town next? Why does the person who wrote this article think this is totally normal?"

I am sure that normies would find it weird that a town's population would increase by 50% because of Haitian refugees, but I don't think they'd see it as bad. They'd complain if it meant that the people living in the town now have to leave, but they'd have no reason to suspect that that's the case. They'd just see it as a harmless population increase.

There is nothing good or okay about what happened to Springfield, cats or no.

Why would this be the case from a normie perspective?

Haitians are raiding back yards to eat cats?

They have some cat-eating custom apparently ...