Posted on 05/17/2021 5:44:00 AM PDT by Kaslin
The left is great at putting the right on the defensive, lumping us all in with a handful of extremists and making us defend them. As I’ve written previously, the left has figured out how to label conservative principles as conspiracy theories, racism or other distasteful characterizations, making us run from our own views.
Part of the reason they get away with the conspiracy theory label is because we get caught spreading stories that may cross that line, and so the left then lumps in perfectly legitimate suspicions with them. This took place far too often regarding the presidential election.
Studies have shown that the right is more susceptible than the left at falling for fake news. This is because the left is up to so much corruption that gets swept under the rug by the left-leaning legal system and MSM that many of the stories seem plausible. The relatively new conservative satire site Babylon Bee is now almost as popular as The Onion, which has been around for years and likely has a far bigger budget, because there is so much craziness believable about the left.
The problem is there is so much information out there now, how do you determine whether something is accurate or not? Legitimate major conservative websites don’t have the time to vet everything. There is no major conservative fact checking site (I have been attempting to start one in order to combat this). So unless you have time to watch an endless stream of 45-minute long videos, what can be done? I am buried with requests from conservatives to watch videos made by people I have never heard of, and cannot keep up with it all. It got worse during the 2020 presidential election, when everyone and their brother made a video about election fraud. COVID-19 compounded things, with all the videos about masks and vaccines.
The fake news videos that tend to get the most steam are ones done by apparent “experts.” You want to believe retired military intelligence and nurses, why would they lie? Well it’s much more complex than that. Here’s what’s going on. A lot of people take a piece of information and run with it before thoroughly vetting it. Because we’re too overloaded with information, we lack time and become sloppy. We hear something that sounds good, from someone good, and we are wired to want to believe it. We may not spend the full hour watching the entire video before sharing it. Or something halfway through it jumps out as a red flag, but we ignore it because the rest of the video seems so good.
Patrick Byrne, the former CEO of Overstock who got involved with President Trump’s legal team challenging the election, revealed in an exposé after the fact on January 27 that Michael Flynn drafted a plan for Trump to bring in the National Guard and U.S. Marshals. None of this ever materialized, of course. But it got leaked at the time to activists who ran with it. They probably only heard hyped-up versions of the plan which had become distorted being passed person to person, which made it seem likely to happen (if anyone has ever really studied Trump however, they would know such drastic action is not his style). What retired military intelligence officer doesn’t believe Flynn? Flynn comes across as a very honest man. While he probably proposed the plan, it was never under serious consideration.
Another recent example is Mike Lindell’s “Absolute Proof” documentary about election fraud. While much of it seemed plausible, there was one lengthy segment discussing foreign hacking of voting machines that was noticeably lacking in evidence. The movie displayed logs of the alleged hacking, and cited just one person, Mary Fanning, who has little information available about her on the internet. There is no explanation as to how Fanning obtained the logs nor any of the technical details about how it worked. For something that serious, that incredulous, you can’t just expect people to believe some little known woman claiming it’s true. If she didn’t reveal more details because she was afraid for her safety, then why did she reveal her name and as much as she has?
Maybe clear, irrefutable evidence will come out that there was foreign hacking, so the investigations need to continue. But one person saying so with some logs that could have been made up isn’t enough to get anywhere, so it allows the left to pile on and claim the right is making up conspiracy theories.
One more way these types of unproven stories pop up is in a vague, general style. The activist will use a lot of attention getting words, like patriots, terrorism, God bless, prayer, collusion, Russians, hacking, mysterious deaths, the elites, etc. There isn’t any real coherent message, and the dots never connect. It’s just a jumbled mess of hysteria (I know someone semi-famous who does this constantly). While it might sound good at a campaign rally, it serves little purpose other than to waste time and divert people from figuring out what’s really going on.
I believe the vast majority of these people are patriots who think they are doing the right thing. But the left will use their sloppiness to discredit the rest of us. Those of us who are really laboring to get to the bottom of issues like election fraud get lumped in with their efforts, and we end up wasting a lot of time defending them instead of doing the tedious work required to hold up to the Democrats’ intense scrutiny.
They also waste our time watching and then researching all of their ideas. I don’t have time to vet every video out there. The videos usually end up the same; usually a grain of truth stretched to an unrealistic conclusion, with lots of vague, attention-getting words. Stop blindly promoting them; if you don’t have time to vet them, don’t share them.
OK, I'll start by not falling for Rachel Alexander's misdirection in recommending conservatives only source MSM narratives and mostly disregard alternative and blog sources, ... why she might even be a shill.
Most people use “Fake News” to merely mean “I don’t like it, I disagree with it”. No need to refute it, just whine “Fake news”.
Equally disgusting and common on the left and the right. A phrase that has hurt more than helped the country.
That is certainly true. Not only that, but for some reason, people think news should be accurate. It’s merely there to make money. No truth is required. The media has always been tribal, it will stay such as long as it makes money.
How are we supposed to know the truth?
People get mixed up.
You are the PRODUCT, not the CONSUMER.
So you think 94.9999% of the news isn’t about politics?
*bada*boom*kisk*
If you want truth go the the Lord.
If you want lies go to men.
Or as they say: in God we trust, all others pay cash.
What is truth?
Seems like that question was asked in a book that has been around awhile.
Simple question isn’t it? But if one can answer that question, it will help in the journey.
A few thoughts:
1) We have been sold on the idea that truth is relative, relative to the situation. That is true. Humans and situations are complex. Can we know our own hearts and every heart and fact involved in a situation.
2) We like simple answers. We don’t have to think about them. Simple answers put us in control of the situation. Complex answers of pros and cons don’t taste as good.
3) There is Absolute Truth. Relative truth does not exclude Absolute Truth.
4) The truth is a rare commodity. Look up the definition of commodity.
5) A prior poster wanted to know how to get the truth. The truth is going to COST you. Time, thinking, money, experience, failure. Few want to pay the price.
I would much rather get the information in printed form.
Do you think we can reverse the trend?
She posts a lot of the fake news I see, especially from Clown Hall.
Surely, with a little thought, you can answer that on your own........................
No not really. I’m not lazy, I am likely the most informed person I deal with on a constant basis. I study and read several points of view and dozens of news stories daily about the major issues of the day.
Election fraud: I know that there was cheating. There always is and will be. Over 50 years Kennedy was elected in the graveyards of Chicago and Democratic held strongholds in Texas. I have read hundreds of articles and am no closer to the truth on what happened. The hyperbole on both sides makes it impossible to know what really happened.
COVID Treatments and prevention: What works? Try and chase this down.
Russia, Russia, Russia: Was it a diabolical coup attempt and few idiots doing stupid things?
What is really happening with the Arizona Audit? Some crazy claims are being made that don’t make any sense. And yes, I think Trump won AZ and other battleground states. But, I sure wish to hell, I could get a straight, provable story without a total slant.
There is no straight answers on a hundred things I am interested in.
“The simple fact that we still have Q followers demonstrates the problem clearly. A source of disinformation can totally discredit itself and still have loyal supporters and followers.”
Yup. It was a brilliant psyop and completely brainwashed a bunch. They are hopeless now. Try to reason with them, you get personal attacks—same as the left does.
And the “Ashley is still alive!” crowd...jeeze.
In my best “Hee Haw” voice, “If it weren’t for fake news, we’d have no news at all.”
The whole idea of an unbiased media is not only silly, but recent.
For most of the last few centuries, each political faction had their own newspaper. We have the ‘Press Democrat’ where I live, I know of papers that have “Republican” in the name, several that have “Independent”, too.
I never trust any source; any issue I run across that moves me I will *ALWAYS* look for information from the opposite side that refutes the claim. Left or right, until I’ve examined the arguments on both sides I regard myself (and others who haven’t also done this) as ignorant.
Easy to do if you STOP LETTING THE MEDIA SH-T IN YOUR SKULL.
Why do you watch/listen to CRAP like Fox and the Alphabets - they are ALL CRAP.
- but you’ll find people hanging on every dingleberry that drops from the media bunghole.
The power of the media is their ability to set off lemming stampedes - learn to live outside the lemming herd or you’ll go over the cliff with them.
Like this article?
It is a good place to start.
and then send them a couple hundred bucks every month ...
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