All Purpose News and Politics Thread Part IV: The Center Cannot Hold

[KOSLOX]

(I dunno why vBulletin won't let us normally post GIFs)

So you're saying black people should separate from each other... but what, pray tell, defines whom should be separated from the masses? The ignorant luddites who vote Democratic who supposedly bang rocks all day due to them being rendered ignorant as a result of their Democratic overlords keeping them stupid, or the superior conservative blacks whose value isn't appreciated enough that we need to be reminded every single day? And where, oh, where, would they move? Alaska? Rural Wyoming?

Here's a scary fact for you; Chicago's a big city. Criminals don't give a **** what skin color they're going after. The more you talk, the less you sound like a man trying to sound witty and urbane and more like a bozo who bought a "Word of the Day" calendar and is trying to use the word he got as many times as possible that day, and the word just happened to be "anaerobe" or something.

When did that ever start? Notice this clown isn't in the thread were many of the boards black posters regularly talk. Because we'd have called him on this nonsense immediately rather than indulge it.

[PaulBullion]

The DJI is currently down about 850 points.

Could this be the big one?

[GindyPosts]

Gamergate created right wing loonies who then went on to join Alt Right. Its not hard to see.

Well, yeah. I mean, gaming culture in and of itself is pretty easy to see as hostile and, dare I say, "gatekeeping". Going all the way back to when Joe Lieberman was finding concerns about kids playing Mortal Kombat (a legit concern) and Night Trap (a... not so legit concern), people who devote their lives playing video games have developed an "us versus them" mentality, and whenever a politician or activist, be they on the left (Hillary Clinton), center (Liberman) or the right (Jack Thompson) had an issue with video games, they got angry. And still do. It's just now with social media, it's much more obvious and impactful. The irony is that the GamerGate culture, in spite of being filled with people most likely hating Jack Thompson back in the day, grew to love Thompson due to Thompson condemning one of GamerGate's biggest villains, the feminist Anika Sarkeesian who is well-known for her YouTube channel.

Ashamedly, even going as far back as my "Doogie" days when I first joined the forum in the mid 2000s when I first joined CBR Forums and my cloistered life left me horribly ill-prepared for the outside world and the internet itself, I myself was part of this, and it's sorta easy to understand why one can easily be swayed to. Growing up in the late 90s and early 2000s, one of the things I loved reading the most was gaming magazines, but in hindsight, game magazines were far more about the sizzle than the steak, and didn't care about lying to their audience since the goal was to market games, no matter how deceitful the practice, with the worst offenders being magazines operated for the console groups (Nintendo Power being the most iconic of the bunch). YouTuber Super Bunnyhop made a video exploring game journalism and how these magazines operated compared to today. The video is about an hour long, so you may do some skipping at parts, but generally, the point is that whenever GamerGaters go "we want respectable journalism!", they're actually referring to the bias they read growing up which gave everything nine thumbs up or some other arbitrary critique score, and seeing people tear down something they want universal glowing praise is heretical behavior, dammit! That's not the whole reasoning, but it's up there.

And, it's no surprise that some video game diehards, given their sheltered lives and paranoid mindsets, would grow to believe these imaginary beliefs that foreigners and minorities are ruining America, and embrace alt-right, white nationalistic rhetoric. It's one reason why games aren't fun for me anymore, along with companies nickel and diming vulnerable people with microtransactions and the growing need to focus on online gameplay.

[GindyPosts]

When did that ever start? Notice this clown isn't in the thread were many of the boards black posters regularly talk. Because we'd have called him on this nonsense immediately rather than indulge it.

Aside from, like, one or two posts in some thread about weird neural interface technology, all he ever does is post in this thread and rant about how great Trump will be in saving black culture, and how we gots to get the Arabs out of Africa and stuff. Truth be told, he never was "smart".

Granted, I'm a dumb white dude, so I shouldn't really talk about these things, yet I find the logic so bafflingly appalling. Dude said in one post that he was upset about Reagan calling African delegates "monkeys", but now he's hoping for black people to be systematically removed from other black people because crime exists.

[Tuck]

Gamergate was a dude airing his dirty laundry over being pissed with his ex on 4chan. It was just a whole bunch of bull.

Then someone got the bright idea to wrap this horseshit in the idea that it was really about ethics in games journalism . . . which drew in people who were not aware of the origins. These people were always intended as a shield and an obfuscation for the root of the movement.

A lot of people played into it by attacking these newcomers as though they were part of the original crowd or were aware of the true origins of the movement they signed up for.

But the whole issue with ethics is an issue. Ask Jeff Gerstmann or the people working at Kotaku now (who are under new ownership that is pressuring them to be more advertiser friendly.)

Of course, the proof that Gamergate wasn't really about ethics in journalism was that the whole Shadow of Mordor thing happened (the dev was offering early review copies in exchange for promises of high review scores) at its height and nary a peep.

[KOSLOX]

Aside from, like, one or two posts in some thread about weird neural interface technology, all he ever does is post in this thread and rant about how great Trump will be in saving black culture, and how we gots to get the Arabs out of Africa and stuff. Truth be told, he never was "smart".

Granted, I'm a dumb white dude, so I shouldn't really talk about these things, yet I find the logic so bafflingly appalling. Dude said in one post that he was upset about Reagan calling African delegates "monkeys", but now he's hoping for black people to be systematically removed from other black people because crime exists.

I honestly don't understand how any black people are surprised at all. I was born in 1981, I can't remember a time when I didn't specifically know he was a racist.

Granted I can only remember back to about 1987, it gets pretty spotty before that, but I'm sure even in kindergarten I knew.

I grew up in Iowa, in a biracial family, in the early 80s. I was KEENLY aware of race, and people employing dogwhistles or coding if not just saying outright bigoted things.

[worstblogever]

The DJI is currently down about 850 points.

Could this be the big one?

Holy f***, could be. That's 3% of the world's wealth in a day... if it recovers by the end of the day, even to 500, we're still talking 2% of it.

Right now, it's fluctuating in the 700-800 range, which would make it in the Top 5 individual drops in a day, and mean that the biggest 5 drops in stock market history all would have occurred during the Trump administration.

[Jackalope89]

Yeah, I never understood Republicans' fascination with Reagan, even when I was a registered GOP. He enacted a lot of stupid laws, increased the debt, and had 1 decent speech. With this whole thing about him calling the African delegates "monkeys", yeah.

[kidfresh512]

Obama responds to El Paso and Dayton like a real president should

Michelle and I grieve with all the families in El Paso and Dayton who endured these latest mass shootings. Even if details are still emerging, there are a few things we already know to be true.

First, no other nation on Earth comes close to experiencing the frequency of mass shootings that we see in the United States. No other developed nation tolerates the levels of gun violence that we do. Every time this happens, we’re told that tougher gun laws won’t stop all murders; that they won’t stop every deranged individual from getting a weapon and shooting innocent people in public places. But the evidence shows that they can stop some killings. They can save some families from heartbreak. We are not helpless here. And until all of us stand up and insist on holding public officials accountable for changing our gun laws, these tragedies will keep happening.

Second, while the motivations behind these shootings may not yet be fully known, there are indications that the El Paso shooting follows a dangerous trend: troubled individuals who embrace racist ideologies and see themselves obligated to act violently to preserve white supremacy. Like the followers of ISIS and other foreign terrorist organizations, these individuals may act alone, but they’ve been radicalized by white nationalist websites that proliferate on the internet. That means that both law enforcement agencies and internet platforms need to come up with better strategies to reduce the influence of these hate groups.

But just as important, all of us have to send a clarion call and behave with the values of tolerance and diversity that should be the hallmark of our democracy. We should soundly reject language coming out of the mouths of any of our leaders that feeds a climate of fear and hatred or normalizes racist sentiments; leaders who demonize those who don’t look like us, or suggest that other people, including immigrants, threaten our way of life, or refer to other people as sub-human, or imply that America belongs to just one certain type of people. Such language isn’t new – it’s been at the root of most human tragedy throughout history, here in America and around the world. It is at the root of slavery and Jim Crow, the Holocaust, the genocide in Rwanda and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans. It has no place in our politics and our public life. And it’s time for the overwhelming majority of Americans of goodwill, of every race and faith and political party, to say as much – clearly and unequivocally.

[worstblogever]

Only hours after the El Paso shooting, Moscow Mitch tweeted out the following photo:



Why yes, that is a tombstone bearing the name of his opponent, Air Force veteran Amy McGrath. Also, Merrick Garland's name is there, because Mitch is gloating about the Supreme Court seat he stole, too... but let's also wish death upon him.

But it's not like he's wishing his political opponents death while the nation is sandwiched between mass shootings marking the current pinnacle of a swath of deaths from gun violence you refuse to do anything to prevent.

F*** that old turtle-lookin' sumbitch. Preferrably on Election Day 2020.

[Jackalope89]

Only hours after the El Paso shooting, Moscow Mitch tweeted out the following photo:



Why yes, that is a tombstone bearing the name of his opponent, Air Force veteran Amy McGrath. Also, Merrick Garland's name is there, because Mitch is gloating about the Supreme Court seat he stole, too... but let's also wish death upon him.

But it's not like he's wishing his political opponents death while the nation is sandwiched between mass shootings marking the current pinnacle of a swath of deaths from gun violence you refuse to do anything to prevent.

F*** that old turtle-lookin' sumbitch. Preferrably on Election Day 2020.

Wow. Just when I thought that stupid turtle couldn't sink any lower, he goes and does this. What a piece of crap he is.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Only hours after the El Paso shooting, Moscow Mitch tweeted out the following photo:



Why yes, that is a tombstone bearing the name of his opponent, Air Force veteran Amy McGrath. Also, Merrick Garland's name is there, because Mitch is gloating about the Supreme Court seat he stole, too... but let's also wish death upon him.

But it's not like he's wishing his political opponents death while the nation is sandwiched between mass shootings marking the current pinnacle of a swath of deaths from gun violence you refuse to do anything to prevent.

F*** that old turtle-lookin' sumbitch. Preferrably on Election Day 2020.

The worrisome thing is that picture could give some unbalanced, right leaning lunatic deadly ideas, just like Cesar Sayoc whom I just heard got 20 years in prison.

[Dalak]

Only hours after the El Paso shooting, Moscow Mitch tweeted out the following photo:



Why yes, that is a tombstone bearing the name of his opponent, Air Force veteran Amy McGrath. Also, Merrick Garland's name is there, because Mitch is gloating about the Supreme Court seat he stole, too... but let's also wish death upon him.

But it's not like he's wishing his political opponents death while the nation is sandwiched between mass shootings marking the current pinnacle of a swath of deaths from gun violence you refuse to do anything to prevent.

F*** that old turtle-lookin' sumbitch. Preferrably on Election Day 2020.

#MoscowMitch is threatening his political rivals just like his pal Putin, I wish I could find this anything but depressing but as I figure nothing will come of it I'm going to find something to lift my spirits now.

[Jim Kelly]

This is how stochastic terrorism works. A politician just has to name some people as targets and their extremist followers will take it from there.

[Electricmastro]

All sorts of things are being blamed on why terrorists are choosing to pick up guns and slaughter people, but based on this data, video games aren't fueling that fire as much as people in high positions of power are making them out to be. Unless someone can point me to more accurate data, then the data just doesn't add up to video games being the blame:



https://www.vox.com/policy-and-polit...deo-game-chart