Malicious censorship on the net by Twitter and Facebook

Posted on August 21, 2018 by lawofmarkets

I tried to open the following article on twitter via my mobile phone – Details of Ocasio-Cortez’s Ties To George Soros Revealed – and this is what came up:

Warning: this link may be unsafe

https://thefederalistpapers.org/us/details-ocasio-cortezs-ties-george-soros?utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=MobileFloatingSharingButtons&utm_content=2018-08-19&utm_campaign=websitesharingbuttons

The link you are trying to access has been identified by Twitter or our partners as being potentially harmful or associated with a violation of Twitter’s Terms of Service. This link could lead to a site that:

steals your password or other personal information

installs malicious software programs on your computer

collects your personal information for spam purposes

has been associated with a violation of Twitter’s Terms of Service

Back to previous page

Learn more about unsafe links

Ignore this warning and continue

I get something similar when I try to open up links to Rush Limbaugh.

Twitter, with 100% certainty, was not worried that my password would be stolen, that malicious software would be installed, or that personal information was being collected for spam purposes. They just wished to deter me from going to the website and reading the article that had been posted.

If they are a common carrier, any and all of this should be seen as an infringement of our right to free speech. Same again for Facebook, Google and any other purveyor of personal views. The phone company cannot decide whether to connect me to someone else based on their judgment over whether I should be allowed hear what other want to say to me or what I have to say to others. Same again that a common carrier should just carry and not offer their judgements.

If it is not illegal to say it, then it should be illegal for them to prevent someone from saying whatever it is.

All that then comes with this: Facebook has TRUST ratings for users – but it won’t tell you your score.

Earlier this year, Facebook admitted it was rolling out trust ratings for media outlets.

This involved ranking news websites based on the quality of the news they were reporting.

This rating would then be used to decide which posts should be promoted higher in users’ News Feeds.

It’s not clear exactly what users’ ratings are for, but it’s possible they may be used in a similar way.

But Facebook hasn’t revealed exactly how ratings are decided, or whether all users have a rating.

You’ll just have to trust them.

Jordan Peterson discussed in The Claremont Review of Books

Posted on August 16, 2018 by lawofmarkets

From THE JORDAN PETERSON PHENOMENON. I see Peterson as an attempt to guide us back to common sense, but perhaps there is no such thing, only tradition and custom. But we are also inheritors of the Western philosophical tradition. These are excerpts I have pulled out that seemed to summarise where the article was heading. But you should read the article yourself and see what you make of it.

His intent is to refute all “blank slate” doctrines that deny our biological hard-wiring and teach the same disastrous lesson: humans are merely social artefacts with no inherent or evolved nature. From there it is but a quick step to insisting that any differences in abilities or interests leading to disparate outcomes are arbitrary and unjust, and that men and women are essentially the same. This last emphatically erroneous point is of particular concern to Peterson, because it is at the root of so much of the unhappiness he sees in his clinical practice; not to mention that a society incapable of supporting stable families and raising healthy, well-adjusted children won’t long survive.

And this.

Peterson sidesteps the question of whether he is himself a believing Christian, and hints that he is agnostic. Some critics refuse to accept Peterson’s half-loaf of Scripture without God. They conclude, with Friedrich Nietzsche among others, that there is no Christian morality without Christ. But Peterson is actually correct, without ever quite saying how, in suggesting that God and His Word can be understood separately, that it’s possible to see the Old Testament as one among many ancient stories, and yet somehow radically different. He sees the centrality of the Bible for Western civilization, but misses something essential.

What did he miss?

In “Leo Strauss, the Bible, and Political Philosophy,” an essay published in 1991, Harry Jaffa explained that all the ancient cities claimed that their laws were of divine origin. In this sense, the Torah was like the stories of any other ancient city. But all other ancient cities were polytheistic. Only Judaism (and then Christianity) proclaims the “One God who is separate from the universe, of which he is the Creator.” Because the God of the Bible is “both separate and unique,” He is therefore unknowable….

“[But] God endowed man with the capacity for reflection and choice, and thus we can discern that the laws of Moses are “righteous.” Do we not see … that in the Torah, “the teachings of reason and of revelation will not contradict each other, since both reason and revelation are God’s gifts to mankind?”…

Because he is radically unknowable, belief in that God requires a leap of faith. Peterson—or anyone—can therefore find himself unable to make that leap, but nevertheless see in the Word of the Hebrew God the “wisdom and understanding” that makes the Bible unique.

Therefore:

Because people “live in a sea of complexity,” we “perceive meaningful phenomena, not the objective world.” This description of seeing the world pre-scientifically, as a place not of objects but of meaningful phenomena, derives fundamentally from Martin Heidegger and existentialism. Peterson calls himself an existentialist, in fact, and generously salts his book with references to “Being,” acknowledging his “exposure to the ideas of the 20th-century German philosopher.”

Goebbels on Propaganda

Posted on August 15, 2018 by lawofmarkets

From here, not necessarily a reliable source but the list looks accurate enough. Sound advice as well, if your aim is to lead sheep into the sheep pen.

A lie told once remains a lie but a lie told a thousand times becomes the truth.

The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed.

The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly – it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over.

It would not be impossible to prove with sufficient repetition and a psychological understanding of the people concerned that a square is in fact a circle. They are mere words, and words can be molded until they clothe ideas and disguise.

Propaganda works best when those who are being manipulated are confident they are acting on their own free will.

Propaganda must facilitate the displacement of aggression by specifying the targets for hatred.

This is the secret of propaganda: Those who are to be persuaded by it should be completely immersed in the ideas of the propaganda, without ever noticing that they are being immersed in it.

…the rank and file are usually much more primitive than we imagine. Propaganda must therefore always be essentially simple and repetitious.

There is no need for propaganda to be rich in intellectual content.

The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it.

There was no point in seeking to convert the intellectuals. For intellectuals would never be converted and would anyway always yield to the stronger, and this will always be “the man in the street.” Arguments must therefore be crude, clear and forcible, and appeal to emotions and instincts, not the intellect. Truth was unimportant and entirely subordinate to tactics and psychology.

#WalkAway Campaign Official YouTube

Posted on August 13, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Watch.

The intellectual dark web

Posted on August 12, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Meet the Renegades of the Intellectual Dark Web. It begins, but from a source within the enemy camp:

Here are some things that you will hear when you sit down to dinner with the vanguard of the Intellectual Dark Web: There are fundamental biological differences between men and women. Free speech is under siege. Identity politics is a toxic ideology that is tearing American society apart. And we’re in a dangerous place if these ideas are considered “dark.”

Then do go on to read it all followed by this: Why the Left Is So Afraid of Jordan Peterson, also from within the enemy camp.

More here on the intellectualdark.website.

A reading list of original and influential liberal thinkers

Posted on August 10, 2018 by lawofmarkets

This just arrived in my inbox and may be of interest. The question asked is who among the great liberal philosophers should be included in a course on Western Civilisation.

Dear colleagues and friends,

For the 175th anniversary editor of The Economist is launching Open Future, an initiative to discuss liberal values and policies in the 21st century.

I have just crossed this online article about a series on influential liberal thinkers and some critics. It explicitly asks readers to diversify its preliminary list by submitting further suggestions:

https://www.economist.com/open-future/2018/08/02/the-literature-of-liberalism

This may interest some of you.

`
“Liberal”, as the article notes, is now a much contested term. This is what The Economist writes:

The definition of liberalism has long been the source of disagreement. The very term has come to mean “progressive” in the United States, whereas in Britain it has kept its older meaning of being respectful of individual freedom and the wisdom that can be drawn from free thought and open debate.

Once liberalism was invaded by the Fabians, I’m not sure all that much of its original meaning remains, but with Jordan Peterson and others like him prowling about, who knows what the future might bring.

All too often a darkness unto themselves

Posted on August 9, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Two items on the same issue with the same conclusions have just crossed my desk.

DAVID SOLWAY: Jewish Self-Estrangement Is Perennial.

And then this: JUDAISM UNDER ATTACK: THE ORWELLIAN HIJACK OF TIKKUN OLAM.

Wrote about the same thing not that long ago.

The second Battle of the Marne a hundred years on

Posted on August 6, 2018 by lawofmarkets

In August 2014, exactly a hundred years from the day World War I began, I happened to be in France driving along the battle front that crossed from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border and visited many of the WWI battlefields and came across not a single ceremony of any kind to memorialise the start of the most devastating and consequential war in the history of the West. There have been battles that have probably been more consequential – Tours and Vienna [1683] come to mind – but no war has so uprooted every aspect of the European continent, and indeed the entire planet, than the First World War. Whether it was the disappearance of entire dynasties, “the sealed train” which led to the Russian Revolution, or the deadly meddling of Wilson in European affairs, the fact is that even now we are still trying to wind back its effects. There could have been no North Korea without Communist China and there could have been no Communist China without the Soviet Union. There would have been no Nazis and no World War II if there had been no Kaiser and World War I. And on it goes. Yet the same has occurred throughout the period since August 2014 with no memorials and remembrances of any significance that have brought to mind this fantastic war that had done so much to create the havoc of our world today. Those who died on the battlefields of France are barely remembered.

So in The Oz a few days back there was this tiny article on the editorial page foreshadowing the centenary of The Armistice on November 11: 100 years, 100 reasons why Armistice matters. I imagine the Armistice, too, will go by without much notice. So I will just remind us that we are now living through the hundredth anniversary of the second last battle of World War I, The Second Battle of the Marne, whose dates are officially July 15 to August 6 of 1918. August 6, of course, was the date that the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. Two days from now will be the 100th anniversary of the start of the last battle of WWI, Amiens, which brought the war to its end.

We are the products of history whether we think about it or not, and the fact is no one any longer cares about our own past which in itself means we are rudderless and without bearings. We no longer barely know who we are since we no longer know who we have been and from whence we have come. We may well be heading for changes that will make even the eruptions of World War I seem mild and inconsequential in comparison.

The second Battle of the Marne

Posted on August 4, 2018 by lawofmarkets

I happened to be in France driving along the battle front that crossed from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border in 1914 and visited many of the battlefields and came across not a single ceremony of any kind to memorialise the start of the most devastating and consequential war in the history of the West. There have been battles that have probably been more consequential – Tours and Vienna [1683] come to mind – but no war has so uprooted every aspect of the European continent, and indeed the entire planet, than the First World War. Whether it was the disappearance of entire dynasties, the sealed train and the Russian Revolution, the deadly meddling of Wilson in European affairs, so that even now we are still trying to wind back its effects. There could have been no North Korea without Communist China and there could have been no Communist China without the Soviet Union. There would have been no Nazis and no World War II if there had been no Kaiser and World War I. Yet the same has occurred throughout the period since August 2014 with no memorials and remembrances of any significance that have brought to mind this fantastic war that had done so much to create the havoc of our world today.

So in The Oz a few days back there was this tiny article on the editorial page foreshadowing the centenary of The Armistice on November 11: 100 years, 100 reasons why Armistice matters. I imagine that, too, will go by without much notice. So I will just remind us that we are now living through the days of the last major battle of World War I, The Second Battle of the Marne, whose dates are officially July 15 to August 6 of 1918. August 6, of course, was the day the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.

We are the products of history whether we know it or not, and the fact is no one any longer cares about the past which in itself means we are rudderless and without bearings. We no longer even know who we are since we no longer know who we have been and from whence we have come. We may well be heading for changes that will make even the eruptions of World War I seem mild and inconsequential in comparison.

And here’s to you Tommy Robinson

Posted on August 2, 2018 by lawofmarkets

Brought across from Ace of Spades

Tommy Robinson Freed as British Judges Quash the Charges Against Him; He Awaits a New Trial for His Violation of the Unofficial, But Real, British Anti-Islamic-Blasphemy Law

—Ace of Spades

Britain had placed a gag order on any reportage about the prosecution of a Muslim rape-gang. Tommy Robinson showed up at the court where the trail was being held — outside — and talked about it. Though I don’t believe he had any new information to report. He reported what most people already knew — despite the egregious gag-order, word gets out, you know? — and the cops arrested him for it, and immediately threw him into a prison with a lot of Muslim inmates.

Ezra Lavant notes that the antifa protesters are “as white as the Ku Klux Klan.”

Ezra Levant

✔@ezralevant

If there was a fatwa on your head, and your prison food was cooked by prisoners in a Muslim gang, would you eat anything unsealed? Tommy’s family or friends would have arranged for outside food. But starvation, along with solitary confinement, was Theresa May’s order. A scandal.

Katie Hopkins

✔@KTHopkins

Before. After. The British State fattens up Jihadis on taxpayers cash, starves an innocent man imprisoned by a kangaroo court #TommyRobinson

Ezra Lavant says the world is a little freer today, but is it? The governments now in open revolt against their own people have made their point — defy us, and we will send men with guns to throw you in jail and maybe get murdered.

I think that message will be heard much louder than the message that they freed Tommy Robinson after unjustly imprisoning him.

And this isn’t necessarily the end of it: While the contempt charge was tossed out for judicial errors, the state may, and likely will, seek to re-try him. Robinson is only out on bail awaiting this new trial. He hasn’t been declared innocent, nor have the underlying charges been declared null and void.

Also see this Ezra Lavant thread, about the lying, corrupt BBC.

Update: I posted this yesterday, but if you missed it, watch Sargon of Akkad’s video essay on Britain’s increasingly aggressive enforcement of Islamic sharia law.

If you don’t have the full 20 minutes, watch 4:10 to 9:20 or so.

Note: Commenters are saying that while Robinson founded the EDL, he renounced it and quit it after it was infiltrated by racist elements. (Anti-semitic elements, mostly, if I remember right.)

I knew he had denounced those elements but I didn’t realize he’d quit his own organization over it.

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