4 ms·

Breitbart is hardly unique in being accused of being a tool for manipulating voters for the business-owning elite. In any case, it's just a conspiracy theory.

Breitbart is hardly unique in being accused of being a tool for manipulating voters for the business-owning elite. In any case, it's just a conspiracy theory. You have no reason to believe the people at Breitbart don't sincerely believe in the issues they report on.

jacquesm 8y ago
> You have no reason to believe the people at Breitbart don't sincerely believe in the issues they report on. I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt by staking the claim that they are doing this because they are a bunch of cynical bastards. You are making things worse for them by claiming they really are that stupid, and while I can't rule it out 100% it borders on the unbelievable. But if you want to go down that route, be my guest, I do believe Robert Mercer knows what he is doing (just like Rupert Murdoch) and that the damage they are doing is intentional. It's pretty easy to mess with people's heads and there is an awful lot of that going on, if the visitors of those sites sincerely believe in the various levels of BS that are being peddled then some sort of shared blame would be appropriate. I have similar feelings towards religious people and the perpetrators of religion: a failure of critical thinking skills leading to significant damage to the world, with a larger portion of the blame apportioned to the guys in charge (why is it always guys?).
- comesee 8y ago
  I don't think that conservatively biased media is necessarily either stupid or cynically manipulative. Bastards is a strong word. Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? You seem to have strong feelings against Breitbart. Why?
  - jacquesm 8y ago
    > Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? Sure, but that has nothing to do with the heady mix of garbage and conspiracy that the likes of Breitbart like to stir up in order to appeal to emotion rather than to ratio. > You seem to have strong feelings against Breitbart. Why? By trying to frame this as an emotional affair you've just killed my appetite for continued discussion. See, I am not going to let you goad me in the same way that Breitbart does to its visitors. It's cheap and in the end does not serve any purpose other than to derail the discussion. It's Schopenhauer 101.
    - GABAthrowaway 8y ago
      See, I think this is the mistake you're making. You seem to think that there is some element of objective truth left here. There isn't. It's echo chambers all around. The truth is, everything is a simulacra. Fake news, fake memories, fake reality. Fake everything. Wake up.
      - jacquesm 8y ago
        That's another tactic often employed: to try to make it seem as if there are no facts therefore it does not matter if one side or another lies with abandon. So therefore you should not believe anything you read in the newspaper, because after all 'nothing is real'. Truth is a matter of degree, there is no black and white, so yes, it is hard to get to an objective truth when there are more than one participants to any discussion of a real life event. Witness the variety of stories you will get about a car accident that happened 5 minutes ago with several eye witnesses. You will get as many 'truths' as there are people. But a majority of them will usually agree on the bulk of the observable facts, even if individuals can be - and have been proven to be - spectacularly wrong. But that sort of analysis does not pertain to the kind of bullshit that the likes of Breitbart will stir in with the soup to get the ratings up and the blood boiling. Those are calculated efforts at inflicting maximum damage and to get people to respond emotionally rather than rationally. Think 'pizzagate' rather than 'blue vs turquoise'.
        deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
        GABAthrowaway 8y ago
        It's the beginning of the Singularity, though people are not realizing it. Hivemind collectives are already growing exponentially, with extreme subcultures that are essentially customized filter bubbles. It will become steadily more impractical to resist the temptation to join one. You will be punished and an outcast (socially and economically) for not being apart of a hivemind consciousness. People are already deferring the vast majority of their cognition to machines. Eventually, I predict that as technology improves, cybernetics will become an inevitability. So there are an infinite amount of truths now, which is why I don't bother to seek something so fragmented (i.e. outside of my echo chamber).
  - malandrew 8y ago
    The National Review and the American Conservative are two examples of news sources that lean conservative whose writers and audience are intelligent, decent persons genuinely holding conservative beliefs.
    - amanaplanacanal 8y ago
      I realized a bit ago that my news intake was from almost entirely left wing sources, so I started adding The American Conservative. I agree. Good site, and the comments are moderated, so they don't head straight into the sewer that other sites do.
  - happytoexplain 8y ago
    >Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? Why do people jump to this wild ideological attack? I don't see anywhere in the parent post that implied otherwise. If you feel that calling Breitbart and Rupert Murdoch out for what they are is a statement akin to "all conservatives are stupid or indecent", isn't that just instigating a flamewar for no reason, rather than responding to the post?
    - comesee 8y ago
      Not trying to instigate a flame war, thanks for correcting my language if that's what it seems like. I'm earnestly trying to understand what it is about Breitbart that causes Jacques to have the opinion that the people who produce are either stupid or cynical manipulators (not my words). Let me rephrase, can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person subscribing to Breitbart?
  - DanBC 8y ago
    I know lots of right wing people and they loathe Breitbart. Why are you insisting that conservative people must support racist media outlets?
    - comesee 8y ago
      I'm not. I didn't realize people thought Breitbart was racist. Forget conservatives. Let me rephrase, can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person subscribing to Breitbart?

jacquesm 8y ago

> You have no reason to believe the people at Breitbart don't sincerely believe in the issues they report on. I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt by staking the claim that they are doing this because they are a bunch of cynical bastards. You are making things worse for them by claiming they really are that stupid, and while I can't rule it out 100% it borders on the unbelievable. But if you want to go down that route, be my guest, I do believe Robert Mercer knows what he is doing (just like Rupert Murdoch) and that the damage they are doing is intentional. It's pretty easy to mess with people's heads and there is an awful lot of that going on, if the visitors of those sites sincerely believe in the various levels of BS that are being peddled then some sort of shared blame would be appropriate. I have similar feelings towards religious people and the perpetrators of religion: a failure of critical thinking skills leading to significant damage to the world, with a larger portion of the blame apportioned to the guys in charge (why is it always guys?).

comesee 8y ago
I don't think that conservatively biased media is necessarily either stupid or cynically manipulative. Bastards is a strong word. Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? You seem to have strong feelings against Breitbart. Why?
- jacquesm 8y ago
  > Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? Sure, but that has nothing to do with the heady mix of garbage and conspiracy that the likes of Breitbart like to stir up in order to appeal to emotion rather than to ratio. > You seem to have strong feelings against Breitbart. Why? By trying to frame this as an emotional affair you've just killed my appetite for continued discussion. See, I am not going to let you goad me in the same way that Breitbart does to its visitors. It's cheap and in the end does not serve any purpose other than to derail the discussion. It's Schopenhauer 101.
  - GABAthrowaway 8y ago
    See, I think this is the mistake you're making. You seem to think that there is some element of objective truth left here. There isn't. It's echo chambers all around. The truth is, everything is a simulacra. Fake news, fake memories, fake reality. Fake everything. Wake up.
    - jacquesm 8y ago
      That's another tactic often employed: to try to make it seem as if there are no facts therefore it does not matter if one side or another lies with abandon. So therefore you should not believe anything you read in the newspaper, because after all 'nothing is real'. Truth is a matter of degree, there is no black and white, so yes, it is hard to get to an objective truth when there are more than one participants to any discussion of a real life event. Witness the variety of stories you will get about a car accident that happened 5 minutes ago with several eye witnesses. You will get as many 'truths' as there are people. But a majority of them will usually agree on the bulk of the observable facts, even if individuals can be - and have been proven to be - spectacularly wrong. But that sort of analysis does not pertain to the kind of bullshit that the likes of Breitbart will stir in with the soup to get the ratings up and the blood boiling. Those are calculated efforts at inflicting maximum damage and to get people to respond emotionally rather than rationally. Think 'pizzagate' rather than 'blue vs turquoise'.
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
      - GABAthrowaway 8y ago
        It's the beginning of the Singularity, though people are not realizing it. Hivemind collectives are already growing exponentially, with extreme subcultures that are essentially customized filter bubbles. It will become steadily more impractical to resist the temptation to join one. You will be punished and an outcast (socially and economically) for not being apart of a hivemind consciousness. People are already deferring the vast majority of their cognition to machines. Eventually, I predict that as technology improves, cybernetics will become an inevitability. So there are an infinite amount of truths now, which is why I don't bother to seek something so fragmented (i.e. outside of my echo chamber).
- malandrew 8y ago
  The National Review and the American Conservative are two examples of news sources that lean conservative whose writers and audience are intelligent, decent persons genuinely holding conservative beliefs.
  - amanaplanacanal 8y ago
    I realized a bit ago that my news intake was from almost entirely left wing sources, so I started adding The American Conservative. I agree. Good site, and the comments are moderated, so they don't head straight into the sewer that other sites do.
- happytoexplain 8y ago
  >Can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person genuinely holding conservative beliefs? Why do people jump to this wild ideological attack? I don't see anywhere in the parent post that implied otherwise. If you feel that calling Breitbart and Rupert Murdoch out for what they are is a statement akin to "all conservatives are stupid or indecent", isn't that just instigating a flamewar for no reason, rather than responding to the post?
  - comesee 8y ago
    Not trying to instigate a flame war, thanks for correcting my language if that's what it seems like. I'm earnestly trying to understand what it is about Breitbart that causes Jacques to have the opinion that the people who produce are either stupid or cynical manipulators (not my words). Let me rephrase, can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person subscribing to Breitbart?
- DanBC 8y ago
  I know lots of right wing people and they loathe Breitbart. Why are you insisting that conservative people must support racist media outlets?
  - comesee 8y ago
    I'm not. I didn't realize people thought Breitbart was racist. Forget conservatives. Let me rephrase, can you really not imagine an intelligent decent person subscribing to Breitbart?