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This is fairly off topic, but I noticed that the paper thanks Dynata. I got a call purporting to be from Dynata that was a "push poll", meaning they were basica

This is fairly off topic, but I noticed that the paper thanks Dynata. I got a call purporting to be from Dynata that was a "push poll", meaning they were basically using it to present really unflattering questions about a particular candidate. It had a pro right-wing, somewhat obliquely conspiratorial bent - "How concerned are you about child sex trafficking?" It also had more overt stuff, in the vein of "Given that Joe Biden's plans on the economy would destroy it, does that affect your preference for the two candidates?" I asked them who was funding the poll, and they said they didn't know. I find myself curious about how that world works, but cursory google searches didn't help, and I imagine it's pretty murky. Would love to know who is funding those sorts of polls.

boredumb 6y ago
"How concerned are you about child sex trafficking?" ...How is this an exclusive right wing concern? Wouldn't any notion of child sex trafficking by nature require a conspiracy or are we pretending this doesn't exist at alarming levels?
part1of2 6y ago
> This is fairly off topic, but I noticed that the paper thanks Dynata. I'm not sure about your anecdote, nor do I know who Dynata is, but you give the impression that this paper is only thanking one org. The entire section thanks a much broader base than you seem to portray: > We thank Dynata for assistance with data collection and incorporating civil liberties concerns into their surveys. We thank participants at Harvard Public Seminar, Harvard COVID Seminar, the Healthand Pandemics Seminar, London School of Economics, Princeton and NBER SI Development. Funding provided by Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Economics Department. The authors have no conflicts to disclose. The study is approved by IRB at Harvard University (IRB-20-0495 and IRB20-0467),and registered at AEA-RCT registry (AEARCTR-0005609). The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research. NOTE: Formatting issues from the PDF copy
- roflc0ptic 6y ago
  I don't mean to give that impression at all. Looking through this paper it looks like quite legitimate, thoughtful research, and the fact that they used Dynata certainly doesn't impugn their motivations. As I was able to glean, Dynata is a polling firm. Their willingness to do push polling reflects badly on their ethics, but it's orthogonal to their ability to perform effective polling.
thursday0987 6y ago
how is being concerned about child sex trafficking pro right wing?
- pjc50 6y ago
  It's not intrinsically, however linking to spurious allegations (like Pizzagate) seems to be a rightwing tactic. Actual substantial allegations (qv Maxwell/Epstein) seem to be less partisan.
- AftHurrahWinch 6y ago
  You may be unaware that there is a predominantly Trump supporting movement called qanon which coopted an existing hashtag, #SaveTheChildren to allege that the cause of child sex trafficking is "Satan-worshiping, child-molesting criminals led by prominent Democrats". https://archive.is/HSKiG#selection-549.281-549.352 https://archive.is/HSKiG#selection-549.281-549.352 Now, some portion of attempts to #SaveTheChildren on social media are people concerned with child sex trafficking, and some portion are people who think that their political opponents are literal monsters... and it is often not immediately clear which is which.
  - thursday0987 6y ago
    ah. i'm not in either of those political bubbles and i'm not on twitter. guess i'm not missing out if being against child trafficking is somehow either a) a conspiracy theory on the left or b) a conspiracy theory on the right. child trafficking is wrong. full stop.
    - roflc0ptic 6y ago
      You don't really have to be in those bubbles to know about it - there was a much publicized shooting in a pizza shop circa 2017, motivated by baseless fears about a pedophile ring - https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/us/pizzagate-attack-sentence.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/us/pizzagate-attack-sente... Full stop, child trafficking is wrong. But then, so is baselessly accusing people of something as heinous as child trafficking.

boredumb 6y ago

"How concerned are you about child sex trafficking?" ...How is this an exclusive right wing concern? Wouldn't any notion of child sex trafficking by nature require a conspiracy or are we pretending this doesn't exist at alarming levels?

part1of2 6y ago

> This is fairly off topic, but I noticed that the paper thanks Dynata. I'm not sure about your anecdote, nor do I know who Dynata is, but you give the impression that this paper is only thanking one org. The entire section thanks a much broader base than you seem to portray: > We thank Dynata for assistance with data collection and incorporating civil liberties concerns into their surveys. We thank participants at Harvard Public Seminar, Harvard COVID Seminar, the Healthand Pandemics Seminar, London School of Economics, Princeton and NBER SI Development. Funding provided by Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Economics Department. The authors have no conflicts to disclose. The study is approved by IRB at Harvard University (IRB-20-0495 and IRB20-0467),and registered at AEA-RCT registry (AEARCTR-0005609). The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research. NOTE: Formatting issues from the PDF copy

roflc0ptic 6y ago
I don't mean to give that impression at all. Looking through this paper it looks like quite legitimate, thoughtful research, and the fact that they used Dynata certainly doesn't impugn their motivations. As I was able to glean, Dynata is a polling firm. Their willingness to do push polling reflects badly on their ethics, but it's orthogonal to their ability to perform effective polling.

thursday0987 6y ago

how is being concerned about child sex trafficking pro right wing?

pjc50 6y ago
It's not intrinsically, however linking to spurious allegations (like Pizzagate) seems to be a rightwing tactic. Actual substantial allegations (qv Maxwell/Epstein) seem to be less partisan.
AftHurrahWinch 6y ago
You may be unaware that there is a predominantly Trump supporting movement called qanon which coopted an existing hashtag, #SaveTheChildren to allege that the cause of child sex trafficking is "Satan-worshiping, child-molesting criminals led by prominent Democrats". https://archive.is/HSKiG#selection-549.281-549.352 https://archive.is/HSKiG#selection-549.281-549.352 Now, some portion of attempts to #SaveTheChildren on social media are people concerned with child sex trafficking, and some portion are people who think that their political opponents are literal monsters... and it is often not immediately clear which is which.
- thursday0987 6y ago
  ah. i'm not in either of those political bubbles and i'm not on twitter. guess i'm not missing out if being against child trafficking is somehow either a) a conspiracy theory on the left or b) a conspiracy theory on the right. child trafficking is wrong. full stop.
  - roflc0ptic 6y ago
    You don't really have to be in those bubbles to know about it - there was a much publicized shooting in a pizza shop circa 2017, motivated by baseless fears about a pedophile ring - https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/us/pizzagate-attack-sentence.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/22/us/pizzagate-attack-sente... Full stop, child trafficking is wrong. But then, so is baselessly accusing people of something as heinous as child trafficking.