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That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

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181–190 of 656 posts

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#181
post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think treating the government as a singular entity pushing a narrative is missing a bit. There is no singular government moving in lock-step, I think we've seen a lot of those seams showing recently. There are factions, supported by various wealthy powerful interests. Those factions include people in government but also people funding or controlling media. The owner and CEO of a major social network was literally g…

This is true in a _well functioning democratic government_ - by design: as long as there are differences, a single actor cannot take over. Understanding that the media is owned by powerful people, and people have agendas, is a key point to media literacy that should be taught at schools. It doesn't mean media should be ignored, nor that they always aim to manipulate (with some exceptions). It's, again, healthy if you…

Lack of critical thinking is a bit of a worldwide schooling system failure. Underfunding on one hand and not having an education plan for people to develop those skills leads to what we have. Some are lucky to get those skills from home or from top tier schools.

I imagine that this state of things was somewhat beneficial for the ruling elites but Russia is now showing the whole western world, that dumb population is a huge liability.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think I agree with most of what you're saying, I think it can be misunderstood and it can be very damaging when taken to an extreme, so I'll just leave a quote from the absolutely fantastic 20 lessons from the 20th century by Timothy Snyder: > Believe in truth. To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing…

Well, Snyder himself is a bit of a propagandist with his ridiculous double genocide theory. Here's a longer discussion[1] with examples of how he is an ideologue. (I would have liked to post a reply to the people responding to me but alas, I cannot.) [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1brdk1l/comm...

Indeed, everybody except me is a propagandist with their ridiculous 'saying things I don't believe or want to agree with'.

I, on the other hand, am always right.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#183
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the story is espionage, but it isn't actually espionage then the story is bogus, flimflam, propaganda. Made to make you believe, i mean look, we asked all these experts too. And you are not an expert on this, so better believe us.

I thought the point of espionage is complete plausible deniability. For all you know it could be part of a bigger (psy)op to see what "lights up" when people go about sharing analyzing, critiquing this _news_..

there is literally no point discussing further here. you've made up your mind already and will defend that no matter what.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#184
post #98

Once a Chinese grad student explained to me a difference he noted between Chinese and American citizens. He said in China no really reads or watches 24/7 major news outlets in China. They are fully aware that all of it is propaganda and just go about their life. He said Americans seem to get really emotional over content in the press and seem to really struggle with the idea of propaganda / journalism in the news. I…

Amen !

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#186
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Close being 35km.

I think it's 35 miles (X 1.6).

So anywhere in NYC but it must be targeting the UN /s.

Also funny was that it was considered espionage at first ... but they found lots of drugs on site -- clearly not espionage.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#187
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it matter if you can speak if the system is designed do that you can't be heard?

A more serious problem: do people want to listen? Do they want difficult truths or comforting lies?

Honestly, it doesn’t matter.

Staying silent generally doesn’t take an act of courage. No one exercises their speech muscles by staying silent.

The true revolutionary act is exercising our right to speech, honestly and frequently.

The important part is not to keep silent.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#189
post #98

Once a Chinese grad student explained to me a difference he noted between Chinese and American citizens. He said in China no really reads or watches 24/7 major news outlets in China. They are fully aware that all of it is propaganda and just go about their life. He said Americans seem to get really emotional over content in the press and seem to really struggle with the idea of propaganda / journalism in the news. I…

No. In the West, there are competing news sources(despite the best efforts of many). They might be equally biased but you do get a devil's advocate system. China is a one party state that controls all media. Not remotely the same.

In China, you would not have known the story was bogus.

Re: That Secret Service SIM farm story is bogus

#190
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think I agree with most of what you're saying, I think it can be misunderstood and it can be very damaging when taken to an extreme, so I'll just leave a quote from the absolutely fantastic 20 lessons from the 20th century by Timothy Snyder: > Believe in truth. To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing…

[flagged]

It is possible to accept that one can’t know the absolute, complete, detailed truth without giving up on identifying and rejecting lies.

That’s the whole authoritarian / fascist shtick: if you can’t be 100% certain that no formulation of any vaccine has ever increased illness, then “vaccines kill people” is just as true as “vaccines save lives”.

I don’t need to have personally reviewed all records of every single version of every single vaccine to confidently assert the two statements are not remotely equivalent in accuracy.

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