Trans increasing among Teens, especially girls; Cis Whites (heteros
comfortable with their birth sex) are the Enemy
Newsletter published on June 12, 2019
(1) Kids turn
viciously against Parents; 'Cis Whites' (heteros
comfortable with their
birth sex) are the Enemy.
(2) Trans increasing among Teens, especially girls;
Cis-gendered people
are considered evil
(3) Vatican condemns
Transgenderism as attempt to "Annihilate Nature",
deny sexual
differences
(4) US embassies still hoisting rainbow flags, despite advisory
from
Washington
(5) Gay conservatives join fight to kill liberal Equality
Act, which
would force Churches to employ Gays
(6) Carol Roth: Dear
militant feminists, stop messing it up for the rest
of us
(7) Liberals
Cry Censorship after YouTube Demonetizing Frenzy hits SPLC
Content
(8)
YouTube's purge of white supremacist videos also hits anti-racism
channels
(9) Pinterest bans Zero Hedge by adding to "Porn Domain Block
List" used
to target Conservatives
(10) Soros Implementing His Radical
Leftist Agenda By Investing In
Criminal Justice
(1) Kids turn
viciously against Parents; 'Cis Whites' (heteros
comfortable with their
birth sex) are the Enemy.From: Eric Walberg <
walberg2002@yahoo.com>
Subject: re
trans
hi peter,
i was shocked to see 110 transwomen blacks murdered in
US since 2014. i
tried to find stats on trans. they are spotty, but it looks
like numbers
have increased significantly in the past decade.
mostly
transwomen.
this is a good analysis, arguing the internet is the main
culprit. kids
surfing the net, where there's lots of unregulated pro-trans
youtube
videos. also the now strident gaylib lgbTq mantra. kids turn
viciously
against parents
'cis whites' are the enemy.
it
describes this as an epidemic of mass socio-genic illness.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/culture-mind-and-brain/201811/why-is-transgender-identity-the-rise-among-teenseric
(2)
Trans increasing among Teens, especially girls; cis-gendered people
are
considered evilhttps://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/culture-mind-and-brain/201811/why-is-transgender-identity-the-rise-among-teensSamuel
Veissière Ph.D. Culture, Mind, and Brain
Why Is Transgender Identity on
the Rise Among Teens? A new study of
social contagion raises important
clinical and ethical questions.
Posted Nov 28, 2018
Transgender
identity* is characterized by experiencing distress with, or
an inability to
identify with one’s biological sex, usually prompting a
desire to live one’s
life as the opposite sex.
In the DSM-5, the standard classification of
mental disorders used by
mental health professionals, this condition is
known as "gender
dysphoria." Note that classifying gender dysphoria as a
disorder does
not—indeed, should not—imply a moral judgment of transgender
individuals. Depending on the degree of social stigma associated with
it, transgender identity can be accompanied by very significant
distress. The point of the mental-health outlook is to help reduce
stigma and assist transgender individuals in leading good lives. The
role of social norms in this picture, however, remains unclear and hotly
debated.
The historical and cross-cultural record indicates that
conditions akin
to what we now call "transgender identity" have been known
to occur in
all societies, with varying degrees of acceptance, suppression,
or even
encouragement. The widespread acceptance of individuals who were
born
males and dress and live as females, such as the hijra in India, katoey
in Thailand, bakla in the Philippines, and travesti in Brazil, for
example, long predates the current transgender movement in the West.
Despite a longstanding recognition of their existence, transgender
individuals in those countries continue to face some discrimination.
Among the Kuna (also known as Guna) of the San Blas Islands in Panama,
transgender identity appears to have been fully accepted since
precolonial times. As a rare example of a matriarchal and matrilineal
society, names and properties are typically passed on from female to
female among the Kuna, leading to a cultural preference for having girl
children. In this context, male children were sometimes raised as girls,
thereby conferring families with a distinct social advantage. This gave
rise to a rare example of absence of cultural stigma around transgender
identities.
These examples are telling because they point to the
importance of
different social norms in mediating gendered preferences and
behavior.
They also introduce another piece in our puzzle: all the
culturally
recognized incidences of pre-modern transgender individuals
mentioned
above involve natal males who transition to female. In the DSM-5,
prevalence rates of gender dysphoria are estimated at 0.005 percent to
0.014 percent of the population for natal males, and 0.002 percent to
0.003 percent for natal females. The higher prevalence of males
exhibiting the condition is likely related to a higher percentage of
male homosexuals worldwide (3 to 4 percent) as compared to lesbians (1
to 2 percent). While these rates are the subject of debate, the higher
ratio of male homosexuals as compared to women is a consistent finding
across surveys.
As attested by current controversies, rates of
transgender identity
appear to be on the rise, particularly among young
people. Increased
social acceptance of a previously stigmatized condition
likely plays a
role in this process, but other findings are clearly
puzzling:
Transgender identity is now reported among young natal females at
rates
that clearly exceed all known statistics to date.
In a recent
survey of 250 families whose children developed symptoms of
gender dysphoria
during or right after puberty, Lisa Littman, a
physician and professor of
behavioral science at Brown University, found
that over 80 percent of the
youth in her sample were female at birth.
Littman’s study reported many
other surprising findings. To meet the
diagnostic criteria for gender
dysphoria, a child typically needs to
have shown observable characteristics
of the condition prior to puberty,
such as "a strong rejection of typically
feminine or masculine toys," or
"a strong resistance to wearing typically
feminine or masculine
clothes." Again, 80 percent of the parents in the
study reported
observing none of these early signs in their
children.
The plot thickens again: First, many of the youth in the survey
had been
directly exposed to one or more peers who had recently "come out"
as
trans. Next, 63.5 percent of the parents reported that in the time just
before announcing they were trans, their child had exhibited a marked
increase in Internet and social media consumption. Following popular
YouTubers who discussed their transition thus emerged as a common factor
in many of the cases. After the youth came out, an increase in distress,
conflict with parents, and voiced antagonism toward heterosexual people
and non-transgender people (known as "cis" or "cisgender") was also
frequently reported. This animosity was also described as extending to
"males, white people, gay and lesbian (non-transgender) people." The
view adopted by trans youth, as summed up by one parent, seemed to be
that:
"In general, cis-gendered people are considered evil and
unsupportive,
regardless of their actual views on the topic. To be
heterosexual,
comfortable with the gender you were assigned at birth, and
non-minority
places you in the ‘most evil’ of categories with this group of
friends.
Statement of opinions by the evil cis-gendered population are
consider
phobic and discriminatory and are generally discounted as
unenlightened."
Parents further reported being derogatorily called
"breeders" by their
children, or being routinely harassed by children who
played
"pronoun-police." The observation that they no longer recognized
their
child’s voice came up time and again in parental reports. In turn, the
eerie similarity between the youth's discourse and trans-positive online
content was repeatedly emphasized. Youth were described as "sounding
scripted," "reading from a script," "wooden," "like a form letter,"
"verbatim," "word for word," or "practically copy and paste."
Littman
raises cautions about encouraging young people’s desire to
transition in all
instances. From the cases reviewed in her study, she
concluded that what
she terms "rapid-onset gender dysphoria" (ROGD)
appears to be a novel
condition that emerges from cohort and contagion
effects and novel social
pressures. From this perspective, ROSD likely
exhibits an aetiology and
epidemiology that is distinct from the
"classical" cases of gender dysphoria
documented in the DSM.
Littman hypothesizes that ROGD can be cast as a
maladaptive coping
mechanism for other underlying mental health issues such
as trauma or
social maladjustment, but also for other exceptional traits
like high IQ
and giftedness. The peer support, prestige, and identity
leveraged by
the youth who proudly come out as trans certainly appears to be
protective in their circles. As Littman’s study shows, this social
signaling strategy also comes with strong disadvantages, particularly as
it increases conflict between trans youth and the "cis" majority of the
population, which, tellingly, includes a majority of the LGBT
community.
The notion reported by parents that the ROGD appears to be
"scripted" is
also telling. Medical anthropologists describe the process of
outsourcing negative feelings to cultural narratives and systems of
beliefs as "idioms of distress." These beliefs can be partially grounded
in science and biology (as is the case with current brain-based mental
health culture), or not at all (as is the case in cultures that explain
mental illness through the idiom of spirit possession). When extreme
forms of distress and coping arise through novel social pressures and
spread through implicit imitation, strange epidemics of "mass
psychogenic illnesses" have been documented. These have extended to
dancing plagues, possession epidemics on factory floors, fugue states,
or epidemics of face-twitching. These conditions are described as
"psychogenic" (originating in the mind) when no underlying physical
cause can be determined. But the term "sociogenic," which highlights the
social context in which these conditions occur, is a better
description.
Risk factors for proneness to mass sociogenic illness remain
hotly
debated. Tellingly, for our investigation, it is broadly recognized
that
females, perhaps due to their higher sensitivity to social cues on
average, are overwhelmingly more prone to such phenomena. Once more,
this should not be read as a moral story. Medical sociologist Robert
Bartholomew, one of the world’s leading experts on mass sociogenic
epidemics, has long argued that phenomena that are still unjustly termed
"mass hysteria" should be renamed "collective stress responses."
It
is clear from Littman’s study that the rise of rapid-onset gender
dysphoria,
which seems to predominantly involve natal females, points to
a complex web
of social pressures, changing cultural norms, and new
modes of distress and
coping that warrant further investigation. For
parents, educators, and
clinicians alike, caution is warranted in
dealing with this growing
phenomenon.
*Note: an earlier version of this post used the term
"transgenderism"
which, while often used to describe transgender
individuals, is now
considered out of date and stigmatizing by many in the
LGBT community.
"Transgender identity" is the community's preferred term.
The author
thanks the Human Rights Campaign for pointing this
out.
*** Note # 2: I have received numerous private comments from readers
about this article. Some readers pointed out that I did not mention the
controversy and significant public backlash that ensued after the study
was first published in August 2018. You can read my discussion of this
backlash in this next post.
*** Note # 3: You may also read my third
post, in which I call for
dialogue (not debate) and compassion between the
different sides of the
ROGD debate
(3) Vatican condemns
Transgenderism as attempt to "Annihilate Nature",
deny sexual
differenceshttps://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-06-11/vatican-condemns-transgenderism-attempt-annihilate-natureVatican
Condemns Transgenderism as attempt to "Annihilate Nature"
by Tyler
Durden
Tue, 06/11/2019 - 15:05
As many in the world celebrate
"Pride Month" amid a surge in demands for
acceptance of the idea that gender
is more complex and fluid than the
binary categories of male and female, The
Vatican has blasted modern
gender theory, claiming in a new document that it
seeks to "annihilate
the concept of 'nature'."
The document, which
carries the title "Male And Female: He Created Them"
was released by the
Vatican June 10 without prior announcement.
Described as an aid for Catholic
schoolteachers and parents on how to
address the topic of gender theory in
line with Church teaching, the
document questions the motives of transgender
people, saying their
gender transition is "only a 'provocative'
display."
As NCR reports, the text opens by saying that society is facing
"an
educational crisis, especially in the field of affectivity and
sexuality."
It then claims that cultural "disorientation" has
destabilized the
family as an institution, "bringing with it a tendency to
cancel out the
differences between men and women, presenting them instead as
merely the
product of historical and cultural conditioning."
...
"From the point of view of genetics, male cells (which contain XY
chromosomes) differ, from the very moment of conception, from female
cells (with their XX chromosomes)," ...
In cases where a child is
born with ambiguous genitalia, it says "it is
medical professionals who can
make a therapeutic intervention."
"In such situations, parents cannot
make an arbitrary choice on the
issue, let alone society," it
recommends.
"Instead, medical science should act with purely therapeutic
ends, and
intervene in the least invasive fashion, on the basis of objective
parameters and with a view to establishing the person's constitutive
identity." ...
Finally, the document denounced theories that
attempted to "annihilate
the concept of nature" and "educational programmes
and legislative
trends that ... make a radical break with the actual
biological
difference between male and female".
The Vatican says this
"radical separation" between gender and sex has
the goal of achieving "a
society without sexual differences."
As one would expect, Reuters reports
that LGBT rights advocates
denounced the 30-page document as harmful and
confusing, saying it would
encourage hatred and bigotry.
Groups that
minister to LGBT Catholics immediately criticized the
document. New Ways
Ministry, one such group, called it a:
"harmful tool that will be used to
oppress and harm not only transgender
people, but lesbian, gay, [and]
bisexual people, too."
The educational aid does not carry Pope Francis'
signature, and the text
makes no reference of the pontiff reviewing the
document, but Francis,
whose early pontificate was defined by his "Who am I
to judge?" answer
to a question about an alleged gay priest working at the
Vatican, has
made contradictory remarks about gender theory and transgender
people
throughout his six-year papacy.
(4) US embassies still
hoisting rainbow flags, despite advisory from
Washingtonhttps://www.ctpost.com/news/article/US-embassies-still-hoisting-rainbow-flags-13962586.phpCarol
Morello, The Washington Post
Published 4:45 pm EDT, Saturday, June 8,
2019
Since the State Department began rejecting all embassy requests to
hoist
rainbow flags outside the mission buildings during Gay Pride Month
this
year, some U.S. diplomats have been finding ways to defy, or at least
get around, the new policy.
The facades of the U.S. missions in Seoul
and Chennai, India, are
partially hidden behind large rainbow flags, while
the embassy in New
Delhi is aglow in rainbow colored lights. The website for
the embassy in
Santiago, Chile, shows a video of the chief diplomat raising
a rainbow
flag last month for the International Day Against Homophobia,
Transphobia and Biphobia.
The Vienna Embassy's website features a
photo of a rainbow flag flying
below Old Glory on a mast jutting from the
building, a statement by
Diplomats for Equality and a story about a
professor lecturing on the
visibility and growth of LGBT rights.
U.S.
diplomats in Jerusalem joined a March for Pride and Tolerance, and
several
ambassadors have tweeted photos of themselves in local Pride
parades or
standing outside the embassies surrounded by employees
holding up letters
spelling PRIDE.
"This is a category one insurrection," said one diplomat,
who like
others interviewed about the sentiment over the rejections, which
were
not made in writing, spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of
being fired.
How the homophobic media covered the 1969 Stonewall
uprising A practice
routinely approved for most of the decade at many
embassies now requires
top-level approval from the State Department. But
this year, as first
reported by NBC News, all requests were
nixed.
The flap over the flags started when the State Department did not
send
out an official cable this year with guidelines for marking Pride
Month,
as it has in years past. In 2011, the Obama administration directed
agencies involved with foreign policy to promote LGBT rights, a striking
policy for an agency that, up to the early 1990s, considered
homosexuality a security risk and cause for termination.
The Obama
administration's Pride Month guidelines included rules for
flying rainbow
flags from poles outside embassies - they had to be
smaller than the
American flag and fly beneath it. But permission was
granted with no fuss.
By 2016, approvals were left up to each ambassador
or chief of
mission.
That process changed last year, after Mike Pompeo became
secretary of
state. An evangelical Christian who believes marriage should be
defined
as between a man and woman, Pompeo has said gay employees will be
respected and treated like everyone else. But he has downplayed some
symbols of LGBT rights, while introducing several new panels and envoys
specializing in religious freedom issues.
The advisory cable that
came out last year said diplomats are required
to obtain top-level approval
from the State Department's Office of
Management to fly a rainbow
flag.
The State Department declined to answer questions about the Pride
Month
advisory and rainbow flag ban. But two diplomats familiar with the
events said all requests last year were approved.
This year, there
was a shift. Embassies in Israel, Germany, Brazil and
Latvia, plus a handful
of other posts, asked to fly rainbow flags. All
were denied, said a person
at the State Department who was familiar with
what happened.
Although
most embassies seem to be towing the line, the policy shift
appears to have
sparked something of a revolt among diplomats.
Foreign Service officers
have complained on a private Facebook page that
nobody should have asked for
permission anyway.
Some embassies that have flown the flag in previous
years opted this
year to commemorate the month by posting on their websites
President
Donald Trump's statement affirming LGBT rights and inviting
nations to
join a global campaign to decriminalize homosexuality. The
initiative
was the idea of Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany,
who is gay.
Some embassies got playful with the display of Trump's
statement. In
Brasilia, for example, the statement is topped by a photo of
two hands
holding six Play-Doh letters in rainbow colors: LGBTQ. But some
did not
mention Trump's statement at all, an absence made more glaring by
the
juxtaposition with statements by ambassadors and secretaries of states
left over from previous years.
Some gay employees in the foreign and
civil service say the ban on
flying the rainbow flag is just the tip of an
iceberg of slights.
Pompeo has not issued a statement for Pride Month, as
he did last year.
He did not attend the State Department's annual Pride Day
event for two
years running as his predecessors usually did, though he was
traveling
in Europe this year. Instead, he dispatched Deputy Secretary of
State
John Sullivan, a veteran diplomat who promised that the State
Department
will advocate for gay diplomats and their families.
"Day
by day, a death by a thousand cuts, our rights as lgbt+ Americans
are being
eroded with the removal of a guidance here, the rewriting of a
policy there,
or just the quiet disappearance of a web site," Robyn
McCutcheon, a
transgender woman who has served in several posts abroad,
wrote in her blog
"Transgender at State," lamenting what she has
observed throughout the
government in the past two years. "It should
come as no surprise that this
erosion would happen also at the U.S.
Department of State."
Some
acknowledge that their worst fears have not been borne out.
The
administration has appointed several gay ambassadors. Trump became
the first
Republican president to make a statement celebrating Pride
Month. No one has
been fired for sexual orientation, but some said they
have felt more
vulnerable after Trump tried to ban transgender people
from the
military.
Better, they said, to not even discuss LGBT issues publicly and
risk the
consequences of drawing attention to themselves.
"We fly
below the radar," one employee said. "We survive because they
don't realize
we're here."
(5) Gay conservatives join fight to kill liberal Equality
Act, which
would force Churches to employ Gayshttps://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/gay-conservatives-join-fight-to-kill-liberal-equality-act?
Gay
conservatives join fight to kill liberal Equality Act
by Paul
Bedard
| June 07, 2019
Gregory T. Angelo thought he had the
perfect plan after he resigned as
president of Log Cabin Republicans, the
leading GOP LGBT group.
He turned off his email and walked away from his
nonstop role as the
media director, fundraiser, and organizer of
conservative gays after six
years in the hot seat.
Then the new House
Democratic majority passed the Equality Act, which
guarantees added rights
to LGBT Americans, and he went back to work, now
leading a coalition to urge
the Senate to kill the liberal legislation
because it would force Christian
businesses, churches, and
church-related colleges and institutions to cater
to gays in violation
of their teachings.
"I’m not against equality.
I’m against the Equality Act," he said.
What troubles Angelo and other
conservative gays is that the Equality
Act forces gay rights across the
board and breaks a promise he and
others have made in the past to also
protect and enshrine religious freedom.
"Many like me who are gay feel
very strongly about the negative
consequences if the Equality Act becomes
law," Angelo, now working in
communications, said. "It betrays the promises
we had made on past
campaigns and could destroy all the goodwill we built up
with everyday
Americans, especially people of faith."
Since last
May’s House vote, he has moved quickly to thwart Senate
passage, starting
with a column in the Washington Examiner magazine that
warned, "Passage of
the Equality Act would make liars out of the lot of
us. It would put the
nonprofit status of religious charities at risk; it
would force mom-and-pop
businesses to participate in same-sex marriage
ceremonies; and it would
flout bedrock principles that have served as
the foundation of the American
experience for centuries."
That column sparked a social media outcry
against the Equality Act by
conservatives, gay and not, and prompted Angelo
to seek supporters for a
petition to urge the Senate to kill the
act.
In just one day, he said, he had 100 co-signers, including
supporters of
President Trump. Others, such as Heritage Action for America,
also
jumped to attention after the House vote.
"The Equality Act
pretends to promote equality and fairness, but it’s a
cynical power grab to
crush religious freedom and parental rights in the
name of political
correctness," said Jessica Anderson, vice president of
Heritage Action.
"Under the proposed law, religious charities in our
nation’s hospitals,
churches, and schools would be forced to either
violate their beliefs or
shut down, and parents would increasingly lose
the ability to make decisions
regarding their children’s education and
health care."
Today, he
delivered the letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell’s
staff.
In fighting the act, Angelo faced hateful comments such as one on
Facebook telling him to commit suicide.
But he had been there before,
regularly the subject of nasty social
media for clashing with the lockstep
of liberal gay groups, especially
when pointing out the steps the Trump
administration has made to push
LGBT issues and hire and promote gay aides
and judges.
He hopes to push a compromise that provides for most of the
protections
provided by the Equality Act without forcing Christian groups to
cave in
to Washington.
For years, he said, the gay community said to
straight America, "'Trust
us, we are no threat to you, your family or your
faith.'" "Now we must
continue to keep that promise and offer legislation to
provide
protections for LGBT while acknowledging people of faith. Let’s have
nondiscriminatory protections and exempt religious institutions," Angelo
said.
(6) Carol Roth: Dear militant feminists, stop messing it up for
the rest
of ushttps://www.foxnews.com/opinion/carol-roth-restaurants-manners-etiquette-equality-feministsJune
8, 2019
By Carol Roth
My husband has opened the car door for me
every single time we have
arrived at our vehicle since we met nearly 22
years ago. Colleagues and
strangers open doors and let me enter a building
or room first. Other
work associates let me order first at the restaurant.
And, here’s an
almost "secret"… I absolutely love it.
The website
Eater, which describes itself a "the source for people who
care about dining
and drinking in the world’s best food cities,"
recently ran an article that
explained that many restaurants are doing
away with classic training and
etiquette, like serving the women at the
table first and not using phrasing
like "ladies" or "gentlemen" because
they are eliminating "soft
sexism."
These are merely a few examples in a long list of grievances
that are
good manners being killed because some women don’t understand what
equality or sexism really means.
A restaurant serving women first is
a sign of class, elegance and
respect. If you are offended by that, have a
hard think about why you
are so angry.
So, ultra-"feminists" here’s
my request: be miserable if you want, but
stop ruining chivalry, manners and
civility for the rest of us.
Equality is about being seen as equal in the
eyes of the law. It does
not mean that we are all equal in talent, beauty,
strength, material
possessions, free time, health, etc. Not only is that an
unrealistic
objective, it certainly has nothing to do with basic
manners.
I am very grateful to the women who came before me, who fought
for my
and other women’s rights including voting and equal pay. While I
appreciate immensely their sacrifices and hard work, I also can relish
in the fact that because they have done so, there’s no other place or
time in history where it is better to be a woman than right now in the
United States of America.
There are women around the world who are
truly oppressed, who aren’t
allowed basic human rights, who are caned for
adultery, who can’t do
basic tasks without the accompaniment and approval of
men.
We can continue to fight for them, while still appreciating the
manners
of a man—or anyone, for that matter- who is holding the door open
for you.
To dote on a woman and to raise her up on a pedestal is a signal
of
respect, not a reflection of inferiority. While it may be a distinction,
it’s not a discrimination, as it certainly doesn’t hold a woman back.
And, while you may not want a man to offer up his seat on the bus while
you show your grit and determination to stand, I would welcome the
gesture, after a long day in four-inch heels, even if I ultimately
turned it down.
I appreciate the fact that when the Titanic sunk, the
women and children
were allowed off first, and would appreciate the same
courtesy today.
I am glad I was never eligible for the draft. I
appreciate when a man
across the aisle of the plane lets me go first vs. the
ones that jockey
with me for position -- or worse, hit me in the head
fighting to be the
first to get their luggage down. I even give bonus points
to the men
that offer to take my luggage down for me, almost always
responding with
a thank you and "I am glad to see that chivalry is not
dead."
So, to the women who are offended by civility and manners, I again
politely ask you to stop screwing it up for the rest of us and ruining
common courtesy in society.
And to the chivalrous men, your
courtesies are appreciated by many. I
say thank you as I virtually curtsy in
respect, not in deference.
(7) Liberals Cry Censorship after YouTube
Demonetizing Frenzy hits SPLC
Contenthttps://breaking-news.ca/liberals-cry-censorship-after-youtube-demonetizing-frenzy-hits-splc-content/Posted
on June 9, 2019
AuthorQ
‘It is carpet bombing style
censorship’
Source: Liberals Cry Censorship After YouTube Demonetizing
Frenzy Hits
SPLC Content | The Daily Caller
Liberal activists are
crying foul after YouTube’s demonetizing frenzy
slammed the Southern Poverty
Law Center, an organization known for
labeling conservative groups as hate
groups.
A video SPLC published was among those nixed after YouTube
announced
plans Wednesday to remove videos and content that promote white
supremacy. Journalist Max Blumenthal lashed out at the company after the
video, which reports on Holocaust denialism, was pulled for violating
the new policy.
"In @YouTube’s political purge, my video report for
the @splcenter
exposing Holocaust revisionist David Irving as a fascist and
fraud
historian was removed. This purge has already gone well beyond its
stated aim. It is carpet bombing style censorship," Blumenthal wrote on
Twitter Friday.
Max Blumenthal ? @MaxBlumenthal In @YouTube’s
political purge, my video
report for the @splcenter exposing Holocaust
revisionist David Irving as
a fascist and fraud historian was
removed.
This purge has already gone well beyond its stated aim. It is
carpet
bombing style censorship.
https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tn-youtube-hate-extremism-20190606-story.html
…
YouTube used the new policy to demonetize conservative commentator
Steven Crowder, citing several inflammatory statements he directed at
Vox writer Carlos Maza, who posted several tweets before the policy
change urging the company to deplatform Crowder.
Heidi Beirich,
director of the SPLC’s Intelligence Project, mirrored
much of Blumenthal’s
concerns. YouTube needs to weed out bad actors from
those who are trying to
call out racism and white supremacy. She blamed
a sloppy algorithm for the
problem.
"Companies that make billions of dollars a year can certainly
figure out
a way to fix this," Beirich told the Los Angeles Times Thursday.
"Hopefully they don’t get caught up in this purge, but you could see how
they might … if you have a ham-handed process." (RELATED: YouTube To
Step Up Suppression Of Videos That Don’t Violate Any Rules, Promote News
Outlets)
Other activist and liberal journalists expressed their
opinions.
"A policy that attempts to ban hateful content is only as
effective as
the mechanisms implemented to enforce such rules," Color of
Change
President Rashad Robinson said in a statement Friday. "If executed
poorly, this policy could contribute to even more harm for black
communities and other communities targeted by white supremacist
ideologies."
Jordan Chariton, a journalist who formerly worked for The
Young Turks,
also weighed in on the debacle. "This overreaction to
individual
offenders to then destroy the livelihoods of those who cover war
&
corporate power critically is absurd and polar opposite of what
YouTube’s mission once was. Punish INDIVIDUAL hosts if they are selling
shirts based on homophobia. Stop punishing others," he said on Twitter
Wednesday.
(8) YouTube's purge of white supremacist videos also hits
anti-racism
channelshttps://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-tn-youtube-hate-extremism-20190606-story.htmlBy
SUHAUNA HUSSAIN and SAMANTHA MASUNAGA
JUN 06, 2019 | 4:20
PM
YouTube’s campaign against hateful and racist videos is claiming some
unintended victims: researchers and advocates working to expose racist
hatemongers.
A video published by the Southern Poverty Law Center was
among those
taken down after the company announced plans Wednesday to remove
more
videos and channels that advocate white supremacy.
The civil
rights advocacy group received an email notification early
Thursday that a
video of journalist Max Blumenthal interviewing
prominent British Holocaust
denier David Irving was removed from the
SPLC’s YouTube channel.
"We
know that this might be disappointing, but it’s important to us that
YouTube
is a safe place for all. If content breaks our rules, we remove
it," YouTube
said in the email.
A video channel tied to Cal State San Bernardino’s
Center for the Study
of Hate and Extremism also disappeared from YouTube,
the center’s
director, Brian Levin, said. YouTube declined to confirm
whether the
dozen or more academic videos were removed as part of the recent
crackdown, but after the Los Angeles Times inquired, it said Thursday
that it had reinstated the channel.
YouTube’s moves to start banning
content promoting bigotry were
"positive and well-intended," but the
execution has been botched, Levin
said.
"Artificial intelligence has
not been honed to the level where it can
distinguish between content that is
promoting the most odious bigotry,
and that which is reporting and analyzing
it," he said.
That organizations working to raise awareness of hate
speech may have
been casualties of an effort to reduce the spread of hate
speech was not
surprising to Heidi Beirich, director of the SPLC’s
Intelligence
Project. That kind of ironic collateral damage has often
resulted from
tech companies’ efforts to police their platforms with
software that
relies on keywords and other ambiguous signals, backed up by
human
moderators.
Another anti-racist group, One People’s Project,
had an informational
video removed from its YouTube page after Wednesday’s
policy change,
according to a report by the Daily Beast. A high school
history teacher
and a South African blogger were among others affected while
attempting
to counter white supremacy.
"It indicates that they have
not refined well enough the difference
between someone who is exploring
issues of racism and hatred and someone
who’s promoting it," Beirich
said.
Other large internet platforms have fallen prey to the same types
of
errors. Trying to curb anti-gay posts, Facebook accidentally censored
posts by LGBT users who use terms such as "queer." Last year, some LGBTQ
creators on YouTube raised concerns about their content being hidden,
restricted to adult users or demonetized by the company, the Verge
reported.
Jessica J. González, vice president of strategy at the media
advocacy
organization Free Press, said it’s important for tech companies to
rely
on human moderators as opposed to algorithms to train staff in cultural
competency and to ensure their appeal processes are simple, transparent
and rapid.
González’s organization helped develop a set of suggested
content
moderation policies. She said the suggested policies were informed
by
the experiences of people whose posts have been taken down on Twitter
and Facebook for calling out racism.
"A policy that attempts to ban
hateful content is only as effective as
the mechanisms implemented to
enforce such rules," Color of Change
President Rashad Robinson said in a
statement. "If executed poorly, this
policy could contribute to even more
harm for black communities and
other communities targeted by white
supremacist ideologies."
In the SPLC video, Blumenthal was exploring how
people could believe the
Holocaust was a hoax and how that belief
contributes to anti-Semitism,
Beirich said.
"YouTube saw someone
speaking of Holocaust denial and assumed it was
promotion. But it was the
opposite — it was exposure and condemnation of
Holocaust denial
thinking."
YouTube said it posts clear policies on what content is
acceptable and
removes videos violating those policies, but with the massive
volume of
videos on the site, sometimes the company makes the wrong
call.
"When it’s brought to our attention that a video has been removed
mistakenly, we act quickly to reinstate it," YouTube said in a
statement. "We also offer uploaders the ability to appeal removals and
we will re-review the content."
Beirich said the SPLC’s channel also
hosts videos training law
enforcement on how to identify lone-wolf domestic
terrorists or Aryan
prison gangs, or what to do if a hate group comes to
town.
"Hopefully they don’t get caught up in this purge, but you could
see how
they might … if you have a ham-handed process," she
said.
Beirich said the SPLC plans to appeal the video’s
removal.
(9) Pinterest bans Zero Hedge by adding to "Porn Domain Block
List" used
to target Conservativeshttps://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-06-11/pinterest-bans-zero-hedge-adding-porn-domain-block-list-used-target-conservativesby
Tyler Durden
Tue, 06/11/2019 - 10:45
Documents leaked to Project
Veritas by a Pinterest insider reveal that
the San Francisco-based social
media company has blocked links from Zero
Hedge and several conservative or
religious-based websites - adding them
to a 'porn domain block list'
originally intended to keep the platform
free of sexually explicit
material.
Veritas has published several internal documents and
interviewed the
insider, who explained how the company with nearly 300
million active
monthly users censors pro-life and Christian content. The
leak reveals
an aggressive campaign to censor conservative content under the
guise of
'hate speech' and 'fake news.'
Pinterest added a pro-life
group website (@LiveAction) and @zerohedge to
its porn list in order to
prevent users for "pinning" or sharing the
websites
Consumers are
being lied to. Terms of Services are being violated.
Antitrust bullying
everywhere. pic.twitter.com/XnEiRDnObN
— Ali Alexander (@ali) June 11,
2019 Links to the leaked documents can
be viewed here, here, here, here,
here and here. Of note, in February
the social media platform made headlines
for blocking searches related
to anti-vaccination material. At the time, the
company was criticized
over their seemingly random methods for determining
offensive content.
"There’s a secretive process with no real appeal where
people are making
extremely difficult subjective calls that have to do with
politics,
culture and religion," said ACLU lawyer Jennifer
Granick.
The insider who leaked to Veritas agreed, saying that they were
"pretty
surprised" after discovering Live Action's inclusion on the porn
list.
The insider explained that websites on a "domain block list" cannot
be
linked in posts made by users. While investigating, Project Veritas
tried to post the LiveAction.org link on Pinterest and failed to do so,
receiving an error message that read, "Sorry! Your request could not be
completed." Project Veritas reviewed the list of websites from the "porn
domain block list" and was able to confirm that along with
LiveAction.org, websites like zerohedge.com, pjmedia.com, teaparty.org
and other various conservative websites were also listed. The majority
of the document lists pornographic websites. -Project Veritas
(10)
Soros Implementing His Radical Leftist Agenda By Investing In
Criminal
Justicehttps://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-06-11/soros-implementing-his-radical-leftist-agenda-investing-criminal-justiceby
Tyler Durden Tue, 06/11/2019 - 15:35 Via SaraCarter.com,
For many years
leftist billionaire George Soros has used his wealth to
remake our
society.
His latest area of focus is criminal justice. From Texas to
Philadelphia
to Virginia, Soros has reportedly spent millions in backing
candidates
for district attorneys or prosecutors.
"Philadelphia is
the laboratory where this experiment of Soros funded
prosecutors is playing
out," said William McSwain the US Attorney for
Eastern District of
Pennsylvania on Tucker Carlson Show.
"Now the returns are in. Larry
Krasner, the Philadelphia District
Attorney has been in office for about a
year and half, funded by Mr.
Soros, and we can look at the data and we can
see what is happening to
Philadelphia, where homicides have skyrocketed,
shooting have
skyrocketed, the worst types of violent crimes have really
gone up. And
in addition to that some of the low level and mid level crimes
have also
gone up but they aren’t being reported. And the reason they are
not
being reported is that DA has said that he is not going to prosecute
them."
