“Phrase of the Day”. We tend to run through cycles of catch-phrases that people glom onto and use way too much. Usually mis-using, truth be told.
“Dunning-Kruger Effect” was a recent one. All of a sudden everything was “Dunning-Kruger”. Even things that weren’t, “Dunning-Kruger” was confidently attached, I guess as verbal proof that the person using it was correct in whatever assertion they were arguing.
Another recent one was “narcissist”. Suddenly every person with a bad character trait was a narcissist. We had narcissists coming out our metaphorical ears — Significant Other dumped you? Narcissist. You dumped a Significant Other? Narcissist. Hamster got the clap? Narcissist. Pork belly futures not looking so good? There’s a narcissist involved, somehow.
The latest one seems to be “gaslighting”.
These days occurrences which would normally be easily-explained by absentmindedness are immediately “Straight to gas-lighting, do not pass go, do not collect $200.”
It’s annoying.
What’s even more annoying — and a wee bit worrying — is the over-use of the phrase “gas-lighting” is causing us to willfully ignore full-on instances of gas-lighting that are happening to us right in front of our eyes.
As a cynic, and a history buff — but I repeat myself — I put very little faith in the media to do anything other than perpetuate itself. “Yellow Journalism” anyone?
However, recently … bloody hell.
The Legacy Media was in lock-step, singing paeans to the “sharp as a tack” mental acuity of President Biden. Until, suddenly, they couldn’t. Has anyone in the Legacy Media fallen on their sword for that abject failure? Taken any sort of responsibility, of any kind?
Hell, I’m in Texas, and I’ve been making “Non Compos Alpo” jokes about Biden for years now, I find it hard to believe that alleged “professional” “journalists” living in the same sodding zip-code couldn’t see it.
Anyone besides me remember the Legacy Media chanting “horse dewormer” regarding ivermectin? Despite ivermectin being on the World Health Organization’s List of Essential Medicines for literally decades, being used to treat river blindness, scabies, elephantiasis, trichinosis, malaria, leishmaniasis, and literally scores of other infections in humans … the Legacy Media decided to deride this miracle medicine as “horse dewormer”.
Has anyone in the Legacy Media given a public apology, then retreated to their office to Do The Right Thing? Taken any sort of responsibility, of any kind?
Now, Legacy Media is announcing that the economy is actually all ok. CNN today had a article about how “slower inflation is boosting American’s confidence.”
Horse. Feathers.
I’m retired, so I’m drawing my pension from the Texas County and District Retirement System. It’s a decent little monthly cheque.
On top of my pension I’m having to work a full-time job, Rita has a full-time job (and hauling down all the overtime she can get), and we’re both getting some royalty cheques from our books. Those five cheques keep our household treading water in this “confident economy”.
I’m here to tell you that when two #1 combos from McDonald’s to feed a traveling couple costs almost $30 — your economy is in the khazi. And the “Hail fellow well met” grin you wear while lying to us about how things are actually great isn’t really all that convincing.
Anyone else remember the prim expressions when the Legacy Media chidingly informed us that Hunter Biden’s embarrassing little laptop was “Russian disinformation”?
Well, there definitely was some disinformation involved there.
Has anyone in Legacy Media taken any sort of responsibility, of any kind, for that lovely little bit of bushwa?
The latest is Legacy Media informing us quite haughtily that Haitian immigrants are not eating household pets in Springfield, Ohio.
I’m going to be quite honest here — I really didn’t think that folks from Haiti were actually eating people’s dogs and cats … but given the Legacy Media’s track record of — let’s be quite honest here — gas-lighting the American public … now I’m not so sure.
The current cynical joke is something along the lines of: When the Media denies something, it’s two months away from being proven correct.
This can not continue. This gas-lighting of the public by the Legacy Media is toxic to society, and has to stop. One way or another.
And that scares me. The thought of the ultimate response to a Media which — occasionally openly and proudly — engages in gas-lighting the society in which they must exist, in which they should serve, in which they must function …
… I’ve seen a response to journalists and Media commonly thought by the society to be corrupt. And that way lies madness, fire, and screams.
But I don’t know how to stop them. And I’m not sure that Legacy Journalists and Legacy Media they work for want to be stopped.
Madness.
LawDog
Well… my considered opinion, based on observation, and interaction, is that no matter *how much* you hate the legacy media, you don’t hate them enough.
Two months? Two MONTHS?!
Two weeks is more like it, and the way things are going, we’re liable to hit two hours by election day ..
The fact of the matter is many of us don’t have the gravitas to think outside the box. I prefer it that way, and hope some of those blessed with their lack of journalistic integrity are so frustrated they jump from a bridge.
Welp, Live, Laugh, Toaster Bath…. I think we are going to have to nuke trad media from space… it’s the only way to be sure!!
The mayor and police chief insist it is not happening.
The citizens (including multiple 911 transcripts) insist that it is. Some with video.
Said citizens also want the entire city council recalled and removed.
MSM is a blight, a propaganda machine, and like the above poster said, you don’t hate them enough.
Oh to have journalists actually search for the truth till they find it!
Current events. “Whoever wrote this episode should DIE!” (Galaxy Quest) Sadly all too likely with a metric ton of collateral damage, short of Divine Intervention .
Dawg:
When the US Senate threw away South Vietnam back in ’75 we got a pile and a half of refugees who had helped the CIA with their little “secret” war from the mountains of Vietnam. The ‘Nards (Hmong to Minnesnowtans) were basically the hillbillies of ‘Nam. In my first few years of college I volunteered to attempt to help them adapt to living in the US (mostly in St. Paul). Just keeping them from building fires on piles of sand in apartment buildings was one part; teaching them what toilets and sinks were for was another. Stoves were an incredible innovation for them, ovens, too.
But a major part was the difficulty of getting game laws through to them. They figured anything moving was fair, including cats and dogs, and the idea of “limits” on how many fish they could take was hysterically funny to them. It took lots of work to get it through that they would actually pay fines and possibly go to jail for violating what they thought were ridiculous customs.
There is exactly zero doubt in my mind that the Haitian “refugees” (actually Dem-wing replacement voters, eventually) are killing and eating pets, or Canada Geese, or anything else they can kill and eat. It’s what they’ve done for all of their lives, and they’re in a target-rich environment. Given that they’ve dropped 20,000 of them into a town of 60,000 it’s not surprising a lot of headway hasn’t been made in explaining this to them.
It’s… frustrating.
One of the best teachers I have ever had was a journalist. He’d not waste spit on the propaganda machines of today. I’m in agreement.
We must tread carefully lest we end up like the ancient Roman Republic or the Athenians or Spartans.
Ulises from the People’s Republik of Kalipornia
A RESPECTABLE newspaper would have the corrections on the front page ABOVE THE FOLD. An incentive to not have to issue them. Likewise, a RESPECTABLE news show would LEAD with corrections, again an incentive to not have to issue them.
I do not foresee any respectable (traditional) media anytime soon. It might happen, but it’ll be a Phoenix rising from the ashes of what came before.
The MSM printed stories of a Haitian gang who practiced cannibalism but seems to have failed to investigate if the same people would eat pets. They claim that the missing critters were probably just used in animal sacrifices.
I feel so much better now.
I am terribly worried about what is going to happen in November. In 2020, Trump received an historic number of votes, but we are to believe Biden got an even more historic number of votes. This time around, all indications are that the support for Trump has grown substantially, and in many demographics that are historically Dem voters. How far are they willing to go to pretend Harris wins? 90M votes? 100M? It will have to be even more brazen than 2020, and if they do this, I fear the response will be violent.
On the flip side, the democrats have a history of getting fiery and violent when they lose, and the rhetoric this time is off the charts. I fear we are in for a troubled time either way.
Here we go yet again… and the ‘words’ that the MSM is throwing out have been polled, etc. for useage and click bait, to ‘enhance’ the sound bite’s generation to click on it and ignore actual news.
Re Blackwing, he’s NOT wrong, same with the Vietnamese in LA, Houston, etc. Remember the ASPCA going bat nuts over the Vietnamese in LA ‘adopting’ a dog or two a week?
The legacy media are not dead yet but they are losing market share, and we can help that process along by giving publicity to alt-media channels and the sites that carry them.
As good places to start, I recommend substack.com, locals.com, rumble.com, and bitchute.com. The last three are podcast platforms that don’t block or ban people for political viewpoints as YouTube does.