#stochastic terrorism

[grneyedmonster15]

The circumstances surrounding Nex Benedict’s death are so frightening to me. Little kids getting bullied and murdered just for existing as their authentic selves is horrific on its own, but it’s even worse that this murder was instigated by that fascist terrorist Chaya Raichik and that this same fascist terrorist was appointed to an Oklahoma Board of Education library media advisory committee by an apparently equally fascist superintendent. On top of that, I heard that the school punished Nex, the *victim* of this vicious attack, rather than the perpetrators.

Now law enforcement is claiming Nex didn’t die of trauma from the assault, which is absolute horseshit because even if it turns out their head injury wasn’t the immediate cause of death, their death was still a direct and foreseeable result of being terrorized and assaulted by other kids and then being punished by the school for being victimized.

Nex’s death was especially jarring to me because they looked a lot like my youngest child, who is pansexual. My heart lurched when I saw their picture. I was already worried about my child’s safety at school because we live in a red area, because my child has been bullied before over being autistic, and because of our country’s absolute failure to address gun violence, but now that the fascists are ramping up their terrorism against LGBTQIA children, I’m absolutely terrified for my child.

[edenfenixblogs]

If non-Palestinian goyim leftist activists would just condemn antisemitism then it would really free up Jewish leftists from all the time we have to spend proving that it exists. And then we’d have more time and energy to spend fighting for Palestinian liberation WITH YOU instead of desperately trying to combat a constant barrage of hate all by ourselves.

It is so emotionally draining to have to be the one to shout “HEY. PEOPLE ARE ATTACKING ME SO PLEASE JUST HELP BY SAYING THAT YOU THINK ITS WRONG THEYRE DOING THAT. SHAME THEM A LITTLE BIT!” All day every day.

Because we know you won’t do it. You’ve demonstrated every day since 10/7 that you won’t do it. I cannot fathom why except that you hate Jews or are scared of letting your other friends know that you like Jews.

Just, like, practice what you preach my dudes.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Dehumanizing and vilifying a person or group of people can provoke what scholars and law enforcement officials call stochastic terrorism, in which ideologically driven hate speech increases the likelihood that people will violently and unpredictably attack the targets of vicious claims.

At its core, stochastic terrorism exploits one of our strongest and most complicated emotions: disgust.

[...]

Propagandists have fomented disgust to dehumanize Jewish people as vermin; Black people as subhuman apes; Indigenous people as “savages”; immigrants as “animals” unworthy of protection; and members of the LGBTQ community as sexual deviants and “predators” who prey upon children.

[...]

Researchers have estimated that transgender people are more than fourfold more likely to be the victims of violent crime than their cisgender counterparts, and while not a direct link to violence, other scientists have linked disgust sensitivity and authoritarianism to a higher opposition to transgender rights. Over the past few months, assailants repeating the groomer slur have threatened to kill drag queens and LGBTQ people, as well as educators, school officials, librarians, parents and lawmakers who have come to their defense.

In the lead-up to the midterm elections, a blitz of far-right radio ads targeting Black and Hispanic stations in swing states has repeated falsehoods about transgender people and a QAnon warning that the Biden administration will make it easier for children “to remove breasts and genitals”—an attempt to evoke disgust. Other ads aimed at white audiences claim minorities are the true aggressors and destroyers of social norms. One decries “anti-white bigotry.” Another warns ominously, “Stop the woke war on our children.”

The cynical appeal to protecting children by attacking minorities has exposed a bitter irony: disgust is an emotion that evolved to keep us out of danger, but people have long misused it to inflict cruelty and catastrophic harm.

[asm5129]

My videos on the 1st Amendment and free speech are going to be really important in the next few weeks as claims of censorship, acts of domestic terrorism and incitement of it, and billionaires controlling the flow of information and misinformation become more and more prevalent. Please please PLEASE watch them, I designed them to be very accessible so anyone should be able to understand them and learn from them. It’s gonna be really, really important to know law and history around these topics in the coming days and weeks—Even more than it has been.

In Part I, we explore the history of the 1st Amendment, the legal rights we do and don't have, and how modern approaches to 1st amendment law have resulted in the threat known as Stochastic Terrorism.

In Part II, we explore Monetary Politics, break down who controls modern expression and how, and then discuss ways to begin addressing the threats modern speech issues have introduced.

[victusinveritas]

[thingstrumperssay]

LibsOfTikTok kept on getting banned for inciting violence against drag shows and children hospitals so Musk unbanned her and now there’s a banner basically saying “don’t ban her without talking to me first.”

[liberalsarecool]

Why do all the Lone Wolves believe the same shit and follow the same media? 🤔

#MAGA

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Jesse Duquette

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

September 16, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Sep 17, 2024

In the week since Trump’s disastrous debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, MAGA Republicans appear to be melting down. As Republicans commandeer the disaster news, the Democratic presidential nominee appears to be trying to stay out of their way. Harris sat for an interview with media host Stephanie Himonidis Sedano, known as “Chiquibaby,” of the Spanish-language U.S. audio Nueva Network, an interview that will air tomorrow on more than 100 radio stations.  

For the third day in a row, officials today had to evacuate two elementary schools in Springfield, Ohio, citing threats that have led to safety concerns. The city has also canceled “CultureFest,” its annual celebration of diversity, arts, and culture, and the local colleges are meeting virtually out of safety concerns. The Bureau of Motor Vehicles has had to close, as has the Ohio License Bureau.

Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, said that there have been “at least 33” bomb threats against schools and public offices after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his running mate, Ohio senator J.D. Vance, spread the lie that Haitian immigrants to Springfield have been eating the pets of their white neighbors. DeWine reiterated that the immigrants in Springfield are there legally, and noted that he has authorized troopers from the Ohio State Highway Patrol to provide additional security at the district's 18 school buildings. 

On CNN yesterday morning, Vance admitted to Dana Bash that he had created the story of Haitian immigrants eating pets. He justified the lie that has shut down Springfield and endangered its residents by claiming such a lie was the only way to get the media to pay attention to what he considers the crisis of immigration. Once the pet-eating story was debunked, Vance said that Haitian immigrants are spreading HIV and tuberculosis in Ohio; in fact, new diagnoses of HIV dropped from 2018 to 2022, and the director of the Ohio Department of Health says there has been no change in TB rates.  

That a politician of any sort would lie to rally supporters against a marginalized population comes straight out of the authoritarian playbook, which seeks to build a community around the idea that the people in it are besieged by outsiders. But when that politician is running for vice president, with the potential to become the president if anything happens to his 78-year-old running mate, who is the oldest person ever to run for president, it raises a whole factory of red flags.  

Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times noted the support of racist ideologue Alfred Rosenberg of the Nazi Party for the antisemitic text “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a text fabricated in the early twentieth century by officials in czarist Russia. Rosenberg stood by the “inner truth” of the text even though it was fake. Like Rosenberg, Hitler’s chief propagandist Joseph Goebbels wrote, “I believe in the inner, but not the factual, truth of The Protocols.” While Democratic Ohio representative Casey Weinstein has called for Vance to resign, aside from DeWine, Republican lawmakers have not repudiated Vance’s lie. 

Astonishingly, Vance is trying to rise to power on lies about the people of his own state, the people he is supposed to represent. Not only have Democratic politicians demanded that he stop, but also amidst the chaos, the Republican mayor of Springfield and two Republican county commissioners would not commit to voting for Trump. The popular backlash against this lie has also been swift and strong. The Ohio-based Red, Wine, and Blue organization has organized the #OHNoYouDont campaign to reiterate on social media their stance against the division Vance and Trump are stoking. 

Trump seemed to try to regain control of the political narrative on Sunday by posting on social media, “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,” a comment that looked like an attempt to change the subject from the backlash to the pet-eating lie, the continuing disparagement of Trump’s debate performance, and increasing attention to Trump’s attachment to right-wing provocateur and conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer.     

In the days since Trump took Loomer to a commemoration of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001—which she has suggested were an “inside job”—the media has paid more attention to the 31-year-old extremist who has been Trump’s close companion since Spring 2023. Loomer has cheered the drowning of 2,000 migrants and called for “2,000 more.” In June she said that Democrats should not just be prosecuted and jailed, but “they should get the death penalty. You know, we actually used to have the punishment for treason in this country.” 

When some commenters suggested her relationship with Trump was sexual, she countered with a truly vile statement about Vice President Kamala Harris. The increasing visibility of Loomer near Trump has made those Republicans trying to run a more traditional campaign beg him to cut her loose, but Trump seems reluctant to distance himself from her. Sam Stein of The Bulwark today wrote that those Republicans worried about Trump being surrounded by conspiracy theorists are a decade late. After listing Trump’s many years of conspiracy theories, Stein wrote, they’re not “worried that Loomer will turn Trump into a raving lunatic. They’re simply worried that Trump might lose.” 

As Trump seems increasingly detached from reality, Vance has become the face of the Republican presidential campaign. He seems desperate to turn the media cycle from Trump and the extraordinary unpopularity of the plans outlined in Project 2025 and toward immigration. It’s a hard sell, since voters correctly note that it was Republicans, egged on by Trump, who killed the strong bipartisan border bill in the spring. On Thursday, September 12, Vance said on CNBC that if immigration were the path to prosperity, “America would be the most prosperous country in the world.” 

Outside of the hellscape in MAGA Republicans’ mind, it is. The Federal Reserve recently noted that as of the second quarter of 2024, U.S. household net worth is growing by a strong 7.1% a year. The stock market is also strong, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average rising 228 points today to set an all-time high. 

On Sunday afternoon, shortly after Trump’s Taylor Swift post and another calling the “failing” New York Times a threat to democracy, as Trump was golfing at his club in West Palm Beach, Florida, Secret Service agents noticed and fired on a man holding a rifle with a scope. Today, Carol Leonnig, Josh Dawsey, and Isaac Stanley-Becker of the Washington Post reported that authorities have warned Trump of the risks of golfing at his own courses because of their proximity to public roads, but Trump insisted they were safe and kept using them.

The acting director of the Secret Service, Ronald Rowe Jr., said today that Trump’s plan for golfing on Sunday was unscheduled, so the secret service used an emergency plan for protecting Trump. Rowe said the suspect, Ryan Wesley Routh, a convicted felon with a history of apparent mental illness, did not have a line of sight to the former president and did not shoot. He escaped and was later caught. Cell phone records suggest he was in the vicinity for 12 hours before being flushed out of the bushes. 

Democratic leaders again denounced violence and said it has no place in our country. Observers noted that it was Trump who signed a bill revoking gun-checks for people with mental illnesses put in place by President Barack Obama and that he promised the National Rifle Association (NRA) that he would roll back all the gun safety provisions President Joe Biden has put in place if he wins in 2024. But the Trump campaign called for donations on a website suggesting, as MAGA Republicans did after the shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania, that Democrats were complicit in the threat to Trump. “There are people in this world who will do whatever it takes to stop us,” Trump’s campaign said. 

Unfortunately, two attempts on a president’s life in such short order are not unprecedented. As Tom Nichols pointed out today in The Atlantic, Gerald Ford survived two attempts in 15 days in 1975. But, as Nichols also points out, Ford did not fundraise off the attempts or blame his opponents for them. 

Opponents are pointing out that it is Trump and the MAGA Republicans, not the Democrats, who are stoking violence. Marcy Wheeler of Emptywheel noted that in July 2023 Trump posted an address for former president Barack Obama on his social media network, prompting a stalker, and that in four different jurisdictions, Trump’s lawyers have argued that the First Amendment protects Trump’s right to attack the judges, prosecutors, and witnesses in the cases against him, as well as their families. Other’s recalled MAGA’s “jokes” about the brutal attack on then–House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul. 

Trump supporter Elon Musk, who owns the social media platform X, wrote, “And no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala,” a post he later called a “joke” after observers asked about the national security implications of a defense contractor who has $15 billion in federal contracts suggesting the assassination of the president and vice president. Musk’s post had more than 39 million impressions before he deleted it.

After his own incendiary post, Musk wrote: “The incitement to hatred and violence against President Trump by the media and leading Democrats needs to stop.” Conservative lawyer George Conway retorted: “What utter nonsense.”  

Indeed, the MAGA attempt to tie the shootings near Trump to the Democrats is pretty clearly an attempt to stop Democrats from talking about the issues of the campaign by claiming that any public discussion of Trump’s own unpopular policies and hateful words will gin up violence against him. 

One of the biggest issues MAGA Republicans would like to stop people from talking about is abortion. Reproductive healthcare journalist Kavitha Surana explained in ProPublica today that every state has a committee of experts that meet to examine women’s deaths during or within a year of pregnancy. Those committees operate with a two-year lag, meaning that we are now learning about women dying after the Supreme Court overturned the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that recognized the constitutional right to abortion. 

Georgia’s state committee has recently concluded that at least two women have died in Georgia from preventable causes after hospitals in the state denied them timely reproductive healthcare.

Amber Nicole Thurman died just weeks after the Georgia abortion ban went into effect. She went into sepsis from unexpelled fetal tissue after an abortion she obtained legally in North Carolina. Georgia’s law made the routine dilation and curettage procedure, or D&C, a felony with vague exceptions that make doctors worry about prosecution if they perform it. Reports show that doctors repeatedly discussed a D&C for Thurman but put it off even as her organs began to fail. By the time they performed the procedure, it was too late. 

Surana notes that Georgia governor Brian Kemp said he was “overjoyed” when the law went into effect, and that it would keep women “safe, healthy, and informed.” Attorneys for the state of Georgia accused abortion rights activists who said the law endangered women of “hyperbolic fear mongering” just two weeks before Thurman died. 

She left behind a 6-year-old son.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[sordidamok]

Trump is deliberately attacking the rule of law in USA and his cult followers are imitating him. This is a threat to democracy. The fact that he is getting away with is proof that the law favors rich, white men.

Serious work to do.

[originalleftist]

Governor Jay Inslee has active the Washington National Guard "Based upon general and specific information" re "civil unrest" around the election.

(Reposted from Spoutible.com)

It is terrible that we've reached the point where this is necessary, but given what has already occurred, and the ongoing threats being made, this is only responsible government.

MAGA Republicans will fear-monger about it. They will probably try to falsely claim that this is a "coup" or "martial law" as Whataboutism to cover their own plans for such. Ignore them. Their inflammatory rhetoric is why this is necessary.

Also, if you have not yet voted/need to vote in person on Election Day, don't let the fear of unrest deter you from doing so. This action is being taken to ensure that you CAN cast your vote in safety, and have it fairly counted.

Personally, I am relived that officials are increasingly responding preemptively to the threat of violence, rather than retaining illusions about what MAGA has planned.

[edenfenixblogs]

For some reason this one really wrecked me, more than most. What a complete disregard for culture and peace.

Yiddish is a language of diaspora Jews desperately clinging to a shred of their heritage while being oppressed in Western Europe. It is the language of European Jews forced to live in shtetls. It is a language that predates modern Israel and the resurrection of Hebrew. It is the language of the diaspora in which antisemites and anti-zionists so desperately want Jews to remain. It is a language of the oppressed. It is a language of loss. It is a language of exclusion. It is a language of community. Of Jews finding each other and building community in the face of oppression.

Sholem Aleichem was a Yiddish author and playwright. His works inspired Fiddler on the Roof, a musical about literal Jewish expulsion from Russia after continued violent assault.

Additionally, the related Hebrew greeting (Shalom aleichem) means, “peace be upon you”)

Also, it nearly exact to the traditional Arabic greeting “As-salamu alaykum” which means the exact same thing. And is used by Muslims as well as Arab Jews who were expelled by Muslim countries between 1948 and 1972.

Finally, shalom aleichem is a Jewish liturgical song—one of my favorites—and it explicitly calls on G-d and angels to bring peace.

It’s used to ring in Shabbat

I cannot put into words how deeply offensive this is to me personally. I am so wounded by this.

[unsolicited-opinions]

American Jews who support Trump are bad at being Jewish.

[doylewesleywalls]

[jonostroveart]

Con Text

Trump, increasingly reckless with his violent rhetorical imagery, spent the day contextualizing the graphic image he spewed to Tucker Carlson last night, where he has Liz Cheney looking down the barrels of 9 rifles. The Republican candidate for President is a stochastic terrorist.

[charyou-tree]

Musk is using twitter to incite rightwing riots in the UK, and will certainly do the same as a part of the fascist effort to deny trump losing the election.

[classicintp]

Irritated listening to right-wing media talking about how liberals claiming Trump is a threat to democracy "riles up all liberals" and that because of that rhetoric "eventually this was bound to happen."

But when people point out him and his administration riling the MAGA base up causing torch wielding white supremecists to riot in the streets screaming for blood, causing MAGA supporters to drive a car into a crowd of people, causing MAGA supporters to attempt the kidnapping of a Democrat governer, causing a MAGA supporter to bash the skull of the House Speaker's husband, causing MAGA supporters to storm the Capitol Building to stop a peaceful transfer of power... THEN that idea is suddenly ridiculous? Then the problem isn't the rhetoric of the Trump administration, but a problem with mental illness? You can't have it both ways.