I was not shocked.
One of them may be under the control of a brain slug disguised as one of Those Hats.
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Science has always been subservient to emotion. It doesn’t know what questions to seek answers to - that agenda is firmly dictated by values and values derive from our feelings about things and our need to create order in the world. For a very long time, and to a great extent even today, science has been driven by capitalist or imperialist agendas. Capitalism and imperialism are not natural orders on their own, they arose from the shared lies we told each other about what is good and what is right. Once we identify what is desirable, science is only too happy to help us get there.
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No sympathy, even though doxxing is wrong.
These grown ass men took it upon themselves to passively threaten a girl who’s a minor simply because she’s an activist who says stuff they don’t like.
And now they get to find out for themselves firsthand how it feels being harassed online by strangers.
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Not really doxxing in this case imo, as the only information that the Post published was the names that they were posting under on Facebook, which presumably they chose themselves (and are probably their real names). It’s not like they found our these people’s home addresses and published them (although if they’d sent a reporter round to interview them I’d have been amused.)
Anyway, I am always glad when I see the Bristol Post publishing a proper article like this, because like most other local papers in the UK they’re wholly owned by a conglomerate these days (Mirror group in this case).
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Greta herself has been the first to say “you shouldn’t believe in climate change because I told you so, you should believe in it because the scientists are saying so.”
If her emotional argument gets more people to pay attention to the science then that is great. After all, science tells us that human beings make most decisions for emotional reasons anyway.
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Loneliness and a feeling of worthlessness.
People like this don’t really have an issue with climate change (or whatever). They feel irrelevant and expendable and desperately want attention to help fill the void of their empty life They purposefully look for the most controversial take because the social media algorithms reward it and shock value brings attention.
People like Boris and Trump, social outcast themselves, realized that if you recognize these forgotten people, they will support you regardless of your actual policy (even if that policy, like the repeal of ACA, is not in their best personal interest).
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In what way are either of them social outcasts? They are part of the ruling class, born into the ruling classes in fact. They are wealthy, attended the top universities in their countries, and were groomed for power! they are literally some of the most powerful people in the world! they are not social outcasts, they are part of the ruling class…
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Probably not. I mean, I could be wrong, but I expect that there’s a massive difference in the two sides’ propensity to harass people online here. I don’t really see what demographic the trolley army going after these guys would be mustered from.
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It’s suprisingly similar in layout to the front page the post would probably most want people to forget about: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/07/bristol-post-apologises-for-faces-of-evil-front-page-21-years-ago
I think that justifies her doing what she’s doing, but I’m very wary of giving news organisations a pass for… well, anything they do, really.
On the one hand you have a paper like the Guardian, which I think genuinely wants to foreground climate change as a political issue, but which also can’t help turning that into a vapid branding exercise (to the point that they had ads saying “subscribe to the Guardian to save the planet”, which very nearly made me cancel my subscription on the spot). So we have to be on guard against them just phoning in Greta Thunberg lifestyle updates instead of digging into actual substance.
On the other hand, there are all the right-leaning outlets that love to cover Greta Thunberg because they know how it riles up certain culture-war folks. If that’s how they frame it, we’d probably be better off if they didn’t cover her at all.
In both cases, I think the right attitude to the media is to always ask “OK, great, another Greta Thunberg story, but what actual news are you providing?” Because if we don’t make them earn every atom of our attention, they will just recycle the same old pap at us until our brains are soft mush.
Personally, I don’t pay much attention to Thunbergmania for the same reason I don’t watch a lot of Sesame Street; I strongly approve of Sesame Street, but I already know how to read. Looking at it that way, it makes you wonder what the gentlemen in the article feel so defensive about.
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So many frozen peaches. I don’t know if this kind of public shaming will work. It’s satisfying, but I rather think it will backfire.
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Greta’s constant message is to pay attention to the science, and pay attention to all of the people asking for action on climate change, not just her. She’s a star - but she’s been put in that position by other people, she’s never looked for it for herself. If politicians and corporations start taking serious, effective action to slow climate change, she’ll happily be off to lead her life away from the spotlight.
So if you are tired of hearing from Greta, start nagging your politicians to take action against the climate crisis! The sooner they do, the sooner she’ll retire to private life.
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Well, they are outcasts from sanity, intelligence, rationality, decency, and humanity.
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These guys are publicly abusive because, in part, they think they can say this stuff with no consequences. So giving them public consequences should stop some of the other people who are tempted to make violent threats.
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And still very much in the ruling class. A social outcast is not someone who is a prime minister, or owns buildings in Manhattan. Our society regular casts out people, but it’s not people like Trump or Johnson.
And keep in mind, plenty of people do not find them beyond the pale in the least.
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So it’s OK for them to spout hateful, despicable garbage in public but it’s not OK to give them the hiding they deserve in public? Rot.
Do you think these people are careful to separate their public utterances on social media from their public utterances in any other venue? Of course they aren’t. The garbage they spew on electronic media is also the garbage they spew in the bars and wherever else they congregate. There’s no ethical difference between someone calling them out on their garbage in a crowded bar and calling them out on social media.
I believe in the Golden Rule – do unto others as you would have them do unto you. But I believe in making it work. By the way they have been hateful towards a tiny girl, they have demonstrated that they want or are at least OK with having other people be hateful towards them. OK, let’s give them what they deserve.
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So. . . these guys aren’t proud of their words now that everyone knows what they said?
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Yeah, that’s how it always works.
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I’m trying to resolve your obviously, factually true post with a vague feeling of agreement with @statusquo’s post and I think it goes like this: I don’t think “social outcast” is the right words, but I think there is still something there in the basic message. Take out “social outcast” and replace it with “entitled and aggrieved” and I think it’s certainly paints part of the picture that was requested by the comment it was in response to. “Social outcast” in their own, warped view of reality only (in Trump’s case, in Johnson’s it’s an act).
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