Florida Republican says vaccination is "the mark of the beast"

F$%K!!

You mean my parents put the mark of the beast on me when I got my dip-tet shots as an infant??

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It’s not about the lowest common denominator though. If it were, CNN would have Dua Lipa reading the teleprompter, not Wolf Blitzer, and have Tom Holland handling interviews instead of Chris Cuomo.

It’s not about journalism, either, to be clear. It’s about alienating broader audiences from the news and constricting the debate to a self-selected group.

CNN and the rest of corporate media are minimizing their acknowledgement of the depth and breadth of the crazies because they are trying to reassure their core audience that they are still all that matters.

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I can’t see how Dua Lipa would be anything other than a huge improvement over Wolf Blitzer. And if she read the news with this band? Solid win.

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It’s always about their invisible sky god who does nothing with these idiots and fools.
Nothing to see here, just another stupid RepugliKKKlanner.

#NeverVoteRepublican

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It really is. Dua Lipa and Tom Holland make better money elsewhere doing things they like better (even though both are likely smarter than Wolf Blitzer). My first day on the job in my first career as a TV news network writer, though, I was instructed specifically to write with the assumption that the viewer had no more than an 8th grade education level (in terms of comprehension, reasoning skills, and general knowledge).

True, but mainly it’s about creating a false sense of “objectivity” supposedly in the name of free speech that’s really about not losing audience share (and advertising revenue). Which is why, going back to the 1980s, panels about religion in public schools would often feature Young Earth creationists demanding that Genesis be featured in science classrooms.

Very true. Their core audience demographic is dying and they’re competing against social media platforms that take the same profit-driven pseudo-objective, lowest-common-denominator, freeze peach approach but that’s much more appealing to young people.

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At what point can we demand that people need to provide evidence their diety actually exists before using a religious viewpoint as an argument?

It really needs to happen sometime…

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Here, here! An imaginary friend’s opinions have imaginary value.

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Florida Man. He’s everywhere! He’s everywhere!

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It’s true that Dua Lipa is a bit pricey for Jeff Zucker, but Wolf Blitzer makes $5,000,0000 a year. CNN could easily find an alternative at that price who would appeal to more people than Blitzer. Gary Kublinski on the 11 pm weekend weather slot in Boise would do no worse.

I think it’s reasonable to look at the miserable state of the news through the lens of extreme risk aversion, which affects both the financial and journalistic approach. I think the false objectivity and extreme focus on a narrow audience fit this point of view.

I think the deeper question is why are they so risk averse, though? It doesn’t fit the model of HBO which drops shows and stars and goes after different demographics all the time. I think in the end they make the most sense as agressive seeking money, but only within very strict boundaries established by an ideological framework.

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Can we do this? please.

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Ha! Mark of the BEST more like it.

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Though to be fair, I’ve been hearing this exact thing from evangelicals for a very, very long time, except what the “mark of the beast” is changes constantly. It must create a bunch of cognitive dissonance given how often they shift targets.

Unless they think it’s somehow cumulative - “Oh another mark of the beast! Wow, there are so many now, it’s definitely the End Times!”

Yeah, qanon was premised on variations of so many existing evangelical beliefs, it’s inevitable they’ll merge.

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Ugh; sounds like the premise of a very bad late night cable sci-fi movie. Sadly there are people out there thinking exactly that way.

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CriminalUnfortunateKid-small (2)

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IIRC certain reich-wingers in the late seventies or early eighties were warning their followers that the Illuminati-Bilderberg-Rothschild conspiracy was going to force every Murican to get a unique bar-coded serial number tattoo for easy identification. (and remember, kids, that every UPC has the number of the beast built-in, by design </s>)

I don’t remember that happening. Maybe I was out taking a whiz at the time, or maybe the True Patriots successfully foiled the plan, forcing the sinister powers to come up with other methods of carrying out their diabolical plans for domination.

Or maybe the dreaded mark is perpetual vaporware as the conspiracy keeps shifting its plan to new technologies.

No matter the reason for the delays, it keeps the money rolling in from the faithful.

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:arrow_up: Yes, that bottom part. :arrow_up:

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Mark of the beast? Well call me cursed then!

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I have a scar on my left tricep from (I think) a polio vaccination as an infant. Guess it’s too late for me! /s

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This ■■■■■ pile of shite also seems to have not read his Bible.

So far I have not heard of anyone getting a vaccine in the palm of their hand or their forehead and certainly not hard enough to leave a permanent mark.

I hope somebody sues him for murder or attempted murder if anyone dies from his bullshit.

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