Reply #361: notice the pattern [View All]

[Two Americas]

Various talking points are tested out, usually fill of invective, and inflammatory and provocative language but little substance. Personal attack, sly insinuations of treason or disloyalty or false motives, attempts at character assassination are all common, and we are seeing more and more red-baiting now (that is a good sign as it is an indicator that things are moving to the Left.) As soon as one of us stands our ground and won't be bullied, the sub thread is abandoned. That gives us a chance to build critical mass with enough people who are interested in the discussion and will not be intimidated, and then when that happens the conservatives disappear from the thread.

All of the talking points were thoroughly demolished, dismantled and refuted. Yet tomorrow, the exact same talking points will be posted again, in the hope that members did not see them refuted before and will be sucked in by them. In other words, there is no interest whatsoever in actually having a discussion, the discussion is merely being used to advance something else, and the methods are disruption and intimidation and personal attacks. That is the methodology of the right wing propagandists - keep repeating inflammatory talking points over and over again, while feigning an interest in discussion and debate. The goal is to make things seem true rather than to discover the truth or recognize it, by traumatizing and intimidating people and then relentlessly pounding the talking points into their heads. Even if people just give up in disgust, or the meeting hall gets burned down - figuratively speaking, threads locked, flame wars started - the conservatives win, because they are not trying to persuade people to their ideas, they are trying to prevent any ideas from being considered or discussed. When people are able to consider ideas and have intelligent discussions, that is a threat to entrenched power and wealth - the system as it is, and it is the status quo the conservatives are promoting and defending.