Redefining Violence
A serious encroachment upon free expression and the right of parents to negotiate what their children are, or are not, subjected to while at the mercy of increasingly political school curriculums. Not just what they’re taught, but how what they’re taught is framed and contextualized.
School Board Meetings Show Only That Freedom is Messy (Salena Zito, Washington Examiner, 8 min.)
Freedom is messy. Our discussions about things that matter to us, such as our children, are chaotic, disruptive, and, yes, divisive. They drive wedges — that's a feature, not a bug. Emotions run high when children’s welfare is involved. Good parents never lose sight that the people who educate their children spend more day time with them in a classroom setting than parents themselves do.
Can we trust our government to distinguish between the actual threat of violence and the passionate expression of viewpoints by parents - to use the FBI against parents on the grounds that school board members feel threatened? What does "threatened" look like? Is it someone yelling at you? Disagreeing with you? Holding an opposing opinion? Who is defining those threats?
This memo wasn’t just designed to target those who would commit violence. It was also clearly designed to stop regular people with real concerns from voicing those concerns because of the fear anything they say will deem them a domestic terrorist, an event that would destroy their personal, community, and professional lives.
It is downright chilling to think that there are parents out there who are worried that they are going to end up on a government list or under some type of government scrutiny if they decide to go into a school board meeting to give a public comment on an issue.
Why Are Moms Like Me Being Called Domestic Terrorists? (Maud Maron, 12 min.)
Late last month, the National School Boards Association, an umbrella organization representing thousands of local elected school board officials, sent a letter addressed to President Biden. It warned that “America’s public schools and its education leaders are under an immediate threat.” But not just any threat: “the classification of these heinous actions could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes.” The letter implored the White House to enlist the support of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Department of Justice to investigate the threat — adding that the alleged crimes fall under the purview of the “PATRIOT Act in regards to domestic terrorism.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland publicly responded to the letter with a memorandum to the director of the FBI. Garland agreed with the NSBA that “there has been a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence” against board members — without providing any evidence. He further announced specialized training for board members to “aid in the investigation and prosecution of these crimes” and, more worryingly, the creation of a task force composed of FBI and Justice Department representatives to “determine how federal enforcement tools can be used to prosecute these crimes.” The FBI’s clear message to parents is that the NSBA is on the right track.
Many of the parents who are on the receiving end of the federal government’s chilling message are new to school boards, new to speaking up and, to say the absurd part out loud, clearly not domestic terrorists. The combination of extended Covid-related school closures; mask mandates; an increasingly extreme race- and gender-focused curriculum; and the removal of tests, honors classes and merit-based admissions has created a bumper crop of engaged — and, in many cases, enraged — parents rightfully concerned about what is happening in their children’s schools. The videos of their pleas, sometimes with kids in tow, have gone viral precisely because they are so authentic and heartfelt.
In a free society, we don’t call the feds to police our fellow Americans because we don’t share their politics. Actual violence should be condemned without reservation. School board members can and should immediately call the police in the event of a crime or a credible threat. But the incidents cited by the NSBA are not criminal and they definitely do not warrant federal intervention. That’s why the NSBA pulls the “interstate commerce” card: It’s the only way to make angry parents at school board meetings worthy of the FBI’s attention. And based on the response, the FBI seems eager to oblige.
Chappelle
Dave Chappelle’s new special, “The Closer,” has caught some heat. I think the scrutiny is a good thing because the special does indeed push some controversial buttons that should be examined. As time passes, however, and more people resist bully activism, I suspect “The Closer” will prove, ironically, to be ahead of its time in spite of being called backward; honest, understanding, even compassionate, in spite of being called bigoted and hateful.
Dave Chappelle Backed by Family of Late Transgender Comedian Daphne Dorman From ‘The Closer’ (Cheyenne Roundtree, The Daily Beast, 8 min.)
Two of Dorman’s sisters told The Daily Beast they were outraged at the suggestion that Chappelle’s set was transphobic or derogatory toward the LGBTQ community, saying they wanted to make clear they supported the comedian.
“At this point I feel like he poured his heart out in that special and no one noticed,” Brandy wrote in a separate Facebook post. “What he’s saying to the LGBTQ family is, ‘I see you. Do you see me? I’m mourning my friend in the best way I know how. Can you see me? Can you allow me that?’... This was a call to come together, that two oppressed factions of our nation put down their keyboards and make peace. How sad that this message was lost in translation.”
“The man loved my sister and felt empathy towards her human experience and, yes, he makes terrible jokes that are also funny,” Brandy added in her Facebook post. “News flash, our whole family does that. Our funerals are laughter through tears, we mourn by remembering the times we laughed together, and yes, some inappropriate humor, too... As often as Dave stands up for Daphne, we will be there for Dave. This man is our tribe, and we mourn alongside him.”
Dave Chappelle is Right, Isn’t He? (Andrew Sullivan, 20 min.)
The Closer is, in fact, a humanely brilliant indictment of elite culture at this moment in time: a brutal exposure of its identitarian monomania, its denial of reality, and its ruthless tactics of personal and public destruction. It marks a real moment: a punching up against the powerful, especially those who pretend they aren’t.
Chappelle is celebrating the individual human, never defined entirely by any single “identity,” or any “intersectional” variant thereof. An individual with enough agency to be able to laugh at herself, at others, at the world, an individual acutely aware of the tension between body and soul, feelings and facts, in a trans life, as well as other kinds of life. Assuming that marginalized people cannot tolerate humor at their own expense is as dehumanizing as assuming they have no agency in their lives. It is a form of bigotry — of the left.
And the capacity for laughter — the target of every fundamentalism, left and right — is integral to being fully human. To remind us that a trans person can laugh at herself is to remind us that she too is brimming with the kind of complex self-awareness that every mature human has. We laugh, above all, at the absurdity of our reality. And yes, that’s the second point Chappelle makes: there is something called reality. We can deny it; or we can accept it. Comedy’s key role is that it helps us accept it.
The current debate, in other words, is not about being pro or anti-trans, in the lazy formula of woke media. The debate, rather, is about whether a tiny group of fanatics, empowered by every major cultural institution, can compel or emotionally blackmail other people into saying things that are not true.
Dave Chappelle’s Rorschach Test (Helen Lewis, The Atlantic, 15 min.)
Is the story here “rich comedian attacks marginalized community” or “Black comedian attacks elite consensus”? That’s why The Closer is structured as a series of dares. Does this joke bother you? What about this one? Running through the culture war’s greatest hits, he dares critics to take unequal offense, and prove his point about a hierarchy of suffering.
And of course, some critics walked straight into the trap. The negative reaction to The Closer has revolved largely around what he says about LGBTQ people. Chappelle has always been clear about the political argument he is making with this material: In a few short years, gay- and trans-rights activism has achieved the kind of cultural veto that Black Americans have failed to win through decades of struggle. In Chappelle’s telling, no other movement has such power.
As presented in The Closer, the story of Daphne Dorman, a trans woman who defended Chappelle online after the backlash to Sticks and Stones, ends with her being dragged on Twitter and her death by suicide. It’s a brutal indictment of social-justice activism on the internet. If Chappelle’s comedy is “dangerous” because it could lead to real-world harm, then what the hell is the word for what happened to Dorman?
Blowhard Whistleblower
There are plenty of reasons to be skeptical about the sudden spotlight moment of the Facebook ‘whistleblower’ who has revealed… no discernible illicit activity. Having strutted into the halls of Congress with guns blazing, is she shooting blanks?
It looks like an illusion of scandal may have been concocted or exaggerated, and the demand for action has followed. A quid pro quo is actually unfolding: Ms. Haugen gets to brand herself, while government and corporate elites seize the opportunity to maneuver themselves into even more entrenched footholds of power.
Bombshell (Mike Solana, 20 min.)
The “whistleblower” revealed her identity. She also rolled out her new career as a talking head, with an eerily-professional marketing push including a new Twitter account, website, and newsletter. She told us absolutely nothing we didn’t already know, then shared opinions the press already holds. Zuckerberg didn’t do enough to stop the riot on January 6th. Okay. January 6th was an insurrection. Interesting. Anger is engagement, and social media companies are therefore incentivized, just as is the press, to polarizing content. Great, we’ve been discussing this obvious, problematic fact for years, including the years before the internet existed. What exactly are we whistleblowing here?
We’re being told that Instagram is causing kids to kill themselves. But where is the data supporting this notion? All the research seems to indicate is self-comparison to our peers is depressing as shit, particularly for people who are already depressed. When are we dragging the Secretary of Education in front of Congress to explain why he hasn’t solved depression?
Facebook could end tomorrow, but so long as the internet exists information will find a way. In terms of benefits, no technology is merely additive. Every new technological advance, and certainly in media, poses a series of tradeoffs. Today, information is free, but we also live inside the stuff. We’re finally starting to sense potential drawbacks to our new home inside the hive mind, but a Senate hearing won’t erase them, and our “whistleblower” discourse doesn’t even address them.
Democrats and Media Do Not Want to Weaken Facebook, Just Commandeer its Power to Censor (Glenn Greenwald, 25 min.)
Far from threatening Facebook and Google, such a legal change could be the greatest gift one can give them, which is why their executives are often seen calling on Congress to regulate the social media industry. Any legal scheme that requires every post and comment to be moderated would demand enormous resources — gigantic teams of paid experts and consultants to assess "misinformation” and "hate speech” and veritable armies of employees to carry out their decrees. Only the established giants such as Facebook and Google would be able to comply with such a regimen, while other competitors — including large but still-smaller ones such as Twitter — would drown in those requirements. And still-smaller challengers to the hegemony of Facebook and Google, such as Substack and Rumble, could never survive. In other words, any attempt by Congress to impose greater content moderation obligations — which is exactly what they are threatening — would destroy whatever possibility remains for competitors to arise and would, in particular, destroy any platforms seeking to protect free discourse. That would be the consequence by design, which is why one should be very wary of any attempt to pretend that Facebook and Google fear such legislative adjustments.
The Fakest “Whistleblower” Ever (Michael Tracey, 20 min.)
Ever since she burst onto the scene last week with a superbly choreographed 60 Minutes special, Haugen revealed a major reason why she has been treated to such effusive “bipartisan” praise. On top of her argument that Facebook must more aggressively regulate political speech — and her calls for the Federal Government to more aggressively involve itself in these speech regulation activities — Haugen is also fluent in the BS-infused jargon of “natsec,” thus making her appear Extremely Serious. This is quite crucial. She’s naturally adept at rattling off impressive-sounding terms like “threat intelligence org,” the mere mention of which elicits nods of solemn affirmation from lawmakers, think tankers, and other similarly Serious individuals who gather to be imparted with her incredible wisdom.
Notice that “whistleblowers” only seem to receive this kind of coordinated official endorsement if they are telling powerful factions exactly what they want to hear, and Haugen has done just that. Try to find a single establishment orthodoxy as regards “Big Tech” and speech regulation that Haugen’s statements have undercut rather than strengthened, and you will come away empty-handed. Nevertheless, her trailblazing nobility has been extolled throughout the media and in Congress, with hardly a critical word even whispered.
How much “courage” does it really take to waltz into the spotlight with a guarantee of mandatory adulation? Does anyone think that Haugen hasn’t already been deluged with further lucrative employment opportunities? What great sacrifices has she made, exactly? She’s even been invited back to address Facebook itself, notwithstanding the mortal danger one would have thought she faces as a “whistleblower.”
She also participated in a meeting with the European Commission last week and will soon be called to testify before the UK Parliament. Has any other “whistleblower” ever gotten such over-the-top Red Carpet treatment?
Tone Policing is Good, Actually (Zaid Jilani, 12 min.)
The most riveting performers draw the crowd, especially when the stage is the social media landscape. That the apparent message of Kirsten Sinema’s hecklers is overshadowed by the tone of their delivery is not some incidental byproduct of impassioned activism. It’s part of the performance. The noise, in fact, is the signal.
In the days that have followed that original confrontation with Sinema (as well as additional ones on a commercial airplane and in a D.C. airport), there’s little evidence that LUCHA Arizona succeeded in putting any real pressure on the senator. Their issues haven’t been elevated. There’s no sign that Sinema is backing off of her positions. She’s gotten a mountain of sympathetic press, and the White House, which has spent weeks trying to pressure her, was forced to concede that LUCHA Arizona’s protest tactics were “inappropriate and unacceptable.”
All of this assumes, however, that actually passing legislation is the goal of this new wing of progressive activism. Among this cohort, activism is often seen as an end in and of itself. Expressing your ideas loudly and proudly, while being abrasive and even abusive towards those who don’t share them, is righteous. Who cares about public policy?
Reparations: A Well-Rounded View (Charles Love, Free Black Thought, 20 min.)
If we buy the argument that slavery in “America” began in 1619, for 170 of the 246 years slavery existed, there was no United States of America. How can we truly be trying to right a wrong when we give the countries that owned slave ships a pass? Hell, New Orleans’ mayor gave the key to the city to the King and Queen of Spain three years ago. Are we going to pretend that much of the South wasn’t controlled by the French and the Spanish, or that New York City wasn’t founded by the Dutch?
This is one of the few areas in which I think the proponents of reparations underestimate slavery’s reach in their claims about those who benefitted from it. They tend to stop at America or at the plantation owner, but those who traded with them and bought their products were also complicit. Additionally, the slave-ship captains were very often not American, nor were the bankers who mortgaged their properties (including enslaved people), loaned slaveholders money, and backed their financial institutions. How do we hold these slavery enablers accountable?
After we determine who is eligible, how will the reparations be divided? I’ve heard talk about giving the funds to the black “community.” What does this do for blacks who no longer live in a majority-black community? Does every black person get the same amount, regardless of age? Will there be means testing? If this is a “restorative fix,” some may argue that people like LeBron James or Oprah Winfrey don’t need a payment. Or does the wealth of wealthy blacks actually argue for higher payments to them? Will the payments come from tax increases? If so, how do we ensure that blacks who are owed are not paying their own damages? This is messy and seems to lead to more questions than answers.
Do Lobotomies Work? (Stuart Ritchie, UnHerd, 15 min.)
A call for pumping the brakes on blanket deference or adulation for Nobel winners.
Editorial Cartooning Is in Danger (Liza Donnelly, Persuasion, 10 min.)
At a time when the world needs new ways to connect, there are fewer opportunities for people whose life's work is to help us do precisely that.
The ability to laugh at ourselves and at the absurdity of modern life is good for democracy. Cartoons enrich our lives with humor, connection, and insight.
It’s Not Misinformation. It’s Amplified Propaganda (Reneé DiResta, The Atlantic, 25 min.)
DiResta makes the case for a new word and concept: ampliganda, or amplified propaganda. It requires no vetting or permissions from media gatekeepers, so-called experts, political leaders, or other elites. Instead, almost anyone, with strategic use of social media, can now spread information - not top-down but from the bottom-up.