Triple Espresso of Coffee Talk

[KennyBanyeah]

Must have been visiting from Florida.

 

[elocomotive]

Must have been visiting from Florida.

Geesh, @dare2be . Take it easy when you're on vacation.

 

[Darkstone42]

I think my overall problem with the MAGA kids is that this shouldn't be news. Some people had a tense interaction, nobody was hurt... why should I care? The news cares because it gives them a chance to stoke the fires for their respective bases/audiences. It gives them an example to go "look (typical conservative/liberal/white/black/woman/man/etc.), this is how they all are and why you're right and they are wrong." But it's not. And it shouldn't be held up as such. And it shouldn't be news aside from maybe a local story.

Guy gets kicked off an airline flight. Two black guys not served coffee. The behavior of people at the extremes shouldn't be help up as representative of anything except "some people are assholes." Assholes come in all political leanings, race, gender, sexuality, etc. United airlines and Starbucks ultimately will employ some assholes. Some liberals and some conservatives will be assholes. The fact that there are assholes isn't news. Systemic assholery should be news, but that is rarely what is reported in these stories.

But this is a BIG part of why polarization is so exacerbated these days. These kinds of stories. The kinds of stories you NEVER would have heard about 20 years ago and especially not 50 years ago. This is the negative offshoot of a social media world where we are all more connected across longer distances. We all saw people as our neighbors and our friends and we didn't talk about politics. But now people includes some of these assholes, and it shapes our view of the world negatively. It makes it feel like these interactions are the world now, when our everyday generally positive experiences don't fit with that narrative.

And this is where our news gatekeepers are failing. Not in Trump's claims that some news (good for him) is real and other news (bad for him) is fake. But in not being rigorous in the application of standards that examine what we really need to know about and what we don't. At some point, the media has to take responsibility for that. Buzzfeed and Facebook won't, but I expect more of our real newspapers and news channels.

On the one hand, I get where you're coming from. On the other hand, insulating these kids from the consequences of being racist jagoffs isn't good for anyone. And make no mistake, antagonized or not, these kids are racist jagoffs, and they were absolutely looking for any opportunity for conflict and to flaunt their invincibility in their white power perspective.

They're clearly not going to learn shame in their homes or their schools, so maybe they should feel some from the world at large. It's got a better chance at teaching them that they're jagoffs for being racist than not. And I'm not going to seek out any excuse for their behavior, whether or not it allegedly exists, because what they did, prompted or not, is indefensible. And at 15 years old, they might not be adults, but they sure as hell should know better by now.

And these kids are a symptom of a real national disease, and reporting symptoms of that disease, I would argue, is, in fact, the job of the media. If it wasn't these kids, it would have to be others doing the same sorts of things.

 

[forty_three]

I think my overall problem with the MAGA kids is that this shouldn't be news. Some people had a tense interaction, nobody was hurt... why should I care? The news cares because it gives them a chance to stoke the fires for their respective bases/audiences. It gives them an example to go "look (typical conservative/liberal/white/black/woman/man/etc.), this is how they all are and why you're right and they are wrong." But it's not. And it shouldn't be held up as such. And it shouldn't be news aside from maybe a local story.

Guy gets kicked off an airline flight. Two black guys not served coffee. The behavior of people at the extremes shouldn't be help up as representative of anything except "some people are assholes." Assholes come in all political leanings, race, gender, sexuality, etc. United airlines and Starbucks ultimately will employ some assholes. Some liberals and some conservatives will be assholes. The fact that there are assholes isn't news. Systemic assholery should be news, but that is rarely what is reported in these stories.

But this is a BIG part of why polarization is so exacerbated these days. These kinds of stories. The kinds of stories you NEVER would have heard about 20 years ago and especially not 50 years ago. This is the negative offshoot of a social media world where we are all more connected across longer distances. We all saw people as our neighbors and our friends and we didn't talk about politics. But now people includes some of these assholes, and it shapes our view of the world negatively. It makes it feel like these interactions are the world now, when our everyday generally positive experiences don't fit with that narrative.

And this is where our news gatekeepers are failing. Not in Trump's claims that some news (good for him) is real and other news (bad for him) is fake. But in not being rigorous in the application of standards that examine what we really need to know about and what we don't. At some point, the media has to take responsibility for that. Buzzfeed and Facebook won't, but I expect more of our real newspapers and news channels.

I do get what you are saying, and on a few levels I want to agree with it it, But I have to disagree BECAUSE we live in a social media world.

You are right, this wouldn't have been news 50 years ago. Dragging a black guy from the tow hitch on your pickup truck would have barely been news 60 years ago. People could feel isolated from horrific things like that when it was reported. "Hey, those backwards rednecks in Mississippi are pretty fucked up" without realizing that there may be people down the street who would do it given the opportunity. What the Internet has changed is has made those abhorrent people less likely to hide. And we as a society need to address it because if we don't, it becomes the norm. And it can't become that. In order to understand the depth of the problem, you have to see it when it happens. You can't sweep it under the rug.

I agree there is a lot of responsibility that should fall on the shoulders of major media. But remember that most major media is owned by large corporations. Information is not the primary goal of the "real" newspapers anymore. They pick and choose what to cover and with what fervency based on what it does to their downmarket brands. If conglomerate owns an oil company and a news station, they are less likely to report negatively if that oil company has a major spill. Conversely, competing conglomerates would cover it much more harshly in hopes of driving customers to their brand. That's what media has become. Social media is the antidote. It's why Comcast and Time Warner want to kill net neutrality. They can't control social media.

Concentration of media ownership - Wikipedia

Instead of looking at the motivations for reporting things, we should not let ourselves get distracted from what is really happening. These people want to "Make America Great Again" which could very well mean going back to a time when you could hang up a "Whites Only" sign in a work bathroom and not get in trouble. Every single time something like this happens, it should come up until everyone has had enough and it is no longer is acceptable behavior. And by and large, it isn't. The shitstain kids (and the militant provokers) are actually the minority. We're just talking about them because their views and attitudes are so wrong. It's growing pains while we evolve.

As was quoted earlier in this thread:

"He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it."
MLK

 

[Comeds]

RIP Bikini Hiker, you will be missed.....if only a tradgedy like this could be avoided

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

This is a weird hill to climb.

 

[elocomotive]

On the one hand, I get where you're coming from.

I do get what you are saying...

Awww, you guys just get me.

 

[jstewismybastardson]

I bet they both like beer

YES!

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

Not to defend Ford on this because he hasn’t really laid out a good argument as to how exactly a carbon tax would lead to a recession but Butts’ boss hasn’t laid out a good argument about how the carbon tax is going to somehow result in plus money going into taxpayers’ pockets. This is very pot/kettle here and it’s pretty shameful that the media (here, at least) have been all over Ford for the past few days about this but barely whimpered when Trudeau made that carbon tax claim that Butts is repeating here.

 

[forty_three]

And let's remember it took him a really long time to come up with "fine people on both sides" of Charlottesville.

 

[jstewismybastardson]

And let's remember it took him a really long time to come up with "fine people on both sides" of Charlottesville.

those kids ripped from their parents and now living in those tent cities had the wrong skin tone

 

[KennyBanyeah]

Apparently Andrew Scheer turned up to support these clowns.

Note the 14/88. Many fine people there Andrew?

 

[KennyBanyeah]

Sure feels like it sometimes though.

 

[KennyBanyeah]

Also, does anyone else kind of suspect that Michael Cohen might be David Schwimmer's father?

 

[Bloody Brian Burke]

Cool story bro time (I may have said this before but it bears repeating because Hussen is always at the centre of shit like this): During the last election campaign, my parents lived in Hussen’s riding. I went by there in the spring to vacuum my car and Hussen (who hadn’t been elected yet) came by with a couple of staffers canvassing the neighbourhood. I heard the spiel because I had nowhere to hide and politely smiled and nodded until he talked himself into out-of-nowhere declaring “Stephen Harper is a dictator!”. I decided to challenge him on that because it’s one thing for Joe Asshole on the internet to say something dumb like that but for a guy running for office (and months away from being given a cabinet position nonetheless) it seemed pretty dumb. I told him that was ridiculous, and that my parents both came from a country that was run by a dictatorship prior to their families immigrating here and would find it offensive to think someone elected democratically not once, not twice but three times in free and fair elections would be considered a dictator by an opponent. He told me he was from Somalia and likewise understood what dictatorships were like to which I asked him if he felt like living in Canada was like living in Somalia.

The way his eyes bounced around in his skull while he jumbled words trying to change the subject will stick with me for a long time. I then told him I’m voting NDP and he left. The fact that he’s still out there fear-mongering isn’t very surprising.

 

[Comeds]

Well I guess the feds will be after me. My phone just "auto-corrected" seemed to Semtex.

 

[KennyBanyeah]

Well I guess the feds will be after me. My phone just "auto-corrected" seemed to Semtex.

Nah, you're good. They know you and will just think it's some kind of sex thing.

 

[KennyBanyeah]

LOL

 

[scoutyjones2]

Also, does anyone else kind of suspect that Michael Cohen might be David Schwimmer's father?

I thought he was on Everybody loves Ramond

 

[forty_three]

Who knew? Trump's top White House attorney is Covington Catholic High School graduate

LOL

Don't worry Kenny, David Hogg is on it.