How does democracy recover from the internet/right wing media led intensification of conspiracy?

Politico writes:

MIAMI — George Soros directs a “deep state” global conspiracy network. A Joe Biden win would put America in control of “Jews and Blacks.” The Democratic nominee has a pedophilia problem.

Wild disinformation like this is inundating Spanish-speaking residents of South Florida ahead of Election Day, clogging their WhatsApp chats, Facebook feeds and even radio airwaves at a saturation level that threatens to shape the outcome in the nation’s biggest and most closely contested swing state. 

The sheer volume of conspiracy theories — including QAnon — and deceptive claims are already playing a role in stunting Biden’s growth with Latino voters, who make up about 17 percent of the state’s electorate.

“The onslaught has had an effect,” said Eduardo Gamarra, a pollster and director of the Latino Public Opinion Forum at Florida International University.

“It’s difficult to measure the effect exactly, but the polling sort of shows it and in focus groups it shows up, with people deeply questioning the Democrats, and referring to the ‘deep state’ in particular — that there’s a real conspiracy against the president from the inside,” he said. “There’s a strain in our political culture that’s accustomed to conspiracy theories, a culture that’s accustomed to coup d'etats.”

And  David Roberts tweets:

And he further notes:

I wonder, though:  does Rupert Murdoch have the ability to dampen down QAnon?   As I understand it, Fox News pretty much ignores it, and while it's happy to hype hysteria over THE LEFT WANTS TO KILL US ALL to its mostly elderly audience, promoting the idea that children are being detained underground by devil worshipping Democrats seems just a stretch too far for the network.

But what would happen if the Murdoch family put out the message to its opinion "stars" along the lines "this is getting out of control - people have to believe our conspiracies, but a sensible democracy can't work if people live in complete and utter fantasy land" and told them to actively promote the line that believing QAnon is nuts and has disproved by false predictions so many times that you can't believe a word of it?  Who knows, perhaps they could sell it as a Democrat led conspiracy so extreme as to hurt Trump because it is so nuts?    

I tend to think that a united front from Fox News to attack QAnon at least could not hurt - perhaps giving Republicans cover to come out and call it out themselves.  

 

A complete disgrace and danger to the country

 

Denis did well

It seems quite a few weeks since I watched a movie on Netflix which I could strongly recommend, but last night was a good one:  the 2013 Denis Villeneuve directed Prisoners.

 I had never noticed it before, and as I consider Villeneuve a director who can make great looking movies which are nonetheless narratively unsatisfying, I wasn't in a hurry to watch it.  (It also stars Hugh Jackman, an actor who I generally struggle to like.)  \

But it's really good - well directed, well acted, and long but quite engaging all the way.  Given that it's about a neighbourhood child abduction, and the father (played by Jackman) is a conservative Christian who goes a bit nuts thinking he knows what's really going on, I thought it carried some surprising ressonance to the social milieu which has led to the current QAnon conspiracy craze spinning out of control in the US, and even Australia.  As Jack the Insider recently wrote:

The State of Victoria is in lockdown, not to reduce the infectious spread of the pandemic but because armed forces are secretly battling for control of the tunnels; an underground network used by the deep state to transport abducted children. Scott Morrison is with the deep state. Andrews was, too, before his arrest.

It is not yet safe to go to the tunnels. But be patient. The Great Awakening is upon us.

Welcome to the latest news from QAnon, the conspiracy theory that has millions of followers in the US and thousands in Australia.

Don't get me wrong:  Prisoners does have a mystery which is resolved by the end and it's unusual but not completely ludicrous, like QAnon.

And speaking of Villeneuve, yes, I have watched the trailer for Dune, a book which I have never read, and I didn't even see the David Lynch movie because of so-so reviews; but this upcoming version looks very stylish and probably worth seeing. 

A troublesome sect

How come I've never heard of the long running documentary series Unreported World?   It's apparently on Channel 4 in England, has been around for 20 years, and at least lately, posts new content on Youtube weekly.  It's the English Foreign Correspondent, by the looks, and probably preceded it? 

Anyway, I only learnt of it because a recent episode popped up on my Samsung Youtube app recommendations, Google knowing (of course) that I watch a lot of Asian content.

Here's the episode, about a money hungry Buddhist sect/cult the Dhammakaya Foundation in Thailand, which at least has the coolest, UFO looking temple thingy I have ever seen (this is a screenshot from the start of the video):

 

 

Looks like the start of The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951 version, and if the flying saucer had a Nazi reception committee.)

 

Here's the video itself:

Surprised I hadn't heard about it before. 

Sharing a date

Yeah, birthdays count for nothing, except it is my 60th today and that one does give even more of a feeling than your 50th that on life's ride you're up and over that initial roller coaster hump, and only have the moderate twists and bumps to continue with until it comes to an abrupt stop.   Not the cheeriest of metaphors, but truth be told, I don't care for roller coasters much anyway.  😊

Anyway, it's good to be alive and well and around to watch things unfold.

I see that a couple of years ago I had a look at famous people who shared my birth date, and noted a couple of low level celebrities.   Looking at a much, much longer list of famous birthdays, and I note the following:

* DH Lawrence: (I've known that one for a long time, but have never read him and have no great interest to start now, either.  I just realised I know virtually nothing about his life, but he has quite a long Wiki entry, so I might read that later.)

* Oh!  Brian DePalma, the director, is 80 today.   I will go to my grave defending The Untouchables as a great gangster film with actually more serious moral content than most of Scorsese's work, and with the most thrilling shoot out sequence ever; so yeah, he's welcome to share my date.

* Ferdinand Marcos would be 103 today if he was still alive:  good to know I share a date with at least one Right wing dictator.   

* Here's a name anyone who has ever owned a pre-digital camera who have read at least once:  Carl Zeiss ("German scientific instrument and lens maker").

* Minamoto no Yoriie, Japanese shogun.  Born 1182.  Never heard of him, but I've taken to telling my kids I must have been Asian in a prior life (it's why I watch so much Asian content on Youtube and Netflix, obviously); and perhaps he is my specific previous incarnation.   No, wait, he was a bit of a dud:

Yoriie showed when still very young great interest in military arts like fencing, and horse-riding. After his father's death in 1199, the 17-year-old became head of the Minamoto clan and was appointed sei-i taishōgun in 1202.^[2] He was, however, criticized for his abandonment of his father's policies, and his mother forbade him from any involvement political activity.^[2] On June 30, 1203 (Shōji 1, 12th day of the 4th month) his remaining powers were formally taken from him and assumed by a council of 13 elders, headed by his grandfather Hōjō Tokimasa.^[2] He ordained as a Buddhist monk. Yoriie, in turn, plotted with the Hiki to subjugate the Hōjō clan; however, he failed, was put under house arrest and forced to abdicate, and was eventually assassinated on July 17, 1204 in Izu.^[2] Yoriie was succeeded by his younger brother Sanetomo, the last of the Seiwa Genji line to rule, at least nominally, over Kamakura. 

All a bit Game of Thrones-ish.  

* Who to end on?   Perhaps a homeopathic murderer?:  Hawley Harvey Crippen [Dr Crippen], American homeopath and first killer to be caught with the aid of wireless telegraphy, born in Coldwater, Michigan (d. 1910).  He has a lengthy Wiki entry too.  All quite famous, it seems, and I think I have heard of the name.   More fun reading.

Anyway, on with life....

My dieting tips

"So, how's the current bout of 5/2 dieting going?" is a question none of my readers ever ask - so I will tell you anyway.

Been going good.   It's great to feel the pants getting looser and wondering if I will have to buy a smaller belt.   I seem to still be losing about 500 - 600g a week.   Not precisely sure where I started, but BMI is now a solid 26 instead of what I think was a verging on 27.

And I have decided it's easier than ever, because I am finding this routine for the 600 cal days is not boring me yet:

Breakfast - cup of coffee (with a small amount of milk) and a banana

Mid-morning - cup of tea (with small amount of milk)

Lunch - Cup of Soup (about 110 cal or less)

Sometime after lunch - 50 g of beef jerky (which is remarkably low on calories, but satisfying)

Dinner - one of the Cole's or Woolies pre made single serve salads.  These are pretty good now, and very convenient.  Usually they are around 250 cal.

 My daily total calories might be a little over 600 cal, but I doubt it ever reaches 700.  Still works.

So my big tips:   beef jerky and supermarket pre-made, individual salads.

Gravity not causing quantum collapse?

Interesting story at Science about an experiment indicating that an idea promoted by Roger Penrose (gravity is what causes quantum collapse) has passed a test.   (Although the ageing Penrose still thinks it is an inconclusive test.)

Excuse me while I swoon over Julia pointing out something useful to know

I happened to see Julia Gillard on the ABC breakfast show today, speaking in her role as Chair of Beyond Blue.

She said that suicide figures for Victoria (of course, the worst affected Australian state with COVID) for 2020 up to August were now available and there had been no increase in numbers over the previous year.   Still, they are worried about the potential for an increase, and hence have produced a video with an suicide prevention message (8 people who once felt suicidal, but came out of it OK.)

This "no increase in suicide numbers despite COVID lockdowns for 7 months" message is not something I had heard of before.   Instead, we get Right wing hysterics like Creighton going on and on about how this is going to devastate people, sending the message that it's reasonable to feel desperate because everything's going to Hell and yes, if you have lost your job your life is ruined, and for no reason.   (Mind you, even that Ian Hickie and the AMA have been talking about increased suicide risk - which is fair enough as a warning to government to try to bring in an adequate response, but I would have thought does run the risk in its reporting of encouraging a sense of inevitability in the vulnerable.) 

So, the positive message of no increased suicides so far should be given more prominence, I reckon.

And, by the way:  OMG, Gillard plays the role of useful ex Prime Minister with such exquisite grace, humour and intelligence, doesn't she?   I sort of swoon over her reasonableness on all appearances she makes.   Compare her performance to a snippet of Tony Abbott last night on Mad as Hell, making a weird "joke" about virgins during a press appearance in England about the lost cause of Brexit - he is still making people like me grind their teeth over what a complete embarrassment he is.      

 Update:  I see that the "no increase" message did appear in the news (at least, on the ABC, the Guardian and The Age - all of which might still be considered Left leaning sites, although not sure about the Age anymore) at the end of August - not sure that I saw it given much prominence on TV news, though.   Certainly, at the start of August, there seems a flurry of "suicides will increase" stories on sites like 7 News. 

Thanks, social media

Another appalling story of malicious rumour mongering on social media in India:

Wild rumours about coronavirus are fuelling opposition to testing in the northern Indian state of Punjab, reports BBC Punjabi's Arvind Chhabra. 

 

"Human organs are being smuggled," Sonia Kaur, who lives in a village in Punjab's Sangrur district, tells the BBC. "Not just the villagers but the whole world is scared of this. Social media is full of such news."

 

Ms Kaur says she has heard of people's organs being harvested under the guise of diagnosing and treating coronavirus. She is echoing the fears of countless others in rural Punjab who are sceptical of the virus.

 

Rumours are flying fast in Punjab that the virus is a hoax, that people who don't have Covid-19 are being taken away to care centres, where they are being killed for their organs, and that bodies are being swapped to allay suspicion. 

 

A mix of fear, anxiety and easy access to social media, especially WhatsApp, has hastened the spread of these baseless rumours in the form of messages and doctored videos. 

 

This has led to protests and even attacks against health workers. Ms Kaur's village was one of several in Sangrur that did not allow health workers to collect samples for testing - crowds pelted them with stones, screaming "Go back, we don't want to be tested", until they left.

One would hope that the Indian government is running some sort of attempt at educating school kids, at least, not to believe rumours on the internet.   Educating old adults in rural areas may well be impossible, I guess...

 

Almost makes you wish bad problems were even worse

This may be kind of obvious, but I haven't noticed too many people saying it:  the problem in a social sense with both COVID 19 and climate change is that both problems work in ways which are very real and very disrupting, but leave a significant proportion of the population being able to claim no personal and immediate effect, despite what scientists and other experts tell them.

This enables the intense politicisation of the response, and a lack of social cohesion.

I mean, if you get a big enough problem - your country at risk of invasion during a war as a perfect example - people will put up with enormous privation and social disruption for years at a time.   Not only that, but some people find the social cohesion from a massive joint response can make the whole thing almost a positive experience.   (I think the ageing scientist James Lovelock says that about his World War 2 years.  By the way, he's 101 now.  Can't be with us much longer.)  

The social difficulty you get is when a problem is real and bad, but not quite bad or immediate enough to shut up the politically and ideologically motivated contrarians from engaging in arguments with cherry picked "evidence" and large slabs of denial of expert evidence. 

You want to feel depressed about the future of cheap overseas travel?

Then read this commentary at CNA:  

Does COVID-19 spell the end of long-haul budget airline flights?

American policing noted

Even by American policing standards, this is outstandingly nuts:

A 13-year-old boy with autism was shot several times by police officers who responded to his home in Salt Lake City after his mother called for help.

Linden Cameron was recovering in a Utah hospital, his mother said, after suffering injuries to his shoulder, both ankles, his intestines and his bladder.

Golda Barton told KUTV she called 911 to request a crisis intervention team because her son, who has Asperger’s syndrome, was having an episode caused by “bad separation anxiety” as his mother went to work for the first time in more than a year.

“I said, ‘He’s unarmed, he doesn’t have anything, he just gets mad and he starts yelling and screaming,’” she said. “He’s a kid, he’s trying to get attention, he doesn’t know how to regulate.”

She added: “They’re supposed to come out and be able to de-escalate a situation using the most minimal force possible.”

Instead, she said, two officers went through the front door of the home and in less than five minutes were yelling “get down on the ground” before firing several shots.

 

 

Count me "amused"

An ancient key to Tenet?

I hadn't heard about this before:  Nolan's film Tenet seems to have clear ties to an old palindrome square:

The ancient palindrome that explains Christopher Nolan’s Tenet

A puzzle dug up all over Europe holds the key to Tenet — and turns it into more than a movie.

I'm not sure if I should see the movie at the cinema.  It seems to universally be considered far too complicated and puzzling as to what is going on, but many reviewers think it is well worth the viewing anyway.

I'm a high scorer

If I admit that my score on this appears to be 11 or perhaps even a 12, can I reclaim status as a "conservative"?:

Mystery phone

I have gifted myself (but not yet opened) a new, low mid-range (as is my cheapskate wont) Android mobile phone, even though it is seemingly the most under reviewed phone on the planet.

It's the Vivo X50 Lite.  Now this is a major brand in Asia (I believe), and the X50 Pro got lots of review attention (at least within Asia) due to its internal gimbal camera, which is a pretty cool feature.   But I have never seen that model on sale here, and I don't spend a lot of time trying to walk and take videos, so I didn't see a need to track that down. 

JB Hi Fi and Officeworks do sell cheap end Vivo phones, and they seem pretty good value, with nice screens.   The X50 Lite came out not so long ago, originally at $499, but it has been on sale recently for $399.

The price drop might be because no professional reviewer is reviewing it.  Even on Youtube, where it seems hundreds and hundreds of Asian people try to make a living by posting video reviews of nearly every phone that is released by any company, I think all of the videos are just information or comparison ones where they list the features of the X50 Lite alone or against other similarly priced phones.

Why is no one interested in properly reviewing a (now) $400 phone with 8Gb ram, 128 internal storage, an AMOLED screen, and all of the sensors which should see me get through the apocalypse as long as I also have a solar powered re-charger??

Here are the full specs.  I suspect the processor is very mid range, but if you don't play games on your phone, I doubt it matters that much.  

This phone is so under the counter that when I went to Officeworks to buy it, it had not been put on display, ever.   They had 4 out the back, and it was on line, but they just never bothered displaying it.  (JB Hi Fi has had it on display, so I know what it looks like.  Lovely screen.)

Anyway, by next week I will have opened and used it.  As with all new mobile phones, I expect I will be impressed by the upgraded abilities in my hand.   And I will review it here.  Ha.

System failure of the worst kind

This guy (who stalked and shot his teenage kids in their house, following the daughter from her bus to find out where they lived) just sounds like he lived his entire life as a dangerous sociopath (but of the kind who could con women into having relationships with him):

Police records showed the man who shot and killed his two teenage children in a domestic assault in Sydney’s northern suburbs had been violent towards or stalked four prior domestic partners and one of his other children.

In 2010, John Edwards was refused a gun licence due to a prior AVO, the coronial inquest into the deaths heard on Monday.

But despite a long history of stalking and assault charges registered on the central police system known as the “COPS” database, Edwards was able to successfully apply in 2017 for a “Commissioners Permit” to undergo gun safety training at Hornsby and Ku-ring-gai gun clubs...

The inquest into the deaths of John, Jack and Jennifer Edwards has heard Edwards had an extraordinary relationship history, leaving behind six partners before Olga and 10 children in total.

Police interviewed all but one of the former partners, and found Edwards had a constant pattern of violence, control and stalking. Several former partners and one of his children had made police reports over decades.

Olga herself had reported two incidents to police, including an incident in February 2017, when she had been separated from Edwards for a year, and he stalked her in her "hot" yoga class....

Ms Richardson also told the inquest that Ku-ring-gai Pistol Club refused Edwards membership in 2016 after he was threatening to an officer of the club.

The Ku-ring-gai club informed the Hornsby Gun Club it had refused Edwards membership but did not let any authorities know. Edwards, who owned five firearms, completed his training at St Marys gun club, which had no knowledge of his history.

Doesn't this indicate that the system should be capable of being marked "guns to be surrendered and never to be obtained again"?

The singing tyrants

OK, so there's a reasonable chance you've seen it elsewhere, but I think it's only been out for less than a week, and I thought it was pretty interesting:



The most realistic looking thing about it (in my opinion) is the way their heads bob around.

I think I have linked to the original post of it, so it will presumably stay up, as I notice it is being taken down elsewhere.

People are suggesting that it shows what "deep fake" videos can do, and a lot of very serious people worry that politics is going to have a lot of trouble dealing with the poisonous effect of deep fake propaganda in future.

Call me too optimistic, perhaps; but if what fake videos can do is highlighted by examples such as this, doesn't it make it more likely that people will be more sceptical of  online propaganda using any form of video?   Not sure that I can convincingly make that case out when there are literally millions of Americans (nearly all Republicans) who at least partially believe in the ludicrous QAnon conspiracies - but perhaps with conspiracy and propaganda it's somewhat perversely the case that the lowest tech communication (simple text messages) promulgates the best?   All people have to believe is that such messages come from an insider - they don't have to speculate about whether the image, video or voice has been faked or manipulated on the way.       

Nick Cohen being sensible

I have been saying a similar thing for at few years now:

I once believed that you should fight the extreme right and extreme left “at the same time and for the same reasons”. The phrase had a fine sound to it, even if I say so myself, and it remains true enough. Anyone who has witnessed the public shaming of those who deviate from approved leftish ideology will find Boris Johnson’s attempts to purge the cabinet and civil service of all who disagree with him familiar. The politics may be different but the oppressive spirit is the same.

But in this terrible year, it is worth saying that moral equivalence is not the same as practical equivalence. As the world stands, the fight against the radical right is a fight for the preservation of liberal democracy. The fight against the far left is a fight for justice for the individual denied the freedom to express his or, and more frequently today, her opinions without post-Stalinist inquisitors demanding she confesses her ideological crimes or lose her job.

Both fights are essential but the difference in scale is so enormous it barely makes sense to put them in the same category.

He should also have mentioned climate change...

Reviews you didn't need

*  I've not finished it yet, but I can fully understand why the second season of Umbrella Academy has been so popular on Netflix.   It's terrifically directed, and the story is flowing with far fewer angsty relationship diversions than the first season, which did drag at times.   It's overall much wittier, too.    A very enjoyable bit of comic book based nonsense.  
*  How's this for a late review:  finally got around to watching Mulholland Drive on the weekend.   I thought I had read years ago that the movie was capable of making sense, but I didn't work it out for myself and had to go check on Reddit for the explanation.   It does have strong Twin Peaks vibes,  and I had forgotten that it had started out as another TV project that was converted into a movie.   Unfortunately, I have to say that the overall impression it gave me was that David Lynch was quite overrated - Twin Peaks was fun and enjoyable in its day, but his movie work doesn't really do much for me.   He really did make Los Angeles look like a physically unattractive dump in virtually every interior and exterior shot - perhaps that was revenge for his "creative differences" with the business at the time?  Another thing the movie made me realise (again) was how extraordinarily tame by modern standards R rated movies of even a couple of decades ago could be in pornographic and violent content.  We can all blame the internet and modern video games for that...