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Perhaps tech platforms need to feed the contents of Human Pathophysiology texts to their algorithms. Scott Ritter's analysis of the deterioration of exposed corpses over time is spot on. The science and the available data hence do not support the conclusion of Russian atrocities in Bucha. But no worries, clearly algorithms written by corporate profit scroungers are more trustworthy than the condition of bodies assessed by someone with direct experience of war. In like manner, those algorithms clearly comprehend more immunology than respected immunologists or teachers who cite principles rigorously established over the past 50 years. It's all just evidence that any assessments of complex systems made in the context of a Capitalist culture that reduces everything to profit can never be trusted. I find it more difficult every morning to awaken to life in a brilliantly logical biosphere whose top predator species functions within the illogical scientific framework of consume-and-discard, poisoning essential ecological resources, and unlimited growth.

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Apr 15, 2022·edited Apr 15, 2022

The increasing reliance upon overt and heavy-handed censorship is a sure sign of weakness and not strength.

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The difficulty for the Tech-Elite-Big Government is that humanity and the societies it forms has survived thousands of years communicating without the Social Media.

Censorship is “a tell” and it the last resort of those who cannot rationally communicate and persuade.

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If you do not worship the Cathedrals narrative, you are a dangerous heretic. They wish they had the CCP social credit score system where you can be unpersoned for disobedience with one click.

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Has anyone else picked up "followers" who have never made comments on anything?

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Isn't victim blaming the entire defense whenever Israel inflicts civilian deaths on the Palestinians? Can't wait to see all pro-Israel media curtailed. Oh, wait. You mean these rules are being applied conditionally? There's not only no fire; there isn't even a movie theater.

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Really insidious to use the "victim blaming" argument to promote US government censorship via corporate proxy.

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Interview w/Scott Ritter, April 6, 2022, By Don DeBar -- Bucha

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfHohl6gCJY

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Scott Ritter’s famous tweet below (April 6, 2022). He was immediately banned from Tweeter – than reinstated and soon again permanently banned without explanation.

Remember, Scott courageously fought US bipartisan War party’s WMD fraud in Iraq from the very start.

“The Ukrainian National Police committed numerous crimes against humanity in Bucha. Biden, in seeking to shift blame for the Bucha murders to Russia, is guilty of aiding and abetting these crimes. Congratulations America…. We’ve created yet another Presidential war criminal !!”

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@DefenceUkraine -- regarding the Tochka-U fired at the train station:

Get the serial number of the missile off the debris. Provide a list of all Tochka-U’s in your inventory by serial number. Prove that missile was never in your inventory.

But you can’t, because it was.. GUILTY !! --- Scott Ritter tweet – April 8, 2022

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Scott Ritter and The Battle of the Donbas – April 11, 2022

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5RKNoIhE40

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In 2013 The US passed the Smith-Mundt Modernization Act. An act that originally came about in 1948 following WWII and the acknowledgement that propaganda directed at a domestic audience is perilous to democracy. The evidence of Joseph Goebbels' deployment of propaganda on the citizens of Germany as Exhibit A.

The "modernization" of it was effectively a repeal of the ban on propaganda through domestic media. Republicans and Democrats alike supported the repeal. Media and "fact check" reports following the "modernization" claimed there was no effective repeal of the ban. Of course, following the repeal of the ban the media and "fact checkers" were by the very passage of the act, propagandists. So when known propagandists say they aren't disseminating propaganda it stands to reason that their denial is propaganda.

The rest, as they say, is history. And the present. And the future? Is up to us.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/14/u-s-repeals-propaganda-ban-spreads-government-made-news-to-americans/

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."

We'd turned off "network news Jan 20, 1981. Actually misplaced our 19" B&W Sony for a while, until we needed it to watch I Claudius, PeeWee's Playhouse and MST3K. In the US, I can certainly attest to ABSOLUTE falsehood in NYC coverage of COVID, Ukraine, Russia-Russia-Russia, Iraq, bin Laden's family relationship with Bush, Israeli, al Saud & Atlantic Council involvement in U S wars of imperialism. ANYTHING to do with AGW, "our" party's fracking Ponsi scheme, ANYTHING to do with WTO, trade agreements, ISDS panels; ANY mention of DNC simply disappearing primary ballots, cops murdering us, etc?

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At the end of this Chomsky Scahill chat, they begin to discuss important points about this issue. Surprising coming from The Intercept... Also, Noam makes some sense about the proxy war. Back to form. https://theintercept.com/2022/04/14/russia-ukraine-noam-chomsky-jeremy-scahill/

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Caitlin, your conclusions, "It's not about saving Ukrainians, ending Covid misinformation, preventing violence, or any of the other excuses they've been rolling out since 2016. It's about censoring the internet," are spot on.

Elite power structures welcomed the internet because it increases the reach of their propaganda. Its use by alternative voices, and their appeal to a growing number of skeptics, blind-sided that power elite. They're using a two pronged approach to shut down those dissident voices and solidify their own power. One prong was Ajit Pai's attack on net neutrality. Net neutrality prevented ISPs from discriminating against independent platforms that compete with popular social media (like Twitter, YouTube and Facebook) by classifying ISPs as common carriers like telephone. Voices for freedom have not yet won that battle, though some progress has been made, particularly at the state and local levels. The other prong is to use corporate social media giants for censorship by proxy, threatening them with anti-trust actions if they don't comply with censorship demanded by government. The courts have yet to deal with that.

As Caitlin correctly sums it up, "The idea is to keep the vast propagandizing power of the internet open while forcing its democratizing power closed, thereby keeping the balance of power tilted far toward the empire managers while manipulating us into believing this is all happening for our own good. But that's all it is: manipulation. Psychological manipulation at mass scale, for the benefit of the powerful. That's all this has ever been."

I do have a minor criticism of Caitlin when she writes, "...at least the arguments about the need to prevent violence technically made sense," and later, "...at least the argument that people were dying as a result of being misinformed about a deadly virus technically made sense." There's a wealth of case law defining incitement to violence, and neither Alex Jones nor QAnon were ever indicted for it. Similarly, we've never before shut down the speech of even the most egregious "snake oil" salesmen on that basis. The most dangerous of "patent medicines" like laudenum were discredited by allowing the salesmen's speech and refuting it. The rampant censorship and propaganda has actually discredited the CDC, FDA, NIH and even CMS and DOD. Censorship continues to the actual destruction of lives, as it always does.

Never give an inch, Caitlin. That small sliver of territory will defeat you.

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Maybe it's worth considering taking our bad selves back to the garden eschewing the wonders of modern technology in order to send a message that we no longer will participate in any of the censorship or propagandizing. Shut down and de-power the web. What do we really need it for anyway? Isn't it possible we, the "revolutionaries" sitting at our screens, are actually, in some way perpetuating the ouroboros of materialistic, imperialist madness? Maybe it's simply time to walk away. I mean how many windmills can we fight at once?

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Palestine Action in the UK started using Donorbox when all previous platforms - including PayPal - dropped them https://donorbox.org/

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"For democracy to survive": we need more censorship - Max Boot

Jefferson is turning in his grave.

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