# The Merits of Social Media in this Pandemic



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

During a pandemic people seek help and advise.
Here is what they get from Social Media:





__





						Types, sources, and claims of COVID-19 misinformation
					






					reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk
				




And the winner is .... !!!


----------



## Alain De Vos (Apr 8, 2020)

What do they get by W.H.O,  other supra-national institutions, communications by  government officials?


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

Alain De Vos said:


> What do they get by ...











						Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) – World Health Organization
					

Information on COVID-19, the infectious disease caused by the most recently discovered coronavirus.




					www.who.int
				












						COVID-19 Response | United Nations
					

On this website you can find information and guidance from the United Nations regarding the current outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) that was first reported from Wuhan, China, on 31 December 2019.




					www.un.org
				








__





						RKI  -  Infektionskrankheiten A-Z - COVID-19 (Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2)
					

Übersichtsseite zu COVID-19 (Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2) unter Infektionskrankenheiten A-Z mit Informationen zu Epidemiologie, Diagnostik, Prävention und Bekämpfungsmaßnahmen sowie externen Links zum Thema




					www.rki.de


----------



## Alain De Vos (Apr 8, 2020)

W.H.O. liked Xi Jinping , that is for the money. But I guess Xi was also not well informed.
Here in Belgium the Minister of health, who is a regular doctor of medicine with former practice bye the way,
stated first it was something like a flue. Social media was faster to aknowledge the problem was bigger
And the actions of the European Union can be summarized in the message "wash your hands".


----------



## balanga (Apr 8, 2020)

Alain De Vos said:


> What do they get by W.H.O,  other supra-national institutions, communications by  government officials?


W.H.O. is owned by Bill Gates.

His aim to to create a monopoly on medcine the same way he did with PCs.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/he...-patient-expected-to-get-it-today/ar-BB12e01f

As someone said recently since he hasn't been able to find a cure for Windows viruses in over thirty years what chance has he got with flu?

He'll probably come up with a vaccine which you need to update every year...


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

balanga said:


> W.H.O. is owned by Bill Gates.


The WHO are part of the UN and cannot be owned by an individual.


----------



## Alain De Vos (Apr 8, 2020)

The claim I want to make is that social media has its value. Even if someone states the Earth is flat, why not. Eratosthenes clames otherwise. And I believe the latter. And I feel Fox news and CNN sometimes a bit limited.


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

Alain De Vos said:


> The claim I want to make is that social media has its value. Even if someone states the Earth is flat, ...


You are absolutely right on that. Earthflateners, Chemtrailers and the like found a home. If you ever suspected that your neighbor is a genius you can prove it there.


----------



## msplsh (Apr 8, 2020)

Please don't make a thread that causes a new rule to be added to the forums...


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

balanga 
Your capabilities in guessing have some potential for improvement. Maybe this is the reason you read in prophecies chambers.

As such a well informed person ahead the present reality you might have an answer to my question:

Mark Zuckerberg is making a lot of money around Facebook. Do you have a clue on what Zuckerberg intents to do with his money?


----------



## shkhln (Apr 8, 2020)

balanga said:


> BillGates tells WHO what to say. The CoronaVirus is his brainchild for controlling the world's population through his forthcoming vaccine.



Is there a competition for the most dumb comment of the month? getopt was obnoxious enough even without you playing along. Don't make this worse.


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

shkhln said:


> @getopt was obnoxious enough even without you playing along.


Ahh, now it gets interesting!


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

msplsh said:


> Please don't make a thread that causes a new rule to be added to the forums...


What are you thinking of? Any suggestions?


----------



## msplsh (Apr 8, 2020)

Well, it's too late for this topic to not go off the rails.

I would suggest banning all COVID-19 topics since "No COVID-19 disinformation" is too difficult to police.


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

msplsh said:


> I would suggest banning all COVID-19 topics


Like this from Thread 74846?
*



			Vendors respond to COVID-19
		
Click to expand...

*


> As the coronavirus pandemic continues to affect many people's lives in an unprecedented fashion, some web server vendors have offered to help in a variety of direct and indirect ways.



Or this from Thread 74823:


> *Life*
> 
> 
> Vitamin D Deficiency – Factor in COVID-19 Progression/Severity/Mortality.
> https://www.modernghana.com/news/992403/vitamin-d-deficiency-a-factor-in-covid-19-progre.html



BTW this thread is about the role of Social Media in a Pandemic. I'd appreciate to stay with this.


----------



## msplsh (Apr 8, 2020)

They're locked, but sure, delete them too.


----------



## getopt (Apr 8, 2020)

msplsh said:


> They're locked, but sure, delete them too.


If you feel that way I'd suggest to contact admin directly.


----------



## shkhln (Apr 8, 2020)

It's an automated account, not an actual admin.


----------



## ralphbsz (Apr 8, 2020)

getopt said:


> Mark Zuckerberg is making a lot of money around Facebook. Do you have a clue on what Zuckerberg intents to do with his money?


Probably buy another 20 houses in Palo Alto near his residence, and clear them out, to increase the privacy of his family (with wife, I think they have 1 little kid).


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

ralphbsz thank you for jumpin' in, but isn't that just a little too realistic? Get some brandy and try again.
balanga, what you think?


----------



## PMc (Apr 9, 2020)

getopt said:


> The WHO are part of the UN and cannot be owned by an individual.


The UN is owned by the neo-socialists.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> The UN is owned by the neo-socialists.


The UN cannot be owned by anyone.

Refresher:


> The FreeBSD forums aim to build and maintain a friendly and co-operative user community. As such, you agree not to post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful, *political*, religious, threatening, sexually-orientated or otherwise *divisive or combative material*, or anything that may violate any applicable laws. Such posts (in this context, 'posts' refers to any part of the forums that is visible to other members, including signatures, private messages, and profiles) will be removed without any warning and attempts to introduce material of this nature can lead to an infraction or you being temporarily or permanently banned from these forums.


----------



## PMc (Apr 9, 2020)

getopt said:


> hateful, *political, [...]  otherwise divisive or combative material*



So, You think that applies to Your assaults against Russian government and it's state-owned media, in particular?
(If I were Putin, I would be offended.)


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

Any more trolls who want to join here?


----------



## PMc (Apr 9, 2020)

Oh! You should have put that in the opening post, that You want to instanciate a troll-meeting here. Then we could have spared our serious comments.

BTW: I had hoped for some cool "disinformation" examples, for my personal entertainment.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> Then we could have spared our serious comments.


Oh, "we"? Are you part of an orchestration or did you fell apart?
Thank you for confirming that you mean it 'seriously'.


----------



## eternal_noob (Apr 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> I had hoped for some cool "disinformation" examples, for my personal entertainment.


Read up on the president of Belarus. He's the winner: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_Belarus#Government_response
Close before second winner Brazil's Bolsonaro: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...naro-says-coronavirus-crisis-is-a-media-trick
Third is Donald 'The Duck' Trump.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

Can we have a decent discussion about this? Or do we have to nuke the whole thread? 

NO conspiracy theories! Yes, I'm looking at you balanga


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice
Thank you for not tolerating conspiracy theories here.

Trying to uncover desinformation in the Internet is always accompanied with contingency noise. It's easy to stand just that. While it is interesting to see where the wind comes from it is disillusionizing in a forum that is meant to help others in a a friendly and co-operative way. 

The motivation to help others is endangered with such fighting. People who can't stand the headwind tend to leave communities where such confrontations and devisioning takes place. Not a few people have left the FreeBSD forums because of irrelevant chatter (intended disturbance), flaming (others opinion) and personal attacks (when not having arguments anymore). Good and helpful contributers have left and this is a shame.


----------



## balanga (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> NO conspiracy theories! Yes, I'm looking at you balanga



In 1500 there was a conspiracy theory that the Sun rather than Earth at the center of the universe.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> In 1500 there was a conspiracy theory that the Sun rather than Earth at the center of the universe.


That wasn't a conspiracy theory. That was the knowledge people had at that time. There's a big difference.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> That wasn't a conspiracy theory. That was the knowledge people had at that time. There's a big difference.


It is sad that this has to be said. At a certain point arguments no not help anymore.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

I've unfriended quite a few people on Facebook lately. Mostly because they started spewing these Corona conspiracies, or that ridiculous anti-5G nonsense. Heck I've even seen combinations now, 5G is supposedly the cause of the symptoms and there's no Corona virus.



> Under the heading “Link met coronavirus?” the Het Laatste Nieuws journalist pointed out that since 2019 a number of 5G cell towers had been built around Wuhan. Could the two things be related? *“I have not done a fact check”*, Van Kerckhoven cautioned, before piling in. “But it may be a link with current events”. And so the fuse was lit.











						How the 5G coronavirus conspiracy theory tore through the internet
					

From an interview with an obscure Belgian doctor to apparent arson attacks in the UK, the conspiracy theory that 5G is somehow linked to the coronavirus pandemic has spread unlike any other




					www.wired.co.uk


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

Sure, others stupidity can be a delightful entertainment.
But when linking obvious madness one should consider something like the Streisand-Effect. One helps spreading when showing it to others. That is the point when things are starting to go viral. And one cannot be sure that others see the madness, it might totally fit their views.


----------



## eternal_noob (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> NO conspiracy theories!


Thank you for watching. Must be hard times for forum mods these days.



balanga said:


> the Sun rather than Earth at the center of the universe


Correction: The sun is in the center of our solar system. The center of the universe is Donald Trump.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

If at all possible, no politics either. It's too much of a hornets nest as it can and will attract the wrong kind of discussion here. 

I love a good conspiracy theory, if done properly. All good conspiracy theories have a small nucleus of truth but explained slightly differently. It's interesting to see how easy it is to dupe people. My dad once told me the trams slept on their side when they're at the depot. And I believed him, granted I was probably 4 years old and simply didn't know any better. But most of the Corona (or anti-5G) theories I've seen are so blatantly fake it's not even funny any more.


----------



## eternal_noob (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> If at all possible, no politics either.


I apologize if my joke about mister Trump being in the center of the universe is considered politics. I just couldn't resist.








						A leading South Korean doctor says Trump's 'pride' and 'ego' are putting the world's health at risk
					

"Trump has spoken dismissively about testing because of his ego," Min Pok-kee told Wired. "As we scientists see it, he's motivated by pride."




					www.businessinsider.com


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

It was more or less meant in general, someone will eventually turn things into a political debate. Much like that ever present Godwin's law.

I love a good joke


----------



## fernandel (Apr 9, 2020)

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Papers.cfm?abstract_id=3561958
https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-21211/v1

It is not social media but someone will have a time and read anywhere...


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Can we have a decent discussion about this? Or do we have to nuke the whole thread?


Nuke the whole thread. This has no place here even if it's "off topic".

"Social media" is a curse and a pox on the world that should be obliterated. 80% of all posts on such things are there by the hand of people who have no right or education. See reddit. It's the reason there are editors on responsible news platforms; to vet the irresponsible that now dominates the so-called "news".

I was shocked to learn, yesterday, that some people get their news from Facebook. That is such a horrific piece of information more terrible than covid-19.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 9, 2020)

1/3 of America has been getting what they thought was news from Facebook for about a decade. Much of those were paid for advertisements, which were disseminated intentionally by backers of those advertisements and unwittingly by others. I was surprised by how many people believed Facebook and things like that.

The problem was there before the internet, but it wasn't nearly as widespread as it is now. Before it was limited to fewer outlets where disinformation literature reached book stores, I believe including even one located such as in Grand Central Station.

For the Internet, in the late 1990's and early 2000's there was a proportion of more smart people on the Internet. Then everyone else got online. They said, the Internet could educate more people, but it seemed to do the opposite too.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Nuke the whole thread. This has no place here even if it's "off topic".


With all respects. With your demand you make yourself party of those who's aim is to destruct this thread. This would not be admin's wisdom.

Critics of Social Media and disinformation there must be heard and will be heard.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> "Social media" is a curse and a pox on the world that should be obliterated.


Ehm, forums are a form of social media too. Usenet also. When you think about it, the old BBS's were too. Fidonet wouldn't have existed if people didn't want to socially interact with each other.



drhowarddrfine said:


> I was shocked to learn, yesterday, that some people get their news from Facebook.


I'm shocked to learn that you didn't know this before yesterday. This has been going on since forever, even long before Facebook, MySpace and all the "modern" equivalents of bulletin boards existed. The only difference is that now _everybody_ is able to access them.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Ehm, forums are a form of social media too.


Good point! But they are different. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and similar are commercial. They exploit the need for communication for generating profits. Moderation in the so called "Social Media" is a cost factor. Click-baiting there generates profits. Not so here.

If the dumbest conspiracy theories or hate-talk is placed in commercial Social Media revenues are generated with ad-networks. If same is done here trouble starts.


----------



## balanga (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> That wasn't a conspiracy theory. That was the knowledge people had at that time. There's a big difference.


People were executed at the time for having views which differed from those in power.
The people with the real knowledge at the time were suppressed, just as they are now.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> People were executed at the time for having views which differed from those in power.
> The people with the real knowledge at the time were suppressed, just as they are now.


Try reading an actual history book from time to time.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> The people with the real knowledge


Why do you place the word "real" in front of knowledge?


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

getopt said:


> But they are different. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and similar are commercial.


True. But I do believe they all started with the best of intentions. But as soon as companies like that go public (shares, trading) it's not the original creator's control any more and it's the investor's control. The only reason why people invest in anything at all is because they believe they can make money off of it. That's when the problems begin. 



> Moderation in the so called "Social Media" is a cost factor.


Yes, it's also quite difficult. Even forums like ours have moderators and the more users we get the more moderation is required. Ever tried to drink from a fire hose? Same idea. It's just too much.


----------



## mark_j (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Ehm, forums are a form of social media too. Usenet also. When you think about it, the old BBS's were too. Fidonet wouldn't have existed if people didn't want to socially interact with each other.



Not a fair comparison.
Back in the '80s/'90s, the BBS scene was the domain of the nerd. He (yes predominantly HE) spelt elite as l33t and downloaded pirated copies of Novell and Windows 3. Hell, even the early internet in the '80s, before it became what it is today, was frequented by nerds.

Nowadays, "social media" is a widespread pox on society. While it may do good in small pockets, it proliferates nonsense, conspiracy theories, anti-vaxers, haters, fake news and generally is, with few exceptions, the domain of idiots, SJWs, bullies and attention seekers.
It, unfortunately, gives a voice to those who just should not have a voice.

(You might guess from this I have NO time for faceplant, insta-twit and so on. Cynical? Hell yes!) 
[/rant]


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> But I do believe they all started with the best of intentions.


Maybe in the very first days, when the idea was born. But that did not hold for long.


SirDice said:


> But as soon as companies like that go public (shares, trading) it's not the original creator's control any more


I doubt that because that would leave the initiators innocent. It's the owners responsibility turning a garage startup in a NYSE listed incorporation. One has to want it and usually one knows precisely where that is going. Zuckerberg still is responsible for the does and don'ts at Facebook. He is responsible for what is going on frontside to client and in backoffice. He is still responsible for all data leaks that became public and he is still the one responsible for the leaks that did not make it into the public. He has got more power than he can digest and certainly more power than a single individual needs. Facebook is a worldwide monopoly that needs to be broken up like once AT&T. Facebook needs an antitrust lawsuit.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 9, 2020)

Zuckerberg was a bad person before he started Facebook.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

sidetone said:


> Zuckerberg was a bad person before he started Facebook.


A too simple sentence, probably useful when fishing for 'Likes'.

Attributing persons is not so helpful.
Analyzing what a person has done is the better approach.

So if you have a story what Zuckerberg had done before Facebook and you feel that is not good, share the facts. If you (generic you) have done so, it even is not necessary to call someone bad. The idea of that this person might be bad is developing without further pushes in readers minds. And what is important, you avoid being accused for malicious gossip.


----------



## balanga (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Try reading an actual history book from time to time.


Ever heard of Giordano Bruno?

Q.E.D.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> Ever heard of Giordano Bruno?





> After his death, he gained considerable fame, being particularly celebrated by 19th- and early 20th-century commentators who regarded him as a martyr for science,[6] although *historians agree that his heresy trial was not a response to his astronomical views but rather a response to his philosophical and religious views.*











						Giordano Bruno - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


----------



## balanga (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Try reading an actual history book from time to time.



Incidentally History is not static.  History is written by victors, and often re-written years later.

Ever heard of the Katyn massacre? History taught us that  20,000 Polish Officers were executed by the Nazis, but in 1990 that History was re-written and the Soviet Communists were blamed for those executions. Before 1990 anyone claiming the Communists were to blame would have been dismissed as a 'conspiracy theorist'.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 9, 2020)

And there's the Godwin...


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga 
Have you seen my question above regarding the word "real"?
It is necessary to understand this.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 9, 2020)

getopt said:


> Attributing persons is not so helpful.
> Analyzing what a person has done is the better approach.
> 
> So if you have a story what Zuckerberg done before Facebook and you feel that is not good, share the facts. If you (generic you) have done so, it even is not necessary to call someone bad. The idea of that this person might be bad is developing without further pushes in readers minds. And what is important, you avoid being accused for malicious gossip.


That is a simple statement. The way he insults people for trusting his platform in college. How he steals others' work to start Facebook. This tells me a lot.

This type of behavior hasn't changed from him. He switches users' privacy settings to public without informing them. I know they shouldn't have that on there, but still, that's bad. He sells user data in ways worse than other social media companies. I didn't see the utility in Facebook then, never used it, and now I see it for what it is. For someone who pries into people's lives, he has body guards guard his garbage can, like he's hiding something. For some spans, every 3 days something would come up in the news about something ridiculous he does.

It's obvious the type of person he is, and I will attribute the word bad, even rotten, to him. Like I care about attributing this to someone who actually profits from gossip and false advertisements. This person didn't become bad, he was rotten since the beginning.

He insults them for trusting his platform, because in some way he knows he can't be trusted to them with it? Not everyone is a dishonest creep, but it's an intranet, so they didn't assume the person hiding behind it is Zuckerberg like. At least it's him, and not someone worse, but Zuckerberg would sell data to that guy. Foolish for trusting someone they don't know, but perhaps assuming wrongfully the type of person or of false security. We know who he is now, or should, and people still trust him and Facebook.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> Ever heard of Giordano Bruno?


Have you ever heard about the work of the








						Giordano Bruno Foundation - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

sidetone said:


> It's obvious the type of person he is, and I will attribute the word bad, even rotten, to him. Like I care about attributing this to someone who actually profits from gossip and false advertisements. This person didn't become bad, he was rotten since the beginning.


See, what I tried to tell above is that probably most people with common sense will come to a similar or even worse conclusion. But it makes a huge psycological difference if you tell someone what conclusion is yours and others should follow. People are proud of their own outcome and that is way more powerful. 
Got me? Give your readers a chance.


----------



## balanga (Apr 9, 2020)

Real knowledge is that which turns out to be true when the facts emerge. Most bubble dwellers do not realise they are being brainwashed.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 9, 2020)

What real knowledge?


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> Real knowledge is that which turns out to be true when the facts emerge.


Asking myself what kind of knowledge you are talking about?
Scientific knowledge?

Wouldn't it be sufficient to say: "Knowledge is ..." ? Because what was before known facts cannot be called knowledge. What about knowledge as a process? That would include an understanding of a preliminary knowledge which could be replaced by better knowledge later. But that would colide with the term "real knowledge" as such a thing is static by definition and not replacable.

Next problem is calling something true. What is if others say, sorry but this is not true. Can knowledge be disputed? What you think?


----------



## obsigna (Apr 9, 2020)

People do confuse Believe with Knowledge. This may happen to everybody, however always to the dumbest first. Who wants to believe goes to the church, who wants to know does a research. Research starts with literature and we won’t find this on Twitter, FaceBook, Reddit, Instagram, etc.

Researchers end with writing. Believers start with writing and leave the boring reading part for others. A quick look on this thread tells us who belongs to which group.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

SirDice said:


> And there's the Godwin...


Yes and no. For you it is Godwin, because you just talked about it. You've got a hammer and now the problem is a nail.

I admit that first I reacted the same way. But this is not a typical Nazi-nail for a Godwin-hammer. It would be a Godwin if balanga intended typical nazi-talk. I think that was not his intention. He used Katyn massacre (1940) as an example for a changed historian view. That is totally legitimate but it opens a can of worms in the Polish-Russian relations when looking into it. Highly interesting stuff including the crash of the polish aircraft (2010) on the way to Smolensk. It is essential for understanding the present Polish-Russian tensions and therefore excellent material for toxic conspiracy theories of all sorts.

But! What does that mean here in the FreeBSD forums.
The Katyn massacre was named as an example. So far so good.
But beware us from a discussion on that. Even if is really interesting historical stuff it is actual toxic politics with ongoing reframing fights from all sides. If you let that run you might attract DoS attacks.

Now why is such a can of worms phantastic for Social Media? It is guarantied that confronting opinions start an emotional fight where arguments do not matter. It is a hedonistic fight if you will. The fight is the purpose and clicks are generating profits there as having said already. 
Any attempts to make our FreeBSD forums a backyard for fighting too must be stopped.


----------



## getopt (Apr 9, 2020)

obsigna said:


> A quick look on this thread tells us who belongs to which group.


Yeah we start knowing each other. That's community life. But that should not divide  or separate us as this would damage our forums.


----------



## Birdy (Apr 9, 2020)

The Internet itself is a social medium.
I use it to look up contradictory information and make up my own mind, whatever the subject.
No special need for FB and other "SM".

EDIT - About the OP article: who checks the fact-checkers?

O.T.: W.H.O: Gates Foundation Now Second Largest Funder After U.S. Government <---> W.T.F!


----------



## msplsh (Apr 9, 2020)

getopt said:


> But that should not divide  or separate us as this would damage our forums.



Fortunately, the forums have the Ignore feature.


----------



## PMc (Apr 9, 2020)

sidetone said:


> For the Internet, in the late 1990's and early 2000's there was a proportion of more smart people on the Internet. Then everyone else got online. They said, the Internet could educate more people, but it seemed to do the opposite too.



No it doesn't educate. Nothing does; you must educate yourself.

The internet in the 90's was incredibly great - because all the non-mainstream people were there, all who would dare to venture into unknown terrain, all the conspiracy "theories", all the cool stuff that usually happens behind the scene, instead of the stupid brainwashed crap from mass-media.
Info that formerly did only circle around via grapevine, where nobody was really certain about it (like that smoking pot will not kill you nor make you a junkie), got accessible, could be reflected and criticised by any participant, and it was up to the reader (and _only_ the reader) to decide on what might be the most plausible viewpoint. This was in total contrast to the common mass-media with their pre-defined learning-targets and their "dont-tell-them-anything-that-could-make-them-think" agenda.

But then the money-makers came, and content didn't count anymore, only clicks did - and all went down the gully.


----------



## fernandel (Apr 9, 2020)

balanga said:


> Ever heard of Giordano Bruno?
> 
> Q.E.D.


Did you ever read Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: The Little Prince? What do you think about this book if you did?


----------



## sidetone (Apr 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> No it doesn't educate. Nothing does; you must educate yourself.
> 
> The internet in the 90's was incredibly great - because all the non-mainstream people were there, all who would dare to venture into unknown terrain, all the conspiracy "theories", all the cool stuff that usually happens behind the scene, instead of the stupid brainwashed crap from mass-media.
> Info that formerly did only circle around via grapevine, where nobody was really certain about it (like that smoking pot will not kill you nor make you a junkie), got accessible, could be reflected and criticised by any participant, and it was up to the reader (and _only_ the reader) to decide on what might be the most plausible viewpoint. This was in total contrast to the common mass-media with their pre-defined learning-targets and their "dont-tell-them-anything-that-could-make-them-think" agenda.
> ...


It depends where you look on the Internet, and what the source content is that of what you read.

There are fact checkers, peer reviewed medical knowledge, good information on other sciences, Britannica online, good information on operating systems, free textbooks, investigative websites and responsible news. A lot of it is free or easily accessible. I learned about where to look and how to sort it. Some conspiracy theories can only go so far, until information can be verified by unrelated independent groups, but this information is not as quick to be noticed by everyone.

"(like that smoking pot will not kill you nor make you a junkie)," this information has been around in encyclopedias from at least the early 90's, that referred to the 70's. Information then, said it wasn't chemically addictive, and compared to alcohol in this sense, but recent information by the scientific community has changed to say it's mildly addictive, that tolerance for it builds. People overreacted to it, because it started finding its way to grade schools. It's actually an overrated plant. Those who decide to use it have a negative impact, they're giving money to cartels, even if it is transported from legal states like Colorado or Vermont, because violent cartels profit by having it transported from there too. Money from pot is destroying Mexico (problems from there have spilled into neighboring countries before) and we complain why there are so many asylum seekers. Some of the same pot smokers complain about immigrants or want to join border patrol groups. Some of the same people who take the side of cartels think, they only harm people who crossed them. When they kill people for simply being a woman working in Juarez, and they traffic people for slavery, or kill news reporters, because facts getting out irk them. They believe the US is in Afghanistan for opium, yet the people they argue in favor of, are the ones transporting opium in from Mexico who collaborate from those from Iran from that in Afghanistan, but they make some excuse to say, someone else takes something and transforms it to something more dangerous within this country. They start getting mad, so I don't argue with them anymore. I could spend half of my day saying dumbass more times than I care to count about them, and my day would be more well spent than them believing that.

"'dont-tell-them-anything-that-could-make-them-think' agenda" has been around since forever, from the beginning of civilization, to feudal systems, to colonial America, to indentured servitude and slavery and other social constructs. Our system is better today, as there are social constructs in our constitutions that offer some protections, if it weren't for so many uneducated people who don't know propaganda benefits those with a selfish motive. Today much of the problem is laziness, they rather have someone tell them something, than read it for themselves, and say, well, this person will always inform me, so they can only go at the pace when someone wants to inform them. But, they are so ready to read texts full of stupidity. They don't read, and they say, you should read more. I read enough to know a lot, even when I'm exhausted from reading, I read way more than they could. Some people think propaganda in comments is more meaningful than websites that have been reliable since forever. We even have a stupid society and stupid feckless leaders too who act like fish, or just do what's convenient or what is economically beneficial for their colleagues.


----------



## PMc (Apr 10, 2020)

sidetone said:


> It depends where you look on the Internet, and what the source content is that of what you read.
> 
> There are fact checkers, peer reviewed medical knowledge, good information on other sciences, Britannica online, good information on operating systems, free textbooks, investigative websites and responsible news. A lot of it is free or easily accessible.



Yes, I figured that out when I was about 12. There was no Internet yet, but there were libaries. I figured that all the knowledge you might ever need, for whatever task, it is all written down. You can search it, you can read it, whenever You may happen to need it.
So there is no challenge in that, no magic and no nothing.

At that point I quit learning, and started to look out for that which is not written in the libraries.

So, what do you need "fact checkers" for? Why do you need people to tell you what you are allowed to think and what not?



> I learned about where to look and how to sort it. Some conspiracy theories can only go so far, until information can be verified by unrelated independent groups, but this information is not as quick to be noticed by everyone.



What do you need "unrelated independent groups" for? You could go and verify the stuff by yourself.
And then it comes out, that these conspiracy "theories" are not banned because they are wrong, they are banned because they are true.



> "(like that smoking pot will not kill you nor make you a junkie)," this information has been around in encyclopedias from at least the early 90's, that referred to the 70's.



Yes, that's what I am talking about! I am online since 1988, and I was significantly involved in achieving this one! 
Because, up to that time, you could very easily have your home searched when only _talking_ about the matter!



> Information then, said it wasn't chemically addictive, and compared to alcohol in this sense, but recent information by the scientific community has changed to say it's mildly addictive, that tolerance for it builds. People overreacted to it, because it started finding its way to grade schools. It's actually an overrated plant. Those who decide to use it have a negative impact



Yes, yes, that may all be more or less correct, and I am not promoting to use the stuff. But that's not the point, the point is this: Harry J. Anslinger. This is a proven conspiracy. This is (or, say, was) official state-doctrine distributing blatant lies, consistently, over decades, spending billions on the support of these lies, and prosecuting and putting into jail everybody who would dare to disagree (like Timothy Leary)!

This is a proven one, nowadays, but it was not in my youth. And that is what there is to know about conspiracy "theories".

Lets get to the next one: I happened to get my prep-for-evac, in writing, six hours before 9/11.
At that time my people did work on lots of interesting stuff, supposedly related to the interbanking software etc.. I didn't track it all, but we had those travel restrictions; people from our team were not allowed to travel in the same airplane together.
It seems we had been important, so important that those up higher would not be able to afford a significant loss of our team's members. And so, it seems, a decision was made beforehand, that my people should somehow be kept safe from the 9/11 happening.



> "'dont-tell-them-anything-that-could-make-them-think' agenda" has been around since forever, from the beginning of civilization, to feudal systems, to colonial America, to indentured servitude and slavery and other social constructs.



Exactly. That's why I prefer to do my own investigations, and have my own X-files.



> Our system is better today, as there are social constructs in our constitutions that offer some protections, if it weren't for so many uneducated people who don't know propaganda benefits those with a selfish motive. Today much of the problem is laziness, they rather have someone tell them something, than read it for themselves, and say, well, this person will always inform me, so they can only go at the pace when someone wants to inform them. But, they are so ready to read texts full of stupidity.



Yes, and, as I often said, the stupid make money off the even more stupid.
But why should I care? Why do You care?

There are open questions, and I want answers. What other people do is not my concern. If they also want answers, they can join in. If not, then that's not my business.


----------



## shkhln (Apr 10, 2020)

sidetone said:


> The way he insults people for trusting his platform in college.



Those are words of wisdom.


----------



## PMc (Apr 10, 2020)

So, what is wrong with "social media"?

Well, everything is, beginning with the name.
What is socializing? Socializing is sitting together at the campfire n the woods with a good beer. Having a gossip with the caretaker while walking the staircase. Meet with your friends and frankly speak out what is actually on your mind. ...
Monitoring a gadget and talking to a computer is NOT social. It is anti-social.

So, these "social media" should correctly be termed anti-social media.

Recently, a new business did appear: hugging courses, offered by so-called "hugging academies". In these courses one can learn how to hug another person. There is no risk involved; it all happens under the thorough supervision of experienced therapists.

Hello?? Anybody home? I was thinking that every baby, every little new-born already knows how to do that, instinctively, without training, and -most important- _without rules_.

But indeed, this is similar to "social media". While the idea of socializing, at least to some extent, implies to open up, to be honest, and to talk about your thoughts more or less frankly, the oppsosite holds true for "social media": while these also appear to be intended for casual exchange, there are "moderators" (therapists) who determine what is allowed to think.

The reason for that is also simple to grasp: when talking to a computer, people are conscious that they do NOT talk to a human, and behave accordingly - without compassion.

But then otoh, this is not an all new thing. In socialist cultures there were always certain people designated to make sure that the citizens do only think what is allowed to think and do only talk what is allowed to talk.
That's why I term the new world-wide anti-social online culture as neo-socialist.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 10, 2020)

PMc said:


> At that point I quit learning, and started to look out for that which is not written in the libraries.
> 
> So, what do you need "fact checkers" for? Why do you need people to tell you what you are allowed to think and what not?
> 
> ...



Critical thinking, logic, mathematical thinking can be applied...

If I would fact check how files in FreeBSD work, I would edit a line several ways, and compare the ways that do and don't work. Then say, this one is it, than needing official documentation that doesn't exist or is not documented enough.

Fact checkers --> Snopes, Politifact and investigative journalism

Critical thinking can be used in relation to that. As a theme, they're supposedly there to help sort out facts, as it is realized this is needed, while propaganda also claims the same. As, why do I read into what one says, than something else?

Investigative journalism has found use in social media for truths. What is posted there can be verified a number of times, to root out disinformation, or to verify facts, including news. There are good things in social media, like what's going on by honest or well meaning people, and documentation of events.

Other fact checking, would be seeing things for yourself. Based on the many information sources put together. Verifying what you can yourself.



> Exactly. That's why I prefer to do my own investigations, and have my own X-files.
> ...
> Yes, and, as I often said, the stupid make money off the even more stupid.
> But why should I care? Why do You care?
> ...


For all of us, it's better to understand to not know something, than to make up an answer to be satisfied. What other people do and believe falsities affects everything as a society.



shkhln said:


> Those are words of wisdom.


I forgot I said that college quote about Zuckerberg putting down other students. But seeing that, reminded me, that few people (even a teacher) in college even promoted bs to be hateful. A siren in my brain goes off saying, get out of here, (not from physical danger) and my rational thought says, yes get out of here, but do so without making a scene. I sit through that shit, because I spot the door and know if I walk out, my path will get blocked, and I'll be made to look like a fool who has to turn around. I can't shove people, even if they deserve it, so I realize I would have to turn around.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Apr 10, 2020)

SirDice said:


> I'm shocked to learn that you didn't know this before yesterday.


I don't hang out with people who would stoop so low as to get news from Facebook or television. Actually, that's not true. Most people get their news from television and I have a very close acquaintance who is a television "news" producer. You can see her creating such great stories about doggie toys and reddit headline makers. I also spent almost 10 years working in that area myself. I worked in television news when real, former newspaper men worked on real news and not only stories about charities, your kids play dates, and the latest trends in fashion. Think "All the President's Men".



SirDice said:


> Ehm, forums are a form of social media too. Usenet also. When you think about it, the old BBS's were too. Fidonet wouldn't have existed if people didn't want to socially interact with each other.


Back then, you had more educated people. Nowadays, everyone has a voice, including those who--as I said earlier--should probably not be allowed online. Anyone can say anything and then you have those who will believe anything and spread the lies. Sure, it happened in the past but in a limited way among those smart enough to ignore the ignorant. 

Similar to this forum. You don't get the internet crazies here like the 80% that occupy reddit. It's a limited, more intelligent group and there is a vetting of content even though it's more relaxed than in the past.


----------



## ShelLuser (Apr 10, 2020)

Alain De Vos said:


> The claim I want to make is that social media has its value.


Until the company behind the social media outlet decides that what you want to share doesn't suit the general demographic and thus they will actively remove such contents. As is already happening on a grand scale.

So to stick with your flat earth theory: when enough government officials consider those stories to be upsetting then it'll just be a matter of time before you can kiss them goodbye.

Which is why I don't see any serious value in social media. Not much more than that of a regular forum. The only difference would be the ease of access, but there's a whole different meaning behind that one. Big brother is definitely around those areas and actively following you provided that you're logged on all the time.


----------



## SirDice (Apr 10, 2020)

ShelLuser said:


> Until the company behind the social media outlet decides that what you want to share doesn't suit the general demographic and thus they will actively remove such contents.


It's privately owned. Which means they can decide what to allow and what not. They're free to remove any content they like, it's their right to do so. The only thing that matters is that they're not consistent when applying their own rules. Content that clearly violates their policy is left online, while perfectly fitting content is removed. It's this apparent randomness that's utterly annoying. 



ShelLuser said:


> So to stick with your flat earth theory: when enough government officials consider those stories to be upsetting then it'll just be a matter of time before you can kiss them goodbye.


When it's a government that does this it's called censorship. That's an entirely different can of worms.


----------



## Alain De Vos (Apr 10, 2020)

I've posted nudes on facebook,





						Log into Facebook
					

Log into Facebook to start sharing and connecting with your friends, family, and people you know.




					www.facebook.com
				



Claming sensorship on social media is rather hard to implement. [Except in North Korea]


----------



## ShelLuser (Apr 10, 2020)

SirDice said:


> It's privately owned. Which means they can decide what to allow and what not.


I am well aware, and that's also why I personally don't consider social media to as useful as the OP does.


----------



## PMc (Apr 10, 2020)

I think there is a difficulty. Nowadays, if you happen to be young, people are practically forced to use
these social media - because all the parties and appointments are managed there.
And then you will pick your viewpoints on current events also from there; that is natural, we are more likely to follow in on that what pops up in our peer group, than to do strictly rational evaluations.

So one might get to the point that there is indeed a problem with the fake informations circling there. In earlier times non-mainstream viewpoints were circled as well, but they circled much slower, they were put to test in practical life by many people, and then, if there appeared to be of some value, they might become a living subculture with their own viewpoints, their own media, their own gatherings - hippies, punks, etc.
The test was not if all the informations are logically correct, the test was if they are viable, that means, if they can be practically put to life. A kind of evolutionary test.



sidetone said:


> Critical thinking, logic, mathematical thinking can be applied...



Yes, that is probably the only thing one can do with the input that comes out of a computer. With the input from real living people we could also use intuition, psychological knowledge, know thyself, and experience.



> Fact checkers --> Snopes, Politifact and investigative journalism



Does that lead to anywhere? Politics is ugly, nobody is neutral there. They are all factions pursuing their own agenda. I think if anybody in politics declares themselves a "fact checker", that is already reason enough to not trust them. Because they have a reason why they want people to trust them, and that reason is their agenda.



> Critical thinking can be used in relation to that. As a theme, they're supposedly there to help sort out facts, as it is realized this is needed



But why should they? For what benefit? For which party's agenda is it needed?



> while propaganda also claims the same.



And each side points at the respective other and says "they do propaganda". Its like schoolboys in a struggle, each stating the other had begun.

So this leads to nothing. And the facts are actually mostly irrelevant. You can have a fact checking, and then you can say, this is a proven fact - but that is useless, because the fact is _selected_. Out of thousands of existing facts this fact was selected because it is useful (for some agenda). And then it is elaborately proven, to be correct or wrong, whatever. And the other thousand facts, which might shed a different light on the matter, are silently ignored.
That is how "fact checkers" work. They are not much different from propagandists.



> Investigative journalism has found use in social media for truths. What is posted there can be verified a number of times, to root out disinformation, or to verify facts, including news.



I think it is mostly a waste of time. There is no single truth. And if you want to generally trust anybody there, you're gullible. Politics is all about power, and the only thing those people want is power.



> For all of us, it's better to understand to not know something, than to make up an answer to be satisfied. What other people do and believe falsities affects everything as a society.



I think the only thing that really affects a society is a lack of 'panem et circenses": If there is no proper entertainment for the masses, then society will have a problem. Besides that, any kind of nonsense can be told to a society, and it will continue to function just fine.
Look at the various religious belief systems. They all appear like nonsense to the critical watcher, nevertheless these groups get along fine.



> But seeing that, reminded me, that few people (even a teacher) in college even promoted bs to be hateful. A siren in my brain goes off saying, get out of here, (not from physical danger) and my rational thought says, yes get out of here, but do so without making a scene. I sit through that shit, because I spot the door and know if I walk out, my path will get blocked



That's well done.  Listen to the intuition, compare it with ratio, and remember the message. But don't fight a fight (or risk an affront) when there isn't the option to win.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 11, 2020)

PMc said:


> Does that lead to anywhere? Politics is ugly, nobody is neutral there. They are all factions pursuing their own agenda. I think if anybody in politics declares themselves a "fact checker", that is already reason enough to not trust them. Because they have a reason why they want people to trust them, and that reason is their agenda.
> 
> ...
> 
> ...



When there is propaganda, there's a need for fact checking it. Necessity -> Invention. They realized, there's a need for fact checking, so they made one. Some people care about something, even if it's attached to their ego, impatience with disinformation, helping others, doing what's right. Not every person or organization is dishonest. It depends on why that organization exists, its reputation, its history, its affiliations, etc...

There's a need or want for something like FreeBSD, so they do their purpose, and make enough to pay their bills, while staying true to what it does, and not compromising what it does. Another organization unrelated to software wants to make billions, and only looks at profit while cutting out everything. Big difference.


Investigative journalism actually is transparent. They show you the data, and you can even verify it yourself. It's not some conspiracy, that different people can show different footage angles of a single event, and have so many comments about the same event. Then, journalism being able to verify it, and use photographic forensics on what did or didn't happen.


----------



## balanga (Apr 11, 2020)

sidetone said:


> Zuckerberg was a bad person before he started Facebook.


I sometimes wonder whether Zuckerberg actually started Facebook...

It's interesting that Darpa's *LifeLog* was "canceled" the same day Facebook was founded (Feb 4, 2004). 

Both projects had the same aims. Is it that much of a stretch to think that Facebook is simply a new name for LifeLog with a new figurehead?


----------



## PMc (Apr 12, 2020)

sidetone said:


> When there is propaganda, there's a need for fact checking it. Necessity -> Invention. They realized, there's a need for fact checking, so they made one. Some people care about something, even if it's attached to their ego, impatience with disinformation, helping others, doing what's right. Not every person or organization is dishonest. It depends on why that organization exists, its reputation, its history, its affiliations, etc...



I see, You're an optimist. 
It's sad I just didn't find those people in the politics playground. But then, maybe You have more luck. I wish it to You.


----------



## shkhln (Apr 12, 2020)

balanga said:


> Both projects had the same aims. Is it that much of a stretch to think that Facebook is simply a new name for LifeLog with a new figurehead?



That reminds me of the venerable "Vkontakte was started by FSB" theory. There is probably similar crackpot bs floating about any popular social network.

FSB/NSA/GCHQ are not in the business of running internet companies. What these agencies have is ability to coerce any sizable company operating within their respective countries into cooperation through lawful and not so lawful means. They don't need to start those companies, they don't need to operate them, they do _not_ need to be friends with company founders or management. It's called "division of labor", balanga.


----------



## eternal_noob (Apr 12, 2020)

balanga said:


> Facebook is simply a new name for LifeLog


The Reptilians actually started FreeBSD. Need proof? Just compare the logo to an actual photo of Lieutenant Colonel Xhfrla:




The similarity is evident.


----------



## PMc (Apr 12, 2020)

shkhln said:


> That reminds of the venerable "Vkontakte was started by FSB" theory.



Ah! Is this what I think it is? 
Then I suppose You also know that "legal-citizen-of-the-world" thing...



> FSB/NSA/SIS are not in the business of running internet companies. What these agencies have is ability to coerce any sizable company operating within their respective countries into cooperation through lawful and not so lawful means. They don't need to start those companies, they don't need to operate them, they do _not_ need to be friends with company founders or management. It's called "division of labor", balanga.



Exactly. This "division of labor" is also what solves the issue which SirDice mentioned earlier:



SirDice said:


> It's privately owned. Which means they can decide what to allow and what not. They're free to remove any content they like, it's their right to do so.
> 
> When it's a government that does this it's called censorship. That's an entirely different can of worms.



So, the government makes a law that the private companies have to make certain that only "allowed" (whatever that means) content is published, or otherwise the companies get punished.


----------



## shkhln (Apr 12, 2020)

PMc said:


> Ah! Is this what I think it is?



Probably not, I don't believe this ever was a thing beyond the Russian segment of the Internet. You are likely thinking about Durov's claim of FSB persecution, which was a part of his Telegram marketing strategy.


----------



## PMc (Apr 12, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Probably not, I don't believe this ever was a thing beyond the Russian segment of the Internet.



It probably wasn't. But then people started fingerpointing at that Russian segment of the Internet, stating there would exist unwelcome political opinions and stay uncensored, and that made me curious (obviousely those "opinions" were female and quite good-looking). That was the first time I heard about VK.

So I cursed myself another time for not having learned russian language, and started to try and unravel the whole story right from the beginning, nevertheless. I certainly didn't get it all, but what I could figure, well, it's quite entertaining.


----------



## sidetone (Apr 12, 2020)

balanga said:


> It's interesting that Darpa's *LifeLog* was "canceled" the same day Facebook was founded (Feb 4, 2004).
> 
> Both projects had the same aims. Is it that much of a stretch to think that Facebook is simply a new name for LifeLog with a new figurehead?


Let's say near that date is related, and not a coincidence. It makes more sense that Zuckerberg was influenced and motivated by it. Zuckerberg also bought up many competitors, so his behavior is to absorb other companies, ideas or technologies. He stole from his college mates. It's how he operates. Suggesting they were in it together is a stretch. Zuckerberg is some kind of nerd who has some obsession with prying on and disrespecting people, and he thinks that's an accomplishment. He likely already knew about it, and was following it, and near that date was probably the trigger for him.

A lot of things start about the time something else stops. There's usually someone else picking up where someone else left off. It's influence. They're following something, and when it stops, they continue it. There's also two different people who invented prepositional calculus independently at around the same time from different locations. Ideas that were the precursors probably passed between them indirectly, among people who didn't know each other, or world wide, and to them the next steps were obvious.

Zuckerberg also has things ready, and he times things. As when he was hired to do something, and he stalled, sabotaged and stole _from his college peers_ to start Facebook. That's who he is.









						At last — the full story of how Facebook was founded
					






					www.businessinsider.com


----------



## balanga (Apr 12, 2020)

sidetone said:


> Zuckerberg also has things ready, and he times things. As when he was hired to do something, and he stalled, sabotaged and stole to start Facebook. That's who he is.




Having just watched Out of Shadows I would not be surprised if the CIA does not have some influence on Facebook.


----------



## Crivens (Apr 12, 2020)

Did anyone mention the venture capital fund behind google already?  *whistle innocently*


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Apr 12, 2020)

balanga said:


> I would not be surprised if the CIA does not have some influence on Facebook.


The CIA and NSA get blamed for everything. It's a ruse by the KGB, the Chinese, and every other secret agency to distract everyone from their own activities that don't get mentioned anywhere near as often. It's like in the 1950s and 1960s when everything was blamed on the atomic bomb.


----------



## Crivens (Apr 12, 2020)

And when you take your tinfoil hat off and put the thinking cap on - where a trough is the swine will come.
Do you really think that the local alphabet soup agencies do not have access to the data? No matter who founded it or is running it - as a US company you have no choice other than handing over the keys to the castle. Same goes for all other nations and their local No Such Operation dudes.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

IrenePayne said:


> We'll get all the news there.


If you are getting your news from social networks, you're doing it wrong.
Source: me. 10 years working for television news. Related to a large city network television news producer.
Might have more later as I skim through this thread. In the meantime, read what a recently resigned MSNBC news producer has to say.

EDIT: Oh now I see I've been here too often before.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 7, 2020)

Nothing wrong with getting news from social media. As long as it's from a reputable news source. The thing about social media however is that there's a lot of fake news being created that _looks_ like it came from a reputable source. And there are lots of drones out there that will just blindly forward everything that comes across their path without questioning its validity.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

SirDice Thus my point. No one is vetting that junk and no one is vetting the junk you see on television "news" either like real news organizations of yore did.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 7, 2020)

Even the news organizations of yesteryear where biased. Some more than others but they all reported from their worldview. That hasn't changed and that's why you need to watch news from various different sources.


----------



## shkhln (Aug 7, 2020)

There is no point in talking to a new account until they leave at least one message on a technical topic


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

SirDice It most certainly has changed and I would not trust any television news organization today. Even PBS stumbles along these lines recently. I agree that one needs to check several sources but the problem is that almost all sources today are tainted and unreliable. Just yesterday, NBC "news" reported something they learned about an event from a Facebook post. A Facebook post?! One post?!!

Geez


----------



## PMc (Aug 7, 2020)

shkhln said:


> There is no point in talking to a new account until they leave at least one message on a technical topic



Thanks, point taken - this looks like, well, hm...

We should understand that "fake news" is an agitation term, used to discredit the viewpoints of the respective other side.
Social media is a semantic territory, and it's all about propaganda, about dominion over that territory - consequentially every party states that they are reputable and the others would propagate "fake news".

Now if you would still talk to other people, in the real world, you might get some glimpse about what is sensible, some glimpse of realism, that gives you a base to evaluate what you read. But as a zombie npc attached to your gadget, you are only Stützmasse for the respective parties.


----------



## Crivens (Aug 7, 2020)

In my university time, I would sometimes go to the library and read the international press to one topic. {Asian, London, NewYork} Times, The Guardian (fishwrap these days). Some paper from Singapore. Cross reference that with the local sources (dpa,...) and you are surprised.

But news from social media? That is a pool of anecdotes, sung by the grape vine in the wind.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 7, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Just yesterday, NBC "news" reported something they learned about an event from a Facebook post. A Facebook post?! One post?!!


That sounds dodgy indeed. But I'm pretty sure news media made similar idiotic reports 10-20 years ago. You just don't remember any of them. Memory is selective and can easily be warped over time.


----------



## Phishfry (Aug 7, 2020)

I agree with most of the sentiment here but I do think social media has widened the scope of reporting.
Take the Beriut explosion for example.
There were no less than 6 different videos posted by citizens of the horrific explosion.


			Search Twitter - #LebanonExplosion
		

All posted by ordinary joes.
So I agree that mass media is doing very little fact finding these days but I do see some merit to citizen reporting.
What bothers me about media is how they insert video of a prior event and talk over it like it was the event.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 7, 2020)

Phishfry said:


> Take the Beriut explosion for example.
> There were no less than 6 different videos posted by citizens of the horrific explosion.
> All posted by ordinary joes.


I had actually seen some before any of the news outlets reported on the explosion. On the other hand, I've also seen quite a lot of fakes posted right after the news broke. Mostly conspiracy type innuendo. And at some point it becomes really difficult to differentiate between what's real and what is fake.


----------



## Phishfry (Aug 7, 2020)

Yes that is a danger with citizen reporting

__ https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1291325032770285568_View: https://mobile.twitter.com/SyedAAN2/status/1291325032770285568_

 But no news orginasitation could be expected to have 6 different camera angles of a mass causality event.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 7, 2020)

SirDice said:


> And at some point it becomes really difficult to differentiate between what's real and what is fake.



This is the key to understand the world we're living in today.
This and a bit of analysis of official information sources.


----------



## tingo (Aug 7, 2020)

All media ("newspapers", news agencies (those who feed newpapers), television, radio, ++) are biased, and have been so for more than 30 years. If you are lucky, a news source will tell you up front what kind of bias it has (political, social, economic, etc). If not, you have to figure it out yourself.

The problem today is that with so many news sources, and most of them competing for advertising money to survive, the quality of the "news articles" or "reports" they produce and the quality of the work done (research, verification of sources, checking for alternative views) goes downhill very fast. You can see this in many ways, one example is how often some "serious media" gets tricked into running a prank / fake story made up by some artist or activist.

So every interested citizen has a larger burden of work on hers/his shoulders; separating real news from fake, wrong, "misreported" or simply just spam.
Good luck, everyone!


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

SirDice said:


> I'm pretty sure news media made similar idiotic reports 10-20 years ago.


And you got fired for it. 

There was a story about a photographer for a news organization (CBS?), years ago, who re-positioned a sign of some sort so it would give him a better shot with the background he was interested in. He was immediately fired for influencing the story. 

The serious newsmen, when I worked there, were required to have at least two authoritative sources for any information they wanted to run with and that was pretty common (see the movie "All the President's Men").


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

tingo said:


> All media ("newspapers", news agencies (those who feed newpapers), television, radio, ++) are biased, and have been so for more than 30 years.


Well, they have been biased since time immemorial. There is no getting around that. Everyone is. It's how the editorial staff handle a reporter's story that can correct that, admittedly with their own biases injected. Again, there is no way around that but some do better than others. That's how a news organization gains respect.


----------



## Crivens (Aug 7, 2020)

Same with TV.
Quality is constant, it is just spread over more stations/papers/channels...


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 7, 2020)

Look at who owns the media, this information is public.
The media are not biased, they do very efficiently the job for which they are paid.
And those who pay are their shareholders, not the public.


----------



## tingo (Aug 7, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> The media are not biased, they do very efficiently the job for which they are paid.


When I say biased, I mean that they do more than report news based on the information they have; they want to tell a story with an "angle", so they speculate, or interview "experts" to speculate on the meaning of, or reason for a news event. If they were unbiased, they would report what they knew as facts, and not speculate.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 7, 2020)

tingo said:


> When I say biased, I mean that they do more than report news based on the information they have; they want to tell a story with an "angle", so they speculate, or interview "experts" to speculate on the meaning of, or reason for a news event. If they were unbiased, they would report what they knew as facts, and not speculate.



Yes, and you feel uncomfortable about it and that's fine. 

Now, try and adopt a different perspective: look at the impact their way of presenting things has not on yourself, but on average Joe.
Don't limit yourself to the news, also study the impact of films, reality shows, talk shows and the rest.

Pay a particular attention to the emotions in the audience.
It's easy, emotions translate by definition into muscular tensions (movements, facial expression and so on), which will resonate in your body and mind.

Don't you begin to see some congruence in your observations of the average Joe?
Well, that's what the media get paid for: shaping our society.
You may not like what they do, but be sure that they do it well in the eyes of their shareholders.

Understanding why shareholders pay for these services is another story and we can only partially succeed in this endeavor.


----------



## Jose (Aug 7, 2020)

SirDice said:


> Even the news organizations of yesteryear where biased. Some more than others but they all reported from their worldview. That hasn't changed and that's why you need to watch news from various different sources.











						William Randolph Hearst - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


----------



## Jose (Aug 7, 2020)

shkhln said:


> There is no point in talking to a new account until they leave at least one message on a technical topic


Especially if their avatar is a stock photo https://br.freepik.com/fotos-gratis/mulher-moderna-tomando-uma-selfie_3369269.htm


----------



## Samuel Venable (Aug 7, 2020)

I think it's unhealthy to post political and/or religious matters on a forum about software. I wish the COVID issue didn't have to take on becoming a political issue, but it did. I've tried posting things on such topics on other forums in the past and it didn't pan well. Now when I post anything political, I make sure it's stuff that not only are my opinion but most people can agree with, and keep it balanced to avoid quarrels, and I am one of those many people who have both seen and acknowledge there is a lot of fake news being spread around whether the news source is left or right wing doesn't matter. It's everywhere. It makes situations like this global pandemic confusing as crap to know who to trust, and I think we can all agree on that one for the most part. Just my two cents, trust a news source that has the least evidence for being liars, and don't go by their political views on unrelated topics on whether you should trust them about COVID.

As for the topic at hand, a lot of people have been swayed by social media as of late. There are a lot of people I know that used to lean conservative but no longer do because of recent news being spread, mostly on social media. Whether that news is true or not I'll leave it to the discernment of the viewer, it's not my place to try to convince anyone of anything or argue my way into thinking I've proven something.


----------



## shkhln (Aug 7, 2020)

Jose said:


> Especially if their avatar is a stock photo https://br.freepik.com/fotos-gratis/mulher-moderna-tomando-uma-selfie_3369269.htm



Both TinEye and Google image search failed me with this photo. Any recommendations?


----------



## Jose (Aug 7, 2020)

shkhln said:


> Both TinEye and Google image search failed me with this photo. Any recommendations?


Google Image Search listed it under "Visually similar images" for me:





						Google
					

Search the world's information, including webpages, images, videos and more. Google has many special features to help you find exactly what you're looking for.



					www.google.com


----------



## shkhln (Aug 7, 2020)

I just got another shot of the same person from Bing (https://img.freepik.com/fotos-gratis/jovem-mulher-falando-no-celular-a-sorrir_23-2147893573.jpg), but nothing reasonable from Google. Go figure.


----------



## Crivens (Aug 7, 2020)

Jose said:


> Especially if their avatar is a stock photo https://br.freepik.com/fotos-gratis/mulher-moderna-tomando-uma-selfie_3369269.htm


Good catch. That account is already on some watch list (mine for sure).


----------



## Phishfry (Aug 7, 2020)

gpb
With our country so divided please check your politics at the door.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 7, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Well, that's what the media get paid for: shaping our society.


I don't entirely agree with that but I do agree with your point. All of media--television, radio, film--is now owned by a limited few companies. A lot of the people within these companies are very liberal people. (My son is a professional actor who owned a theatre company, appeared in films and commercials, knows a lot of people you've heard of,etc.). The plays and films they present are often to tell a story. Sometimes in an attempt to change your mind about how you should think about other people or the world (racism, pollution, sexism, all that). One of the most profitable and much talked about plays he put on was one with a political agenda. It attracted that type of person and sold out every night. Was written about in all the papers with great reviews. Some of the actors were thrilled because it promoted their beliefs.

If you watch all of news, you'll see each network has a similar agenda based on profit. In the past, network news was a separate division of the entertainment arm. The news department did not concern itself with profit but that changed about 25 years ago when CBS, I think, abandoned that and moved it into the programming department, thus making it a profit making division.

Listen to the news anchors. How often do you hear them giving their opinion on a story or the events they present? "The awful thing done by one group to another!", they'll say. The heartbreaking story they're about to tell you. And so on.


----------



## PMc (Aug 7, 2020)

tingo said:


> When I say biased, I mean that they do more than report news based on the information they have; they want to tell a story with an "angle", so they speculate, or interview "experts" to speculate on the meaning of, or reason for a news event. If they were unbiased, they would report what they knew as facts, and not speculate.



Well yes, but, as others have also stated here, this already happens for a long time. If they make a report about some exotic region which I happened to have travelled, they create a certain specific story about it (which may not have much to do with what you might find there on average). If they make a report about some special people, lets say Wiccans Beltaine festival, they are looking for sex orgy - when they did make report about hackers, they didn't care about ethics or security, but wanted to have some spectacular break-in. 
So there are three lines: first, it has to be something that catches the readers/watchers, so it has to be spectacular or exaggerated. Second, it has to be in-line with the political bias of the respective media (one can find these out). 

And third, there is a couple of fairytales our whole culture has commonly agreed to believe in. For instance, before christmas, when all the charity organizations collect money, they usually advertize their business with a picture of an african baby. So what does that mean: that african baby is obviousely not considered as a human individual with a dignity, instead it is merely an icon to transfer a message, it is a simple glyph with the meaning "poverty". I tend to call that abuse. And travelled part of Africa, and what I have seen is a lot more, and a lot more differentiated than the storyline usually brought up in the media - the latter most often only circulating around how helpless the people there are and how dependent on our help (=money). 
I think this is something that is intended to be commonly believed by the news consumers. And tentatively I might go as far as assuming this might be a remainder of colonialism viewpoints: now the Africans are no longer considered as countries that can simply be annexed and exploited because they would be too stupid to manage their own, but still are considered as dependent on our gratitude because too stupid to manage their own.
So this is an example for imagery, storylines that go thru almost all the media, and still may not be fully true or even ethically questionable.


----------



## a6h (Aug 8, 2020)

Samuel Venable said:


> Just my two cents, trust a news source that has the least evidence for being liars [...]


There's a problem with the term evidence. What is evidence and what is not, for the most part, is depend on definition. It's vary from one filed of study to another, between different papers, ... If you have time to spare, read this article, I enjoyed it.  The Nature of “Evidence” in Qualitative Research Methods


shkhln said:


> [...] but nothing reasonable from Google. Go figure.


Just my opinion: Bing produces better search result on two specific items:
1. Searching for images, either keyword, or similar photo (upload)
2. Finding and skimming news headlines on a chronological order.


----------



## Samuel Venable (Aug 8, 2020)

Well by evidence I was referring mainly based on things you can gather as true or false as being an eye witness to something rather than believing it just because the news who agrees with your political views said so.

If a news source is genuinely concerned about the wellbeing of their viewers or nation, they will consider what is best for those people and not lie, and if they do lie it is because they serve an agenda not run by morals or what is best for others, but what is in their own best interest alone.

There are people making claims there was a peaceful protest, where I live, and it was not at all peaceful based on what was actually seen by my friend. Does that make me an eye witness? No. Does it mean I should trust my friend over any politician? Probably. Although I can't exactly say that with absolute certainty. Thus going back to the original point I made, if you didn't see it happen, you have no concrete evidence. I'm not talking about what is on tv. I mean like being there.

Joe Biden was accused for being mentally incompetent, because he "endorsed Trump" by accident. It wasn't as bad as they made it look, they had an agenda. Although I do believe he may have dimmensia, that's just from being old and that is unrelated to whether his political views are correct or not. Everyone is likely to get that problem as they get but so old.

I've seen agendas on both ends, although I do try to avoid mentioning the ones I see coming from the left because it's pretty controversial to some people. I don't want to be a hinderance to this discussion.

Coronavirus is killing a lot of people and killing a lot of jobs and destroying a lot of families globally. It truly sucks to have so much division among the human species in times like this, that it had to become a political war that one thing on it's own. My mom can't stand wearing a mask. Sometimes, I can't stand her because of it. She makes it a much bigger deal than it really is, and all because she claims to be claustrophobic, which I don't even know if that is a real excuse.

If you asked for my opinion, generally speaking social media does more damage to people's lives than anything good. Not just in the case of corona. How many people get depressed or even suicidal and believe they aren't important and kill themselves because they don't get as many likes, comments, reactions, or messages as other people get. It's like a popularity contest. Corona is similar in that everyone is posting videos on social media to be the next gone-viral "winner".


----------



## a6h (Aug 8, 2020)

Samuel Venable . I wasn't critical of your comments. I understand your points.


----------



## Samuel Venable (Aug 8, 2020)

vigole said:


> Samuel Venable . I wasn't critical of your comments. I understand your points.


No, I understand, I just wanted to give extra clarity.


----------



## PMc (Aug 8, 2020)

Samuel Venable said:


> If a news source is genuinely concerned about the wellbeing of their viewers or nation, they will consider what is best for those people and not lie, and if they do lie it is because they serve an agenda not run by morals or what is best for others, but what is in their own best interest alone.



Question: why should they?
Why should _anybody_ be concerned about Your wellbeing? For what reason? And what benefit would they have of that?

Now lets get a little bit more tough and more grown-up and get clear on that. Long ago somebody told me, the people a newspaper calls their customers are NOT their readers. And that hits the mark: they have no obligation whatsoever to be honest to their readers, because they do not get paid by their readers, but by their advertisment customers.

IF you want quality input, then go shop for your own damned think-tank. (In fact I did. But I didn't pay for, it was just fun. You don't believe, if you get together some half dozen well educated and widely interested people of different fields, and sit together every friday night evaluating current affairs, how far you get that way already.)



> There are people making claims there was a peaceful protest, where I live, and it was not at all peaceful based on what was actually seen by my friend. Does that make me an eye witness? No. Does it mean I should trust my friend over any politician? Probably.



That depends. Maybe both are trustworthy, only the media does understand the term "peaceful" different than Your friend. Thats why you need to invest into background clarification. Of your friend, obviousely: upbringing, preferences, contacts, engagements, ... Then You will know how to evaluate his perceptions.



> Joe Biden was accused for being mentally incompetent, because he "endorsed Trump" by accident. It wasn't as bad as they made it look, they had an agenda. Although I do believe he may have dimmensia, that's just from being old and that is unrelated to whether his political views are correct or not. Everyone is likely to get that problem as they get but so old.
> 
> I've seen agendas on both ends, although I do try to avoid mentioning the ones I see coming from the left because it's pretty controversial to some people. I don't want to be a hinderance to this discussion.



The president is a puppet used by those in power to entertain the masses. No matter what You elect, those in power don't change. So, is it worth the necessary investments to figure out the truth? Which of Your decisions would depend on it?



> Coronavirus is killing a lot of people and killing a lot of jobs and destroying a lot of families globally. It truly sucks to have so much division among the human species in times like this, that it had to become a political war that one thing on it's own. My mom can't stand wearing a mask. Sometimes, I can't stand her because of it. She makes it a much bigger deal than it really is, and all because she claims to be claustrophobic, which I don't even know if that is a real excuse.



Okay. lets get clear on this one. First off, afaik microbiologists seem to agree that those so-called "masks" are not really useful, at least not unless it were special medical equipment (which is neither provided not available/affordable to the masses). They're nevertheless important as a symbol to be shown publicly. And, they have another very concrete and physical effect: you cannot properly breathe.

Now if you go to the S&M people and ask them about breath reduction, that will be entertaining. It will become clear that breath reduction is a very potent means to exert power over somebody: to make clear to them that they depend on your allowance even for the most simple life-sustaining functions. And so we get to the point of it - which is not on the pyhsical, but on the psychological level: those "masks" (or facial abasement diapers, as I tend to call them) are an important step for the government in finally getting rid of natural law, human rights and human dignity.

Then consider the background: so there is a virus that might infect people. That is perfectly normal; it is the purpose of a virus to infect people. (I used to travel tropical backyards; and you won't imagine how many viruses did infect me every day.) A virus is purely ecological; and going into a mass hysteria and trying to fight it, means to try and fight nature. But then, mankind itself is (part of) nature, so the only outcome can be that they start fighting themselves. As is to be seen (q.e.d.)


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 8, 2020)

First the masks, then the drones, next the vaccine. We'll soon regret that good old virus.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 8, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> [...]  Don't limit yourself to the news, also study the impact of films, reality shows, talk shows and the rest.  [...]  Well, that's what the media get paid for: shaping our society.  You may not like what they do, but be sure that they do it well in the eyes of their shareholders.  Understanding why shareholders pay for these services is another story and we can only partially succeed in this endeavor.


Recommended reading: The Velvet Rope Economy (Nelson D. Schwartz). Some Links & Videos.


----------



## a6h (Aug 8, 2020)

Thanks mjollnir for book suggestion. We have to find a way to list all  books, which are recommended on this Forums over the years, in one place.

[EDIT] I mean, only books. Not blogs, articles, video, podcast, etc.


----------



## Samuel Venable (Aug 8, 2020)

PMc I wasn't stating my opinion on the masks past the point I don't mind nearly as much as my mother does about wearing them. I do sort of lean to believe what you do in that they don't necessarily help much, if at all, I just wanted to avoid opening that can of worms in case someone felt strongly about it the other way around. My mother complains about the masks and how much she has fiery hatred for our governor Northam over his policies regarding corona and the masks i just find the level of anger and hate to not be helpful and a bit troubling. There is some context I guess i did leave out. I wish the left and right didn't have so much anger and hate towards each other. It makes me sad, personally.

I also am aware no one has any obligation to care about other's best interest if they don't care about those things. Although I have met a lot of people who do genuinely care for the lives of others, and I tend to believe that those in power are not any less human in that they are just as able to be good people as those underneath the government's power. Although, with great power comes great responsibility, the temptation may increase to be selfish to those in power, it's what they do with that human instinct and whether they resist it and choose to be selfless regardless that would determine whether they would be trustworthy. Whether as a politician, news source, or anything else politically.

I can understand the pessimism though.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 8, 2020)

vigole said:


> Thanks mjollnir for book suggestion. We have to find a way to list all  books, which are recommended on this Forums over the years, in one place.  [EDIT] I mean, only books. Not blogs, articles, video, podcast, etc.


I would agree to a forum section _Misc.Books_ for assembling books on BSD, programming, etc., anything related.  But not for books on other topics, as general as e.g. the section _Music_.  Rationale:

there are dozens of websites for this already available
this can be potentionally divisive (like the book I mentioned can potentionally start a flame war)
EDIT: IMHO it's ok to post a link like I did now & then, when it matches the topic discussed.  But I do not agree on a general section on books.  Let's remind ourselves on the purpose of this forum.  It's about FreeBSD.  The topic of this thread is related to computing, so it matches somehow.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 8, 2020)

Jose said:


> William Randolph Hearst - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> ...


William Hearst has passed long ago.  Interestingly, the Wikipedia article about Rupert Murdoch does not have a section about critics like the above has ...


----------



## Jose (Aug 8, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> William Hearst has passed long ago.


That was my point. Bias in journalism is nothing new, like Sirdice said.



mjollnir said:


> Interestingly, the Wikipedia article about Rupert Murdoch does not have a section about critics like the above has ...


Wikipedia exercises caution in the biographies of living persons. I'm sure they're worried about being sued for libel or slander.


----------



## PMc (Aug 8, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> I would agree to a forum section _Misc.Books_ for assembling books on BSD, programming, etc., anything related.  But not for books on other topics, as general as e.g. the section _Music_.  Rationale:
> 
> there are dozens of websites for this already available
> this can be potentionally divisive (like the book I mentioned can potentionally start a flame war)



I think I see both sides. There is a couple of books that are not technical in nature, but are somehow related to the topic nevertheless. For instance, in some hacker club it was expected that everybody have read John Brunner's _Shockwave Rider_ (indeed I also expect that, if only because it is a perfect example of a science-fiction having become fully reality by now), or in some BSD users group it was highly recommended to read R.A.Heinlein. These things were kind of folklore, and helped shaping a common ground of mindset.
Obviousely there might also be people who might not be into that kind of books, but then they would just ignore it, and good.
But nowadays, strangely, everything can be "potentially divisive". I don't understand that - it appears to me that people no longer value a common mindset, but instead only look for things where they get the chance to be offended. So then, I would say, just give them the opportunity to do what they desire most - give them the chance to be offended! *veg*


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 8, 2020)

PMc said:


> [...]  But nowadays, strangely, everything can be "potentially divisive". I don't understand that - it appears to me that people no longer value a common mindset, but instead only look for things where they get the chance to be offended. [...]


It's not the 1st time that human mankind experiences a _culture clash_.  It's just the amount of wealth & advantage some people can gain from that has reached exorbitant heights, because thanks to IT, the globe is a village nowadays.  Keep in mind that the algorithms of _commercial_ social media platforms shall _maximize profit_, thus they are tuned to favour divisive topics to present to their victims, exploiting human psychological deficiencies/flaws.  EDIT We are conditioned & educated to accept that as beeing normal, and behave accordingly.  Sadly so, that's the new normal.


----------



## PMc (Aug 8, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> It's not the 1st time that human mankind experiences a _culture clash_.  It's just the amount of wealth & advantage some people can gain from that has reached exorbitant heights, because thanks to IT, the globe is a village nowadays.  Keep in mind that the algorithms of _commercial_ social media platforms shall _maximize profit_, thus they are tuned to favour divisive topics to present to their victims, exploiting human psychological deficiencies/flaws.



Well, you can hear me state similar critique about these new media, so I basically agree. But then also, nobody is forced to consume these media. It's similar to back in my youth some communist youngsters complaining about the horrible power commercial firms like Coca-Cola would have over people - but then to get to the most simple and practical solution and just *not drink* the crap, that was beyond their capability of thinking (or, they did want to complain for the sake of complaining, and were not interested in solutions). 
In any case, the best approach was to get away from the political agitators, and get among normal people with a sane mind, where a common mindset would be valued and some actual work could be accomplished - and thats what we did.

To give You a example, just look at that Mr. Nelson D. Schwartz. He does *not* complain about the governmental repressions. He does *not* complain about the doing away with basic human rights (like gathering, hugging, breathing). He does *not* complain about the introduction of slavery. He does accept all the repressions as given.
But then he identifies some group to put the blame on: he identifies some "rich" people who assumedly can buy themselves out of the repressions - so it is these people we should hate! Instead of critizising the repressions, he wants to split society and fuel hate into! What good can that do??

Yes there are damn rich people around. Even worse, I was living off no more than water+bread in the late 80s/early 90s, because I didn't have anything and wanted to get the Internet working. And only later, when everthing was done and working, after 2000, those "commercial social media" guys appeared on scene, and they got damned rich from the work that we had done earlier - while I am unemployed and get nothing today.
But, should i be envious about that, or greedy, or hateful? No, that would not change anything except making me myself unhappy.


----------



## PMc (Aug 8, 2020)

Samuel Venable said:


> PMc I wasn't stating my opinion on the masks past the point I don't mind nearly as much as my mother does about wearing them. I do sort of lean to believe what you do in that they don't necessarily help much, if at all, I just wanted to avoid opening that can of worms in case someone felt strongly about it the other way around. My mother complains about the masks and how much she has fiery hatred for our governor Northam over his policies regarding corona and the masks i just find the level of anger and hate to not be helpful and a bit troubling. There is some context I guess i did leave out. I wish the left and right didn't have so much anger and hate towards each other. It makes me sad, personally.



I mentioned that already earlier - it seems the younger generation no longer has the ability to have stong values and a clear mindset about anything; it's now all about we must not offend anybody and must be helpful and harmonizing.

I might suppose your mom does get to some important point, but only on an unconscious level - she knows there is something to complain, but she doesn't really know what.

And I come to the impression that social education at highschools sucks nowadays, because this should actually be common knowledge.

Lets recapitulate in short. Alongside with the code of law, and even long before it, was always another law that is called "natural law". And that concerns things which are so elementary that they are considered self-evident and nobody ever bothered to write them down.

Then later there was a problem, because the roman church came along and declared all their religious dogmas also as "natural law" - just as if their God were self-evident and not a matter of faith.
Consequentially, people of today are no longer very happy with natural law, because it can become bloated in such way, and so they nowadays prefer codified law that is written in books.

Nevertheless, the natural law exists, and if you reserach into human rights, you will soon find the notion that these are based onto natural law.
And it is quite easy to explain how natural law works, if you for instance consider the question if people should be allowed to breathe. Nobody ever wrote down a law that would state that people are not allowed to breathe, neither did anybody create a law stating that people are allowed to breathe. (Or, e.g., that they are only allowed to breathe during off-work hours, etc.)
Nobody did make such laws because that would be pointless: it is part of the human nature to breathe, so this is a natural law that cannot be changed or regulated, and therefore does not need to be codified.

There are things one just cannot change, and cannot regulate. On the same line: humans have a natural drive to meet and gather, we are "social animals" (as was stated here before), so this is inherent in human nature and neiter need nor can be regulated. Same line: humans have an impulse to hug and caress each other. This is natural and cannot be regulated.

There is only one cause when these natural things are to be regulated: when somebody has taken ownership and possesses the respective humans, that is, they are slaves.

So that is what worries your mom, it has a name: slavery. Your mom is against slavery! She's an abolitionist! What a shame...  *veg*



> I also am aware no one has any obligation to care about other's best interest if they don't care about those things. Although I have met a lot of people who do genuinely care for the lives of others, and I tend to believe that those in power are not any less human in that they are just as able to be good people as those underneath the government's power.



Question: why should certain people have power over other people, at all?



> Although, with great power comes great responsibility, the temptation may increase to be selfish to those in power, it's what they do with that human instinct and whether they resist it and choose to be selfless regardless that would determine whether they would be trustworthy. Whether as a politician, news source, or anything else politically.



It is very simple: if you have the option to keep your job or loose your job, what do you do? You tend to keep your job and arrange with the demands. Most people will do that, and the others no longer are in the job, i.e. in politics

This has nothing to do with pessimism, it's realism. But the positive point in it all is: nobody needs a government to exert power over people. Just like CocaCola, a government can only exist for as long as people tend to consume government.


----------



## Samuel Venable (Aug 8, 2020)

I will say you have a lot of interesting points that do make me think. There is a lot of fear of trying not to offend anyone. I'm aware I have it. I'm just not sure what I can do besides fear it or speak my mind and let all hell break loose lol There really does come to a point where everyone is so passionate about how they feel it just gets messy pretty quick.

I feel like there is an in between. Offending too much and not enough. Should we offend a masked murderer and single him out for his deeds by putting him in jail/prison? Well... heck yeah!

There are injustices of many kinds, it's a shame there are only very specific ones that are so dang evil that we all agree is wrong, but then there are other things more contreversial that could potentially be just as bad, or in some cases worse that no one feels opened to discussing. Everyone wants to do life their own way, and we all have different ideas of what that looks like and what is acceptable in times like especially now with COVID.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Recommended reading: The Velvet Rope Economy (Nelson D. Schwartz). Some Links & Videos.



If you scratch past the surface, you'll find the fundamental structure of our society has been remarkably stable over time. There has been a "storm in a glass of water" during the French revolution but, besides some seats have received new occupants at the top, the same have stayed at the bottom since immemorial times - in fact, since we've been making iron weapons and the money to pay those using them to keep the structure of society stable.

During Antiquity, those at the top were called citizens, those at the bottom slaves. Nowadays, those at the bottom are called citizens and those at the top no longer feel the need for a name. This divide remaining so stable over time, beyond Newspeak fashion, means it is necessary - in other words, a constraint. On this forum, we all belong to the slaves group, otherwise we wouldn't be there. And this is good to know because it helps us focusing on our freedom, hence feeling as happy as possible, instead of chasing Chimeras and feeling angry and disappointed most of the time.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> I mentioned that already earlier - it seems the younger generation no longer has the ability to have stong values and a clear mindset about anything; it's now all about we must not offend anybody and must be helpful and harmonizing.



It's not that they no longer have this ability, it's that they are constrained by the media (and thus those controlling them) through the same kind of mechanism you describe in you previous post (#142).

Why do the media have this power? Simply because as social animals, we cannot live alone. So during our childhood, if a majority of the other children we meet at school does something, we'll do the same even if we don't really like it. And during childhood, we don't have the capacity to analyze our experiences, nor to decide to go our own way, so we're unaware of being shaped in a particular way. Only if, as adults, we suffer beyond acceptable from our early conditioning will we have the motivation to reflect and act differently.

What you described here relies on the same mechanism:



PMc said:


> It is very simple: if you have the option to keep your job or loose your job, what do you do? You tend to keep your job and arrange with the demands. Most people will do that, and the others no longer are in the job, i.e. in politics



If we lose our job, we are set apart and we cannot stand that. People living in environments where nobody works will do exactly the opposite: they'll do all they can so as to never, ever work in order not to be set apart their usual environment.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> But nowadays, strangely, everything can be "potentially divisive".



When you understand how the media work and who they serve, you also understand this is easy thought control.
And you understand why people jump on the bandwagon.



PMc said:


> So then, I would say, just give them the opportunity to do what they desire most - give them the chance to be offended!



They desire this the most because everybody on Earth wants to be a good person and feeling offended is a way to exhibit one's "good person" values.
This is a natural mechanism and people do with what they have: the artificial "values" served by the media as the "good person" social standard.


----------



## PMc (Aug 9, 2020)

All right, but something is missing here:

why did we, as youngsters, go against the stream? Why did we question the authorities, start to do things which were not commonsense (or not allowed) like smoking ganja and listening to Fleetwood Mac?
Why did we create a social environment of our own that would adhere to our own values, disregarding the traditional ones - and basically just disregarding the media, or well knowing that it is all bogus and a voice of the establishment?

The common understanding of this is that the youth tends to protest, tends to go against established values - in the process of making up their own values (which C.G.Jung calls "individuation"). Many of them will revert back to the mainstream as soon as they will have a wife and a job and carry some responsibility. But also, if the critique is over-all viable and does adress valid points, it will persist.

So, question: why do the youth, those growing up today, not recognize how grotesque the whole scheme has become, figure out what they really need to be happy, and go for that?


20-100-2fe said:


> So during our childhood, if a majority of the other children we meet at school does something, we'll do the same even if we don't really like it. And during childhood, we don't have the capacity to analyze our experiences, nor to decide to go our own way, so we're unaware of being shaped in a particular way. Only if, as adults, we suffer beyond acceptable from our early conditioning will we have the motivation to reflect and act differently.



It seems you skip an important step here. In between childhood and adultship is the coming of age, which is a very important thing, because it is when the young person starts to reflect what has been done to them in their childhood, and decide upon what they want to be as an adult.

This is important, because this is the only point ever where progress happens! (There is a saying that new discoveries, new paradigms in science take one generation to become accepted. That is because an established scientist will not change their way of thinking just because it has been found wrong and new unterstanding has become known. Only the next generation, growing up into the field and evaluating what is there, will then choose the best options.)

Why does the youth of today not recognize that the whole social media crap does in no way nurture their real needs?


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> why did we, as youngsters, go against the stream? Why did we question the authorities


Because the minds of youth have not grown to maturity yet and have not learned all the ways of the world and common behavior.

After having owned fast food restaurants for over 30 years, where the hiring of youth is prevalent, I would tell anyone who listened that "young people do a lot of growing up between the ages of 18 and 20". Typically they have graduated from high school and are now interacting with more people outside of their young groups. They find there are requirements imposed on them in order to keep a job and the cliques they formed before won't form with the work group they may be with now.

This is true even if they go to college or university where rules, constraints and pressure is everywhere from far more adults and pressure from their peers who are more driven to accomplish the goals they went to college for.

My opinion is that the laws restricting the voting age to 21 was proper--and true for all the laws and regulations applying restrictions to those under 21.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> why did we, as youngsters, go against the stream? Why did we question the authorities, start to do things which were not commonsense (or not allowed) like smoking ganja and listening to Fleetwood Mac?
> Why did we create a social environment of our own that would adhere to our own values, disregarding the traditional ones - and basically just disregarding the media, or well knowing that it is all bogus and a voice of the establishment?



A "social environment of their own"? Why do they smoke ganja, then? Where did they get this idea? Who produces ganja? Teen agers like them? Who produces music?

In fact, they just take what they're offered by the media, a ready-made revolution. It is even more blatant with "reality shows".

Also note the behaviors you cited are fairly recent, post WW II.
Before that, young people were just reproducing the behaviors of adults, e.g. shouting, drinking and fighting.



PMc said:


> So, question: why do the youth, those growing up today, not recognize how grotesque the whole scheme has become, figure out what they really need to be happy, and go for that?



They try their best to be happy with the limited means they have.
They just come to an age where they can start doing things on their own, they haven't had the time to learn by their experiences yet.
Moreover, they are far more manipulated than we were at the same age, it's much more difficult for them than for us.



PMc said:


> Why does the youth of today not recognize that the whole social media crap does in no way nurture their real needs?



Some of them do realize what's going on. A minority, of course, but still. For the others, it is too hard, out of their reach.
But don't think it is easier for adults, so many of them prefer putting on a blindfold to make some extra miles in their life.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> [...]  To give You a example, just look at that Mr. Nelson D. Schwartz. He does *not* complain about the governmental repressions. He does *not* complain about the doing away with basic human rights (like gathering, hugging, breathing). He does *not* complain about the introduction of slavery. He does accept all the repressions as given.  But then he identifies some group to put the blame on: he identifies some "rich" people who assumedly can buy themselves out of the repressions - so it is these people we should hate! Instead of critizising the repressions, he wants to split society and fuel hate into! What good can that do??


You did not get the point.  It is not to blame _anyone_, but to unveil the methods of spreading envy & fission, by leveling some basic psychological mechanisms we're usually (naturally) constrained to follow.  Unless we free ourselves from that by developing awareness & serenity about this.  Maybe Yoga should be teached in primary schools...


----------



## PMc (Aug 9, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> You did not get the point.  It is not to blame _anyone_, but to unveil the methods of spreading envy & fission



Never mind. The point I got is that Mr. Schwartz is the one who is spreading envy and fission. And I know that pattern all too well, have seen it often enough before.



> Unless we free ourselves from that by developing awareness & serenity about this.  Maybe Yoga should be teached in primary schools...



I doubt Yoga would help anything in that regard. The Yoga we know in the west (and can join courses at the gym at any time) is considered just something like gymnastics. The Yoga taught in the east is usually part of a religious system, and deeply integrated in hindu traditional philosophy - which is not simply "to be teached in primary school". In fact, you could teach them as well conservative christian contemplation, which, when properly applied, provides the exact same benefits.
And in order to get a clue what Yoga could actually be about, I recommend the _Eight Lectures on Yoga_ by Mahatma Guru Sri Paramahansa Shivaji.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

"Western Yoga" can help learn self-respect, though, but only to those who are ready to learn it.


----------



## PMc (Aug 9, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> During Antiquity, those at the top were called citizens, those at the bottom slaves. Nowadays, those at the bottom are called citizens and those at the top no longer feel the need for a name.




This is a nice description, and I like Your style of putting it in words - but, is it actually true? 
Yes, we know tha generally praised "first democracy in the world", the ancient Greek, included only a selected few of established Athens citizens, while lots of others, peasants and slaves, were out.
Rome had a clear distinction between the 'cives romanus' who would have rights, and any other who would have no rights.
So, anywhere is a kind of "establishment" - a group of people who would decide along which values a society is supposed to run, and which rules and taboos should be in place. And these groups have formal and informal means to secure their place, as well als means to decide upon the hierarchy among themselves.

You're also right that there was a kind of hiccup with the French revolution - and some say, this (and democracy in general) is just a great hoax of the Illuminati, in order to move the gentry out of sight so these could not be blamed anymore; and that way to establish their power even better, because the people, now due to the illusion of democracy, would have to blame themselves for all mishaps.
This is obviousely a conspiracy-theory.

So, the most asked question: who are the illuminati today? You say, they no longer feel the need for a name. But then, do they still exist at all?
What I see is just people who got into certain positions - for a variety of reasons: because of daringness, because of luck, because of inheritance, because of recklessness, because of being at the right place at the right time and doing the right thing, or whatever.
And then, these people gather with people in similar position, because that is natural, and everybody does. And so this becomes an "establishment", without there being any conspiracy at all - only some people doing what they think might suit them best.



> This divide remaining so stable over time, beyond Newspeak fashion, means it is necessary - in other words, a constraint.



Yes. And I might suppose it is much simpler: it is just an attribute of the mind. There are not so many people who are willing to take responsibility and undergo risk. Many more do prefer to just hide among the masses and blame somebody else for their mishaps.

I am not sure if that is an educational matter, or just one of diversity. Anyway, entrepreneurship is not gifted to everybody. And obviousely, entrepreneurship does not guarantee one to rise into the establishment - but it's a prerequisite.


----------



## PMc (Aug 9, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> your content will be removed...



Typo: it's not "your content", it's "their content".
It's the content they earn their money with, and so, obviousely, they need to be in control of that content.


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 9, 2020)

PMc said:


> You're also right that there was a kind of hiccup with the French revolution



It was not a hiccup. If the Gentry and the Church had made a honorable place by their side to the Bourgeoisie when it began to concentrate a lot of wealth and power, the French Revolution would never have happened. Interestingly, the Industrial Revolution has immediately followed the French Revolution.

As to the Illuminati, it's your interpretation, I wasn't talking about that at all.

Reality is much simpler: there are very few people at the top and these positions are fragile, so the higher these people are, the more caution and solidarity they need to deploy to last. This is all I'll say about it.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 9, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> Reality is much simpler


I tell people this all the time. With all the angst people are in from what they see on TV or read on the internet, they should pay more attention to what's happening as they walk down the street and sit in their living rooms. That's where things are really happening and that's where you'll find what people actually care about and you'll find it's never about what you see on TV or read on the internet.


----------



## PMc (Aug 9, 2020)

20-100-2fe said:


> It was not a hiccup. If the Gentry and the Church had made a honorable place by their side to the Bourgeoisie when it began to concentrate a lot of wealth and power, the French Revolution would never have happened. Interestingly, the Industrial Revolution has immediately followed the French Revolution.
> 
> As to the Illuminati, it's your interpretation, I wasn't talking about that at all.
> 
> Reality is much simpler: there are very few people at the top and these positions are fragile, so the higher these people are, the more caution and solidarity they need to deploy to last. This is all I'll say about it.



Those on top are of no concern to me. They can be on top for as much as they are happy with, for, what I get about their lifestyle, it is by no means desireable, even less something to envy.

The Illuminati, however, are of concern, because, as the name says, they are responsibe for the enlightenment. And the greatest revolutionary achievement would probably be to get everybody enlightened - that's about what Buddha wanted. So this is the cool part, the fancy side of things - whereas "those on top" are just boring.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 10, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> [...]   WHY, some kind of social network (or video hosting), started to be interested
> so much in some kind of "disease"?... IMO, it's very obvious, that all this so called
> "corona virus" bullshit is just an idiotic propaganda, in which certain powers are interested
> very much. [...]


_Semper queret..._.  Did you ever reflect it could be _you_ who's been fooled by idiodic propaganda?  Do you believe all the governments, economical leaders & scientists created a worldwide conspiracy, causing a multi-trillion economical damage just to suppress the plebs?

I feel very very sad about people who _refuse_ to apply simple mathematics (exponential growth) & others who keep calling this the _"Wuhan Virus"_ (usage of this term can be considered racism), implying it could have been contained -- which is nearly impossible due to it's high infectiousity -- and denying the obvious outage of their own government to constrict the spread of this virus in their country.

Before you compare this to Ebola (which could be successfully contained): ordinary people from West-Africa do not travel around the world, but Wuhan is an 8-million metropole with economical interrelations throughout the globe.  And unfortunately, the pandemic started at the same time when the chinese new year's holiday began, where these people traditionally travel back home to visit their families.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 10, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> others who keep calling this the _"Wuhan Virus"_ (usage of this term can be considered racism)


Since it is believed to have begun there, it cannot be considered racism.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 10, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> Since it is believed to have begun there, it cannot be considered racism.


It can, because it has been given another name which is commonly accepted worldwide.  More importantly, the people using that term _"Wuhan Virus"_ keep on implying it could have been stopped there.  That's as silly as accusing the local government of the Andaman & Nicobar Islands or Sumatra they should have contained the Tsunami 2004.
EDIT: Personally, I do not accuse all who use that term of beeing racists.  What matters is the 2nd implication.


----------



## PMc (Aug 10, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> _Semper queret..._.  Did you ever reflect it could be _you_ who's been fooled by idiodic propaganda?  Do you believe all the governments, economical leaders & scientists created a worldwide conspiracy, causing a multi-trillion economical damage just to suppress the plebs?



That, as usual, depends on what benefits are to be achieved in return for the cost.

But, if you bother to have a look at the stock exchance, you will see - nothing. The trading ranges are _exactly the same_ as they were a year ago.

So, there simply is no "multi-trillion economical damage" - there is _no such damage at all_ - at least not where it counts: at the stock exchange. This economical damage is again only a fairy-tale.

Indeed, millions and millions of livelihoods have been recklessly destroyed. Millions of people running their own littlle shop, or running their shop with a handful of employees, have been driven into poverty. But that is nothing the big players would bother about. Just the opposite, and specifically in the gastronomy branch, there is a long-standing intention to get rid of these small businesses: since people want to get quality food, and they want to get the same reliable quality food all over the world - quality that can only be provided by the big players (like Kentucky Fried, Pizza Hut, Burger King, you-name-it), so it was very important to finally get rid of those local "specialty" restaurants nobody except Michelin knows.

But that is just a corrollary. The much more important thing, the biggest benefits, immense benefits immeasureable in money terms, are achieved by eradicating compassion, and teaching people to express their hate and contempt for their fellow human.

See, almost all respectable religions do teach compassion. The teach that one should care for the fellow human.
This was never to the liking of the socialist ideology, and they were always against religion, for a simple reason: when people are compassionate and help each other, there is no way to profit from that. But, otoh, when people do _not_ help each other, but instead have a goverment take away their goods and redistribute them among those who might need them, then the government people can rip-off as much as they want for their own pockets.

So, governments were never happy with compassion, because compassion might reduce the need for government. But then. compassion is not only a religious command, it is a very natural human habit, and cannot so easily be done away with even if that is highly desired.
Now what was achieved with the corona-hoax is an excellent coup de main: not just to do away with compassion, but to prohibit the very base on which compassion can only grow: proximity. (It is more obvious in German, where Nächstenliebe is elementary rooted in Nähe - so the interdiction of Nähe gets rid of compassion once and for all.)

This then has an immeasurable wealth of advantages: for instance, as I remember, my father, when there was the need to drill a hole somewhere in the house, borrowed a powerdrill somewhere at the workplace. And later I was wondering why there is the habit of buying all kinds of crap which you would need only twice a year, instead of sharing and helping each other. Simple answer: helping each other endangers the economy.

Now we can take this a big step further, as now we have deeply implanted into the subconscious that the fellow human does not deserve any cooperation, but instead is highly dangerous!
By the same means we now have eradicated all political initiatives, as these do basically depend on people gathering and talking to each other. We have now abandoned democracy, by keeping it on the paper but removing the very basic human interactions on which it is based.

There are many more achievements. Consider the requirement to pay with credit card. In many regions there was still a strong reluctance to use credit card, and people would prefer real money. This is a big problem, because only credit cards allow to disposses the people by simply pushing a button (if, for instance, they are disobedient).

Now this issue has also been brought a great leap forward. And there are many many more...


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 10, 2020)

PMc said:


> That, as usual, depends on what benefits are to be achieved in return for the cost.  But, if you bother to have a look at the stock exchance, you will see - nothing. The trading ranges are _exactly the same_ as they were a year ago.  So, there simply is no "multi-trillion economical damage" - there is _no such damage at all_ - at least not where it counts: at the stock exchange. This economical damage is again only a fairy-tale.


Looks like you do not understand some basic correlations?  Prices at the stock exchange can give a rough _indication_, but not a _measurement_ of economical damage.  The economic output is commonly measured by GDP (for a country) and there's also an aggregate to apply the same measurement to the whole world's economic output.  The latter has seen a drastic decline due to the pandemic.


----------



## a6h (Aug 10, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> _Wuhan Virus"_ (usage of this term can be considered racism)


What about Spanish flu, french fries, German shepherd, ...!?!

[EDIT] Give me a break!


----------



## 20-100-2fe (Aug 10, 2020)

PMc said:


> There are many more achievements.



And there's one more big achievement to be expected when we'll all be required to be vaccinated.
I sincerely wish I'm wrong, but we'll not have to wait long to see.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 10, 2020)

The virus is called SARS-CoV-2, the disease you get from it is called COVID-19. The "Spanish" flu didn't originate in Spain, they were just the only ones that had newspaper reports about it, the rest of the world tried to censor it (sound familiar?). It's actually called H1N1 and is an influenza virus.


----------



## PMc (Aug 10, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Looks like you do not understand some basic correlations?  Prices at the stock exchange can give a rough _indication_, but not a _measurement_ of economical damage.  The economic output is commonly measured by GDP (for a country) and there's also an aggregate to apply the same measurement to the whole world's economic output.  The latter has seen a drastic decline due to the pandemic.



But that is merely academic and has no practical consequences. The prices at the stock exchange give not only a "rough indication", they exactly tell how rich you are, meaning, which company you can buy. And that is all that matters.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 10, 2020)

PMc said:


> [...about compassion...] Now what was achieved with the corona-hoax is an excellent coup de main: not just to do away with compassion, but to prohibit the very base on which compassion can only grow: proximity.


This is ridiculous.  Proximity has not been prohibited, and neither is compassion.  Proximity is beeing restricted, and compassion is beeing promoted: wear a face mask to show your compassion for others.  I do see your points though, that the restrictions implied by the pandemic are contrasting some very basic human needs.  But please do not mix vague discontent about all unfairnesses in the world to construct a worldwide conspiracy.


> This then has an immeasurable wealth of advantages: for instance, as I remember, my father, when there was the need to drill a hole somewhere in the house, borrowed a powerdrill somewhere at the workplace. And later I was wondering why there is the habit of buying all kinds of crap which you would need only twice a year, instead of sharing and helping each other. Simple answer: helping each other endangers the economy.


I recently borrowed an electrical drilling machine to my neighbor.  Nothing wrong with that, no restrictions whatsoever about such helping-each-other.


> Now we can take this a big step further, as now we have deeply implanted into the subconscious that the fellow human does not deserve any cooperation, but instead is highly dangerous!
> By the same means we now have eradicated all political initiatives, as these do basically depend on people gathering and talking to each other. We have now abandoned democracy, by keeping it on the paper but removing the very basic human interactions on which it is based.


Again, ridiculous.  Contrarily, cooperation is requested!  The cooperation that most governments and vast majority of ordinary people are asking for, is to wear a face mask when people are gathering & wash your hands frequently.  Wow, what a harsh restriction of your basic rights...


> There are many more achievements. Consider the requirement to pay with credit card. In many regions there was still a strong reluctance to use credit card, and people would prefer real money. This is a big problem, because only credit cards allow to disposses the people by simply pushing a button (if, for instance, they are disobedient).


This is the only topic in your post with some factual content.  1st, paying by cash is not forbidden.  2nd, there are projects to pay anonymously by card, as if it was cash.  Sorry I can not provide a link.  These are very young.


PMc said:


> But that is merely academic and has no practical consequences. The prices at the stock exchange give not only a "rough indication", they exactly tell how rich you are, meaning, which company you can buy. And that is all that matters.


??? What a nonsense.  The prices at the stock exchange are those that _have been_ paid.  There's no guarantee whatsoever that the same (or near) price will be agreed upon a few seconds later.


----------



## bookwormep (Aug 12, 2020)

getopt : I must say you show all of us incredible ( and admirable) intellectual bravado from time to time.
I tried to write this the other day, but the thread was probably under review by moderators.

So, the original post (OP) caused me to reflect on the original intent behind the creation of ARPANET, a
precursor to the internet. A text messaging service used by university computer science, engineering and
research departments. These were highly educated people engaged in technical problem solving (mostly). But as time moved on, more access was granted for other projects and other problem solving.

To summarize, we want to receive the benefits of large populations of highly educated and detail oriented
people seriously using scientific methodology to achieve targeted goals (Pandemic problem solving).
Therefore, get back to basics and use the messaging service like the ARPANET!


----------



## scottro (Aug 12, 2020)

As someone who was in the ICU with covid, I hope that no one is paying attention to those shouting hoax.  It doesn't surprise me on this forum, sad to say.   They are incorrect. It is not a hoax.  It is very real, it is killing people.  Personally, I would say that calling it a hoax on a forum is far more serious than asking about using CURRENT on FreeNAS, but that's just me.


----------



## Phishfry (Aug 12, 2020)

I don't consider it a hoax but I think to call the term "Wuhann Virus" racist is silly.
Perhaps "Kung-Flu" is a bit insensitive but not racist.
I think it also helps to remember that this virus was covered up by the Chinese government.
Doctors were jailed for alerting other doctors to the effects.
So there is no need to apologize for calling this the Wuhan Virus.
Utter mayhem was foisted upon the world by the Chinese government to save face.
To say that they are not to blame or equate it to a Tsunami is ridiculous.
A tsunami cannot be controlled. A virus can.








						A doctor was arrested for warning China about the coronavirus. Then he died of it
					

Anguish and fury are growing in China, inflamed by an ugly reality: that authorities prioritized saving face over the health and safety of the people.




					www.latimes.com


----------



## sidetone (Aug 12, 2020)

I know 1 person who died of it.


----------



## scottro (Aug 12, 2020)

Honestly, I can't believe they didn't let this thread stay closed.  
So, anyway, I'm thinking of using CURRENT on a FreeNAS machine. Anyone have any experience doing that?


----------



## a6h (Aug 12, 2020)

scottro said:


> I'm thinking of using CURRENT on a FreeNAS machine


Thread topics-about-unsupported-freebsd-versions.40469


----------



## Crivens (Aug 12, 2020)

You guys asking for trouble? Or are you just horsing around?

Go put CURRENT on your NAS. And 4.4 on your latest uefi-only shiny. It gives you all something to do and us something to laugh. 

Other than that, these days I have limited tolerance for stupidity. Stupid got us into this mess.


----------



## sidetone (Aug 12, 2020)

I think he was making a point.


----------



## ralphbsz (Aug 12, 2020)

sidetone said:


> I know 1 person who died of it.


I can offer another 2.



scottro said:


> Honestly, I can't believe they didn't let this thread stay closed.


I think leaving it open is actually a good idea from a free speech viewpoint. It allows some people to expose how they think, so we can in the future evaluate their other communications in view of how sensible they seem to be with regard to the Covid question. On the other hand, if the admins want to close or delete it, because it causes trouble, I fully understand, because it seems to attract both undesirable attention and undesirable people.



Crivens said:


> Go put ... And 4.4 on your latest uefi-only shiny.


Amazingly enough, FreeBSD 4 is still in use. Just logged in to one such machine:

```
> uname -a
FreeBSD example.com 4.10-RELEASE-p22 FreeBSD 4.10-RELEASE-p22 #5: Thu Feb 28 02:46:42 PST 2008     user@example.com:/build/obj/build/src/sys/BIGSYS  i386
> date
Wed Aug 12 14:39:17 PDT 2020
> uptime
 2:41PM  up 264 days, 13:32, 2 users, load averages: 0.74, 0.35, 0.19
```
I'm not saying that running 12-year old code on an internet-facing machine is a good idea, but this is an existence proof of it being possible.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 13, 2020)

Phishfry said:


> Perhaps "Kung-Flu" is a bit insensitive but not racist.


I think it's funny. When someone is making a joke with no intention of demeaning someone, then I take it as it is--a joke. I love it when I make a joke and someone tries so hard to stifle their laugh as they berate me for telling it cause some social justice warrior is butt hurt over it.

All these months later, I still haven't met anyone who had the virus. I also haven't met anyone who knows someone who has the virus.
I went to the hospital three times, recently, where they have someone at the entrance checking everyone and quizzing them. I asked them if they have ever turned anyone away. All of them had been doing it for weeks, at least, and none of them have.

Now, I'm not saying it's a hoax. I am saying--and irritated that--they are targeting the wrong people and things. They should have been contact tracing from the beginning. I said that the first week all this came out. They should have targeted people who came in from other countries that were hot spots. Making everyone wear masks and distance from each other is just throwing a blanket over everything.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 13, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> All these months later, I still haven't met anyone who had the virus. I also haven't met anyone who knows someone who has the virus.


So, things can only exist if you've seen them? Is that your argument? 



drhowarddrfine said:


> I asked them if they have ever turned anyone away. All of them had been doing it for weeks, at least, and none of them have.


Maybe the people who know are infected are smart enough to stay at home? You know, responsible people. 


drhowarddrfine said:


> They should have been contact tracing from the beginning.


Maybe they didn't in your country, they sure did in mine. But they're running into several problems. Some people flat out refuse to cooperate, for whatever reason. Some people even provide _false_ information. Then there's the problem of sheer numbers. Contact tracing is doable if there's 10 people involved, but due to some people totally ignoring social distancing and just going out to party met dozens, if not hundreds of people. Trying to trace them all gets exponentially worse. It takes a lot of time and effort to do these traces and they're simply running out of manpower to do those checks properly.



drhowarddrfine said:


> Making everyone wear masks and distance from each other is just throwing a blanket over everything.


Social distancing and masks significantly reduce the infection rate. I'm sure you've heard about compound interest and how it works, even a small percentage can grow to large sums given enough time. The infection rate R works the same way. By reducing R you can significantly reduce the speed at which the virus spreads. You do this to try and prevent your healthcare system from getting completely and totally overrun.


----------



## mark_j (Aug 13, 2020)

SirDice said:


> So, things can only exist if you've seen them? Is that your argument?



That's how I proved aliens don't exist. Come on! 

I was just watching Hard Knocks (NFL Pre-Season documentary) and the opening frames are the Charger's Head Coach Anthony Lynn saying "I've had Covid". He must be the only one ?


----------



## getopt (Aug 13, 2020)

scottro said:


> As someone who was in the ICU with covid, I hope that no one is paying attention to those shouting hoax. It doesn't surprise me on this forum, sad to say. They are incorrect. It is not a hoax. It is very real, it is killing people.


I'm sorry to hear that you were hit by the virus. I hope you are recovering well.
Don't worry about the loud ones. The FreeBSD forums proves to be pretty resilient to what I call strange noise. 

Sharing one's views and thoughts does not mean we live in a world of harmony. Disenchantment though may induce clarity of mind.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 13, 2020)

getopt said:


> Sharing one's views and thoughts does not mean we live in a world of harmony. Disenchantment though may induce clarity of mind.


A world where everyone would agree on everything would be utterly boring. It's the nuances and differences in opinion that make things interesting.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 13, 2020)

Phishfry said:


> [...] I think it also helps to remember that this virus was covered up by the Chinese government.
> Doctors were jailed for alerting other doctors to the effects.


Agreed.  For shure this was not helpful (off topic: I guess you'd call _Snowden_ a criminal).  But would it have been possible to contain the virus?


> So there is no need to apologize for calling this the Wuhan Virus.
> Utter mayhem was foisted upon the world by the Chinese government to save face.
> To say that they are not to blame or equate it to a Tsunami is ridiculous.
> A tsunami cannot be controlled. A virus can.
> ...


And here we have the exact utterly plain wrong fact-bending intended to pass the buck, that makes me go crazy.  Please switch on you mathematical skills and combine the following:

This virus has a fairly high _basic reproduction number_ & is very easily transmissible
We have a reasonable immunity against many other highly infective deseases (both natural & by vaccination), but not against the corona-virus. Thus the velocity of spread is exorbitantly high for the Corona virus.
Many infections happen when the spreader shows no symptoms of beeing infected (thus there's no reason to be tested).  In practice, it's impossible to prevent this silent spreading _under the radar_.
EDIT Approx. 80% (?) of all infected persons show only mild symptoms or none at all, these add the most to the silent spread.
Wuhan is part of the world's workbench.  Infected business travellers showing no symptoms travelled around the globe from day one of the occurance of the corona virus.  EDIT It makes no difference if the Chinese had not suppressed these doctors you referred to above, because numerous infections had already happened outside China when the virus was identified for the 1st time.
Conclusion: We can not stop the spread.  No government could have stopped it.  All we do is to mitigate/deaccelerate it.  By wearing face masks, practicing _physical_ distancing & hygienic measures.  And patiently keep on to kindly & convincingly spread the word...


drhowarddrfine said:


> They should have targeted people who came in from other countries that were hot spots. Making everyone wear masks and distance from each other is just throwing a blanket over everything.


See above.  You're free to add 1 + 1.  What I do not accept, and then I call bullsh*t, nonsense & such by it's name, is when people _refuse_ to apply simple mathematics for political reasons.
P.S.: the 1st infections in US & Germany seem to have happened in late 2019, because of business travellers to/from Wuhan.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 13, 2020)

SirDice said:


> So, things can only exist if you've seen them? Is that your argument?


I said no such thing. I even explicitly stated it isn't a hoax.


SirDice said:


> Social distancing and masks significantly reduce the infection rate.


I'm sure it does but that's not the point I made.


----------



## Birdy (Aug 13, 2020)

SirDice said:


> ... masks significantly reduce the infection rate.





mjollnir said:


> Conclusion: ...  All we do is to mitigate/deaccelerate it.  By wearing face masks, ...


Are you sure about that?

[_Mod: Link to unverifiable information removed_]


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 13, 2020)

Birdy said:


> Are you sure about that?


No, I'm not.  I think the assumption that a face mask reduces the rate of transmission is reasonable, because it holds back droplets.  It may not help at all, because of the very small droplets hovering in the air in closed rooms (no air flow), and only very expensive medical PPU filter these micro-droplets.  These topics are currently heavily investigated & scientists have not agreed upon a clear statement yet.  We have to live with these kinds on uncertainty.  At least we try to mitigate the velocity of the spread, based on current knowledge & common sense, and that means we act solidary & guided by compassion.  Simply because when too many people get infected at the same time, our hospitals will be overcrowded very soon.  My point was that it's cheap & not helpful to play the Jackass game (to pass the buck).  Obviously that's what Phishfry and, to a lesser extent, drhowarddrfine do.


----------



## drhowarddrfine (Aug 13, 2020)

mjollnir No, I'm not passing the buck. My only point is that the burden of this has been passed on to us when the proper response was obvious (to me at least) from the beginning.


----------



## getopt (Aug 13, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> P.S.: the 1st infections in US & Germany seem to have happened in late 2019, because of busines travellers to/from Wuhan.


Medics having seen the first cases of Covid19-patients at University Hospital LMU Munich have this timeline:


			
				https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMc2001468 said:
			
		

> A 33-year-old otherwise healthy German businessman (Patient 1) became ill with a sore throat, chills, and myalgias on January 24, 2020. The following day, a fever of 39.1°C (102.4°F) developed, along with a productive cough. By the evening of the next day, he started feeling better and went back to work on January 27.
> 
> Figure 1.
> 
> ...


Thanks to elaborate media coverage including TV people got aware that the virus is spreading and is no more an Asian event only.

Thanks to the creditable and responsible communication of that Shanghai resident woman the learning curve started there at an early stage.

Instead of thanking that women for her so important warning locals started discriminating people with an Asian appearance. Responsible media coverage including TV contributed to education and slowing down dumb discrimination. Japanese and Vietnamese not having traveled at all had hard days then but that nonsense has almost stopped now.

I remember this time in February very well and I took it as an alert and changed my behavior to washing hands and distancing. When trying to buy a mask in March none were available anymore at that time.

Without reliable media coverage (including TV) I would not have noticed the spreading.


----------



## SirDice (Aug 13, 2020)

Birdy said:


> Are you sure about that?


Fairly certain. Are N95 masks better? Definitely. But that doesn't make other masks useless. The link you provided shows someone (no idea who he is or what his expertise is) stating a bunch of "facts" but doesn't provide any references that allows someone else to verify those "facts".


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 13, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> mjollnir No, I'm not passing the buck. My only point is that the burden of this has been passed on to us when the proper response was obvious (to me at least) from the beginning.


You wrote the proper response would have been to screen people coming from hotspot regions.  My point was that it's reasonable to assume that infections outside of China had started already when the virus was still unknown.  Because of it's very high transmission rate, and silent transmission by asymptotic spreaders.  Additionally, it's nearly impossible to prevent the silent transmission even now, where we have identified the virus & can test asymptotic people.  Thus, yes it is right to screen travellers coming from hotspot areas.  But this is only one measure among a few others to _mitigate & deaccelerate_ the spread.  It can not and could not _stop or contain_ it.  EDIT I.e. you're _passing the buck_ of responsibility from you to authorities.  Of course the authorities are responsible to get their tasks done & monitored, but we all are responsible for the measures we can take to mitigate the spread of the virus. 


getopt said:


> Medics having seen the first cases of Covid19-patients at University Hospital LMU Munich have this timeline: [ Jan 24th 2020 ]


Same argument: It's reasonable to assume that numerous silent infections had already happened when the 1st patient with symptoms showed up in the hospital.  EDIT IIRC the infection happened approx./at least 10-14 days before symptoms show up so severe that an infected person has to see a doctor & visit a hospital.


----------



## scottro (Aug 13, 2020)

Sigh. In a country as ignorant as mine, (the US), people like my wife, a small Oriental, has to deal with idiots screaming you Chinese brought this here. She's not Chinese, by the way.  Talking about it coming from China encourages this.  Since this thread has had people stating, you don't need a mask, it's a hoax and let's blame the Chinese, I think mods bear some responsibility. Even twitter is blocking misinformation like that.  You are allowing dangerous information to be spread, and allowing people to accuse an entire country for the actions of a few. I would expect better.  Even a post bringing CURRENT into it couldn't get this one closed.  

getopt thank you for your kind wishes.  At least, unlike these forums, some of the social media, to return to the topic in the title, are blocking posts decrying masks, or saying it's a hoax.


----------



## getopt (Aug 13, 2020)

scottro you have always been a valuable member of this forum and I'm glad you are back here.

Regarding the attempts to shut down this thread because of some annoying noise it would not be possible to answer basic questions i.e. on wearing masks.

One may wonder that members still have basic questions, but we try our best to answer all to our best knowledge using reliable information.

You may always use the "report button" for single posts to be reviewed by our mods. Closing the whole thread would be not appropriate as long as a thread is helpful.


----------



## scottro (Aug 13, 2020)

getopt, thank you.  Your reply makes me realize that I'm being as bad as some of the people I'm criticizing.  I think the best bet for me is to just stop reading this thread.   Problem solved.  Again, thank you.


----------



## getopt (Aug 13, 2020)

scottro said:


> Your reply makes me realize that I'm being as bad as some of the people I'm criticizing.


Not at all. You feel hurt because of your COVID19-experience. Anyone with a minimum of empathy understands and respects this. I do myself stay away from threads that I feel not worth reading. It does help. But I'm still here.


----------



## Crivens (Aug 13, 2020)

scottro sorry to hear that about your wife. I haven't heard anything like that from here.

And when it comes to "all a hoax" or "harmless for kids" - back in march an aquaintence found her kids in the morning pale blue and gasping for air. They  went to the ER pronto. The older one collapsed two weeks ago after climbing some stairs. So still severe defects after MONTHs of healing. This virus is no joke nor harmless to kids. He who says otherwise better does not to my face.


----------



## scottro (Aug 13, 2020)

Well, this is NYC.  Fortunately, she's just been screamed at, a few people have been attacked.


----------



## mark_j (Aug 13, 2020)

drhowarddrfine said:


> mjollnir No, I'm not passing the buck. My only point is that the burden of this has been passed on to us when the proper response was obvious (to me at least) from the beginning.


Yes but ultimately 'us' are the ones who get the virus, so all steps you can take to both mitigate its spread and avoid catching it yourself should seem to be logical. The burden is ours. 

It's also not just a virus, it's a novel virus. It has many unknown and novel outcomes from long-term organ damage to remaining in the body long after anti-bodies have formed.


----------



## Birdy (Aug 14, 2020)

SirDice said:


> The link you provided shows someone (no idea who he is or what his expertise is) stating a bunch of "facts" but doesn't provide any references that allows someone else to verify those "facts".


Its' a summary of his previous multiple writings which contain the references.


----------



## mark_j (Aug 15, 2020)

Crivens said:


> scottro sorry to hear that about your wife. I haven't heard anything like that from here.
> 
> And when it comes to "all a hoax" or "harmless for kids" - back in march an aquaintence found her kids in the morning pale blue and gasping for air. They  went to the ER pronto. The older one collapsed two weeks ago after climbing some stairs. So still severe defects after MONTHs of healing. This virus is no joke nor harmless to kids. He who says otherwise better does not to my face.


I believe people (some people) take the fact that children are less susceptible to the virus as an indication of immunity. Children seem to be less able to spread the disease because the virus does not make it into the upper respiratory system. They put 1 and 1 together and manage to get 3!
But, as you obviously know first hand, there's a reason this virus is called *novel*. It's effects are just not typical of what some world leaders call "just a virus".


----------



## mark_j (Aug 15, 2020)

scottro said:


> Sigh. In a country as ignorant as mine, (the US), people like my wife, a small Oriental, has to deal with idiots screaming you Chinese brought this here. She's not Chinese, by the way.  Talking about it coming from China encourages this.  Since this thread has had people stating, you don't need a mask, it's a hoax and let's blame the Chinese, I think mods bear some responsibility. Even twitter is blocking misinformation like that.  You are allowing dangerous information to be spread, and allowing people to accuse an entire country for the actions of a few. I would expect better.  Even a post bringing CURRENT into it couldn't get this one closed.
> 
> getopt thank you for your kind wishes.  At least, unlike these forums, some of the social media, to return to the topic in the title, are blocking posts decrying masks, or saying it's a hoax.



Your country does not hold the ignorant crown alone, I'm afraid. It's happened in mine as well. 

However, somehow hiding its origins will do nothing. It came from China, that is fact (regardless of the "facts" presented by the CCP). Denying it is, well, just denial.

Unfortunately, there are ignorant idiots, racist fools and bigots everywhere and the best we can do is call it out when it occurs. It's too bad we can't legislate against stupidity; at least not without filling the jails!


----------



## a6h (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA Nobody should quit. Quitting enables conformity. We shouldn't forget, that outside of the mathematics and logic, there's no absolute truth and we can't prove anything.


----------



## sidetone (Aug 15, 2020)

Corona virus is real, but some governments have used it as an excuse to take away people's rights. It's of convenience to them.

I don't want to wear a mask when it's hot outside, but a mask is actually to reduce transmission of the disease. Stores should be able to require people to wear a mask inside, even if it's inconvenient when one is left at home, because that's private property. But safety measures are the limit to what a store can do on private property.

Safety measures are the limits for many regional governments. Basic rights are not to be infringed on. On the other hand, not wearing a mask infringes on the safety of others who are susceptible to Covid. It gets into abstract ground, when comparing being required to wear a mask, being required to wear shoes in a store, or being required to wear clothes outside.


----------



## Crivens (Aug 15, 2020)

vigole said:


> ILUXA Nobody should quit. Quitting enables conformity. We shouldn't forget, that outside of the mathematics and logic, there's no absolute truth and we can't prove anything.


When it comes to proof, you forgot booze. But that's it.
You are right about quitting, that would be self inflicting cancel culture. 

And ILUXA, please don't post when tipsy. OK?


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA  Again, you should ask yourself who's beeing brainwashed.  Please tell me a method to fool thousands of scientists to become part of a worldwide conspiracy.  That's ridiculous.  Please recall some simple facts about human behaviour:

filter all facts contrary to your believe by either ignoring or declaring to be fake
put everything, even if unrelated, to fit into your believe
when running out of arguments, insult & disparage the others
Please apply the same stubborn critics to what these doctors tell you.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

Crivens said:


> When it comes to proof, you forgot booze. But that's it.
> You are right about quitting, that would be self inflicting cancel culture.
> 
> And ILUXA, please don't post when tipsy. OK?


For what purpose do you offer the narrative that ILUXA is plastered?
Did he tell you that?

And most interesting what "culture" would be cancelled?

EDIT: As can be seen below, I cannot resist getting applause from the wrong side.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

vigole said:


> ILUXA Nobody should quit. Quitting enables conformity. We shouldn't forget, that outside of the mathematics and logic, there's no absolute truth and we can't prove anything.


And these two can _prove_ their limits.  That's unseen in any other realm.  Mathematics builds upon the axioms.  Once you accept these, all what follows is true _iff_ the axioms are valid.  For some esoterians & political clowns, their respective _"axioms"_ are so weird that it's hard to impossible to have a real discussion with them.  Sadly so.


----------



## a6h (Aug 15, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Mathematics builds upon the axioms.


True. There's no way around axioms and concepts. There's also unsolved problem of induction. No matter how rational, at the end we restricted by our presuppositions.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

Of course, from global perspective, everything is exist while you believe in its existence.
Believe me or not, but you're able to materialize things pretty easily.

No comments, Crivens. Your moderation "work" has already forced to leave this forum one great member...
Your attempts to offend me are ridiculous.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA Please tell me a method to fool thousands of scientists to become part of a worldwide conspiracy.
EDIT I would not worry if you leave simply because your childish animated picture in your signature is very annoying, and more so: this seems to be your intention.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

Money, big money. Also, please, search alternative sources of information, not popular ones only.
There are a lot of REAL scientists telling the truth these days.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

mark_j said:


> I believe people (some people) take the fact that children are less susceptible to the virus as an indication of immunity. Children seem to be less able to spread the disease *because the virus does not make it into the upper respiratory* system.



“One of the theories is that children have the [ACE2] receptors for this virus *more in the nose [and] in the upper respiratory system* than in the lungs [lower respiratory system], and adults have these receptors in the lungs,” says Elizabeth Barnett, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at Boston Medical Center and professor of pediatrics at Boston University School of Medicine.


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> Money, big money. Also, please, search alternative sources of information, not popular ones only.
> There are a lot of REAL scientists telling the truth these days.


Did you apply the same critical doubts to these sources?  Who are these _"REAL"_ scientists?  Please supply links to these alternative sources, so we (_"brainwashed idiots"_) can be enlighted.  Did you ever think about _their_ intentions & benefits?


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> Please supply links to these *alternative* sources,


Argh! Please do NOT! The FreeBSD Forums is not a tool to spread links to disinformation and propaganda.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

English isn't my native language, mjollnir, so even if I'll post something, you won't be able to understand it.
I'm not very strong in English sources of information. So you should do a little research by yourself.
Also, as far as I can see, you're from Germany, on 1st August, as far as I remember, there was a huge protest
against false pandemic and quarantine in your coutry in Berlin, ask those FREE people next time.


----------



## a6h (Aug 15, 2020)

What is science is depend on methodology. A wide range of definition from knowledge (Latin scientia) to Logical Empiricism (Vienna Circle).
There's no such a thing as The Science. It's all about definition and methodology. For example find some professors at biology  (Genetics to be specific) or physics departments, ask them privately, without intimidation, what are they thinking about psychology/'human science'. Do the same at mathematics department, and ask them about Inferential Statistics. You'are going to be stunned.


ILUXA said:


> Money, big money


That definitely a factor, as job security.


----------



## shkhln (Aug 15, 2020)

mjollnir said:


> alternative sources



Probably Russian rap.


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

Huge protest in Berlin against coronavirus rules and false pandemic on 1st August,
one of their slogans was "We are the second wave"


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> [...] on 1st August, as far as I remember, there was a huge protest against false pandemic and quarantine in your coutry in Berlin, ask those FREE people next time.


I was there and saw these _"FREE"_ people: a mixture of hardcore esotarian, hardcore religious of any flavour, and/or neo-nazis, caged in their respective weird ill views & mentally forced to press every information into a great global conspiracy.  That's exactly the opposite of beeing free.  So you think all those scientists & medical doctors have been corrupted by _"big money"_ and you're one of a small elite who found the few that resisted? Where's your scepticism?  Do you stop beeing critical once someone confirms your _global conspiracy_?
EDIT And the hospitals in Wuhan, North-Italy, Spain etc. got overcrowded by a normal seasonal flu?

Assertion: you failed to provide any single factual argument, that I can carefully examine myself.
Instead your posts are a sequence of blatant stupidity & ignorance, expressing nothing but vague anxiety & fear (_"big money", "submission and obedience, because slaves should be submissive"_).


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

FREE people are free not because of their belonging to certain groups (religion, politics, etc),
they are FREE in their hearts, and no one is able to steal their FREEDOM anywhere.

"America" may be replaced with every country.


----------



## a6h (Aug 15, 2020)

jesse:  Do you like my hat?
jimmi: No.
jesse:  You racist conspiracy theorist.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> Huge protest in Berlin against coronavirus rules


What you call "huge" were some 20.000 people. In Berlin it is possible to protest, even for non benevolent purposes. There is freedom of assembly and there is a free press too.

But why talk about Berlin? Let's talk about your country. What kind of protests are allowed in your place? What do you think about the COVID-19 statistics in your country? Are the deaths properly counted?

Tell us first hand what you see in your country. Are human rights recognized where you live? Does your understanding of "FREEDOM" respect other human beings with their human rights?

PS: Where did you learn German language?


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> Real number — is more than 1 million.


This picture is NOT Berlin. You got fooled.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> In my country, they pay money to doctors, which write corona virus as diagnosis.
> Also, hospitals pay money to people, which will say that they got corona virus.


Does this country got a name or is it Mars?


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

getopt said:


> This picture is NOT Berlin. You got fooled.


Yes, your're right. This picture is from internet, but I saw much more photos with this protest,
and real number of people is much bigger, than 20 thouthands.











getopt said:


> Does this country got a name or is it Mars?


If I'll want to publish the country, in which I'm living now, I'll write about it in my profile.
For now think that it is Saturn


----------



## a6h (Aug 15, 2020)

The problem with calling it hoax is that we're going to dismiss any investigation, to find out what really happened. If you don't want to look at hospitals, take a look at economy. Economy is down the toilet. I don't believe it's a hoax. Something happened. There should be consequences. People lives is ruined.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> Yes, your're right. This picture is from internet, but I saw much more photos ...


Why don't you post a picture of yourself in the green uniform? Do you get paid for being a green little man from Mars?


----------



## Deleted member 48958 (Aug 15, 2020)

No. It's just basic anonymity. Better post your photo, it will be interesting too, IMO


----------



## Mjölnir (Aug 15, 2020)

These photographs show far less than 20 000 people...


----------



## Crivens (Aug 15, 2020)

My BS-o-meter curled up and exploded while I did a little nap. This thread is, sadly, unsalvageable.


----------



## getopt (Aug 15, 2020)

ILUXA said:


> No. It's just basic anonymity.


Ok, but what about the green uniform? Do you get paid for wearing it?


----------



## SirDice (Aug 15, 2020)

Deleted a couple of posts with antivax and anti-corona rhetoric.


----------

