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Across the Internet, a Game of Whac-a-Mole Is Underway to Root Out Extremism

36 points| pseudolus | 5 years ago |npr.org | reply

106 comments

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[+] waterheater|5 years ago|reply
Mirriam-Webster defines "extremism" [1] as "advocacy of extreme measures or views : radicalism"

By this definition, extremism and radicalism are equivocated. However, I know many people on the "left" presently identify as radicals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_left).

The article differentiates between the terms "extremism" and "radicalism" by assigning a "political-right" label to "extremists" and a "political-left" label to "radicals".

Stifling the extremes of one "side" while supporting the other "side" is how you implement cultural revolution. It is quite literally a repressive tactic.

The term "Whac-a-Mole" assigns a sense of childishness and fun to the extremism elimination efforts, which disarms "moderates" and dehumanizes cultural revolution.

[1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extremism

[+] emodendroket|5 years ago|reply
I think you have to play pretty fast and loose with the groups involved to come to these conclusions.
[+] wbronitsky|5 years ago|reply
This account is actively spreading disinformation. They are spreading FUD about vaccines and now about ANTIFA. They site spurious sources and they are not being properly flagged.

I’m amazed that they think that two moderators could combat nation states. Such hubris.

[+] 1cvmask|5 years ago|reply
It’s funny how the elites use this ploy to stamp out any differences from the dominant narrative - from the alleged left or right. Freedom of speech is a danger to elites when you have freedom of reach (distribution).

Opposition American politician, Eugene Debs, with over a million votes (alleged extremist) imprisoned by autocratic President Woodrow Wilson for passing out pamphlets against the war entitled “ Anti-War Proclamation and Program”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debs_v._United_States

In the ultimate twist of fate the advocates for censorship get censored by Facebook:

https://twitter.com/jimmy_dore/status/1354572535799504901?

An academic conference on censorship gets censored by Youtube:

https://www.mintpressnews.com/media-censorship-conference-ce...

[+] simonh|5 years ago|reply
That's a mischaracterisation. Debs was convicted of encouraging violations of the law, specifically the draft laws. His arguing against the war was held to be perfectly legal.
[+] emodendroket|5 years ago|reply
This used to be more or less exactly my attitude but then my mom got really into QAnon nonsense and the whole Capitol raid thing unfolded and I've become a lot more sympathetic to just banning people raving about Chinese Manchurian candidates from social media. Honestly, even when alternative news sources are easily accessible nobody reads them.
[+] spazrunaway|5 years ago|reply
Extremism is relative. The opinions of an average American in 2008 would be labelled "far-right" today (see: opposition to gay marriage, transgenderism, support for colorblindness, I could go on). Sooner or later, people will see that it's a fool's errand keeping up with this runaway train of an overton window.
[+] TheBobinator|5 years ago|reply
Sensationalism generates extremist beliefs as a consequence of its operation.

The mainstream media\media monopoly has two deeply engrained habits; one, the belief in distributing free news, two, in sensationalizing every story to maximize ad revenue.

Technology reduces cost, ergo, when costs reductions meet these two habitations, the net result is training the audience to accept sensationalisation itself as a brand and if they do so, you tend to polarize an audience in unpredictable ways as a consequence of operating your media empire.

Think about it this way. The reason the MSM puts out news is to sell advertising, and to the advertisers, we are products the MSM is selling to them. What do you do with products once you are done with them? You throw them in the garbage. Once we're used up we become trashed.

It's the belief that sensationalism itself is trustworthy that creates this trashing, and I would encourage anyone to learn to detect sensationalism as the psychological baseline for stimulation has risen to such an extreme these days.

In this instance, the moment we refer to any kind of warfare operation as "whack a mole" is when you begin rolling your eyes as the author is not treating people with respect.

Good, accurate information is expensive. If you need proof of that, talk to a historian.

[+] fatsdomino001|5 years ago|reply
Support for colour-blindness is far-right? Who knew MLK was such a far right extremist eh?
[+] emodendroket|5 years ago|reply
Yeah sure, but is QAnon stuff ever going to be mainstream? Probably not.
[+] betterunix2|5 years ago|reply
The average American in 2008 was not walking into a synagogue and murdering people. Let's not pretend that far-right extremism is something other than what it actually is.
[+] it|5 years ago|reply
Interesting how the article doesn't mention any game of whac-a-mole to root out leftist extremism.
[+] emodendroket|5 years ago|reply
Because there's no serious left-wing insurgency anybody is worried about. There are people who like posting guillotine images on Twitter but little real-world impact.
[+] stormqloud|5 years ago|reply
Leftist extremism doesn't exist. Look how many years they spent telling us Islam is a religion of peace and calling every islamic attach on society a lone wolf attack.

Cognitive dissonance. Populations doesn't know what to think anymore if they think at all.

[+] milkrocks|5 years ago|reply
What a loaded article, NPR should be defunded for putting out something so biased.
[+] kazinator|5 years ago|reply
Once there is money involved, people will be dogged. Nobody is going to take it sitting down if they're making tens of thousands of dollars and you shut them down.
[+] sneak|5 years ago|reply
What exactly is the "whac" that is intended for people with views outside of the mainstream?
[+] AnimalMuppet|5 years ago|reply
Whac-A-Mole is an arcade game for children. It has holes in the playing surface, and a mallet or hammer that the player holds. Mechanized moles pop up out of these holes, stay up for a moment, and then go back down. The player attempts to hit the mole with the mallet while the mole is up out of the hole. The difficulty is knowing which mole (or which hole) is going to be the next one you need to hit.
[+] knowaveragejoe|5 years ago|reply
I am (again) saddened to see how much of HN appears to be engrossed in right-wing grifterism.

The GOP is literally playing with the fire of stochastic & headless terrorism, driven by a sophisticated & well-documented misinformation campaign that has convinced many millions of people that the election was stolen and that donald trump(of all people) is anointed by god to root out a global satanic, pedophilistic cabal that is responsible for all of the world's woes. A lot of these people think the world is ending and it's now or never.

These same people showed up at the nation's capital with every intention of taking hostages & holding show trials.

But you know what the real problem is? Groups of young, ineffectual leftists who don't even show up to vote let alone participate in government.

[+] TMWNN|5 years ago|reply
>These same people showed up at the nation's capital with every intention of taking hostages & holding show trials.

Is that the current description? What happened to "attempted coup"? Oh wait, maybe five armed people out of 150 who entered the Capitol != coup attempt by any level of common sense, so I guess now the above is the description du jour. Never mind the preposterousness of such a group also "taking hostages & holding show trials". Perhaps in another few months the MSM consensus will finally get to what was and is obvious to anyone who isn't histrionic: 150 idiots (the vast majority unarmed) who illegally trespassed into a government building. They can and will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law ... As far as "illegal trespass into a government building" can go, at least.

(And no, the Capitol police officer who died wasn't "killed by a fire extinguisher" wielded by said idiots. He died at home from unknown causes and apparently wasn't assaulted by anyone https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/02/politics/brian-sicknick-charg... .)

[+] s9w|5 years ago|reply

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[+] tejhra|5 years ago|reply
Is there any evidence to backup the claim that the person referenced is “far right” and “racist”?

It appears that these terms have lost meaning and are fair game to throw around regularly in articles about Trump supporters or conservatives.

[+] ike77|5 years ago|reply
There are plenty and they are easy to find. It's hard to believe that your comment was made in good faith.
[+] hn8788|5 years ago|reply
His wikipedia article gives a bunch of examples, including saying that Trump supporters have no recourse but to kill government officials.