Has America Imploded? (1 Viewer)

[Jon]

I've mostly stopped watching Fox News and YouTube political stuff lately, because it sucks up so much of your time and I have too much other stuff to do. But I am getting a feeling things are not quite right over the other side of the pond.

Has America imploded?

 

[Isaac]

I've mostly stopped watching Fox News and YouTube political stuff lately, because it sucks up so much of your time and I have too much other stuff to do. But I am getting a feeling things are not quite right over the other side of the pond.

Has America imploded?

And I think the worst part of it is, we can't even BEGIN to agree on who to blame. Blame is futile and inappropriate, you say? But yet we have to, there is no hope of figuring out how to go back to normal if we don't know what or who to address.

Personally, I believe / would guess that once Trump is totally "out", things will go to normal.

 

[Vassago]

Not really. Life will carry on past the few thousand idiots here taking things to the streets. They really are a drop in the bucket. I think most Americans are being responsible and reasonable.

The media may make it look like there are protestors everywhere, but it's not really like that. A couple cities have had problems recently, but with a country this size, that's not really anything for most of the country to worry about. I live in a big city and nothing has happened here.

 

[Jon]

I don't agree with the mob of Republicans storming the building, just as I didn't agree with the mob of Democrats in the BLM riots. But if we are to criticise Trump, you have to view this in context, where the context is riots in 400 cities across America during the BLM protests. You can't turn a blind eye to the much larger number of deaths, looting and rioting on the BLM riots side, and then criticise the storming of the government building and the 5 resultant deaths. IMHO, you have to avoid myopic perceptions of what is going on, else you are just being a hypocrit. The number of unaccounted for deaths remains a hidden number, because the vast numbers of people who are catching Covid through all these protests and the exponential spreading thereof are lost in the sea of numbers. You cannot put a figure on it. But it is happening.

If you put up this one major riot vs the BLM riots, it is like a drop in the sand when it comes to death counts. Neither should be going on, but do put it all in perspective. Ignore Nancy Pelosi who wants to impeach for any reasons, or use a removal from office. She wanted him removed from office before this and has already impeached Trump. She just wants to stain his presidency, all a bit childish and not using the political process for its intended purpose. And a hypocrite on mask wearing.

This last year hasn't done much for the image of America. It looks like a country torn down the middle with polarised views, with the media fanning the flames with distorted reporting and finger-pointing. I think identity politics is partly to blame, dividing people up into mobs rather than individuals, and then warring one against the other.

In the UK, we have left vs right, Brexit vs non-Brexit. But it seems to be a much milder ailment. Sometimes I wonder if it is the libel laws over in the UK that hold back what people can say, and therefore tone everything down. I don't know. But it has all gotten a bit nasty.

 

[Isaac]

This last year hasn't done much for the image of America. It looks like a country torn down the middle with polarised views, with the media fanning the flames with distorted reporting and finger-pointing. I think identity politics is partly to blame, dividing people up into mobs rather than individuals, and then warring one against the other.

Excellent summary. Also @Vassago summarized it well. I think most Americans are actually just normal, mature people like you and me, sitting in our homes or businesses, working away, quite sane & restrained, albeit with strong opinions. There's always a small element of people that will make things look dire on any side, but things will be OK. I hope. I'm trying to be extremely optimistic vs. the way my worrying mind really feels about the liberals having total and complete control of Presidency and both Houses for 4 years. Hopefully something will hold them back. Keep it in prayer.

 

[Vassago]

There certainly weren't hundreds of riots across the country. That's what I'm saying. With the exception of a few cities that had major problems, Portland probably taking the trophy, most cities have continued on unscathed with only peaceful protests. As others have pointed out so much, the media loves to spin things to be larger than they are.

As someone who is not affiliated with any party, I was actually a Republican turned Independent, much to the shock of people here, I agree with you that both sides has good and bad. The largest problem is that whenever you have mass gatherings of actual peaceful protestors, it's going to draw in opportunistic thugs, looters, and rioters. They may not even care about the reason the protestors are there. They just want to cause chaos. It's disgraceful. And it has happened with both sides with every protest. This is not the only Pro-Trump protest with the issue where'er people have died this year. In either case, they are super spreader events and that's awful.

Things will get back into a sense of normalcy after some time. There won't be a President inciting a crowd, intentional or not. Things will get better.

 

[Jon]

I also think we can all learn that a pandemic can create not just societal and economic chaos, but violence, conflict and strife. Governments need to invest less in nukes, and instead more in pandemic protective measures. Spend more money where the biggest risk is. Bill Gates warned about all this in a TED talk about 5 years ago, but everything is such short-term thinking, ignoring the existential threats like pandemics.

 

[Jon]

Crowds lead to thugs, looter and rioters. I wonder if there is an argument then not to have a crowd. If you consider the cause and effect of it, while you consider your presence blame free, your crowd participation may be indirectly leading to the death of another individual. A bit like buying an iPhone but claiming no responsibilty for the exploitation of underaged workers in Chinese factories with appalling working conditions and human rights.

Is there any merit to that argument?

 

[Isaac]

There certainly weren't hundreds of riots across the country

Huh? Respectfully disagree w/you on that for sure. I count each night as a riot, I think the number is in the 1000's, not 100's.

Any night that crowds of people were running around and blocking traffic, breaking windows, smashing or burning things, that was a riot to me.

Anyway, this is still very interesting to me, it shows how we as a nation of people have wildly different perspectives of even the basic facts.
Fascinating, but that's OK, we're all different - and we all tend to minimize certain things and maximize other things.
Take the capitol riot - some people are more likely to think "it's the worst thing that's happened to america ever" - they're focused more on the fact that it happened IN THE CAPITOL, which makes some people see it as more like a insurrection/revolution of sorts. Then others will look at the actual physical damages or dangers posed, and think heck - that was like 1/3 of 1 night of Minneapolis riots, so we all have different ways of interpreting things - and I'm OK with that, because that can't and won't ever be changed.

 

[Isaac]

Crowds lead to thugs, looter and rioters. I wonder if there is an argument then not to have a crowd. If you consider the cause and effect of it, while you consider your presence blame free, your crowd participation may be indirectly leading to the death of another individual. A bit like buying an iPhone but claiming no responsibilty for the exploitation of underaged workers in Chinese factories with appalling working conditions and human rights.

Is there any merit to that argument?

Well, I would hate to make any changes to our basic american "right to peaceably assemble", as long as it stays peaceable.
But I know what you are saying - any large crowd is inherently dangerous! Because the slightest thing it does carries a lot of force, and can easily become a monstrous weapon of destruction.

But you also have to consider the 'why' behind it. Nobody wants a large, angry crowd (except maybe the crowd and certain politicians), but maybe giant groups of unhappy people deserve to be heard - rather than just dispersing them. I have to apply that at least "ok, let's hear them out" even to the crowds that I think are B.S., or at least I ought to.

 

[Jon]

I count each night as a riot

Good point! That puts Portland nearly into the hundreds.

What about all the statues torn down? That is rioting. How many hundreds of places were looted? What defines a riot? If it is a "mostly" peaceful protest, does that mean some are rioting and therefore it is a riot? Why would you discount a small number of people rioting when they are doing the very definition of rioting, just because a larger percentage of the protesters are not rioting? Isn't that always the case in most riots? The invasion of the federal building by Trump supporters was called a riot, yet the vast majority of people were not in the building (I assume). Does that mean it is a "mostly" peaceful protest too?

Is the number of riots actually that important? Isn't it the net effect of riots? Consider how many police were injured and the number of deaths that occurred in 2020 due to the riots.

Just an example. More than 700 officers injured in the "mostly" peaceful protests and that was just up to June 8th last year!

Source: https://nypost.com/2020/06/08/more-than-700-officers-injured-in-george-floyd-protests-across-us/

According to Wikipedia, 14,000 arrests in 49 cities were made since protests began, but that was measured just up until 22 June last year.

 

[Vassago]

Huh? Respectfully disagree w/you on that for sure. I count each night as a riot, I think the number is in the 1000's, not 100's.

Any night that crowds of people were running around and blocking traffic, breaking windows, smashing or burning things, that was a riot to me.

Anyway, this is still very interesting to me, it shows how we as a nation of people have wildly different perspectives of even the basic facts.
Fascinating, but that's OK, we're all different - and we all tend to minimize certain things and maximize other things.
Take the capitol riot - some people are more likely to think "it's the worst thing that's happened to america ever" - they're focused more on the fact that it happened IN THE CAPITOL, which makes some people see it as more like a insurrection/revolution of sorts. Then others will look at the actual physical damages or dangers posed, and think heck - that was like 1/3 of 1 night of Minneapolis riots, so we all have different ways of interpreting things - and I'm OK with that, because that can't and won't ever be changed.

That's implying it happened everywhere with large crowds. It simply didn't. Nothing happened in my large city though we had peaceful protestors downtown. Seriously, nothing. I know I'm not alone in that.

 

[Isaac]

That's implying it happened everywhere with large crowds. It simply didn't. Nothing happened in my large city though we had peaceful protestors downtown. Seriously, nothing. I know I'm not alone in that.

I believe you.
But we know there were cities where it happened in multiple parts of the city, for weeks, every night.

Even where I live, Phoenix, a relatively (or used to be?) conservative area where it was quickly stamped out by force........We still had about 2-3 nights of rioting in multiple parts of town. Then you have about 15 cities where it happened routinely for a period of several weeks and in some cities' cases, months.

Ok, maybe 100's not thousands. But certainly that.

 

[Steve R.]

Has America imploded?

It's a violent "religious" revolutionary eruption following four years of Democrats maneuvering to sabotage the Trump administration. As with virtually all "religious" fanaticism, rationality will cease. What is occurring is a combination of the French Revolution's Reign of Terror and the reemergence of McCarthyism (this time from the left). Once the fanatical "religious" revolutionary Democrats assume control of the Government on January 21st, the pogrom will begin. Like sharks smelling blood, the Democrats will be going into a feeding frenzty. No prisoners.

In the zest to lynch Trump, an overlooked aspect. When those on the left rioted, looted, and destroyed property, many Congress people essentially endorsed those activities as "justifiable" actions based on alleged past grievances, such as (alleged) racism. They also went on to vilify law enforcement and to castrate the ability of law enforcement to respond. Then when the police were overrun by the Trump supporters, all of a sudden these Congress people were for law-and-order and are now demanding that heads-must-role because the police were unable to protect the Capital. So the very people who wanted to essentially put the police out-of-business are now disingenuously blaming the police!

Overlooked is the issue of why normally law bidding Trump supporters became unruly. It's easy to say that Trump riled them up, To the fanatical "religious" Democrats and some Republicans that is the easy excuse. After all we can't blame ourselves, we are the leaders!!!! (extreme sarcasm).

When leaders fail, the public becomes upset. Instead of working for the benefit of all US citizens, Congress played disgusting political games. Additionally, the lawlessness being purposely overlooked by Democratic Congress people set a bad example. Now you have one rally of Trump supporters that became unhinged, but all those who ignored left wing lawlessness now become (falsely) outraged. Instead of demanding that Trump resign, all those who set-the-stage by favoring left wing violence should resign. Of course they never will as they lack the ethical courage to look in the mirror and consider the Frankenstein monster they created.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

You want to know the cause of this disaffection? I'll answer. You might wish to disagree with me.

The media has mutated from what used to be reliable, unbiased muck-raking from every direction. But the media has taken a different, and in my mind a very DANGEROUS direction. The "liberal" media and the "conservative" media have engaged in a war of words that is a total inversion of the original reason for "Freedom of the Press." The purpose of that particular amendment is that if the press is free to print the truth regardless of whom it may hurt, the public can make a better-informed decision when voting. And in my mind, nothing can be a higher purpose. It is totally in line with the concept of letting the people rule.

However, modern press has warped their presentations to include opinions and inflammatory language in what SHOULD be a straight news article. This one gets me every time I read it: The press reports that "Person xxxxx issued a statement not based in fact regarding ..." - but the article is published less than a day after the statement, FAR too soon to be able to verify whether the statement was or was not based on fact. That irks me no end.

It is no skin off my nose if on the op-ed pages, someone disputes or impugns the factual nature of something. But in the factual news, if you don't have proof, DON'T PRINT IT. And the reporters who do this (plus their editors) should be penalized for publishing opinions in a news article, or for publishing as fact something they haven't had time to verify.

The media is now trying to control the minds of the populace. I'm sorry, but that is NOT THEIR JOB. I don't know exactly how I would curtail this trend, but some restrictions on freedom of the press seem in order in the form of penalties for people who don't understand the difference between fact and opinion when they publish something.

I blame the unrest on the blatantly biased media reporting that we see. (NOTE that I didn't claim which side was biased.) It has become a war for viewership or readership ratings, truth be damned. And THAT has to stop.

 

[Isaac]

I tend to agree with you a lot. The media's choice of what and how to report on things, and how to slant it, literally is starting to control the entire country & people. It worries me.

 

[Vassago]

And can we NOT pretend that this goes for ALL media, including this so called new network that Trump started pushing with the whole QAnon thing?

 

[Pat Hartman]

Not really. Life will carry on past the few thousand idiots here taking things to the streets.

Are you talking about Antifa or BLM? They have an agenda and they're not stopping until Biden (or more likely Harris acquiesces). Or are you talking about the million people who showed up in Washington, including my daughter and her friends? Where approximately 50 people committed the crime of breaking into the Capitol building. Some of those people were not actually Trump supporters as the police are finding out as identities are investigated. The march on Wednesday was peace and love. Old people with canes. Young people with babies and small children. And don't forget, the Mayor shut down all the businesses, not because she believed there would be rioting but because she hates Trump and by association anyone who supports him. She also convinced hotels to just cancel reservations so instead of enjoying a gourmet dinner and a nice hotel, they had to drive home that night because their reservations got cancelled. I'm sure this was just wonderful for the local economy which generally makes their money on tourists and other visitors.

My daughter and her friends shared their lunch which they had the presence of mind to bring with a young couple and their son. Then a few people, a pretty small number when you look at the size of the crowd, committed a crime. They will certainly be prosecuted (and they deserve to be) unlike the Antifa and BLM thugs who have gotten away with murder, looting, burning cars and buildings, destroying entire neighborhoods, occupying buildings and neighborhoods, and attempting to injure Police Officers. They just get arrested and released. You can bet your sweet bippy that won't happen to these, mostly Trump people. They will do jail time because we have two standards of justice in the US under the leftist regime.

If you put up this one major riot vs the BLM riots,

Major? Maybe because people died. There is video of one woman being shot by the Capitol Police. I think one police officer died and I guess the other three were accidents but no one is talking about them. When the crowd is a million people and around 50 commit a crime, I wouldn't categorize that has "major" when there are hundreds or thousands of looters and arsonists in every BLM and Antifa riot. Those riots are destroying lives and neighborhoods. Most of the people who went into the Capitol building were taking selfies rather than trying to burn the place down or injure police officers.

If it is a "mostly" peaceful protest,

That's leftspeak for the BLM and Antifa folk fests where the media refuses to show the looting and fires because they are complicit. However, they are hyperventilating and showing their OUTRAGE and calling the scuffle in DC an insurrection. I think only one of the ~50 people arrested was carrying a gun. Pretty silly to try to try to overthrow the government and leave your guns at home.

I agree with Doc. The media keeps fanning the flames with their opinions masquerading as news. I watch a variety of "news" sources and I think the liberals are far worse than the conservatives regarding interspersing purple words, innuendo, and opinions offered as facts in their reporting. The mantra of the media is "if it bleeds, it leads". If nothing is bleeding today, they just make something up.

But the real culprits are the Republican establishment. They refuse to do anything about social media or even call out the main stream media for their incessant reporting of opinions as facts. and in this particular case for simply laying down and playing dead while the Democrat machine steals a Presidential election (and probably the Georgia run offs too. same Democrat machine, same people counting the votes, same ballot boxes to stuff. Same lack of knowledge of how many ballots they actually mailed out so they know if they get too many back).

Can you imagine a world where Twitter and Face Book can just ban the President of the United States of America because they don't like him? How about if they banned the Queen? Look to see more of this now that they are sure of their power. FB has banned me permanently for one single post. Apparently because the post included "took my money at gunpoint for 50 years and now claims SS is an entitlement. I want my money back!", I'm a danger to society. I have no recourse and neither do you. If they don't like something you say, they will cancel you too. I think it was FB who said that they would report your "criminal" actions to your employers if you disagreed with the current party line so you could really be cancelled. If you have FB or Twitter accounts, watch what you say. How about that poor cheerleader who sent a video clip of her lip-syncing to a rap song that included an offensive word. Her "friend" kept it for several years and then send it to the college she had been accepted to in her dream cheer leading program. They cancelled her. This is our new reality folks and I'm pretty sure that even the leftists among you are going to be pretty unhappy at what you have wrought since the left eats their own also.

Just FYI, BOTH the Senate and the House had their offices "occupied" by protesters in the past 2 years. AOC herself, led a mob that occupied Pelosi's office So, "storming" the Capitol is not exactly unusual in DC.

 

[Jon]

I see that in the recent riot, the woman shot by a police officer was white. Is there any outrage over this? Or do white lives not matter? With all the brainwashing going on with BLM, it seems as though a white death is not worth protesting about. In other words, no blame should be attributed to the police officer. You only do that if she was black.

To be honest, I do not know if this is how it is being reported in the US, but in the UK, I read that a police officer was defending the building. But I know damn well that if the invader was black, then there would be reams of outrage over this police brutality and racist behaviour.

There seems to be a double standard if the victim is white or if they are a Trump supporter. Or if the police officer is white.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

And can we NOT pretend that this goes for ALL media,

I'm not pretending that it doesn't apply to ALL media. I'm explicitly saying that all media that I have seen indulge in trying to sway the public by slanting their articles. The only regular publications I have seen that didn't slant their articles politically was in old copies of National Geographic or Scientific American.