Media bullies attack the defenceless, then hide behind the Shield of Saintly Victimhood themselves

The scandal eh? Citizens arrested at the Capitol Riot were collecting donations from fellow Americans to pay for lawyers when USA Today swooped in to “expose” the travesty of it. Imagine the presumption of innocence and the right to “a fair trial”?

Once upon a time the second largest masthead in the US used to expose corruption in the great halls of power, but now they just attack private citizens. USA Today was wielding its influential power to cut off avenues for powerless people to raise enough money to afford better legal protection.

BLM rioters got donations direct from Kamala Harris and 13 Biden staffers, but Trump supporters are not even allowed to use Paypal or Venmo to get help from fellow Americans to cover their legal costs.

In the battle between the little guys and The Establishment Rulers, the legacy media is picking the side of Goliath, then asking us to be gentle on them.

Glenn Greenwald lobbed a sarcastic reply to the lead author:

Glenn Greenwald, Tweet. USA Today.

And she and half the profession were so enraged they briefly set twitter on fire  –saying she was “just an intern”, it was only her first story, and he was a mysogynistic bully.

Thus do the media bullies pull the Snowflake Defence:

Journalists Attack the Powerless, Then Self-Victimize to Bar Criticisms of Themselves

Glenn Greenwald,  Substack

Wow, what brave and intrepid journalistic work: speaking truth to power and standing up to major power centers by . . . working as little police officers for tech giants to prevent private citizens from being able to afford criminal lawyers. Clear the shelves for the imminent Pulitzer. Whatever you think about the Capitol riot, everyone has the right to a legal defense…

…increasingly, the largest corporate media platforms are used to punish ideological dissent and thought crimes by powerless, private citizens. They do not criticize or investigate real power centers, but serve them. And what makes it worse — so, so much worse — is that, as they assault, dox and harass private citizens, these journalistic bullies depict themselves as the real marginalized people, as those who are so fragile, voiceless, powerless, and vulnerable that criticizing them is tantamount to bullying, harassment, and violence.

Do you see what they are doing here? They are working to create a moral framework where it is always impermissible to criticize their journalism, no matter how shoddy, deceitful and amoral it is. They constantly concoct reasons why the journalist in question is too marginalized and too vulnerable to legitimately criticize.

Those who like monopoly-government like monopoly-media too:

This new journalistic tactic of weaponizing and misappropriating the language of marginalization, abuse, harassment and oppression and applying it to themselves — all to render any criticism of their work a form of assault and abuse — is one I have written about several times before. The last time was when a major front-page reporter at the most influential paper in the country, The New York Times’ Taylor Lorenz, got caught lying twice in six weeks, and those (such as myself) who criticized her for it — who criticized her journalism for the Paper of Record — were branded toxic, misogynistic bullies who were inciting dangerous hate mobs against her. And thus was criticism of this powerful journalist somehow manipulatively converted into an act of morally reprehensible harassment.

What these journalists are doing is as transparent as it is tawdry. They insist that you not treat them as what they are: people who wield extreme power and influence to shape political discourse, widely disseminate disinformation, wreck people’s reputations, expose the identity of private citizens, and propagandize the public. No, increasingly they are demanding that you treat them as exactly the opposite: the most marginalized, vulnerable, endangered and fragile members of society whose standing is so tenuous that publicly criticizing them should be barred as an act of violence, and those expressing critiques of their work must be consequently shunned as harassers and abusers.

Let there be Fame

…just like that, the real victims in America are not the jobless or the homeless or residents of addiction-ravaged communities or victims of violent crime but, instead, the rich, famous TV personalities for CNN. This is the fictitious melodrama — with themselves cast as the stars — that they are demanding you ingest to treat them with deference and respect.

Precious petals.

9.6 out of 10 based on 84 ratings

51 comments to Media bullies attack the defenceless, then hide behind the Shield of Saintly Victimhood themselves

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    Jojodogfacedboy

    [Off Topic.]AD

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    John R Smith

    Our world is populated by colonizers of pale European descent … and their victims.
    I’m not being sarcastic.
    I am merely reporting the stated views of the BBC, NYT, WP, the great majority of college students and the their indoctrinators, and Governor of Vermont.
    The only true marginalized group are the alleged victimizers.
    (If I’m not mistaken, soon The US Congress will codify this my declaring that the 1964 Civil Rights Act includes all excepting cis male persons of pale European descent.)
    Restorative Justice is progressive for revenge.

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      Terry

      Restorative Justice is progressive for revenge…against innocent people.

      They would want to be very careful with their wanton abuse of power, lest those they now freely victimise tire of the abuse and rise up to become the “things” they already accuse them of being. If their fantasy bogeymen actually existed, they would dare not point them out.

      There will be little quarter given to those that currently use “marginalised-group-status” as both cudgel and shield in their tyrannical war against good people.

      They play with forces they do not understand and cannot control (although their hubris tells them otherwise). When it turns ugly (and it will), they would have already played their “victim card”; no one will be listening.

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    kevin kilty

    By and large journalists have only worked for the establishment as their propaganda arm. This is true the world over for most of history. Much safer.

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    Mikky

    The BBC has done this kind of thing recently to covid vaccine sceptics, a TV programme about some of the most-followed on youtube, they got treated like climate climate “deniers”. One news channel was singled out for special treatment, they went for funding mechanisms, which in this case was Paypal. The BBC presented its “findings” to Paypal, which then cancelled its funding mechanism for the news channel.

    State-sponsored media using its funding to drive rivals out of business.

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      DevonshireDozer

      I gave up on the beeb years ago, so didn’t see it. Who were the targets? Which YT channels?

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    Yonniestone.

    A journalist is the ultimate fence sitting politician, they have no loyalty to anyone and can hide behind the laws they abuse when needed.

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      Leonard

      Yonniestone, I respectfully disagree.
      Within the USA Big Press (both print and electronic) and the big tech sites are nothing more than screeching and lying enablers of the leftist government and their employees. They are not fence sitters, they are openly anti-democracy and anti-freedom appendages to the leftist government moving rapidly more and more to the left.

      The big question to many in the US is have we reached a tipping point that cannot be reversed? If this is true, Communism follows Democrat Party rule as the night follows the day.
      Pray for the USA to recover rule of law and justice for all.

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        Tilba Tilba

        Within the USA Big Press (both print and electronic) and the big tech sites are nothing more than screeching and lying enablers of the leftist government and their employees. They are not fence sitters, they are openly anti-democracy and anti-freedom appendages to the leftist government moving rapidly more and more to the left.

        It’s funny how this debate has turned.

        For most of the time since WWII, the “mainstream media” has been seen by the centre-left, unions, social democratic parties, students, etc, as being the tool of capitalism … pro-business, anti-union, anti-regulation, pro-free trade, pro-Israel, and very hawkish on foreign policy. And also very conservative on most social and cultural issues.

        Who can forget the “shock-horror” and fake moralistic outrage that all the tabloids indulged in when “reporting” on even the mildest of scandals.

        But to now claim that mainstream media are “openly anti-democracy and anti-freedom appendages to the leftist government” is a huge stretch. They remain very conservative. Sure they rock along with movements of the day, but overwhelmingly they all support the status quo.

        They are businesses – they have to have content which attracts the biggest audience possible, so they have to remain popular and mainstream somewhere in the centre. Otherwise they die.

        If I were a serious leftist I wouldn’t be relying on the WaPo or NYT to be leading the revolution, LOL.

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        Yonniestone.

        Yes and when those leftist governments prevail and alter rules and laws to suit the current dictatorship those journalists will swap ideals very quickly, the only thing that will get them is complete abolition of free speech and confidential sources (snort) then they will be truly owned and in the employ of big brother.

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    graham dunton

    We must stay the course, fighting big tech, to comply with freedom of speech.

    They are in breach of US legislation, Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act of 1996 as the article will explain

    Acknowledged links below
    Section 230 Does Not Protect Big Tech From State Anti-Censorship Laws
    By The Heartland Institute | Mar 31, 2021 3:00 PM ET

    https://redstate.com/heartlandinstitute/2021/03/31/section-230-does-not-protect-big-tech-from-state-anti-censorship-laws-n353229

    what are the Paypal legal requirements, when cancelling a funding mechanism?

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    Peter Fitzroy

    Very good point raised in this post, who appointed the tech companies to this role? Why has nothing been enacted to control this?

    /mind you #1 post is way way way of topic

    [#1 was #2 draws a long bow.]AD

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    • #
      Peter Fitzroy

      And post #2

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      John R Smith

      IMHO the division of the culture into victims and victimizers is exactly the topic.

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      R.B.

      That isn’t the issue. It’s the monopoly because of the ownership of a person’s account making it hard to change platforms, as well as the take over of television channels and boards of large businesses.

      All in the name of fighting Nazis, behaving like them.

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      Tilba Tilba

      who appointed the tech companies to this role? Why has nothing been enacted to control this?

      I suspect it’s inevitable that governments and the high courts will look at this issue. The social media platforms have become so huge and influential, that there are arguments that they should be treated like common carriers – and “lose” the right to be private companies who can moderate and censor in any way they want.

      In the US they obviously have First Amendment rights, but none of their users do – they can be censored and banned. Perhaps they do need to be made into common carriers of some sort, and their “social licence” to operate will depend on that – it depends what society “wants” from these technologies over the next generation.

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        Lucky

        Plus 1 for TT, the concept of common carrier fits this situation exactly.

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        • #
          Tilba Tilba

          The downside is that there might be higher levels of moderation, and equally, everyone who posts might be liable to be sued for defamation, incitement, hate speech, and so on. Real names and addresses might become mandatory.

          The freewheeling “lightly” moderated set-up we now have might disappear, or morph into something that no-one likes much.

          But something has to be done – even at a basic anti-trust level, Facebook and Twitter are too powerful. Attempts to compete with them fail pretty much (look at “free speech” Parler).

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    nb

    Hmm. USA Today. What’s that?

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      Tilba Tilba

      When you travel about the non-English-speaking world, often it’s the only English-language paper easily available. Say what you will about its content, its international distribution skills are impressive.

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    PeterS

    Yes big tech is now the monster that’s devouring the Western world. Who needs outside enemies when we have the likes of big tech within our own midst doing the job for them to destroy our way of life? Of course the governments are letting it happen because they are too busy winning elections, and the people who vote for them are by and large clueless as to what is happening. It’s a catch-22. They will all find out the hard way what they slept through. It’s not going to be pleasant at all. Monsters never are.

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    another ian

    Around that area

    ‘There’s a debate going on between doctors on the BMJ website about the new covid vaccines. Here is the original article that kicked it off. ‘

    http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2021/04/05/trust-the-experts/

    And links to the comments there

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    • #
      Kalm Keith

      An important debate; and why is this “jab” called a vaccine when it is patently Not.

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        David-of-Cooyal-in-Oz

        G’day K K,
        I thought they’re calling it a “jab” because they know it’d be a lie to call it a “vaccine”.
        A pre-emptive cover-up.
        Cheers
        Dave B

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        Ian

        Not sure to which jab you are referring for as far as I can see, the articles and the BMJ don’t specify any particular vaccine.

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          Kalm Keith

          Stop calling it a vaccine.

          Chemically it is not a vaccine, that’s why they name changed to Jab.

          Ouch.

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            Ian

            KK you write “Stop calling it a vaccine. Chemically it is not a vaccine” but what is “it’?

            I don’t understand what you mean by “chemically it is not a vaccine”. A vaccine is an agent that stimulates the immune system to produce antibodies.. Different vaccines use different ways to stimulate antibody production but all achieve the same end result.

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            • #

              well originally a vaccine was against vaccinia viruses and anything else was an inoculation. Maybe he meant that even though the former word is common parlance for the latter?

              ” In 1881, to honor Jenner, Louis Pasteur proposed that the terms should be extended to cover the new protective inoculations then being developed.”

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                Kalm Keith

                The main thing I was thinking of was that the original vaccines had a particular mode of derivation and function.

                My understanding is that the mechanism by which CV19 Jabs function is different.

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              • #
                Ian

                KK writes “The main thing I was thinking of was that the original vaccines had a particular mode of derivation and function.”

                “My understanding is that the mechanism by which CV19 Jabs function is different.”

                KK I think Jabs is just a convenient short form of injection. And differences in mechanisms doesn’t make some vaccines non vaccines as all vaccine mechanisms generate antibodies.

                The mechanisms by which they function all generate the same end result. The first vaccine was used in 1796 when Edward Jenner showed infection with the mild cow pox virus gave immunity to the lethal small pox virus.

                Early vaccines used an attenuated, non-virulent, form of the live virus or an inactivated, killed, form of the virus.
                Recently Pfizer and Moderna used messenger RNA (mRNA) to stimulate antibody and Novavax uses a modified spike protein gene.

                The immune systems T and B cells are integral in antibody production and different vaccines may have different effects on these cells.

                But be that as it may, the mechanisms by which vaccines act is immaterial as the end result is antibody production. So, yes, they are all vaccines

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              • #

                The AZ vaccine is pretty much a standard type of vaccine seen for other diseases in recent decades.

                The RNA vaccines are new but ultimately are producing an antigen that is visible to the immune system just like Jenner’s original.

                01

  • #

    Sulfuric gaslighting … stinks like hell.

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    David Maddison

    Very, very occasionally there is good news for the forces of truth and justice.

    In Project Veritas vs the Leftist New York Times, probably the only non-Leftist judge in New York dismissed the motion by New York Times to dismiss the libel law suit that Project Veritas is bringing against it for malicious libel.

    The NYT stated to the effect that Veritas made up their claims about voter fraud in Minnesota despite clear evidence Veritas provided.

    Now the case must be heard by the court. Sadly, the Left still managed to get their “president” fraudulently “elected” so it’s not going to change the outcome of that.

    Video: https://youtu.be/gaYR4CBrqlc

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    Simon B

    Glenn has the right defence, use their own platforms to be sarcastic about their intentions and morals. Sarcastic praise works. Then shut down and move on. Leave these hypocrites to themselves nodding in consensus at their own images in the mirror.

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    Old Goat

    The MSM’s bias has morphed into active participation in the propaganda war. My question is who is actually running this war – they are hiding in the shadows manipulating both politics and the media . The participants we can see are not the sharpest tools in the box….their unaccountability and lack of intelligence is the only thing stopping their heads from exploding from cognitive dissonance.

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    http://video.foxnews.com/v/6244873677001/

    Check out Watters on FoxNews taking apart the sham Presidential Media Conference at the expense of the bought and paid for Media.

    He claims Joe Biden is being played by an Actor!!

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      Tilba Tilba

      He claims Joe Biden is being played by an Actor!!

      Golly gosh … stand by for breaking news that Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy are fake news!

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    Mike-SMO

    As for the “vaccine”, Talk with your doc and hope that he/she/it is current with the literature. I was in recently, and since I have responded in un-expected ways to any number of medications over the years, I told my doc that I would probably wait while he and his friends made all their mistakes on someone else. I knew and understood words like “RNA, micelle, and vector” and have no comorbidities except age and a snarky sense of humor, so my doc smiled and nodded. His office expedcted to get the J&J variation due to the easy storage, so he’d let me know. In the mean time, I wash my hands before I touch my face or food (as I always have as a plumber, hospital employee, and airline passenger) and stay away from the public transportation snot dispensers. I don’t think that masks and common sanitation (without clothing & shoe changes) does anything except avoid tedious discussions in store lobbies. Treat comorbidities (high BP, high blood glucose, etc) and stay away from buses and trains. Zinc gets good press down in the manhole.

    “Do you want to live forever?” (A Conan movie, I think.) Talk to your doc and not some snarky guy on the Internet.

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      Lucky

      The message in this comment is not applicable to Australia where the medical profession is tightly regulated and medics at any level can be de-registered for telling a patient anything not approved.

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    Mike-SMO

    And furthermore, the media is selling clicks and issues at the check out. The reporters typically don’t know anything, but sound good (sometimes) due to a spell checker and an equally ignorant editor who knows how to frame a sentence. In other words, they woulkdn’t know it if they stepped in it.

    “Testing” is useful to the government and to politicians who want to scare the peasants. The PCR test is ridiculously sensitive and is not “calibrated” for clinical use with SARS-CoV-2. A “positive” PCR test means that you have some virus or fragments of viral RNA in your snot, probably from the guy who walked through the lobby in front of you. The test is useful to the “gubbmint” to monitor viral spread but a “positive” test does NOT mean disease; it means “exposure” to the virus somewhere along the line. Chill!

    The “vaccines” were developed rapidly due to new technology. I have no idea if a Chinese lab was involved with “Mao Tse Lung”. South China has been producing new and horrendous diseases for several centuries. When you have wild animals, farm animals, and a billion plus humans with primitive sanitation all in a cluster where they eat, drink, and crap in the same place “rare” things are going to happen. I had to look up “pangolin” and “civit cat”. Boeing and Airbus just add a bit to the game. Supposedly the “plague” in the American southwest came in the rats and fleas in the boats from China in the 19th Century. Wash your hands, treat what you should have treated (i.e. comorbidities like obesity with high BP, Type 2 diabetes, etc.) and talk to your doc. Chill!

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    NoFixedAddress

    The MSM is no longer Main Stream Media but merely BSM (Bull Sh*t Media).

    There are heaps of great, real media sites with JoNova being one of them.

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    Deano

    Journalists. Yes, there’s good and bad but the bad ones can do a lot of damage. I remember when the Australian Governments internet meta data retention laws were being debated. Initially, almost all journalists were opposed. “Our sources could be revealed. Journalistic freedom could be compromised.” they cried.

    So the government allowed journalists specifically to be exempt from having their meta data retained. Suddenly, those journalists who purport to be working to protect us all decided the new data laws were entirely justified. I’ve never forgotten that.

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    CHRIS

    Just read that a huge personal data leak from Facebook has affected over 500 million users globally. Governments of the world (especially the USA) are directly responsible for this. When are people going to realise that a combination of the “Tech Titans” and world governments are the cause of society falling into a distopian 1984-style world???

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      NoFixedAddress

      merely BS-Media as the actual, supposed, break in occurred some years ago.

      If not.. call faceache’s fone number.

      If your game.

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    CHRIS

    IF IF IF IF

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