Independent News

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BBC:

Conspiracist charged over alleged French coup plot

Rémy Daillet is accused of forming an extremist group to plan a series of attacks against the French state.

French reports say he allegedly recruited soldiers for an attempt to seize the presidential palace in Paris.

Mr Daillet’s lawyer denied the allegations and called him a “political prisoner”.

Once a regional leader of a centrist political party, Mr Daillet, 54, has become an influential figure in French conspiracy circles.

The Frenchman was already being prosecuted for allegedly organising the abduction of an eight-year-old girl at her mother’s request in eastern France in April.

Aaron Blake/WaPo:

The most shocking new revelation about John Eastman

He and Trump were not just pressing forward despite the mob; they apparently were trying to leverage it.

“Well, Kevin, I guess these people are more upset about the election than you are,” Trump told House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), as relayed by another GOP lawmaker.

The comment is characteristically Trumpian. It was suggestive that maybe McCarthy might heed what the mob was trying to tell him, even if Trump didn’t say so explicitly. And thanks to Trump’s efforts to block disclosures to the Jan. 6 committee and the tight lips of McCarthy and other Republicans who spoke with Trump during the riot, we don’t know much about what Trump was saying or doing that day.

But new revelations from The Washington Post on Friday night reinforce that there was indeed an effort to leverage the mob — quite explicitly.

Madeline Holcombe/CNN:

Gen Z is growing up during a pandemic. They have a message for the rest of us

Many young people told CNN they felt helpless while others worried about their mental health. “This pandemic has brought me self-reflection and analysis, but it also was a test on the world and this country, and I fear we are failing,” said Ella Stromberg, a 17-year-old from Vancouver, Washington.

Young Americans may not have autonomy over how they attend school, if their families get vaccinated or the policies elected officials implement, but they are observing the victories and pitfalls of those who do.

NY Times:

Covid Shots Are a Go for Children, but Parents Are Reluctant to Consent

Vaccinating 5- to 11-year-olds could be a big step toward returning to normal life in the U.S., but even parents who got the shot are worried about how it might affect their kids.

But a report this month from researchers at Northeastern, Harvard, Rutgers and Northwestern universities found that parental concerns around the Covid vaccination had increased “significantly” from June through September. Chief among them, researchers said, were the newness of the vaccine, whether it has been sufficiently tested, efficacy, side effects and long-term health consequences.

According to a survey released Thursday by Kaiser Family Foundation, scarcely one in three parents will permit their children in this newly eligible age group to be vaccinated immediately. Two-thirds were either reluctant or adamantly opposed. An Axios-Ipsos poll found that 42 percent of parents of these children said they were unlikely to have their children vaccinated.

Glenn Kessler/WaPo:

The repeated claim that Fauci lied to Congress about ‘gain-of-function’ research

But we see no reason to change the Two Pinocchio rating we awarded [Senator Rand] Paul. There is a split in the scientific community about what constitutes gain-of-function research. To this day, NIH says this research did not meet the criteria — a stance that is not an outlier in the scientific community. Indeed, it appears as if EcoHealth halted the experiment as soon as it seemed to veer in that direction.

Meanwhile, [Senators] Cotton and Cruz are spinning the letter as confirming what it does not say. They are welcome to offer an opinion about its meaning. But, so far, it’s not a fact that NIH has admitted funding gain-of-function research. So they also earn Two Pinocchios.

The Hill:

Subpoenas are a real worry for lawmakers facing Jan. 6 questions

Lawmakers who may have been involved with the planning of rallies on Jan. 6 are coming under renewed scrutiny over their roles, teeing up questions of whether the committee investigating the attack on the Capitol may take the historic step of subpoenaing sitting members of Congress.

A Sunday story from Rolling Stone didn’t directly tie Republican lawmakers to the violent assault, but two sources who are cooperating with the committee instead detailed multiple meetings with members of Congress to coordinate contesting the election results and plan the rallies that preceded the attack.

Ariel Edwards-Levy/CNN:

What the polls agree on about Biden’s approval rating

Notably, however, the polls provide a much narrower range in their estimates of how many people disapprove of Biden — all seven of those surveys put Biden’s disapproval rating somewhere between 48% and 52%. Instead, a good chunk of the variation has to do with the share of Americans who say they aren’t sure. Two of Biden’s worst recent polls, the Quinnipiac and Grinnell surveys, both found 12% saying they’re unsure about Biden’s job performance, or declining to offer an opinion. In the CNN, CBS and AP-NORC polls, by contrast, 1% or fewer didn’t weigh in.

EJ Dionne/WaPo:

Take the win, Democrats, and don’t look back

But however it turns out, the Virginia contest should force Democrats to confront the imperative of shifting the terms of the political debate. In a state Biden carried by 10 points, Youngkin managed to dominate the campaign’s final weeks with a shameful focus on critical race theory — which is not taught anywhere in the state — and the suppression of challenging books in high school curriculums.

Youngkin’s trafficking in racial backlash could work as well as it did, because Democrats have fallen short in fulfilling one of the most important aspirations of the Biden era. They hoped that politics could be defined more by how government can get useful things done and less by manufactured issues that promote moral panic among conservatives and sharpen divisions around race, immigration and culture.

Passing Biden’s program and defending it successfully offer all wings of his party the best opportunity they will have to push the day-to-day dialogue toward the tangible and the achievable.

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As a climate summit gets underway in Glasgow, Virginia prepares for a tense election day, and the souls of the dead rise to demand mostly chocolate, here’s some of what you may have missed on an otherwise quiet news day:

• ‘F*** you, we’re taking over your school boards,’ says conservative 1776 PAC leader

• Will BIPOC have the same access problems to booster shots as they did with the vaccine?

• Sitting Bull’s great-grandson identified, now he wants to bury him where ‘he will be respected’

• They put a spell on us: Black musicians and spooky tunes for Halloween

Community Spotlight:

• Community Spotlight: A tribute to Mr. Bus, one of Daily Kos’ most legendary characters

• ClimateBrief: Now that Germans are at risk of drowning, we are all balancing in the same lifeboat

• 365 Days of Climate Awareness 81 – The Kyoto Protocol

Also trending from the community:

• Senator Sinema, I do not think that infinitive means what you think it means

• Encouraging COVID Convo with a 2016 Trump Voter

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Helllllllo Daily Kos readers! I’m Michelle, and I’m on the Daily Kos Equity Council. The Equity Council is a Staff (and Community!) resource that is working to make Daily Kos a place where everyone can thrive. We’ve put together a great list of content we found this month under the cut. Grab some snacks and fresh drinks, and put on your favorite playlist for reading. Let’s learn together! 

First up, two pieces from our own fearless Faith, who wrote this piece on microaggressions and this piece following up on an in-house microaggression panel we held for the Daily Kos Staff. If you missed either of these, be sure to check them out. Faith is much better with words than I am, but I appreciate the effort we’re all putting in to making Daily Kos a place where all progressive folks can feel like they belong. 

Related to the above, here’s an interview from 2020 with one of the panelists, Dr. Kevin Nadal, on NPR, about the long- and short-term effects of microaggressions for those who experience them. Microaggressions Are A Big Deal: How To Talk Them Out And When To Walk Away

Here’s a great piece directed at managers who want to make their workplaces safer for marginalized employees by Sheena Daree Miller on Idealist. Reducing Personal Bias | Tips for Managers

The Equity Council is hosting a second panel for Daily Kos Staff, on fighting ableism, in December. We’ll share the video and details with y’all, as well, but if you’d like to do a little reading before that kicks off, I recommend this piece from Culture Amp’s blog: Disability in the workplace: Barriers to employment & retention. Making an accessible workplace is not rocket surgery, and companies lose out on hiring and keeping great employees by not acknowledging that. 

Here’s an excerpt from a new book by Kyla Schuller, The Trouble with White Women, that appeared in Slate this week: For Me, but Not for Thee: How white feminism failed Native Americans in the late-19th century. Schuller’s book takes a look back at several of white feminism’s icons and contrasts them with BIPOC activists who were fighting for actual equity at the same time. This excerpt looks at Alice Fletcher, a late 19th-century white feminist who was as instrumental in separating Indigenous people from their land and children as she was in pushing the boundaries on (white) women’s roles in society, and contrasts her against Frances E.W. Harper, the Black activist and writer who once shared a stage with Fletcher. Harper’s rebuttal of Fletcher on that stage is a work of art. While I have not yet read Schuller’s book, Harper’s and Fletcher’s stories illustrate that “for their time” is a poor defense for racist actions, no matter when they occurred. Fletcher, as well as many other icons of white feminism, were well aware of the harm they were causing in the moments they were doing the harm. Both Fletcher the living woman and Fletcher the white feminist icon benefited directly from the harm she did to Indigenous Americans. 

Related to the above, and also a little bit to some links below, this is a piece from 2014 by a writer who is very dear to me, and it helps me, a white lady, every day. What I Mean When I Say White Feminism, by Cate Young. 

Next is this thoughtful piece from The Mary Sue, Retellings Aren’t “Overdone” Just Because Marginalized Authors Finally Have a Chance, by Alyssa Shotwell. This stood out in particular for me: 

While some retellings are rather modern and straightforward, often, when put in the hands of marginalized writers, new aspects can be explored, as well as minor elements of the original work expanded on—and it still really took the advent and leverage of the internet to get mainstream publication of marginalized authors’ takes on classic texts. If nothing else, these adaptations allow people just get to truly see themselves in the text, no “but …” required.

In news of the painfully obvious, here’s Nicole Narea at Vox on how we fix the worker shortage: by fixing the absurdly and unnecessarily complicated immigration system. Immigrants Could Fix the US Labor Shortage. 

Some context on this next one. As phrased by a lovely colleague of mine, “NY likes to think they did it first.” Well, several other cities (including Detroit) have, in fact, done what NYC talks about in the link below, they declared racism a public health crisis. Racism is Declared a Public Health Crisis in New York City (NYT). 

Finally, a fantastic and well-researched video from Khadija Mbowe on the missing people who are ignored when we get caught up in “Missing White Woman Syndrome.” 
 

Mbowe’s YouTube channel is worth a subscribe if you aren’t aware of her work. Check out her video descriptions for even more resources, and, frequently, lists of great places that could use your donations. 

Thanks for joining me on our first link tour! What have you been reading/watching/learning this week? 

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A respected community leader who in recent months has been one of the foremost champions for vulnerable Haitian families seeking safety in the U.S. was this week awarded the 2021 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award. Guerline Jozef, co-founder and executive director of nonprofit organization Haitian Bridge Alliance, accepted the honor outside California’s Otay Mesa Detention Center, calling attention to the continued, inhumane detention of immigrants in the U.S.

“The Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award identifies and honors those who embody Robert F. Kennedy’s belief that the power of individual and collective moral courage can overcome injustice,” RFK Human Rights said. The organization was founded by Ethel Kennedy, and is today led by their daughter Kerry Kennedy. “Each year, we honor outstanding champions of social justice who stand up to oppression, even at great personal risk, in the nonviolent pursuit of human rights.”

“This year, we’re proud to honor Guerline Jozef, executive director and co-founder of the Haitian Bridge Alliance,” the organization continued. 

Jozef and Haitian Bridge Alliance have been among the leading advocates demanding a halt to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) deportation flights to Haiti—flights that are continuing this very day—and full accountability for the mistreatment of Black migrants both at the border and within federal immigration detention facilities. On Wednesday, Jozef accepted her honor outside one such detention facility in California.

“Guerline Jozef is a true hero, and no one is more deserving of an award celebrating courage in the pursuit of human rights and social justice,” FWD.us President Todd Schulte said in a statement received by Daily Kos. “Through her leadership of the Haitian Bridge Alliance, Guerline has not only dedicated her life to defending the rights and dignity of Haitian and Black immigrants and saved countless lives, but has shone a light on our cruel and long-broken immigration system that disproportionately disadvantages Black, brown, and indigenous people seeking protection.”

“She continues to be a leader advocating against cruel and inhumane policies that harm people seeking asylum, particularly Black migrants, such as Title 42, and the outrageous continued deportation of Haitians,” Schulte continued. Other leading organizations joined in to congratulate Jozef.

“This award is for my brave brothers and sisters who were subject to abuse, inhumane and unjust treatment under the bridge in Del Rio, Texas last month,” Jozef said following news of her award. On Wednesday, advocates urged members of the public to show their support by sending a message to the Biden administration urging a halt to Haitian deportation flights and an end to the anti-asylum Title 42 policy. Click here to send your message today.

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Welcome back to the weekly Nuts & Bolts Guide to small campaigns. Every week I try to tackle issues I’ve been asked about. With the help of other campaign workers and notes, we address how to improve and build better campaigns or explain issues that impact our party.

The Democratic coalition is a large one, and it is filled with a lot of different groups and different issues that matter to them. All of these issues are important, and all of them deserve to have room to be heard. Unfortunately, there is often an expectation that our allies will instantly become puppets and decide that their duty is to always back us on every issue, and to not push for items on their own agenda. There is a difference between a campaign and advocating for an issue, and often candidates become very frustrated that Democratic allies aren’t “doing enough” to help their campaign, or they won’t back off when a candidate is on the wrong side of an issue versus a Democratic donor and ally. This week on Nuts & Bolts, we’re going to talk about the fact that our allies are not our puppets, and they need to be respected for what they are trying to accomplish.

Don’t expect allies to wade into completely unwinnable races.

I have long advocated that Democratic candidates should challenge in every single race, if for no other reason than to divide Republican donor resources and force them to stay in their home district and raise and spend money versus building an insurmountable war chest. That’s a great idea—for candidates. For Democratic allies, however, their end goal is far more about getting actual policy passed in a statehouse or in the U.S. House, and in red states, that means that they often find themselves staying out of races where the Democratic candidate has no real chance to win. Why? Because they don’t want to find a Republican incumbent who is going to be even harder to deal with in the next legislative session, while they have gained nothing. If that Republican incumbent was always terrible, they might take a chance, but it is hard for them to encourage their donor base to invest in a race they aren’t going to win instead of a race they might win. They have to look at the odds for their donors and for their issues, and invest appropriately. 

What causes more Democratic campaigns to become agitated is the “friendly incumbent” rule. This guideline, supported by many advocacy organizations, says: If a Republican is sitting in a district and has been a solid vote in favor of their issue—whether it is pro-choice, pro-education, pro-union, etc. then they will endorse and sometimes financially help the Republican in the race. This infuriates Democratic campaigns, but we have to see it from the perspective of these organizations: If they are going to ask Republican legislators in red states to stand with them on tough issues in districts a Democratic candidate can’t hold, they cannot turn around and stab them in the back during the next election, as that could cost them a primary—and then, the organization has lost a voice fighting for their issue.

This sounds like advocates are terrible Republicans willing to support machines, who don’t see the big picture!

One of the emails I reviewed from the 2020 election had a sentence eerily close to the above, questioning why an organization didn’t do more to support them. I asked the candidate who didn’t win what public stance or statement they had made in support of the cause of the organization they wanted help from, and how did it turn out? Well, they refused to turn in a questionnaire from the organization or make a public statement, because on the advice of the campaign around them, they believed talking about LGBTQ issues would cost them the election and so they just couldn’t do it. “But they should know I would be better than the Republican!” Hold on there, sport.

Allies cannot make assumptions about the outcome of the way a legislator will behave once elected. There are many Democratic legislators all over the country who aren’t always in line with Democratic values, and I’m not talking about the U.S. Senate. Asking for an organization to put resources and effort into your campaign when you refuse to acknowledge they exist or even mention them is a pretty tall order. Partner organizations are not groups that decide they must do something because a Democratic campaign tells them to do so.

Allies are partners.

Democratic allies are partners. There are issues where you can have major disagreements with an organization that helps with Democratic funding, and discuss it openly and honestly. You may never come to an agreement, but if you hold open the discussion, you can make progress. There are strong Jewish, Catholic, Hindu, and Islamic organizations which have been supporters of Democratic candidates. Maybe you don’t always agree with an issue they champion or that they want  prioritized. Sit. Listen. Be respectful. Don’t assume that there is some sort of bad intent. 

Allies can be your partners and friends. What is the point, and what is to be gained by going out of your way to turn off and alienate part of your coalition because you believe they “aren’t doing enough,” or due to the fact you disagree? Stand on the issues you believe in, but if you are doing it out of the expectation of a reward cookie from our allies and partners, then the reason you are committed to that issue may need to be reevaluated.

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by Delilah Alvarado

This story was originally published at Prism.

Less than a year after COVID-19 vaccines were made available to the public, many Americans are now eligible to get a booster shot from Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson, increasing protection from a virus that has killed more than 738,000 people across the U.S.

Health officials say all three boosters are “highly effective” in reducing the risk of hospitalization, serious disease, and death, and some more vulnerable communities are being encouraged to get the booster shot as soon as possible.

Similar to the first round of vaccinations, booster shots are currently only available to certain demographics: The Moderna and Pfizer booster shots are available to those 65 or older, and those between the ages of 50–64 with medical conditions. However, those 18 years and older can receive a booster if they have an underlying medical condition, live in long-term care facilities, or work in high-transmission settings like hospitals, schools, homeless shelters, and correctional facilities. For the Johnson & Johnson booster, anyone over the age of 18 is eligible, but it might not be recommended if there is a history or possibility of blood clots. All boosters should be given at least six months after their COVID-19 vaccine was administered. Eligibility for the booster shots could expand as soon as more testing and data is gathered.  

Inequities and lack of access for BIPOC

For communities with an underlying distrust of the health care system due to disparate treatment and systemic inequities, getting a booster shot is especially important. Black, Native, and Latinx people are significantly more likely to contract and die from COVID-19. Despite being disproportionately affected by the virus, disinformation, lack of access to the vaccine, and vaccine hesitancy were a few of the factors responsible for the delay in vaccination rates among people of color. Health organizations, ad companies, local communities, and other officials worked together to help combat these hurdles and assure hesitant communities that the vaccine is safe and necessary. Vaccination rates for Black and brown people have been climbing in recent months, but now that boosters are available, communities and organizations aren’t letting up on fighting for access.  

One of the main hurdles during the vaccine rollout was the lack of access in certain communities. Eligibility criteria for the vaccines was initially more rigid than for the booster shots, and problems with accessibility for BIPOC made it possible for some more privileged groups to jump the line and gain access to the vaccine. Many essential workers beyond educators and physicians had to wait while wealthier white citizens received a shot first—even when they weren’t eligible.

Because of these issues, health physicians are encouraging people to wait to get a booster shot if they are not a part of a vulnerable group. And like with the vaccines, in some places such as Colorado, the number of white booster shot recipients is outpacing the number of Black and brown people.

Currently, 57% of the American population is fully vaccinated. Health officials say access to booster shots should not be as difficult as getting the vaccine, and the number of those getting boosters is outpacing those getting their first dose.

“The structural inequities, they’re not gone away completely, but they’ve dramatically been improved,” said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association. “We now have vans going into communities giving shots [and] we have beefed up the systems to move people and offer transportation. The community health centers that are in those communities are now giving vaccines, so they’ve increased the number of vaccinators–people giving shots. They’ve increased the number of places for people to get shots, and they’ve made the systems that give shots mobile so they can go into communities or go into those communities and bring people to where they get vaccinated.”

Getting the message out

Before eligible people can get their booster shots, they first have to know it’s their turn. In order to get the message out, some health officials are taking what they’ve learned from the vaccine distribution to ensure equitable access to everyone.

Mobile efforts continue to work in local communities with the help of churches after studies showed that medical professionals partnering with Black churches “in delivering COVID-19 education and vaccination could be an effective way of increasing vaccine uptake in Black communities.”

Pop-up clinics and mobile vaccine efforts have also curbed the other major hurdle that older, working-class people still face: online appointment set-ups. While making a local online portal seemed more efficient for some cities trying to relay vaccine information to residents, some of the websites dealt with bugs, complexities, and crashing—especially when vaccines were first available. Only having online portals made vaccine appointments inaccessible for many older Americans, a worry some have about the boosters.

Frank Fuentes, chairman of the U.S. Hispanic Contractors Association, said technology was one of the biggest hurdles the Latinx workforce faced in Texas—not a language barrier or hesitancy—when trying to get vaccinated. The problem was that the most vulnerable older, working-class people—construction workers, field workers, and hospitality workers—were not really on social media and could not navigate such technological systems nor take the time to make an appointment.

“It was shameful to me, because it was set up as a competition,” Fuentes said. “They only had so many vaccines. Whomever was the one that was smart enough, lucky enough to get the appointment through that stupid portal was the one who was going to get the vaccine.”

Technology might not be for everyone, but it can still be utilized in providing the right information to those online. Virtual conversations, campaigns, and professional health accounts continue to promote vaccinations, while others have gifs and reshareable content regarding boosters for social media and followers.

Because many other communities faced this issue, non-health organizations such as the U.S. Hispanic Contractors Association worked with local governments and health organizations to provide vaccines to not only their own organizations, but other workers as well, such as those in the food industry. They’re still focused on these efforts as boosters become available.

“Community-based organizations are very important because, a: They’re trusted messengers, and b: They know the community,” Benjamin said. “And I think they quite frequently provide services at times and in places that traditional providers don’t.”

And while vaccine hesitancy is still a problem, Benjamin believes it isn’t much of a concern anymore for communities of color, as health officials and organizations acknowledged the distrust and worked to educate and connect with communities, which brought the vaccination rate up.

“It’s less of an issue. It’s still there, but within the booster community, those folks got the shots, so they’re less likely to not want to get the booster,” Benjamin said.

Fortunately, there is a broader range of places to receive the booster shot, as doctor’s offices, clinics, and local pharmacy retailers are now more experienced and equipped to give them out.

Benjamin says to schedule a booster, people should look to how they received their first shots.

“If they got it with the health department, check with the health department. If they got it through one of the retail clinics [Walgreens, CVS], then go get it from there,” Benjamin said. “In most cases, you just have to do what you did before: Make an appointment and go in.”

Delilah Alvarado is a journalist from Austin, Texas, covering multiple sects including business, marginalized groups, social issues, and pop culture.

Prism is a BIPOC-led non-profit news outlet that centers the people, places, and issues currently underreported by national media. We’re committed to producing the kind of journalism that treats Black, Indigenous, and people of color, women, the LGBTQ+ community, and other invisibilized groups as the experts on our own lived experiences, our resilience, and our fights for justice. Sign up for our email list to get our stories in your inbox, and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

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As political bloggers, it’s our job to stay up to date on what’s going on in the national “conversation,” however ridiculous that conversation often becomes. Occasionally it’s necessary, though, to step back a bit from reacting to the political outrage du jour to more fully assess the broader picture of where we are—and what we’ve become—as a nation and, probably more importantly, as individuals. In 2016, it was almost a cliche to say “this is not normal,” but that staggering absence of normality (for those of us old enough to appreciate it) has over the ensuing five years grown more skewed and surreal, culminating in starkly visual and shocking terms with what we all witnessed happening on the steps of the U.S. Capitol in January.

The larger picture, as much as it gets lost in the weeds of the daily headlines, is this: We are now living in a country where the entire agenda of one of our two major political parties revolves around largely fictitious grievances stoked by right-wing media for profit and political gain. While the existence of that right-wing media is hardly a new development (Fox News, for example, has been around since the late 1990s), as it has become intertwined and entrenched with the sustaining platform of what we call “social media,” something different and more sobering has emerged, in the form of a dull, senseless and wholly impervious disregard for reality as it actually is. 

We were assured in 2016 that there must be very good reasons that archetypal “angry white males” were so incredibly angry. We were told about “economic displacement” and class envy. We were regaled with righteous, indignant horror stories about immigrants supposedly stealing their rightful jobs and poaching off of our schools and health care. We were told about the dwindling opportunities for those white males to get ahead, make a living, to fulfill what was characterized as the “American Dream.” And some of that seemed plausible enough: That’s how Donald Trump managed to slither into the White House, by catering to those grievances and promising white America that they wouldn’t be ignored by the so-called “liberal elites” (of course all Trump did was give their bosses a huge tax cut). But in truth, none of this seemed so bizarre and untoward that it couldn’t be attributed to classic right-wing race-baiting, a time-honored characteristic of the Republican Party since the 1960s, the reactionary consequence of Black folks agitating for equal voting and civil rights, yet another ugly vestige of a Civil War that had never really ended.

Even after it became clear that the Russian Federation sought to influence that 2016 election through social media, even when it was revealed that some enterprising firms such as Cambridge Analytica had mined reams of voter data that the Trump campaign used to target specific demographics with propaganda amplifying those same racist themes, it hadn’t yet really dawned on most of us just how pernicious and powerful these technologies had become, and how much they actually influenced human behavior. It wasn’t really until the COVID-19 pandemic hit that we saw how drastically social media could distort the minds of Americans, to the point where reality itself became a fungible item, to be manipulated at will according to the whims of whoever happened to be wielding the propaganda.

It was at the very outset of the pandemic that the overwhelming and insidious power of social media really came to the fore, when people began making grievously foolish decisions about their own life and death based solely on politically motivated misinformation they’d been fed on social media, mostly on Facebook. And as a result of a cynical leader and his political followers who gleefully stoked and amplified such propaganda for their own private ends, whatever sense of unity of purpose this nation ever possessed quickly and (probably) irrevocably vanished. In its place, for nearly half the nation that calls itself Republican, a fictional alternate world has now emerged, filled with violent, macabre fantasies and ginned-up hatreds, most of them completely untethered from reality.    

The teaching of critical race theory, for example, now the sole focus of Republican campaigns in multiple states, is simply not a real thing, not an “issue” at all (unless you happen to be enrolled in a graduate-level college Black studies program). Likewise, the threat of some predatory transgender person lurking in a girls’ bathroom is also an almost entirely fictional construct (conservatives are now howling about a teen allegedly involved in an assault in a Loudoun County, Virginia, criminal case, without acknowledging that young children have more to fear in bathrooms from Republican politicians than they do transgender people). The fact that these “issues” are almost entirely the product of race- and fear-based insecurities and ignorance doesn’t make them any less “real” to Republicans, in most part thanks to the overweening presence and ubiquity of tribe-based “information bubbles” created by social media.

Nor are there teeming hordes of migrants spreading disease among our population. The fixation on so-called immigration issues with little if any actual real-world personal relevance to tens of millions of Republican voters is simply another hot-button outrage generator from the right’s ready arsenal. Most Republicans have probably never spoken to an undocumented immigrant (unless they’ve employed them), let alone had their actual job supplanted by one. Their real-life experience with them is most often peripheral if at all, limited to having their lawns manicured or being handed a bag full of burgers at a fast food franchise by such folks. Yet the fear and resentment generated by constant repetition of these memes on social media has created an alternate universe where, much like the Red Scare in the 1950s, Republicans literally fear immigrants spreading crime to their towns, while reality suggests that such fears are wholly unjustified.

Nor are throngs of roving Black Lives Matter activists out and about, threatening their children who venture into urban areas. Republicans who believe these things apparently now live in a permanent defensive crouch, in constant fear and dread of what are largely social media-spun myths, amplified by Fox News. In a country with about 330 million people and tens of thousands of murders in any given year, one example (or even 10 examples, for that matter) of an undocumented person committing a crime is not a trend; it’s not even a tiny blip on the real-world radar of actual crime in this country. You want to know why violent crime went up in 2020? Because we’re in a fucking pandemic, forcing people out of work or into small spaces together for long and unbelievably stressful time periods. Of course there’s going to be an uptick in violent crime and aggressive, stupid, and reckless behavior. Anyone who’s driven on the roads for the past two years knows this.

The reality is that the majority of whites in this country have it relatively good. If they happen to be smart enough, most of them can attend some type of college or trade school. If they’re not, they’re still doing a hell of a lot better than most people of color. None of the lily-white insurrectionists who terrorized the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 looked like they missed many meals. Most of them had the money to spare to transport themselves across the country with little trouble, whether it was in their $50,000 pickup trucks or by jet airplane. Most of them had nice warm camo or hunting gear to keep them cozy before they assaulted Congress. And all of them, apparently, had smartphones and comprehensive internet and cable plans. But because of the impermeable bubble created by social media, they still consider themselves aggrieved “victims.” Of something.

People say that the terrorist attacks of 9/11 “changed everything.” Well, Jan. 6 changed everything too. For the first time we all got to see in living color on our TV screens just exactly how heinous a world has been spun out of whole cloth by the combination of Fox News and Facebook. We saw Americans literally hunting down other Americans, attacking cops, smashing up our national symbols, literally pissing and shitting on our sacred institutions, all spouting the same delusional nonsense they’d internalized from Facebook groups, Fox, and right-wing social media websites. And stoking this “Big Lie,” squatting over them all was Donald Trump, urging them on. Even after the insurrection failed, Republicans continue to glamorize or airbrush this sordid event as if it were something good or decent, many parroting their delusions as irrefutable truths. 

Yes, that “changed everything” for a lot of us. We finally saw the consequences of a poisonous social media-saturated culture wedded to a right-wing political philosophy. It’s called fascism, and there’s nothing “American” about it. It’s the same creeping authoritarian mindset that’s infected various countries in Europe over the past 20 years, and it’s the same mindless violence that tore the 20th century in half and just about destroyed the free world back in the 1930s.

It is absolutely clear that Facebook knew exactly what they were doing when they created this ecosystem of polarized hate. As reported by Jessica Guynn and Kevin McCoy for USA Today, (here via Yahoo news for those barred by the paywall) documents recently revealed by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen leave no doubt of the company’s knowledge about the potential monster they were birthing. The initial inquiry into the pernicious aspects of Facebook’s techniques occurred after the 2016 election, when “critics charged that the company’s apps exploited human psychology to hook people on social media, hijacking their time and undermining their well-being.” The manner in which Facebook “hooks” people has been well established: Each “like” is comparable to administering an endorphin dose. But the relationship between the way its news feed algorithm was structured for users practically begged for extreme content.

As Guynn and McCoy report:

[T]he focus on posts with high numbers of comments and likes rewarded outrage and resulted in the spread of more misinformation and divisive content, according to internal documents reviewed by USA TODAY. The more negative or incendiary the post, the further and faster it spread.

The symbiosis of “negative or incendiary” posts and overtly political content was more than obvious (the company’s internal documents, highlighted by Guynn and McCoy, acknowledged that “outrage and misinformation [were] more likely to be viral”), but just for good measure, Facebook even ran simulations based on fictional political users they’d created in order to see what content each type of user would gravitate to, and—just as importantly—what would be directed toward them.

The internal Facebook documents show how swiftly the platform’s recommendation algorithms can amplify polarization by sending users to content full of misinformation and extremism.

Facebook’s “simulations” involved a hypothetical conservative and hypothetical liberal Facebook user. Within five days, the “conservative” user was bombarded with radical right-wing content, while the liberal user was hit just as swiftly with excoriating, anti-Trump content. As Guynn and McCoy point out, particularly noxious, outlying content was provided to users by Facebook’s “reshare” feature in which posts not involving “friends” were shared to the user, based on assumptions about their interests.

The long and short of this social media paradigm is that people become radicalized by an insular system designed to reward and thereby encourage the spread of divisive content, to increase user engagement. Whether that is Facebook’s fault or the fault of human nature is frankly irrelevant: The point is that (at least in this country) it had indisputable effects, as particularly evidenced by the degree of polarization and now blind adherence to blatant misinformation by Republicans, the consequences of which have fractured our republic along political lines in ways we have not seen the likes of since 1861.

Haugen has stated:

“I saw Facebook repeatedly encounter conflicts between its own profits and our safety. Facebook consistently resolves these conflicts in favor of its own profits,” Haugen alleged during a Senate hearing this month. “The result has been more division, more harm, more lies, more threats and more combat.”

The worst aspect of all this is none of it should be happening. Of course, Americans have the right to expect that one of their political parties will actually set forth policies about what they can do for the country rather than stoke imaginary grievances and violence to maintain its power, whether on Facebook or otherwise. But more importantly, we all have a right not to suffer the consequences of someone else’s mindless manipulation, whether that person is of the left or right political persuasion. Especially if that manipulation leads to violence and acting out, the way it has for Republicans now wedded to the Big Lie.

Facebook has taken that right away. Without Facebook, yes, many of these folks would still exist. They’d still be out there. But they wouldn’t be getting together, marching in this delusional groupthink the way they are today. Whether it was through Facebook’s negligence, greed, or something worse, we’re only now beginning to find out; Haugen says the company’s decisions are “disastrous for our children, our privacy, and our democracy.” She doesn’t seem to be exaggerating based on what we’ve seen thus far.

Jessica J. González co-founded the anti-hate speech group Change the Terms. In an interview with The Guardian earlier this year, she stated:

“Facebook has let white supremacists organize and conspiracy theorists organize all over its platform and has failed to contain that problem,” González said. “In fact it has significantly contributed to the spread of that problem through its recommendation system.”

But regardless of whether Facebook is to blame, we’re now—all of us—forced to deal with a formidable and potentially deadly tool of political influence and social manipulation, one in its essence wholly artificial, almost completely unregulated, and one specifically designed to result in large swaths of our population absolutely convinced that they are in the possession of the truth, even when what they have absorbed is purely lies.

If that doesn’t spell danger to you, I don’t know what else possibly could.