Roundup April 26, 2021

Information and my reactions of news.

I begin this roundup with my thoughts on comments from conservatives about restricting voting for those who are uninformed or ignorant of civics and issues.

An article in the Washington Post reported on comments made by an Arizona Republican member of their state legislature. State Representative John Kavanagh (R) stated, on CNN, that, “Not everybody wants to vote, and if somebody is uninterested in voting, that probably means that they’re totally uninformed on the issues. Quantity is important, but we have to look at the quality of votes, as well.” Of course, he later tried to walk back his words, but that’s to be expected from those who make ignorant statements showing the truth of their beliefs.

An article in USA Today, used in the Washington Post article, on remarks made about voting, gave some more examples. From the article, “For example, Andrew McCarthy stated in National Review: “It would be far better if the franchise were not exercised by ignorant, civics-illiterate people.” Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson, a Republican, warned of the dangers of voting by the “uninformed.” Kevin Williamson, also at National Review, asked whether America “would be better served by having fewer — but better — voters.”

Who are these ignorant and civics-illiterate voters? It’s minorities and the poor who these conservatives are crying about. You know, the people who came out and voted for Joe Biden. Those votes have scared Republicans so badly that they have come out openly for voter suppression by writing and enacting laws to the advantage of Republicans in future elections.

If we use their thinking we must then examine a group overlooked by these “patriots.” That group would be the white supremacist racists, QAnon believing, Trump-loving, LGBTQ hating, REPUBLICANS! These Republicans consider themselves true patriots, defenders of the Constitution, moral and ethical Christians, and the only segment of society capable of determining the direction of American life.

They’re not educated, civics-aware voters. They can’t be. For instance, followers of QAnon are people mentally incapable of using critical reasoning skills (including Republican luminaries Representatives Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene). This is clearly demonstrated by their idiotic beliefs of the conspiracy theories espoused by QAnon. What critically thinking person could believe that Democrats are/were running a child sex ring out of the basement of a pizza restaurant in Washington, D.C.? How can “good” Christians categorize those people who deserve the love of Jesus Christ and the rest, like the LGBTQ+ community, who will burn in hell, be educated voters? How can white supremacist racists who want all minorities dead or removed, just as Hitler wanted all Jews exterminated, be educated voters (consider too the number of white people they’d kill for siding with minorities over their white America dreams)?

Certainly these Republicans should be allowed to vote. Of course, they are excused by the commenters I wrote of above. I’m sure that Republicans can’t see any problems with those voters and the democracy they’d have in power. Wait, make that dictatorship, since they want Trump and a family dynasty he’d institute.

That makes John Kavanagh, Andrew McCarthy, Michael Watson, Kevin Williamson, and others of their ilk, to be nothing short of bigoted hypocrites. Apparently they believe the U.S. Constitution doesn’t extend to all the people. Now, that’s ignorant! They and those like them should be the ones denied the right to vote if anyone should be.

Now we move on to an article on heavy.com about a Tennessee man, Sam Johnson. Johnson is the CEO of a company called VisuWell, a telemedicine platform company. It seems Johnson decided to harass an LGBTQ teen boy who chose to wear a dress to his prom. Johnson took offense at the teen’s appearance, telling the teen that he shouldn’t be wearing a dress. The teen’s boyfriend, who was recording the interaction on his phone, related that Johnson made comments, “You look disgusting, you look ridiculous, you look like an idiot…” In the end Johnson was thrown out of the hotel this occurred at, as well as being told by others to leave the teen alone.

What a bigoted sob! Where the hell do people get the idea that they have the right to harass anyone, for any reason. Obviously, they were not taught to mind their own business when they were growing up. That or they decided they could make anything their business, as Johnson clearly did in this case.

Now, Johnson told Newsweek that the was no truth the accusations. He said he was just handling “obnoxious, loud behavior by this group of teens.” Funny, that’s not what we see in the video – which Johnson says (without proof) was edited. I’m willing to bet that if you asked Johnson, he’d tell you he is a “good” Christian too. In reality, he’s a sick, twisted, coward for his inability to allow people to express themselves. To me, his petty behavior is why we have hate crime laws in America.

I wonder if he would be considered to be a person who would make an educated and responsible voter the Republicans want?

Just these two articles alone show the problem with so many people (all Republicans maybe?) in our country. Their ignorance and hatred for all they disagree with leads them to condemn others and decry the inability of those they oppose to be less human and capable than they are. Are Democrats and the left perfect? Nope, not by a long shot. But, they shine compared to the morons I’ve written about in this article. If they are so determined to force people to follow their beliefs only, then maybe they should all relocate and create their own country of bigoted, racist white people. I suggest Antarctica.

Until next time

QAnon is Not #SavingOurChildren

Human Trafficking is a Real Problem, Not a Conspiracy

Tonight I’d like to introduce you to Babylon Jones, a.k.a. furiousbabs, an enthusiastic Zillennial activist who’s just about sick of the direction America’s headed in. Babylon will be authoring posts of interest about their passions, political outlook, and general relevant interests. -John Broge

#SaveOurChildren. It’s a tag that’s been rampant on social media over the last couple of months (perhaps longer, depending on what sources you consume), sometimes being spammed in the comments of totally unrelated posts in an effort to “raise awareness.” This disinformation campaign, spearheaded by QAnon leadership and carried out to the masses by your hysterical Aunt Barbara is muddying the waters and actively hindering the real fight against real human trafficking. Now, you might be asking “what’s this kid know about it? Is she a human trafficker?? Was she a victim???” Well, all I’ll say is that some kids were obsessed with keeping their Tamagotchis alive or having a foot spa day with some Orbeez, I was obsessed with learning about human trafficking. It’s still my life’s goal to be a federal prosecutor specializing in these types of cases. So, in this piece, I’m gonna start by setting the record straight – talking about what human trafficking really is, and perhaps more importantly, what it definitely isn’t. Then we’re gonna go over Pizzagate and why these kinds of conspiracies pop up at the times that they do. Finally, I’m going to discuss why the QAnon trafficking conspiracy is really so harmful, why it’s so effective for its target demographic, and yes, why it’s so darn infuriating to those of us actually in the know. 

Human trafficking is a business. Full stop. This is where the story starts and ends; it’s not an action movie, it’s not a conspiracy theory, and it’s not a political movement for either side of the spectrum. This business is global, it grows annually and exponentially, and it is run by people of all genders, nationalities, races, socioeconomic classes, and intelligence levels. Something insurmountably important to know, too, is that most human trafficking is not sex trafficking. Labor trafficking is more rampant than sex trafficking worldwide, including in the US (UNODC). Additionally, trafficking is woven into our lives – and woven right into the fabric of those GAP jeans your grandma bought you. Atlanta, GA is the fourth-largest human trafficking hub in the world (CTDC) and most big-box retailers have been using labor trafficking victims – including children – to manufacture their clothes and other products off and on for literally decades (LastWeekTonight). 

There are agencies – both official government-run ones and community-led alike – working every day to find and save trafficking victims and dismantle trafficking operations.Those trendy articles you’ve been seeing about “65 children saved from a human trafficking operation in Ohio!!!”? That happens every day around the world; it’s a constant battle. Now, I know we all love those juicy statistics, so I’ll give you some: the Polaris Project identified 22,326 victims and survivors of human trafficking last year; according to the Counter Trafficking Data Collaborative (CTDC), most victims of sex trafficking are recruited by an intimate partner, and while most victims of any type of trafficking are indeed female, for the 9-11 age bracket, 53% of victims are males. 

My final and super-important informative note on human trafficking is also about what it isn’t. Human trafficking and sex work are not the same thing. I mean this, whether we’re talking about the Red Light District in Amsterdam, a willing prostitute on a street corner in New Jersey, or a teacher who has an OnlyFans as a side hustle. Adults of all genders (since y’know, children can’t consent) who willingly engage in any form of sex work, including porn, prostitution, escort services, or sugaring, are not victims – they are not being exploited, and they are not tragedies of a debaucherous culture. If anything, sex trafficking is a byproduct of an unhealthy, patriarchal, sex-negative society wherein sex is something that “happens to” vulnerable populations and is “done by” powerful ones. 

Now let’s dive into the meat and potatoes of why we’re bothering to discuss human trafficking right this second (more than any other second). The “elite liberal pedophile underground sex trafficking ring” conspiracy from QAnon is not new, not even close. Hate to accuse people of plagiarism but, this crap started in the ‘80s. If you’ve never heard of the McMartin Preschool conspiracy, allow me to brief you: a mother with unaddressed mental health problems claimed that her son had been sodomized by his preschool teacher, and from there, a massive scandal involving preschools across the nation emerged. Parents (mostly conservatives) began insisting that their children were having their blood taken for Satanic rituals by the operators of this preschool exploitation ring, among other horrific claims (Reinhold). 

Fast forward a few decades to 2016, when the shiny “new” Pizzagate theory took hold. Since apparently Hillary Clinton’s emails are the topic that’s going to destroy the world, of course they’d come up here; basically, WikiLeaks released some emails between Clinton and her campaign chief, and 4chan (the even more white supremacist embryo of QAnon) trolls jumped on it immediately. There was a handkerchief identified as having a pizza-related map on it, the owner’s name was apparently an anagram for the French phrase “I love children,” and very long, stupid story short, eventually Trump’s supporter base was entirely convinced that there was an actual child sex trafficking ring being perpetrated via the Comet Ping Pong pizzeria. And I mean convinced; location owners received death threats (Young). Now here we are in 2020 – there are ostensibly child sex trafficking rings around every corner, including on the overstock website Wayfair, where cabinets named after missing children were allegedly being sold for tens of thousands of dollars, and where QAnon has convinced a gullible conservative fanbase that liberals are selling thousands of children – and more importantly, that King Trump is going to take those demons to church. 

So why is this narrative so incredibly effective? Well, the first reason has absolutely nothing to do with politics, and it’s very simple: your average Joe doesn’t know how to make heads or tails of a statistic. Like I said earlier, we all love statistics. They’re snappy and shocking, and often very, very misleading. Some people get statistics from wildly unreliable sources and then spout them as gospel; other times (more often), they use data from reputable sources, such as the ones I’ve already used here, but the reader has absolutely no context for what they’re looking at. For example, the Polaris source I used shows that sex trafficking occurs a lot more often than labor trafficking in the United States – “but how can that be?” you cry, since I just said earlier that labor trafficking occurs more frequently. First of all, the Polaris Project relies on reports to their hotline; a lot of labor trafficking victims don’t know they can or think they can’t afford to call someone for help. Also, there’s a concept in criminological measurement called the “dark figure.” This refers to the amount of crime that goes unreported, and trust me – the dark figure is big when it comes to trafficking (Pepinsky). Both of these things being said, it’s unfathomably easy to either twist or genuinely misread statistics if you don’t know what you’re talking about.

So we’ve got these sensational, enraging statistics about child sex trafficking that QAnon is spewing left and right, and perhaps the bigger piece to the effectiveness puzzle is the community for which this conspiracy has been carefully cultivated. Conservatives have a lot of anger; we all do, but specifically, conservatives have a lot of violent, generalized anger. This type of conspiracy is a perfect beacon for them – an invisible enemy to rally around? Sign Aunt Barbara up, man! BLM is gaining traction, leftists are annoyingly protected by like, “the law,” but by God, pedophiles are still universally hated; all the better if they’re on the left. And, disgustingly – all the better if they’re Jewish. Every conspiracy theory has a strong thread of anti-Semitism running through it (heard of the Rothschilds?), but how many times have you heard George Soros’s name pop up in the context of QAnon? Chances are, a lot. 

The final reason that this conspiracy is so effective is because, unfortunately, it’s very palatable. Crimes against children are one of the most abhorred acts in Western society, and we’re collectively extremely reluctant not to believe allegations about them. This brings me to why these conspiracies arise when they do – it’s a perfect demonization tactic. What was happening in the ‘80s? Well, a lot, but besides pet rocks and Reaganomics, conservatism was exploding; in 2016, obviously there was an election happening, and here we are in an election year again. There is no better way to make your enemy everyone’s enemy than by saying they’re hurting kids. 

I can tell you without doubt that QAnon is disabling the actual fight against human trafficking. Mainstream media constantly reporting on agencies’ sting operations renders those agencies largely ineffective in carrying out stings for at least a few months. We now have #MommaBears gearing up with their AKs ready to “do bad things to worse people,” not only potentially putting themselves in danger, but also potentially putting victims in danger if they decide to go do some vigilante justice with no idea what they’re doing (not even to mention we really do not need more things for conservatives to think they have a right to shoot at right now). Spamming #SaveOurChildren turns people away from learning about real human trafficking because they’re sick of hearing about the fake version, and now trying to do any kind of Google search about the subject pulls up mostly news stories – some condeming the movement, some spreading its message, almost none giving useful information. Another hidden consequence that most people don’t even want to consider is what the QAnon narrative does to the pedophile community – and yes, I’m sorry to tell you, there is a community. It’s not a valid part of the LGBT+ community (like some media sources are trying to convince you), but there are genuine communities of pedophiles trying to refrain from ever offending, including refraining from consuming child pornography. Hearing about how much they deserve to die is detrimental to their mental health, and may lead to increased suicide or may encourage them to just go ahead and offend, since everyone hates them anyway. 

Finally, I’m just gonna go on a little rant about why this “trend” is infuriating far beyond its concerning nature. How dare anyone use human trafficking victims as a political pawn? And I’m not even talking about Q leadership (we know they’re dirtbags anyway) – I’m talking specifically about the hysterical Aunt Barbaras. I’ve seen friends who’ve never said a peep about this issue suddenly flooding their own feeds with the latest “news” about the horror of child sex trafficking with a less-than-subtle chaser of what we should “do” about it – “did you know that 80% of trafficking victims have to cross an official border?? Makes you think…” They do not care about the labor trafficking crisis, nor the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women (which is becoming worse literally by the day), nor about adult victims of human trafficking, nor about the children being detained and “lost” by ICE – none of it, and to top it off, they have no idea what they’re talking about and have the audacity to lecture people who do. At its core, the QAnon conspiracy is a virtue signaling load of crap that gives white conservatives an excuse to be angry and feel protective about no one. Care about more than hypothetical white children – do better. 

As a final note, if you’d like to learn more about the real problem with human trafficking, do go ahead and research Operation Underground Railroad, the Polaris Project, Liberty Shared, the A21 Campaign, and the International Justice Mission. If you think you know about someone being trafficked, call the Polaris hotline at (888) 373-7888. Teach your kids how to be safe online, and learn about who your family members and friends are close with – even if it’s an intimate partner or a parent. Thanks for reading.

Sources: 

CTDC. “Global Data Hub on Human Trafficking.” Counter Trafficking Data Collaborative, 2018. Retrieved from https://www.ctdatacollaborative.org/

LastWeekTonight. “Fashion” [YouTube video]. HBO, 2015. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdLf4fihP78

Pepinsky, Harold. “The Growth of Crime in the United States.” American Academy of Political and Social Science. Retrieved from https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/000271627642300104

Reinhold, Robert. “The Longest Trial – A Post-Mortem; Collapse of Child Abuse Case: So Much Agony for so Little.” New York Times, 1990. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/1990/01/24/us/longest-trial-post-mortem-collapse-child-abuse-case-so-much-agony-for-so-little.html

The Polaris Project. “2019 Data Report.” Polaris: Freedom Happens Now, 2019. Retrieved from https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Polaris-2019-US-National-Human-Trafficking-Hotline-Data-Report.pdf

UNODC. “Global Report on Trafficking In Persons 2018.” United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2018. Retrieved from https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/glotip/2018/GLOTiP_2018_BOOK_web_small.pd

fYoung, Cathy. “‘Pizzagate’ Recalls the Debunked Child Sex Rings of the ‘80s and ‘90s.” Observer, 2016. Retrieved from https://observer.com/2016/12/pizzagate-recalls-the-debunked-child-sex-rings-of-the-80s-and-90s

Are Republicans Destroying their Party?

We Can Certainly Hope They Are.

It seems like every day we find ourselves learning about the latest act of stupidity by the Republican party politicians, political wannabes, celebrities, the President, and others. It is to the point where we must consider if these conservatives are destroying their party. It’s worth looking at and deciding for ourselves. Whether it’s Trump’s lies, McConnell’s intransigence, Coronavirus minimizers and deniers, QAnon conspiracy theory believers, and general pot stirring by Republicans, there’s a little something for everybody’s daily consumption of media stories.

It would all be ridiculously funny if it wasn’t a serious view of how the Republican’s attempt to maintain their hold on Congress and the Presidency. It’s dangerous to just laugh off the things the Republicans are trying to do. Especially when it comes to Donald Trump and his wet dreams of enacting his fascist dynasty to control the country under his authoritarian dictatorship.

We all have heard Trump on his lack of concern about the coronavirus, telling the country on more than one occasion how it will just “go away” at some point. He keeps around him plenty of people who publicly support his beliefs and ignores the experts on the pandemic. He cares not at all of how many contract and die from the virus. This is simply because he is a sociopath, as well as being so egotistical that all he wants are constant words of praise reinforcing his delusions. But, there are other things he is doing as well.

Just yesterday Trump admitted that he is sabotaging the US Postal Service to screw up mail-in balloting, harming the 2020 elections. In a Vice.com article Trump is reported to have said, “They need that money in order to make the Post Office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots. But if they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting, because they’re not equipped to have it.” His Postmaster General, who he has in his back pocket like so many other Administration members, has brought turmoil to the USPS, issuing new rules and procedures to slow down mail delivery. The Postmaster General, Louis Dejoy, has even ordered the removal of sorting machines at mail distribution centers according to a businessinsider.com story This will significantly slow down mail delivery even more, including election ballots.

Then we have Senator Mitch McConnell, Senate Majority Leader, trying to save his hold on his Senate seat at the same time he’s intentionally hurting Americans. He has washed his hands of any further work trying to work out a deal with Democrats to approve a new coronavirus bill. He’s leaving it up to the Trump Administration to negotiate an acceptable bill. With Americans losing the extra $600 unemployment payments, McConnell is causing Americans to be unable to keep their homes, feed their families, to obtain medical care, and just live day-to-day. As I wrote in my “Open Letter to the Filthy Rich” post, 17 – 28 million people are under threat of eviction now that the eviction moratorium has ended. McConnell has also made it clear that no new relief bill will be brought up for a vote if it does not contain language protecting businesses from being sued by employees who contract COVID-19 at work. Make no mistake, McConnell has the blood of innocents on his hands. But, lets move on to the next election issue.

Hopefully you have heard of QAnon and their conspiracy theory. I’ll just provide a small recap. From wbur.com, “QAnon is a far-right conspiracy theory and loosely organized network centered around the belief that the U.S. is controlled by a cabal of child sex trafficking, Democratic elites hell-bent on bringing down President Trump. Followers believe these elites, led by Dr. Anthony Fauci, have gone so far as to manufacture the coronavirus to bring Trump down. They heed cryptic online dispatches of someone named Q who’s anonymous — hence QAnon — who claims the highest government security clearance.“

It sounds extremely ridiculous doesn’t it? Well, there are a number of Republican candidates for Congress who are believers or followers of QAnon. Marjorie Taylor Green won her runoff election to be the Republican candidate in Georgia’s 14th Congressional District and is expected to win in November. She has made videos stating her support for QAnon and she has made racist statements in videos as well. While there are Republicans who have repudiated her belief and her racism, it isn’t enough. Besides her, there are 10 or more other candidates who are QAnon followers – all Republicans running for Congress this year. (Sarcasm alert) Any who win their races can go to Congress and set up the QAnon Caucus. These believers need to be ridiculed publicly for their idiotic beliefs. Not one of them is fit to be a member of Congress in my opinion.

Next, we pull from the greatest hits collection in a redux of birtherism. It’s already being proclaimed that Senator Kamala Harris is not eligible to be President or Vice President because her parents were not legal residents when Kamala was born in Oakland, California in 1964. This is evidence that many people haven’t read, or can’t comprehend, the US Constitution. There is no requirement that a candidate’s parents must be legal residents. The candidate must have been born in the United States, which Senator Harris was. If you don’t believe me, go read Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution. Hang on, I’ll help you out. Article 2, Section 1 states:

No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.

Now, facts probably won’t stand with people who want to believe a lie, especially since they elected the biggest liar in America. The political right gave no peace to Barack Obama, why should it be any different for Kamala Harris. It’s just a tactic to confuse the gullible and maintain their votes for party candidates.

It’s like the Trump’s moves in sending federal agencies into Portland, OR, to clamp down on protestors considered to be anarchists, antifa radicals (there being no antifa organization), and domestic terrorists. I wrote about Portland in my post “The Secret Police” back in July. No one can forget the nightly scenes of the brutality dished out by these federal storm troopers against the protestors, while they “protected” the federal courthouse. Republicans stood behind the actions taken by Trump. Eventually federal agencies were dispatched to other cities across America to spread more of Donald Trump’s law and order brutality.

Nothing will likely change the course the Republicans are taking on their journey to the ballot box in November. However, what Republicans aren’t considering is that even if they survive the election this year there is what occurs beyond 2020. They are making more enemies than friends with their foolishness and disregard for our society. Many people who voted for him in 2016 won’t be voting for Trump in 2020. As an article on theguardian.com reported, Kevin, a Arizona pastor and lifelong Republican voted for Trump, but now states, “I’ve seen how he has tried to divide our country and that is not something I want, nor what our country should have … This man is an absolute danger to our country.” He is not the only Republican who won’t vote for Trump again.

These beliefs and behaviors appear to be eating the Republican Party from the inside out. But, the deterioration of the Republican Party will allow America to radically change and become a nation without inequality and hatred, provided we rise to the challenge. At the minimum, it may allow the breaking of the two party stranglehold on the American government.

We have no idea of what foolishness by Republicans may be reported tomorrow. It’s clear to me how the Republican Party is pulling itself apart. Tomorrow could be the day it implodes.

Until next time,

Coronavirus and Conspiracy Theories

What does the coronavirus and conspiracy theories have in common? They both start with the letter ‘C’.

The number of U.S. confirmed coronavirus cases is, at the time of this writing, 1,562,714. The number of deaths from the coronavirus stands at 93,863. Keep those numbers in mind.

The Big Picture:

Okay, maybe that is the easy answer. There are no commonalities between the conservative conspiracy beliefs and the deadliest pandemic since the 1918 Spanish Flu. Yet, here in America there is a fair many people who believe one or more conspiracy theories about the coronavirus. It would be a totally laughing matter if it weren’t for the fact that there are prominent personalities in government (President Trump and Rush Limbaugh) and the media (Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and others at Fox News) who buy into this horse manure in one form or another.

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