Friday, June 12, 2026

ANDREW BRANCA: A world-class Medical examiner in [Zimmerman] trial testified that the beating was "absolutely likely to inflict death or serious bodily injury." That makes it a deadly force attack, justifying Zimmerman's deadly force defense.

from Andrew Branca.

He's like, oh, let's look at all these poor black victims. Trayvon Martin: George Zimmerman was acquitted.

Tamir Rice: no indictment. Michael Brown: no indictment.

Philando Castile: officer was acquitted.

Freddie Gray: officers were acquitted or charges dropped.

Terrence Crutcher: officer was acquitted.

Sylville Smith: officer acquitted. 

Chikei "Rick" Chao was found not guilty after the shooting death of 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton in South Carolina.

The "returning wallet" case could not be verified, but many people confuse it with Ralph Yarl, the black teen shot after going to the wrong house.  In that case, the shooter later pleaded guilty, so it was not a not-guilty verdict.

00:31.  And it's a mystery to her.  The reason these people were not convicted or sentenced must be racism.  It has to be racism.  All these poor black boys.  All these poor black boys.  It must be racism.  Well, let's take a look, shall we, Genius?

Trayvon Martin: George Zimmerman was acquitted. George Zimmerman went to trial on a charge of malice murder.  Here is what he looked like at the scene. Trayvon Martin was trying to murder him to beat his head through a sidewalk.  Those are pictures of George Zimmerman's face.  His nose is broken sideways on his face.  The back of his head was against the sidewalk, so every punch was actually two blows: the punch to the front of his face with Trayvon Martin mounted on top of him, and then the blow of the back of his skull against the sidewalk.  George Zimmerman's face and the back of his head immediately after Trayvon Martin stopped trying to beat Zimmerman to death by beating Zimmerman's skull through a concrete sidewalk stopped Trayvon Martin was stopped only because of a 9 millimeter round shot by Zimmerman through Martin's demonic little heart murderous, little heart.  Zimmerman's nose was broken sideways on his face.  By the way, when the media printed these photos for the public, did you know they printed them in black and white, so you wouldn't know what you were seeing was blood?  Contemptible eyewitness testimony describe Trayvon Martin mounted on top of a fallen Zimmerman, beating him viciously.  The witness testified, "MMA ground and pound style."  Testified Zimmerman was screaming for his life, for help that never came.  A world-class Medical examiner in the trial testified that the beating was "absolutely likely to inflict death or serious bodily injury."  That makes it a deadly force attack, justifying Zimmerman's deadly force defense.  

Did Karmelo Anthony suffer a beating like this or anything everyone is testifying to the contact of Austin Metcalf to Carmelo characterized it as a "soft push."  And they were not in the dark alone they were surrounded by dozens of people including many black people we're supposed to believe we're supposed to believe that Carmelo Anthony had a reasonable belief that Austin Metcalf and Hunter Metcalf we're going to be allowed to be him to death in front of all those black people?

What about Tamir Rice?  Tamir Rice was a 12-year-old in Cleveland shot dead by police.  And you might be thinking to yourself, "Oh my God!  That sounds . . . how could police officers do that?  And there wasn't even an indictment?"  They shot a 12-year-old black boy, a little child . . .

STEPHEN COUGHLIN: What if the EU leadership does know, and that's why they did it? Because the do and they did.

MJ MURPHY: Every persuasion campaign has a conversion testimony

And there it is: soft intellectual optimism at the end.  It ends on openness rather than certainty, and that makes the whole discussion sound thoughtful, compassionate, exploratory, instead of ideological, and that lowers resistance dramatically. --MJ Murphy

The two women on the panel under review are Monica Lewinsky on the left, commenting about her interview with Dylan Mulvaney on her show called Reclaiming, and Lena Dunham on the right.   

The #MeToo movement was such a complicated moment where women . . . 

TRANSLATION:  let me begin in the safest possible moral territory so nobody questions me this is a classic credibility setup 

And we're not only confronting men but also confronting each other . . . 

All right, this is a sneaky pivot.  We started with male misconduct, and now somehow women disagreeing with women is the real emotional issue.

The way that they had failed each other and then we moved past that . . .

We moved past that.  So the translation here is the enlightened people evolved.  Keep up.  Progress.  Nobody wants to sound left behind.  

And what's interesting now is these conversations about now we have more conversations than ever about what gender is . . .

Notice how she just skips proving any of it.  We go straight from "gender identity exists" to "let's discuss the complexities." That's the NLP bypass.  Skip the foundation, start at the conclusion.  

But also this sort of tease every internet word gatekeeping of what being female is which is . . .

Calling biological definitions "gatekeeping" is hilarious. Women defining womanhood is now apparently running security at the nightclub.

This is kind of you know we know the word turf like what it is to say if you haven't been female in this extremely specific way that it is involves biology . . .

"extremely specific way involving biology" is such a funny way to describe being female.  Say that to the women in Afghanistan. "That's like calling gravity a very rigid falling preference."

And you are not welcome at this party . . .

And there it is.  There it is again.  Boundaries become cruelty disagreement becomes exclusion policy becomes Mean Girls behavior. 

I had Dylan Mulvaney on recently . . .

Celebrity emotional shield activated.  Once a likable personality enters the story disagreeing suddenly feels socially dangerous.

And you know it's it's an amazing her story is amazing . . .

Now we're going to do the gratuitous "she" and "her" pronouns.  This is just emotional preloading.  You are being told what to feel before you think.  

I think what she's . . . 

. . . she's incredible and what she experienced . . .

. . . also publicly 

. . . publicly . . . and she did so elegantly...

He, him.  We are not dissociating from reality, ladies.  We are not doing it. Dylan Mulvaney is a little faggot.  Yeah, I said it.  He's a little faggot.  If someone is polished enough, audiences confuse presentation with truth.  A TED Talk voice can hypnotize half the internet.  

And as someone who . . .

But not without a cost.

I'm pretty sure he cashed in pretty good.  But disagreeing now sounds like we're hurting vulnerable people.  This is emotional armor plating.  

Not without a cost.  And you know, as someone who has, you know, has multiple nuclear trans family members . . .

Oh yes the rhetorical infinity stone I know people personally now Chris is him feels like attacking Thanksgiving dinner.

It's been a big, a big education for me . . .

TRANSLATION: I evolved. Maybe you should too.  Every persuasion campaign has a conversion testimony. 

For me, to see, to be around that, I think, you know, I got to go speak at Trans Day of Visibility in DC last year with this amazing group called The Christopher Street Project, and the thing I expressed was just how having a trans sibling, having trans people in my life, has really opened up in this most expansive way.  It's like, I feel like I see in 4D now.  

This is spiritually hilarious.  We went from discussing public policy to "I have ascended dimensions." Disagreement now sounds spiritually unevolved.

About the possibilities of what . . . all of us hold this incredibly complicated . . . each of us have our own specific gender.

No we don't.  Once every person has their own personal custom gender, the category means literally nothing anymore.  We are basically at Build-A-Bear identity theory.

. . . That has to do with our experiences.  It has to do with how we felt as little kids.  It has to do with how we see ourselves, how we see other people, how we want to interact.  And so I think it's interesting.  Right now, feminism has never been more multifaceted and nuanced . . .

Notice the coding.  Notice the coding.  Expansive equals good.  Nuanced equals smart.  Biology equals mean and narrow. The language does all the work emotionally before the argument even starts.

Expansive but it's also deeply under threat...

And there's our threat framing.  Very common persuasion move.  Expand the emotional stakes until disagreement feels dangerous.

And we are having these conversations yet can't seem to dictate actual laws that affect our bodies . . .

Interesting switch.  Five minutes ago "womanhood was a floating metaphysical energy field," and now, suddenly, "our bodies."  The rhetoric toggles between identity and biology depending on which helps emotionally in the moment.

So it's a really, really, it's always a complicated time to be a woman . . .

Yeah, after redefining Womanhood beyond recognition, we circle back to good old female solidarity again.  It's rhetorical jazz.  

It's a very I think a very complicated but has a real rich vein of possibility at least for dialogue I'm curious how you feel.

And there it is: soft intellectual optimism at the end.  It ends on openness rather than certainty, and that makes the whole discussion sound thoughtful, compassionate, exploratory, instead of ideological, and that lowers resistance dramatically. 

The year is 1949.

The Nobel Prize in Medicine has just gone to the man who invented the lobotomy. Your doctor suggests one for your sister, who has not been herself since the baby came. It is the most celebrated advance in psychiatry of the age, and he is simply current. By the time the prize curdles into an embarrassment, close to twenty thousand Americans have had the operation, and proportionally more here in Britain. The year is 1956. Lay the baby down on his front, the doctor says. So does the most trusted childcare book ever written, the one on every new mother's shelf. On his back he might choke, the reasoning goes. Millions obey. The advice holds for nearly thirty years, long after the evidence has quietly turned, and a generation of cot deaths is counted before anyone thinks to roll the babies over. The year is 1966. A bestselling book informs your wife that menopause is a disease, that she is, in the author's word, a castrate, and that a small daily pill will keep her youthful and tolerable to live with. Her doctor agrees. The drug becomes one of the most prescribed in the country. Nobody mentions that the author sat on the payroll of the company that made it. That detail surfaces decades later, in the same year the landmark trial is halted early for raising rates of breast cancer, stroke and clots. The year is 1979. Your ulcer is caused by stress and sharp food, the doctor explains. Calm down, drink milk, take the antacid that happens to be the best-selling medicine on earth. Two Australians are about to prove that most ulcers are caused by a bacterium and cured by a fortnight of antibiotics. The profession laughs. One of them eventually drinks a beaker of the stuff to settle the matter. The establishment takes the better part of twenty years to stop laughing. The Nobel lands in 2005. The year is 1985. Butter is dangerous, the doctor says. Switch to margarine, it is modern, it is heart-healthy, the experts are united. The spread he nudges you toward is loaded with trans fats, which the next decade will identify as the genuinely dangerous one, and which will eventually be banned outright. The butter goes quietly back in the fridge. No correction is ever printed at the volume of the original warning. The year is 1992. There is a pyramid on the surgery wall, and the very same one in your grandchild's classroom. Bread, cereal, rice and pasta form the broad virtuous base, up to eleven servings a day. Fat is exiled to the tiny tip. The chart was reportedly held back a year while the relevant industries had their say. It is wrong at the bottom and wrong at the top. Now it is today. Your doctor has new guidelines, new studies, a fresh consensus, delivered with precisely the steady confidence of every guideline above. He believes it, and he has good reason to. So did every doctor in this thread. None of them were villains. Each was sincere, most were kind, and all were certain, reading from a map that somebody else had drawn and handed them. That is the part worth sitting with. So when the man in the white coat tells you what to eat, what to fear, and what to swallow every morning for the rest of your life, you are allowed to ask. Who paid for the study. What the evidence says beneath the headline. What he was just as certain about thirty years ago, and where that advice sits now. Then make up your own mind. Call it scepticism, or call it whatever your grandmother called it when she ignored the advert, kept the butter where it was, and lived to ninety-one. It has outlasted every consensus on this list. It will outlast this one too.

TOM LUONGO: Iran's fundamental mistake is thinking they are the real target of Trump's hostilities.

Thursday, June 11, 2026

What Happens When Reality Becomes Negotiable?

What happens when reality becomes socially negotiable let's talk about that let's talk about what happens when reality stops being something we discover and starts being something that we negotiate most people hear that question and they think this is just a philosophical question but it's not it's not this is practical because the moment of society decides that reality is determined by consensus their feelings status or social pressure rather than observation and evidence everything becomes unstable.  And we've seen this this happened before.  We've seen this happen. 

So, Step 1: Reality doesn't care what we think.  Gravity doesn't care about your opinion.  A broken bone doesn't care about your opinion.  Your age doesn't care about your opinion. Your sex doesn't care about your opinion.  Reality exists independently of our beliefs about it.  This sounds obvious but it's actually one of the most important principles civilization is built upon.  Because if reality changes based on what people prefer to be true then what happens truth itself truth itself disappears.

And then Step 2: we shift from observation to declaration.  Historically people looked at reality and they described it now we are increasingly asked to start with declarations and then reinterpret reality around them.  Notice the difference.  The old model was, "I observe X, therefore I conclude X."  The new model is, "I declare X, therefore you must interpret reality through X."  That's a profound shift because observation can be tested, and declarations cannot.  

Step 3: The Social Enforcement Stage.  So here's where things get interesting.  Most people don't actually change their beliefs first, they change their behavior first.  They repeat things publicly.  They avoid asking questions.  They stay silent.  They use language they don't fully understand not because they're convinced but because they want to avoid conflict and consequences, and this is where that spiral of Silence that I was talking about begins.  People stop saying what they think, then they stop hearing what others think.  Then they start believing they are alone.

Then Step 4 comes in: a False Consensus.  When enough people stay quiet something strange happens: a small number of voices can create the appearance, the appearance of universal agreement. Everyone looks around and sees everyone else complying, so everyone assumes everyone else believes even when they don't.  And this is called pluralistic ignorance.  People privately disagree while publicly conforming, and eventually the appearance of belief become more powerful than the belief itself. 

Step 5:  rolls right in.  Reality starts fighting back, right, because the problem with socially negotiated reality is that reality eventually sends invoices.  If you can negotiate language, you can.  You can negotiate policies.  You can negotiate social norms you cannot negotiate consequences reality always has the final vote the bridge either stands or collapses the medicine either works or it doesn't the statistics either predict outcomes or they don't the body either responds biologically or it doesn't reality keeps score even when people stop acknowledging it.

Step 6:  The cost to the individual.  Living in contradiction creates stress. People begin saying things they don't believe.  They begin ignoring things they can plainly see and they suppress questions and they perform agreement. They monitor their speech. They monitor their thoughts, and eventually they become disconnected from their own perceptions. And that's where a lot of confusion comes in.  Not because people can't see reality, because they've been trained not to trust themselves, right?  My friend Sousa talks about, and this is why independent thought matters.

Step 7:  Because independent thought isn't the ability to disagree with everyone; it's the ability to remain connected to observations even when disagreement becomes uncomfortable.  It's being willing to say, "I understand that's the popular opinion.  I understand that questioning may have consequences.  But I still have to start with what is true.  I just got to.  That's how science works.  That's how critical thinking works.  That's how progress works.  So reality isn't cruel, all right.  Reality isn't political.  Reality isn't left-wing or right-wing.  Reality simply is and every society eventually has to decide will we build our beliefs around reality or will we attempt to build reality around our beliefs?  Because one of those approaches leads to clarity, and the other leads to confusion, contradiction, and eventually collapse.  Reality can't be ignored.  It can't be denied.  It can be punished but it cannot be negotiated with.

Microbe function on balance.

WHITE TIGER KNOWS: History Is Watching the Collaborators Who Told Their People to Stop Complaining About Being Murdered


from the Belfast Live press conference outside a government building, L-R, are:

Deirdre Hargey, Sinn Fein MLA, South Belfast.

Rois-Maire Donnelly, Lord Mayor of Belfast/Belfast City Council, and 

Michelle O'Neill, First Minister of Northern Ireland, Sinn Fein.

They discuss the Belfast stabbing incident, threats to the Lord Mayor, and blame figures like Tommy Robinson and Elon Musk for stirring tensions. The video is from a recent press event addressing the unrest.

Every Marine is expected to know about the Battle of Chapultepec, and the associated lore around the "blood stripe" on dress blue trousers, especially corporals and above.

The United States Marine Corps was formally established as a permanent military branch on July 11, 1798.

1917–1919 marks early publication, but 1929 is the “official birthday” of the hymn as we know it.
The Battle of Chapultepec was a pivotal engagement in the Mexican-American War, 1846–1848. It took place on September 12–13, 1847, at Chapultepec Castle on the outskirts of Mexico City.

Chapultepec Castle sat atop a 200-foot (61 m) rocky hill, serving as a natural fortress overlooking the approaches to Mexico City. Originally built in the late 18th century and later converted into a military academy, it was the last major defensive position before the Mexican capital.

U.S. forces under General Winfield Scott (about 7,200 troops) advanced after victories at earlier battles like Cerro Gordo. Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna commanded roughly 25,000 men overall, but the castle itself was defended by General Nicolás Bravo with around 800–1,000 troops (including ~50 military cadets from the academy).

SEPTEMBER 12, 1847
U.S. artillery bombarded the castle.

SEPTEMBER 13, 1847
American troops attacked from multiple directions. Divisions under Generals Gideon Pillow and John Quitman led the assault, scaling walls with ladders amid heavy fire. Marines and soldiers played key roles in the storming of the hill and castle.

The fighting was intense and bloody. U.S. forces suffered significant casualties but overwhelmed the defenders. The castle fell by around 9:30 a.m. on the 13th, opening the gates to Mexico City, which U.S. troops entered shortly after. 
General Winnfred Scott Defeats Mexican General Santa Anna at the Battle of Chapultepec in the Mexican-American War, 1847.

Every Marine is expected to know about the Battle of Chapultepec, and the associated lore around the "blood stripe" on dress blue trousers, especially corporals and above.

The scarlet (red) stripe on the outer seam of the Marine Corps dress blue trousers — wider for officers (2 inches) and narrower for NCOs (about 1.5 inches for corporals and up) — is officially called the

Marine Corps lore and tradition strongly tie it to the heavy casualties, especially among officers and NCOs, suffered during the storming of Chapultepec Castle on September 13, 1847. The idea is that it commemorates the blood shed by those leaders in one of the Corps' most famous battles, which is also referenced in the opening line of the Marines' Hymn ("From the Halls of Montezuma").


This story is deeply embedded in Marine culture. Many units even hold formal "blood stripe ceremonies" when a Marine is promoted to corporal (entering the NCO ranks) and earns the right to wear it.

This story is deeply embedded in Marine culture. Many units even hold formal "blood stripe ceremonies" when a Marine is promoted to corporal (entering the NCO ranks) and earns the right to wear it.

Historical records show the red trouser stripe was introduced in the late 1830s (as early as 1837–1840), several years before the Mexican-American War and Chapultepec. It started as a uniform distinction (influenced by Army artillery styles and jacket facings) and evolved into its current form. The Chapultepec connection is a popular, enduring legend that the Corps embraces for its motivational and historical value, even if not strictly factual.

BUMBADUM: Illegals were getting 2% interest rate covid FHA mortgages with 0 down payment backed by the US Government. That's why we cant afford a fucking house.

And you wonder why I've been saying that Obama and London Stole Fannie and Freddie in 2008? This is what they were ultimately doing under the hood. And they stole this from Americans, using Lehman as cover for the theft. Answer these questions and you'll see what I'm getting at: Why was Lehman liquidated/executed by Hank Paulson?
Why was AIG (London-based reinsurer) bailed out multiple times? Why did all of this happen 7 days after a 'report' said Fannie/Freddie were insolvent and nationalized? 2008 was 9/11 for the US mortgage industry times 12.

HOPE and CHANGE MY FAT HAIRY ASS. 

KUNG FU (@CHART_FU): The Petro-Eurodollar refers to the offshore dollar funding and credit creation system that financed much of that trade. Born in London in the 1950s, it grew into a massive global network of dollar deposits and loans existing outside the US regulatory system.

The Petrodollar vs. Petro-Eurodollar: Two Very Different Systems Most people blur these terms, but separating them is essential for clean mapping. The Petrodollar is the pricing and settlement layer: the vast majority of global oil is still sold and settled in US dollars. This core remains structurally strong and gives America enduring demand for its currency. The Petro-Eurodollar refers to the offshore dollar funding and credit creation system that financed much of that trade. Born in London in the 1950s, it grew into a massive global network of dollar deposits and loans existing outside the US regulatory system. London was the historic heart and still the largest single hub, but the system is distributed across other centers like Singapore, Hong Kong, the Cayman Islands, and Dubai. For decades the two worked in tandem: oil priced in dollars + London (and offshore) financing the flows. That combination powered global dollar liquidity and let the US run large deficits. What’s happening now is the deliberate replumbing of the eurodollar funding side. Bilateral energy deals, WTI pricing migration at Cushing, Gulf swap lines, and new permanent funding centers are replacing the old London-heavy intermediation. The transactional funding layer is being rerouted while the core petrodollar settlement dominance is being protected and modernized. This distinction matters. Critics who say “the petrodollar is dying” are usually watching eurodollar funding stress and missing that the US is actively replacing the fragile old plumbing rather than clinging to a collapsing system.

The mercantilist transition isn’t abandoning dollar primacy — it’s upgrading the architecture underneath it. Same dollar, different (and more controllable) pipes. 

MORAL SUPERIORITY OF THE SOUTH

SAMA HOOLE: Week 26: "Pricing up half a cow and a chest freezer." Week 30: "Considering whether the garden could support a heifer." Week 36: "Naming the heifer."

The label reading evolution: Week 1: "I'll cut sunflower oil from the cupboard. Done." Week 2: "Why is rapeseed oil in the bread." Week 3: "Why is sunflower oil in the hummus." Week 4: "Why is canola oil in the pesto." Week 6: "The shop is now taking ninety minutes." Week 8: "There's seed oil in the tinned tomatoes." Week 10: "The 'olive oil mayonnaise' is 96% rapeseed." Week 14: "Asking waiters what they fry the chips in. Nobody knows." Week 18: "Bringing a small bottle of tallow to dinner parties." Week 22: "Rendering my own dripping on a Sunday." Week 26: "Pricing up half a cow and a chest freezer." Week 30: "Considering whether the garden could support a heifer." Week 36: "Naming the heifer."

The descent into paranoia is just pattern recognition arriving in real time.

LINUXHIPPIE: That's why he's in charge.....to make it go away. It's what the GOPe does. It's why they won't pass the SAVE Act or didn't repeal Obamacare and allowed the obvious fabrications of Russia Russua.

Wednesday, June 10, 2026

Karmelo Anthony's Trial Exposed A Black Supremacist Hatred Towards White People

One of the longer-term consequences of this trial has been the degree to which it just exposed the level of delusion estrogenically, emotional, irrational, unreason, racist black supremacist hatred of white people, and our Judicial System is the fairest in the world by such a large swath of the black population.  

Now, not all.  

I've got a bunch of tabs I'm going to share with you of perfectly reasonable black people out there on social media.  

I have a lot of black people who are my friends. They're rational people.  My dream Supreme Court is 9 Clarence Thomas's.  If you don't know, he happens to be black.  

Some of my personal Heroes are people like Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams.  

So it's certainly not all, but it's a substantial chunk, and they are and they are crazy and they are explicitly anti-white racist and pro-black racist.  No facts or reason will compel them to act against their race, no matter how guilty the defendant who happens to be black.  We had a number of prospective jurors for this trial who were black and when asked by the court, "Listen, we'd like to seat you as a juror, all you need to do is tell us that you can be unbiased and impartial, and they said, "I can't. I can't do it to him.  I can't do it to a black boy."  That's why those weren't seated.  

Now there are a few other prospective black jurors who were not seated for other reasons.  I'm laughing because once again I'm talking about Robert Barnes.  I can't believe it, but what he's doing with respect to this case is so funny to me.  But we'll get to Robert later.  But these people are completely delusional, utterly delusional.

How to deprogram from ideology

How to deprogram yourself from ideology?

That's what this video is going to help you do.  How do you know if you're thinking for yourself?  Most people immediately answer, "Of course, of course, I'm thinking for myself."  But that's the thing about programming.  If you knew you were programmed, it wouldn't work very well, would it?  Every generation looks back at previous generations and we see beliefs that seem absurd, and people wonder how could everyone have believed that?  And the uncomfortable truth is that the people living through those periods felt exactly as certain as we do now.  So the real question isn't "Am I programmed?"  The real question is "How would I know if I was?"  How would I know if I was?  

Step One:  you're going to understand that everyone is influenced.  So the first mistake is believing that you are immune nobody is not me not you not scientists not politicians not professors not activists not journalists human beings are social creatures

Arizona trying to steal old man's property from him in broad daylight.

I thought it was only communist countries that take property that belongs to private owners.

It's for the greater good.  It's for higher education.  Don't want to sell?  Fine.  Arizona will take your property.  Your concerns about expenses, so what?  ASU will not tear it down.  It will go to some ombudsman or college president who will fill the home with his presence, artefacts, and family in some last-minute historical preservation bid that ASU and Arizona didn't see or recognize at the time of the purchase.  

ASU offered this guy $850,000 but he keeps denying them because he says it's just too expensive to move and it's unrealistic due to the high cost of relocation.

But there's another issue here that's being ignored and that's the significance of this home.  It's one of the last surviving pre-statehood residential buildings in Central Phoenix.  That means it's older than Arizona itself which got statehood in 1912.  So this has a huge historical significance.  It's been on the Phoenix Historic Property Register since 1990, and they want to tear it down to build a medical facility?

KOENRAADT: The road to Salvation lies in adopting High status behaviors

The road to salvation lies in adopting high status behaviors.  He recommends the book title improv by Keith Johnstone.  

Impro: Improvisation and the Theater, Keith Johnstone, 2018.

Focusing, Eugene T. Gendlin, 1982.

A brave British woman tells it like it is to a Muslim man and a fake priest: “One million British children have been raped by Muslim men in the last 20 years. How are we supposed to reconcile and accept that?”

History matters.  It matters in any exchange between two people.  It matters in any transaction.  You don't think it matters in war?  It matters in geopolitics.  It matters in business deals. 

Culture matters too.  Why do people ignore this fact?  Are they showing off how big of an idiot they can be?  

Has the good priest not heard if the Crusades or the Barbary Coast slave trade in european white men? 

JESSE KELLY on NEW DHS SECRETARY, MARKWAYNE MULLIN: "No bad press!" If that's the goal, we’re in trouble.

The new Secretary of Homeland Security as of March 24, 2026, is Markwayne Mullin. He succeeded Kristi Noem in this position.

 

Tuesday, June 9, 2026

The Spiral of Silence

10 Words/Phrases that end the debate before it even starts.

One,  Transphobia.  Let's start with the most obvious one.  The suffix "phobia" traditionally means irrational fear.  So if disagreement is labeled a "phobia," then disagreement becomes irrational by definition.  So notice what happens psychologically.  The focus shifts from the argument being made to the character of the person making it. Instead of asking is this claim true, we're now asking what's wrong with the person who said it?  The conversation moves away from evidence and toward social judgment.

Two, assigned at Birth. So this phrase sounds neutral but hidden inside is a very important assumption when doctors record someone sex at Birth they are not assigning it in the way a teacher assigns homework they are observing and recording a physical reality so the phrase assigned at Birth subtly suggests sex is a label that could have been different. The language itself nudges listeners toward the conclusion that sex is something socially designated rather than biologically recognized. 

Three, gender affirming care.  This is a master class in framing.  Who wants to oppose affirming someone?  The phrase immediately creates a moral distinction.  One side is affirming and the other side appears unaffirming.  But notice what disappears.  The actual medical interventions-- puberty blockers, amputations, cross-sex hormones, serious surgery. So instead of debating those things directly, the debate is reframed around whether you are willing to affirm someone.  The language does enormous persuasive work before any evidence is presented.

Four, inclusive.  This word sounds universally positive.  Who doesn't want inclusion?  But inclusion always requires a question. Inclusive of whom? And at who's expense?  Every boundary excludes something.  Every category excludes something. Women's sports exclude men.  Children's leagues exclude adults.  Weight classes exclude larger competitors.  The word inclusive often skips the difficult question of competing rights and interests.

Five, lived experience lived experience is real people genuinely experience things but lived experience is not the same thing as evidence. It is possible to sincerely experience something and misunderstand it.  When lived experience is elevated above objective reality disagreement becomes impossible because nobody can verify another person's internal experience.

Six, identity this word sounds harmless but it has become one of the most powerful words in modern politics identity shifts conversations away from what something is and toward how someone feels about what they are that may be useful in some contexts but in law, Sports, Medicine, and safeguarding, objective categories often matter.  They really matter.  So the word identity frequently serves as a bridge that allows subjective feelings to compete with objective classifications.

Seven, hate.  This is one of the strongest emotional words in the language.  Most people want nothing to do with hatred, which is why accusations of hatred are so powerful.  Problem comes when disagreement itself is treated as evidence of hate.  Once that happens people stop evaluating arguments and start evaluating motives.  The debate is no longer about truth, it's about social condemnation.

Eight, kindness.  Kindness is a virtue, but kindness does not answer factual questions.  If someone says, "Be kind," that may be good advice but it doesn't tell us whether a claim is true.  One of the most common rhetorical moves is for placing a factual discussion with a moral appeal.  You can be kind and still ask difficult questions.  You can be compassionate and still disagree.

Nine, gender diverse this phrase often bundles together many different groups that may have very different experiences and interests the broader category becomes the harder it is to discuss specifics language sometimes expands categories so widely that meaningful distinctions disappear and when that happens Clarity often disappears too.

Ten, bigot this is perhaps the ultimate debate ending word nobody wants to be viewed as a bigot which is exactly why the accusation is so powerful and so overused the moment the label appears many people stop examining argument itself they become focused on defending their character and that's the key lesson of this entire video. The most powerful language doesn't defeat your argument, it prevents your argument from ever being heard.  So the next time you hear a loaded phrase pause pause and ask yourself what assumptions are hidden inside this word what conclusion am I being asked to accept and what would the debate sound like if we stripped away the framing and talked directly about the underlying issue that is where clear thinking begins that is where the spell starts to break.  

CATTLEMAN: Ivermectin treats screw worm for one thing. We’ve beat it before and we will again. We check and care for our herds . . .

Allegedly, TWO migrants were involved in the attack on Stephen Ogilvie in BELFAST