Listen, a second ago you said ‘you were pretty sure SA were in on it’ which meant you didn’t know anything about the deal. You were proposing there was some dark conspiracy with them. You subsequently googled it after someone pointed out PIF. However, PIF were investors long, long before Musk ever thought of a deal or was a substantial shareholder and actually rejected his offer. In short, you knew fuck all about it, as usual.
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This is the way I see it. Musk is bought by a broad pro-fascist international front. That includes Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, the US right wing, and now Israel. People like him are easy to buy. They tend to be fascist in nature, but that nature often lies largely dormant in them for a considerable length of time.
This broad pro-fascist international front recognised Musk as an unstable, ego-driven headbanger. A Trump type, obsessed by the adoration of cretinous fascist and/or incel fanbois, of which we have a few on this forum. A sort of a global Sean Quinn, except younger, more drug addled, and much more deluded about the myth of his own genius, without Quinn’s actual business ability.
Why get your man to control Twitter? Simple. Because Twitter being controlled by such a charlatan greatly aids the advancement of global fascism.
Even if he runs the thing into the ground, the broad international pro-fascist front is fine with that as a loss leader, such an event would still greatly aid the advancement of global fascism, because Twitter, for all its faults, had a lot of value as it was, when its moderation policies were merely bad as opposed to openly pro-fascist.
None of this is that complicated. The fascists identify the potential chaos agents, and then manipulate them, massage their ego, and they’re bought. It doesn’t take that much. Conor McGregor has undergone a similar process and look where he is now. All it took to buy him was a take away pasta meal at the World Cup final and a selfie with Putin.
The conspiracy is in plain sight mate. You’re right that I hadn’t even done much research on it and was guessing. Yet a quick Google actually showed I was correct in my guess.
This stuff is really obvious.
Well done! Now imagine all that time and energy you put into conspiracy theories, and re-directed it to something worthwhile you might not be such a burden on the state.
The ego you have to talk about world affairs when you’re an actual burden on the state is something else. Major incel vibes.
There was Johnny McGurk who was scared stiff of work…
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A ballsy move given their own record
And a chap from Algeria called …
Hiss Teria
When is Johnny Arse joining the growing Irish team at RT?
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Jonny Arse eviscerating Kitty Holland with her ridiculous comments about Aisling Murphy’s boyfriend’s statement. Irish media are a disgrace, mouthpieces for the government and it’s clear their MO amounts to nothing more than running cover for the narrative. No interest in facts and truth.
Thanks John, one of the few journalists with a backbone.
Fri Dec 1 2023 - 13:18
On Tuesday right-wing US broadcaster Tucker Carlson used his new show on X, formerly Twitter, to discuss the causes of the riots that engulfed Dublin last week.
Ireland is a “powder keg” and its Government is “trying to replace the population … with people from the third world”, said the former Fox News host, repeating a version of the anti-Semitic “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory.
He was then joined by “old friend” Steve Bannon, former chief strategist to Donald Trump, who explained there is no real opposition party in Ireland, except for Sin [sic] Féin, whom he claimed are “more and more taking on a nationalistic bent”.
The men went on to lament that gardaí are investigating Irish MMA fighter Conor McGregor, who has made several inflammatory posts about the violence, and to denounce the forthcoming hate crime Bill, falsely claiming it will make it a crime to criticise Government policy.
The pair’s political analysis drew mockery online from Irish social media users, but also celebration from some who delighted in prominent US figures paying attention to migration in Ireland.
Carlson and Bannon were far from alone. Since the stabbing of three children and a woman on Parnell Square in Dublin and the subsequent riots in the city, Ireland, and specifically immigration into Ireland, has been taken up as a cause celebre among many prominent figures on the international far right.
An analysis by Moonshot, a company that monitors violent extremism for clients including the UK government, found dozens of posts by prominent international figures in the far right referencing Dublin during and immediately after the riots.
“These are leading figures and influential figures among the extreme right,” said Moonshot chief executive Ross Frenett. There were thousands more posts by their followers.
The volume of online discussion was “extremely high” and centred around anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant sentiments, he said. Much of the commentary linked the violence to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, including allegations the stabbing attack was “Jewish-funded terrorism”.
This didn’t come from nowhere, Frenett says.
“This is the culmination of something that has been building for a long time. Migration to Ireland has been referenced regularly over the past year by some of these influential figures in the UK. It’s something that has been bubbling away under the surface for the last while.”
Last week’s events sent these discussions into overdrive and not just in the UK, where prominent far-right figures such as former British National Party president Nick Griffin and anti-Muslim provocateur Tommy Robinson have been regularly discussing the violence.
In France, commentators immediately seized on the stabbing as evidence of the dangers of immigration. Over the following days far-right protests took place in several French towns and cities. Reuters quoted a French intelligence official as saying the Dublin riots were a “trigger” for the protests and that there was a will among far-right activists to be “as good as the Irish”.
In the US, commentators on far-right social media platforms voiced support for McGregor and criticised the Irish Government over immigration.
In one popular post on Gab, a user suggested Americans should “run guns” to Ireland, while others said attempts by the Garda to suppress the riots were efforts at white erasure, according to an analysis by the not-for-profit research group Advance Democracy.
“The whole ecosystem is very international and these far-right extremists are really well networked together. So when the Irish far right puts stuff up on [social media] it is very quickly picked up globally as talking points,” said Professor Jane Suiter, a disinformation expert at DCU.
Much, but by no means all, of the interest of the international far right in Ireland can be traced to a young Roscommon man. Keith O’Brien, who goes by the name Keith Woods, has built up a massive online following in the US and regularly appears on American extreme-right media.
The self-described “raging anti-Semite” is a close associate of prominent American white supremacist Nick Fuentes, who is perhaps most famous for briefly serving as Kanye West’s campaign manager during the rapper’s ill-fated presidential campaign.
In August, O’Brien appeared as a speaker at a conference organised by the white supremacist organisation American Renaissance and has also collaborated with neo-Nazi Richard Spencer along with other figures on the extreme fringes of US politics.
Since last week’s violence in Dublin, his profile in the US has grown grew even bigger thanks to an appearance, alongside Irish Freedom Party founder Hermann Kelly, on the podcast of Jenna Ellis, a lawyer who worked with Trump to attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
“There was justifiable anger amongst the population of Dublin,” O’Brien told Ellis.
In response to queries from The Irish Times, O’Brien said he “called on people to direct their frustrations at the government’s failed immigration policies toward peaceful political activism.
“I have repeatedly spoken out against political violence, intimidation and hatred of any kind, and instead advocated making change through lawful activism and advocacy,” he said.
Since coming to prominence, O’Brien has cultivated a reputation among the far right as a deep thinker and a philosopher. A review of his social media posts, many of which have been deleted, reveal a preoccupation with anti-Semitic cartoons and conspiracy theories, many relating to the Holocaust.
O’Brien attended the University of Galway, where he studied philosophy and took part in the debating society. According to an interview he gave in 2019, he went from being a “lefty Sinn Féiner” to someone trying to convince his friends of ethno-nationalism and “national socialist principles”.
During the same interview, he criticised the lack of willingness of Irish “nationalists” to work with the international white nationalist movement in its fight against the “enemy”.
He told The Irish Times he is not a national socialist but is “an ethno-nationalist, in the long tradition of Irish nationalism”. His post describing himself as a raging anti-Semite was a joke, he said. Many screenshots of his supposed comments circulating online are fake while other posts were made in the context of “the very ironic and sarcastic milieu of young right-wing social media culture,” O’Brien claimed.
“O’Brien has extensive links with white supremacists in US, Britain and Australia, and could be regarded as one of the brighter lights in an international movement not known for producing intellectuals,” said Mark Malone, research lead with Hope and Courage Collective, an Irish anti-extremism group.
“In the past O’Brien has spoken frequently about his disdain for women and so he has many fans in the online incel [involuntary celibate] community.”
Unusually among Irish far-right activists, O’Brien maintains “an almost exclusively online persona and rarely turns up at events in Ireland”, said Malone, although he has attended at least one National Party event.
“He particularly plays up his involvement in hate movements in Ireland for his large US audience in order to maximise donations. Many on the far right in Ireland have criticised him for building a large profile and income stream for himself while doing very little to support them.”
By far O’Brien’s most significant international contact is Elon Musk, one of the richest men in the world and owner of X. Along with many other Irish right-wing extremists, O’Brien was previously banned from the platform only to be reinstated when Musk took over last year.
Since then, the two have been in contact on numerous occasions. Musk seems particularly interested in O’Brien’s campaigning to “ban the ADL”, in reference to the Anti-Defamation League, a US organisation focused on combating anti-Semitism.
In response to queries, O’Brien said his only interaction with Musk “in this period was replying to some of his posts”.
The ADL has been a target of Musk since it criticised the growth of anti-Semitism on the platform after the billionaire took over.
“ADL has tried very hard to strangle X/Twitter”, Musk told O’Brien in September in response to the Irishman’s claim the ADL was trying to “extort” the social media platform.
Musk has also taken a keen interest in the Irish Government’s proposed hate speech laws. “This is a massive attack against freedom of speech,” Musk told O’Brien when he criticised the bill last April.
O’Brien, who has nearly 150,000 followers on X, is not the only person from the Irish far-right Musk has been talking to. In recent days, he has discussed the hate speech bill with Waterford anti-immigration agitator Michael O’Keeffe, who was one of those who called for people to take to the streets after the Parnell Square attacks.
O’Keeffe was also one of the people who wrongly identified an entirely innocent immigrant man as the stabbing suspect in a tweet which received almost 180,000 views before being deleted. The falsely accused man is now under Garda protection.
However, O’Brien, with his vastly larger following, finds it easier to get Musk’s attention. In fact, his interactions with Musk form part of a lawsuit against the billionaire by Ben Brody, a young Jewish man who was falsely accused on X of being an undercover federal agent who took part in a brawl among neo-Nazi groups in Oregon.
Musk amplified the false claims on his X account. In legal papers seen by The Irish Times, Brody’s lawyers cited his interactions with O’Brien, “an Irish white nationalist”, as evidence of Musk’s frequent interactions with well-known bigots.
The tech mogul is facing scrutiny in Ireland that goes beyond his courting of Irish extremists. Unlike other social media companies, his platform did not co-operate with gardaí in taking down “vile” posts during last week’s riots, Minister for Justice Helen McEntee told the Dáil.
“They did not engage. They did not fulfil their own customer standards,” she said.
However, Musk’s credibility among the Irish far right has never been higher, with some seeing him as a potential source of revenue for future campaigns.
This week, the chairman of the Irish Freedom Party Michael Leahy wrote to Musk begging for funds to support a legal case by his party against the hate crime Bill.
Saw that last night. To be fair to Sam McBride he pulled her up on her comments after that.
Holland is correct. Ryan Casey was talking shite. People were understandably reluctant to pull him up on his shite talking, but the fact remains he was talking inflammatory shite.
So obviously Holland’s comments strike a raw nerve for Arse, whose entire existence depends on pandering to fascists.
Victim impact statements should be censored, seems to be the message
Holland was adhering to Press Council principles on reporting. Johnny Arse, a yellow-pack ‘journalist’, has no interest in such principles.
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Her interpretation seems cowardly and unprincipled
Might be worth printing them for the small penis brigade here who idolise a guy who called a cave rescuer a paedophile and believe this is the true definition of “free speech”.
https://www.presscouncil.ie/press-council-of-ireland/code-of-practice
Code of Practice
Preamble
The freedom to publish is vital to the right of the people to be informed. This freedom includes the right of the press to publish what it considers to be news, without fear or favour, and the right to comment upon it.
Freedom of the press carries responsibilities. Members of the press have a duty to maintain the highest professional and ethical standards.
This Code sets the benchmark for those standards. It is the duty of the Press Ombudsman and Press Council of Ireland to ensure that it is honoured in the spirit as well as in the letter, and it is the duty of Press Council print and online media members (the press) to assist them in that task.
In dealing with complaints, the Ombudsman and Press Council will give consideration to what they perceive to be the public interest. It is for them to define the public interest in each case, but the general principle is that the public interest is invoked in relation to a matter capable of affecting the people at large so that they may legitimately be interested in receiving and the print and online news media legitimately interested in providing information about it.
Principle 1 − Truth and Accuracy
1.1 In reporting news and information, the press shall strive at all times for truth and accuracy.
1.2 When a significant inaccuracy, misleading statement or distorted report or picture has been published, it shall be corrected promptly and with due prominence.
1.3 When appropriate, a retraction, apology, clarification, explanation or response shall be published promptly and with due prominence.
Principle 2 − Distinguishing Fact and Comment
2.1 The press is entitled to advocate strongly its own views on topics.
2.2 Comment, conjecture, rumour and unconfirmed reports shall not be reported as if they were fact.
2.3 Readers are entitled to expect that the content of the press reflects the best judgment of editors and writers and has not been inappropriately influenced by undisclosed interests. Wherever relevant, any significant financial interest of an organization should be disclosed. Writers should disclose significant potential conflicts of interest to their editors.
Principle 3 − Fair Procedures and Honesty
3.1 The press shall strive at all times for fair procedures and honesty in the procuring and publishing of news and information.
3.2 The press shall not obtain information, photographs or other material through misrepresentation or subterfuge, unless justified by the public interest.
3.3 Journalists and photographers must not obtain, or seek to obtain, information and photographs through harassment, unless their actions are justified in the public interest.
Principle 4 − Respect for Rights
Everyone has constitutional protection for his or her good name. The press shall not knowingly publish matter based on malicious misrepresentation or unfounded accusations, and must take reasonable care in checking facts before publication.
Principle 5 − Privacy
5.1 Privacy is a human right, protected as a personal right in the Irish Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights, which is incorporated into Irish law. The private and family life, home and correspondence of everyone must be respected.
5.2 Readers are entitled to have news and comment presented with respect for the privacy and sensibilities of individuals. However, the right to privacy should not prevent publication of matters of public record or in the public interest.
5.3 Sympathy and discretion must be shown at all times in seeking information in situations of personal grief or shock. In publishing such information, the feelings of grieving families should be taken into account. This should not be interpreted as restricting the right to report judicial proceedings.
5.4 Public persons are entitled to privacy. However, where a person holds public office, deals with public affairs, follows a public career, or has sought or obtained publicity for his activities, publication of relevant details of his private life and circumstances may be justifiable where the information revealed relates to the validity of the persons conduct, the credibility of his public statements, the value of his publicly expressed views or is otherwise in the public interest.
5.5 Taking photographs of individuals in private places without their consent is not acceptable, unless justified by the public interest.
Principle 6 − Protection of Sources
Journalists shall protect confidential sources of information.
Principle 7 − Court Reporting
The press shall strive to ensure that court reports (including the use of images) are fair and accurate, are not prejudicial to the right to a fair trial and that the presumption of innocence is respected.
Principle 8 − Prejudice
The press shall not publish material intended or likely to cause grave offence or stir up hatred against an individual or group on the basis of their race, religion, nationality, colour, ethnic origin, membership of the travelling community, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, illness or age.
Principle 9 − Children
9.1 The press shall take particular care in seeking and presenting information or comment about a child under the age of 16.
9.2 Journalists and editors should have regard for the vulnerability of children, and in all dealings with children should bear in mind the age of the child, whether parental or other adult consent has been obtained for such dealings, the sensitivity of the subject-matter, and what circumstances if any make the story one of public interest. Young people should be free to complete their time at school without unnecessary intrusion. The fame, notoriety or position of a parent or guardian must not be used as sole justification for publishing details of a child’s private life.
Principle 10 − Reporting of Suicide
In the reporting of suicide, excessive detail of the means of suicide should be avoided.
Principle 11 - Publication of the Decision of the Press Ombudsman / Press Council
11.1 When requested or required by the Press Ombudsman and/or the Press Council to do so, the press shall publish the decision in relation to a complaint with due prominence.
11.2 The content of this Code will be reviewed at regular intervals.