đStudies influence,propaganda,platform design,identity @Georgetown âđŒLawfare,The Atlantic đInvisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies Into Reality âhow influencers & online crowds create bespoke realities (invisiblerulers.com) đŠčđ»ââïžTwitter Files supervillain
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Welcome to the Golden Age of Weaponization... đ«„ @mmasnick.bsky.social: 'Now...weâre getting to see what actual censorship looks likeâand surprise, surprise, itâs coming from the very people who complained the loudest about being silenced.' www.techdirt.com/2025/09/03/t... @noupside.bsky.social
Itâs really past time for a movement of belligerent normalcy. Just showing up for the basics of civic life with the same intensity that extremists bring to tearing it down.
Uh huh sure
In case it needs to be said that talk was pure fantasy lol. I was there too, and only sad that the room was too large to heckle effectively. SIO didnât use âAIâ during EIP. It didnât scan âtens of millions of tweetsâ during the election. The guy is a complete huckster, he just says shit.
Itâs really past time for a movement of belligerent normalcy. Just showing up for the basics of civic life with the same intensity that extremists bring to tearing it down.
Today Florida moved to end vaccine requirements in its schools. This battle was fought before in California in 2015 (and saw the rise of RFKJr) as Renée Diresta (@noupside.bsky.social) discusses in LONG SHADOW, the @longlead.com podcast hosted by @vermontgmg.bsky.social. How will it end this time?
I watched the DSA and OSA "Censorship" Hearing in the House Judiciary Committee today so you don't have to. I have some questions. A 𧔠of my internet lawyer, free speech expert, First Amendment scholar ponderings, to no no one in particular: Why are we here? 1/
You have a baby too young to vaccinate, and your older kid is exposed to Freedom Measles or Populist Polio in their classroom. You donât have kids,but you may be impacted if you have cancer. Herd immunity is the point. The silent majority needs to get loud; make this a political liability for Ron.
They are doing this because they think MAHA is a political force and are responding to it. They see no political downside.
Preventing polio in schoolchildren is slavery. Florida parents, pushback is on you. Freedom measles. Freedom polio, now. Get mad â you donât have to be polite with extremist nutjobs like this. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
Show me the incentives, I'll show you the outcome
Rep McClintock now saying that the Biden Censorship Regime was behind censoring the Russia Hoax. That it had the FBI pressure tech companies to interfere in discussions of the "Russia collusion hoax". Pure free association with whatever the base is mad about.
Happening now: "Europe's Threat to American Speech and Innovation" --an extremely serious very real threat that Jim Jordan is spending American time & tax dollars investigating. Jordan has already mentioned "Big Academia" & his censorship industrial complex hoax. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIvu...
Mini-thread here calling bullshit on Jordan, whose MO is to pull a sentence or two out of a massive pile of documents and create a manufactroversy, assuming that people won't know the facts. bsky.app/profile/dwj8...
Rep Issa is talking about his No Censorship on Our Shores bill -- legislation that appears to try to apply the First Amendment as a condition for all international business. It's not exactly clear how it would work, or what actual affronts it's targeting. issa.house.gov/media/press-...
Rep Nadler is pointing out that 60 Minutes and others have settled lawsuits, some in order to get mergers approved. And that the WSJ is currently being sued by Trump. Minority witness @davidkaye.bsky.social points out that threat to American Speech and Innovation is coming from inside the house...
"You can say what you like, I donât care, because thatâs what free speech is," Nigel Farage has just told the House Judiciary Committee, about three hours after his party banned me from covering its conference this weekend.
Happening now: "Europe's Threat to American Speech and Innovation" --an extremely serious very real threat that Jim Jordan is spending American time & tax dollars investigating. Jordan has already mentioned "Big Academia" & his censorship industrial complex hoax. www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIvu...
I went to Truth Social to see if a screenshot was real (no) and the ads continue to be absolutely wild. Hereâs Charlie Kirkâs face being used to promote ivermectin on the sketchiest online pharmacy Iâve seen in a while. âHelps disrupt the viral components of the virus.â
I am happy to see so many people in my feed realizing Eric Schmitt is an extremist asshole. He screwed a lot of good people over the last few years.
Theyâre ones that were already public
Farage is from the UK which, you might note, is not in the EU anymore. The DSA applies to the European market. And if weâre going to talk censorship, wellâŠthere are more local concerns. This is MAGA helping its transnational far right allies. Hereâs a 101 I wrote: open.substack.com/pub/agentsof...
đšThereâs a House Judiciary hearing tomorrow that ppl should know about. Jim Jordan continues to push his censorship complex hoax, & heâs invited Nigel Farage to talk ab the European DSAâs harm to American speech. This is BS. @daphnek.bsky.social explains why: cyberlaw.stanford.edu/a-primer-on-...
It is *because* Benny - and Jack Posobiec, and Mike Benz, and John Solomon, etc etc - are willing to lie that the White House has embraced them. Their lies provide the veneer of legitimacy to do what the Administration wants to do anyway.
So Comer released 33k Epstein Files đ But yet again they are mostly things already released⊠www.politico.com/news/2025/09...
Before he rebooted his Instagram account to look presidential, this was RFK Jr during COVID.
Vinay Prasad had YouTube censor Jonathan Howardâs channel because he didnât like how it made him look. A petty act by a vindictive, unqualified hack. And more evidence that these frEe sPeEcH warriors have always been petty censors out to silence criticism that they just canât cope with.
âIâm not anti-vaccine, Iâm pro-safe vaccine.â
See: (I am surprised Arlington tops the list! Wouldâve guessed Manhattan and its burbs wouldâve ranked higher.) bsky.app/profile/next...
Was a running joke that a third child was the Veblen good of San Francisco
Diono Radian
YouTube should reverse this. Seems strange it wouldnât count as fair use. Seems time for a lot of medical influencers to repost as reaction content on Instagram.
Coverage in The Guardian www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
Vinay Prasad had YouTube censor Jonathan Howardâs channel because he didnât like how it made him look. A petty act by a vindictive, unqualified hack. And more evidence that these frEe sPeEcH warriors have always been petty censors out to silence criticism that they just canât cope with.
This isnât a dig at the author, whose culture writing I like. Itâs at the outlet that has written w/glee over the dismantling of research premised on the idea of shared reality, buying into the culture war trope that such a thing was inherently impossible or innately biased against the right.
Studying or writing about this challenge was framed as some kind of hysterical ââdisinformation researcherââ censorship czar plot to censor AI, as I recall. Glad weâre all coming around to recognizing the risk model here. Happy to discuss the nuance of what the field has actually been findingâŠ
Iâm amused by this article bc of where it appears. Nothing here is novelâit restates points ppl have made for half a decade: gen AI enables both unreality & denial of reality. This makes sources of trust more important. But the ppl who put âmisinformationâ in scare quotes are suddenly concerned.
I use Rent the Runway monthly because I like it for professional things. There is also Nuuly that people seem to use for more casual workwear and things. RTR just changed their offering so there are more options & price points around brand tiers and things (not everyone needs evening wear stuff).
I switched to renting everything about 8 years ago while pregnant with my second. Gaining/losing 40-50lb 3x in 10 yearsâŠthere was no point in buying clothes, cheap stuff and bad fits made me feel worse. It was liberating and Iâve stuck with it since. Maybe something youâd enjoy. RTR monthly.
Theyâre so close to getting it. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/b...
We also tried laying these things out periodically in writing in the general media! (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...
New work by @brendannyhan.bsky.social & @jasonreifler.bsky.social shows further evidence of positive impact of prebunking This is why EIP wrote What to Expect rumor guides for certain periods in elections! And itâs why election deniers reframe this as âbrainwashingâ www.science.org/content/arti...
These are indoors. Iâve had basil and cherry tomatoes live and produce for 2 years, so Iâm curious how long these will go.
They were mid-tier players known for being contrarians. They were given power because of loyalty, not competency. So now, they lie: CDC didnât insist schools close â decisions were local. The CDC didnât âpush cloth masks for three yearsâ â but their idiot base has retconned that into reality.
Your asshole uncle who never stops bringing up the one time you forgot to send a thank you card.
Thanks! The plant has been one constant mass of flowers, itâs interesting. Do you wait for a certain size?
Theyâre Patio Baby
www.thisoldhouse.com/gardening/22... I have Aerogarden Farms now because they fit best in my space but I started with a little countertop one a few years back for herbs and lettuce. Redditâs r/hydroponics and r/aerogarden are helpful for community guidance. My dad has a whole DIY bucket situation.
đ± outdoor garden is good and all - peak okra time and some squash, planted beets - but hydroponics are doing *amazing* rn. Iâve never done shishito before so Iâm not sure when to harvest but there are 4 dozen on 2 plantsâŠBok Choi, basil, thai basil, Thai eggplant not pictured. The đ is oddly paleâŠ
Donât remember that, no, bc it didnât happen. Also, my guy â that was a joke. See that âbIdEN bOdY dOuBleâ URL there?
Still sick! đ€·đ»ââïž kids.
www.nbcnews.com/politics/don...
Body double? Clone? Robot?
parasocial attachment fuels loyalty; audience capture fuels trend toward extremes; together they can create cultlike ideological reinforcement
I wrote about that in Invisible Rulers â particularly the âGuruâ influencer subtype (but sometimes Besties), the âtrue believerâ dynamics, orbiters, toxic fandoms. :) Sometimes devotion is to the figure, sometimes to shared identity or cause they represent. Audience capture = other side of coin.
Yes. Over multiple years, in fact.
Wrote about Comer/Mace attempting to doxx and intimidate Wikipedia editors in an effort to force their own viewpoint onto Wikipedia.
I think the fact that the article exists is also depressing
There's like a new one of these stories every single day it seems
Ours just arrived too!
Massive walkout underway at CDC. RFK jr. must resign so that we can be safe.
Itâs worth looking at the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program data tables. Itâs all very transparent; anyone with a basic grasp of statistics comes away with an increased sense that vaccines are safe and effective. Antivax propaganda, however, tells *stories*. www.hrsa.gov/vaccine-comp...
Just a reminder, since many people don't know about it: the "Popular with Friends" feed is pretty damn good at giving you a quick overview of what's happening. I know there are lots of complaints about "Discover" and PwF is often better for me...
Resignations of CDC staff directly related to misinformation, weaponizing of public health, which is coming from RFK Jr. Untenable situation for them to serve under these conditions. www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...
![In his resignation letter, Daskalakis wrote, âI am not able to serve in this role any longer because of the ongoing weaponizing of public health.â Houryâs resignation letter spoke about the continued spread of misinformation around vaccines. âRecently, the overstating of risks [of vaccines] and the rise of misinformation have cost lives, as demonstrated by the highest number of US measles cases in 30 years and the violent attack on our agency,â Houry wrote.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:2rrp7amblhg3xoly5n5huiqv/bafkreiboml2a3p7qlqb4qmlbhb76rzanvnpkvlpw34wggsq6wsv27wvy5m@jpeg "Click to view full size")
Ah, what a loss of talent in public service. Dr. Demetre was a fantastic communicator during monkeypox -- he briefly became notorious w/the right wing machine bc he had an instagram showing him out living his life. đ Lysenko purged thousands in the Soviet Union; RFK is his intellectual heir.
Abbe Lowell and I represent CDC Director #SusanMonarez. Contrary to govt statements, Dr. Monarez has neither resigned nor yet been fired. She will not resign. We have issued the following statement:
They want to keep up the censorship complex hoax, so theyâve taken it international.
Loyalty over legitimacy in every agency
I meant spray-and-pray not in a content sense but in a "well shit I hear we need to pay some influencers somehow to get us a Joe Rogan of the left"
I think that's the same reaction I had :)
I have no problem with influencer strategies TBC. This feels very spray-and-pray. Very hidden and apologetic, semi-predatory. Not sure what it wants to be, yet also very behind. Not replicating how the right infrastructure operates (it doesnât get it). The broader issues with the FEC are also bad.
Literally everything about this is depressing www.wired.com/story/dark-m...
A grand jury has rejected federal prosecutors' attempts to indict Sean Dunn, the man accused of throwing a Subway sandwich at a CBP officer. This comes after three OTHER failed attempts to indict another person accused of assaulting a federal agent. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/27/u...
That was the term we used around Disneyland in 2015
This is not some juggernaut of the brilliant and powerful. Theyâre just organized online, and loud. You can be loud right back. They donât get to claim the mantle of âwarrior momsâ while bringing freedom measles to your classroom. Make that clear.
For those who thought school vaccine reqts would be safe because they are set by the states â the zealot leading HHS has made clear that heâs coming to weaken your state laws as well. Parents: organize locally to counter MAHA antivax crackpots. Itâs on you. www.washingtonpost.com/health/2025/...
This is going to be such a profoundly destructive bit of quack theatre. It will give struggling people false hope. It will undermine confidence in research. Shameless propaganda from an utter bullshit artist that a lot of people are going to have to work very, very hard to contextualize or refute.
It is important to understand this as what it is: a political project to help far right parties in Europe. âCensorshipâ is the frame they chose because it worked well here. This doesnât mean the DSA is great. But thatâs not the point.
I'm one of the 37 targeted below by DNI Tulsi Gabbard. I haven't had a clearance nor worked in government since 2013. This is political theater & a dangerous example of government abusing its powers to punish private citizens for openly exercising their 1st Amendment rights. My full statement:
America First Legal has long seemed to be writing reports for Freedom Caucus nutjobs in Congress. Are they now designing websites too? lol
Oh I know theyâre suing me. Iâm asking why theyâre designing government websites lol.
Why is the alt text for the America by Design image âAmerica First Legal logoâ?
I understand this seems really boring but by saying âdigital censorship act digital censorship act digital censorship actâ the right made this an issue with their base while the left is asleep. The point is to do what they did here: reframe moderation as censorship, & boost far right parties online.
Rep Jamie Raskin recently visited for negotiations after Jim Jordan wrote a report lying about the DSAâs impact in the US. Hereâs his FAQ: democrats-judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-su...
Is the DSA perfect? Nope. Some things are badly defined, could be used to chill European speech. It does give right to appeal for content takedowns. Ultimately this line of attack is an administration trying to help its âcivilizational alliesâ & Big Tech donors www.lawfaremedia.org/article/regu...
The DSA doesnât âcensor Americansâ. The people whoâve been pushing this BS the longest have been Michael Shellenberger, CBR Chair of Censorship Hoaxes at UATX, and Mike Benz aka Frame Game, who thought Hitler had some good points & wants to help his far right friends www.reuters.com/world/us/tru...
3. The responses always seem to involve a lot of apologizing. When this occurs, orgs or candidates should name what's happening: "This is a random person, we can't control the speech of everyone who shows up to our event, we don't like it, they obviously don't speak for us/for the majority. "
1. The strategy is called nutpicking and it's what made LibsOfTikTok a million+ follower account. 2. GenAI lets the online crowd create fresh propaganda to keep the moment in play, but it also seems to dilute it a bit? Seems to work better for some moments (absurdist etc) than others. 1/2
Well that could plausibly be âlook at this idiotâ
If you believe that keeping your head down and being quiet will spare you from this fate, you are mistaken. This will be all of us.
3500 likes?
*sorry the recent relevant example of a right-wing discourse manufactroversy was Sydney Sweeneyâs jeans not boobs, I regret the error. plus.flux.community/p/sydney-swe...
bc fighting on Twitter was so unpleasant. Majority illusion kicks in as people who disagree stay quiet. Meanwhile the spectacle is handy for the right (see #2) and sparks thinkpieces in MSM ab who should use what words. There were articles ab them in 2020-22. SF def had a âjustice-involvedâ debate.
3)Intra-left fights: this did happen around some of those terms. Ie Latinx. That one pols did start to use even when Latinos were like âwhy?â Pressure to âupdate language to be more inclusiveâ creates a purity spiral and the often-small activist group insisting a term was ârightâ got little pushback
1)Niche in-group performance: influencers who want to use this language do, in content for their communities. 2)Nut-picking: accounts like LibsOfTikTok intentionally dig up the oddest/extremist examples & blast them out, leading to âthe left is saying!â cycle (see Sydney Sweeneyâs Boobs discourse)
Interesting analysis responding to the âDonât Use These Wordsâ memo (âbirthing personâ etc) by Third Way. It looked at language used by Dem politicians in their newsletters, found they arenât using activist-speak. The terms got associated w/mainstream left mostly bc of TwitterâŠfor a few reasons.
Sheâs always been an idiot, but given copious amounts of both attention and grace â cast as the archetype of the Warrior Mother and thus positioned safely above real critical engagement with her ideas, which are a combination of the obvious and the ridiculous.
![More than 3,000 mainstream biologists were dismissed or imprisoned, and numerous scientists were executed in the Soviet campaign to suppress scientific opponents. (1[2][31|4] The president of the Soviet Agriculture Academy, Nikolai Vavilov, who had been Lysenko's mentor, but later denounced him, was sent to prison and died there, while Soviet genetics research was effectively destroyed. 31[4] Research and teaching in the fields of neurophysiology, cell biology, and many other biological disciplines were harmed or banned. The government of the Soviet Union (USSR) supported the campaign, and Joseph Stalin personally edited a speech by Lysenko in a way that reflected his support for what would come to be known as Lysenkoism, despite his skepticism toward Lysenko's assertion that all science is class-orientated in nature. Lysenko](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:5bnbgj7gwebt6hhub4pa5c7n/bafkreigdg2zq43lriifwdnaozs3wnre4dzdeh7et6uc2g4wvyl5k335en4@jpeg "Click to view full size")