Conservatism

[ROAD_DOGG33J]

It is not just an older Republican thing. The younger ones suck just as much.

 

[TexRex]

Mental illness.

 

[Exorcet]

Mental illness.

Also fails for picking a comic series that stands 100% against his idiotic points.

 

[UKMikey]

He must be the real life Robert Kelly.

 

[Jezza819]

Two expelled Democratic Tennessee legislators returned to legislature.

Expelled Black lawmaker Pearson to return to Tennessee House

Hundreds of supporters marched Justin Pearson through Memphis to the Shelby County Board of Commissioners meeting, chanting and cheering before entering the commission chambers, where officials quickly voted 7-0 to restore him to his position.

www.waff.com

In case you haven't been following this story, Tennessee is quickly trying to become Ground Zero for conservative idiocy. After the recent Nashville school shooting three Democratic representatives, two black one white, gave impassioned speeches on the legislature floor for tougher gun laws. There happened to be a large group of students present in the chamber pleading for the Republican led legislature also to do something about tougher gun laws. Well the Republicans weren't going to stand for any of that nonsense. They voted to expel two of the three Democrats for "inciting mutiny". Guess which two they voted to expel? Yep, the two black politicians were expelled. The white female Democrat escaped expulsion by one vote.

One of the Democrats, Rep. Justin Jones, was quickly restored to his office by the Nashville Metropolitan Council earlier this week. Rep. Justin Pearson from Memphis was restored to his position by a 7-0 vote from the Shelby County Board of Commissioners today. Rep. Gloria Johnson was the legislator that survived by one vote.

Tennessee’s House expels 2 of 3 Democrats over guns protest

Tennessee’s GOP-dominated House has expelled two of three Democratic members for their roles in a demonstration in favor of gun control following the Nashville school shooting. The chamber's split votes to oust Reps. Justin Pearson and Justin Jones on Thursday while narrowly sparing Rep. Gloria...

apnews.com

Stinking rats, every single one of those Tennessee Republicans.

 

[TexRex]

Two expelled Democratic Tennessee legislators returned to legislature.

Expelled Black lawmaker Pearson to return to Tennessee House

Hundreds of supporters marched Justin Pearson through Memphis to the Shelby County Board of Commissioners meeting, chanting and cheering before entering the commission chambers, where officials quickly voted 7-0 to restore him to his position.

www.waff.com

In case you haven't been following this story, Tennessee is quickly trying to become Ground Zero for conservative idiocy. After the recent Nashville school shooting three Democratic representatives, two black one white, gave impassioned speeches on the legislature floor for tougher gun laws. There happened to be a large group of students present in the chamber pleading for the Republican led legislature also to do something about tougher gun laws. Well the Republicans weren't going to stand for any of that nonsense. They voted to expel two of the three Democrats for "inciting mutiny". Guess which two they voted to expel? Yep, the two black politicians were expelled. The white female Democrat escaped expulsion by one vote.

One of the Democrats, Rep. Justin Jones, was quickly restored to his office by the Nashville Metropolitan Council earlier this week. Rep. Justin Pearson from Memphis was restored to his position by a 7-0 vote from the Shelby County Board of Commissioners today. Rep. Gloria Johnson was the legislator that survived by one vote.

Tennessee’s House expels 2 of 3 Democrats over guns protest

Tennessee’s GOP-dominated House has expelled two of three Democratic members for their roles in a demonstration in favor of gun control following the Nashville school shooting. The chamber's split votes to oust Reps. Justin Pearson and Justin Jones on Thursday while narrowly sparing Rep. Gloria...

apnews.com

Stinking rats, every single one of those Tennessee Republicans.

Following that incident, the connie bitch governor of the state, Bill Lee, called on the legislature to push forward a red flag law that he can sign, which they either won't do because they oppose expansion of gun restrictions or will do because they lack principles, and bypassed the legislature entirely by rolling out an EO directed at strengthening state background checks because he lacks principles.

 

[TexRex]

Mental illness.

 

[Populuxe]

Mental illness.

So Lila Rose supports rapists deciding who will be the mothers of their children?

 

[TexRex]

So Lila Rose supports rapists deciding who will be the mothers of their children?

Well when you put it like that...

 

[HenrySwanson]

So Lila Rose supports rapists deciding who will be the mothers of their children?

She's....erm.... maybe not all there when it comes to reason. She had a very bad take on the teen who was raped and impregnated that opened some of her supporters eyes to her.

 

[TexRex]

lol

 

[McLaren]

It’s from Matt Walsh, so any reasonably smart person knew he was full of poo.

 

[TexRex]

It’s from Matt Walsh, so any reasonably smart person knew he was full of poo.

God damn. Not inaccurate, but damn.

 

[Liquid]

Plus it's only "the left" who engage in divisive, spiteful, butthurt cancel culture.

 

[UKMikey]

The "claim" was originally that it was an $800m loss but "conservative" MAGA math (or maths as we Brits call it) has inflated this to $4 to 5 billion on social media.

Fact Check-Satirical article about Budweiser losing $800 million in one day taken seriously online

An article about Budweiser, a brand owned by brewing company Anheuser-Busch, losing $800 million in one day following its collaboration with transgender social media influencer Dylan Mulvaney stems from a satirical website but has been mistaken as authentic online.

www.reuters.com

 

[Populuxe]

The "claim" was originally that it was an $800m loss but "conservative" MAGA math (or maths as we Brits call it) has inflated this to $4 to 5 billion on social media.

Fact Check-Satirical article about Budweiser losing $800 million in one day taken seriously online

An article about Budweiser, a brand owned by brewing company Anheuser-Busch, losing $800 million in one day following its collaboration with transgender social media influencer Dylan Mulvaney stems from a satirical website but has been mistaken as authentic online.

www.reuters.com

”Clarence Thomas has been receiving extravagant gifts and kickbacks from wealthy conservatives?”
Right wing media: “Look over there! Bud Light threw a few bucks in advertising to a trans person on the internet!”

 

[UKMikey]

It'd be perhaps gratifying for AB InBev to respond in kind and reduce their GOP contributions (although they did drop sharply in 2020) but I have a feeling that'd be like trying to turn an elephant around in a narrow hallway.

 

[TexRex]

FBI investigating GOP Oklahoma officials caught on tape talking about lynching Black people, murdering newspaper reporters

GOP officials from McCurtain County, Okla. are being investigated by the FBI after they were caught on tape expressing their frustration about it not being socially acceptable beat up and hang Black people, as well as their desires to hire hit men to kill newspaper reporters.

heartlandsignal.com

GOP officials from McCurtain County, Okla. are being investigated by the FBI after they were caught on tape expressing their frustration about it not being socially acceptable beat up and hang Black people, as well as their desires to hire hitmen to kill newspaper reporters.

The audio was published by print-only newspaper McCurtain Gazette-News, and it released transcript of a recording from a county commissioners meeting last month to the public that allegedly incriminates several public officials after disturbing comments were made. The full audio recording from Gazette-News reporter Bruce Willingham will be released by the newspaper at a later date.

After hundreds came out in protest, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) has called for the resignation of McCurtain County Sheriff Kevin Clardy (R), District 2 Commissioner Mark Jennings (R), Investigator Alicia Manning and Jail Administrator Larry Hendrix for their comments in the meeting. District 3 Commissioner Robert Beck (R) is also cited in the audio.

The transcript suggests that the group first started discussing a recent fire which killed a woman and her two dogs. The group joked about the woman’s body parts falling off her body, and that it is similar to eating barbecue.

“So we get her in the body bag and Kyler goes, ‘You do know what we gotta do right?’ Faith goes, ‘No, what?’ He goes, ‘You gotta pre-heat the oven 350 degrees, leave her in there for 15 minutes,’” said Clardy.

Later in the transcript, Jennings and Clardy had a racist exchange and went back and forth about society making it unacceptable to lynch Black people.

“I’m gonna tell you something. If it was back in the day, when that when Alan Marshton would take a damn Black guy and whoop their ass and throw him in the cell? I’d run for ****ing sheriff,” Jennings said.

After Clardy said things aren’t like that anymore, Jennings continued.

“I know. Take them down to Mud Creek and hang them up with a damn rope. But you can’t do that anymore. They got more rights than we got.”

Jennings supposedly went on to say that he knows of two large pre-dug holes “if you ever need them,” referring to disposing the remains of Bruce Willingham and his son, Chris, also a Gazette-News reporter. Jennings also said that he knows of “two or three hit men, they’re very quiet guys.”

Manning chimed in and claimed nobody would care if two of the Gazette-News’ reporters were harmed. “Yeah, but here’s the reality,” Manning allegedly said. “If a hair on his wife’s head, Chris Willingham’s head, or any of those people that really were behind that, if any hair on their head got touched by anybody, who would be the bad guy?”

The trio was supposedly frustrated with the Gazette-News portraying the sheriff’s office unfavorably in their reporting.

 

[Joey D]

 

[Populuxe]

"The trio was supposedly frustrated with the Gazette-News portraying the sheriff’s office unfavorably in their reporting."

Do tell.

 

[UKMikey]

"It's edgy humour!!" defence strategy incoming...

Except I'm not sure Cletus here sounds like he has the capability to make an edgy joke.

Spoiler: sweary dumb racists

At least the GOP governor is calling out his own now that he's been backed into a corner.

 

[TexRex]

 

[TexRex]

FBI investigating GOP Oklahoma officials caught on tape talking about lynching Black people, murdering newspaper reporters

GOP officials from McCurtain County, Okla. are being investigated by the FBI after they were caught on tape expressing their frustration about it not being socially acceptable beat up and hang Black people, as well as their desires to hire hit men to kill newspaper reporters.

heartlandsignal.com

Amazing.

 

[McLaren]

How dare you share what pieces of **** we are!

 

[GranTurNismo]

And of course they will eventually be rehired somewhere else.

 

[UKMikey]

"It's complicated."

 

[TexRex]

Missouri, the Show Me Your Genitals State, is not about to be outdone by Tennessee and Florida.

Screenshot to ensure it all appears on-screen. Here's the source:

While I admit that I still giggle at this particular bitchfit for its breathtaking inanity...

A woman is a human adult born with two X chromosomes.

Period.

Transgender men are not women, no matter how much they want to be, no matter how much hormone treatment or surgery they have received.

If a human has a Y chromosome, whether it's paired with an X chromosome or whether they have extra chromosomes in XYY or XXY combination, they are male. A male with XYY may go his entire life unaware of the xtra Y chromosome as it produces no developmental issues. A male with an extra X chromosome will probably show developmental problems such as near or total sterility, poor genital development, even breasts, but they still carry a Y chromosome, have a penis and not a vagina, and are still male, and cannot grow up to be a woman.

I expect to be flamed for this viewpoint, but seriously... this isn't difficult. A woman has 2 X chromosomes.

...there's no question that this derangement is the basis for the weaponization of bigotry against groups disfavored by conservatives.

 

[Populuxe]

As has been pointed out elsewhere, conservatives didn't give two ***** about trans people until they realized they couldn't target gay people anymore.

 

[TexRex]

Florida bans most public school instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity

It was never about protecting small children. Florida has expanded LGBT censorship across all grades of public school.

reason.com

The Florida Board of Education voted today to approve proposed regulations that will prohibit teachers from providing instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in most classes in any grade of its public schools, expanding censorship of LGBT issues far beyond the stated goals of conservative politicians that they wanted only to protect very young children from overly sexualized discussions.

When Republican Florida lawmakers introduced and passed H.B. 1557, opponents quickly started calling it a "Don't Say Gay" law. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis shot back that the law was only for kindergarten through third grade, even sparring with a reporter at a press conference about the text of the law. He subsequently used a clip of that response in a self-promoting video.

DeSantis' response now looks like misleading nonsense. The law not only banned discussion of sexual orientation and gender through third grade, but it also contained an additional prohibition on any such instruction in a grade where it "is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students." The law did not define these terms, leaving it to the state's Board of Education. That board has decided that almost all discussion of these issues is inappropriate in public schools.

The Miami Herald reports that the board voted today to approve a proposed rule that states that teachers "shall not intentionally provide classroom instruction to students in grades 4 through 12 on sexual orientation or gender identity unless such instruction is either expressly required by state academic standards … or is part of a reproductive health course or health lesson for which a student's parent has the option to have his or her student not attend."

If "Don't Say Gay" wasn't accurate when it was passed last year the state has worked to make it accurate after the fact. Reason noted in March when this rule was proposed that the state's social studies benchmarks call for teaching about homosexuality only in connection with the Holocaust and in psychology classes. That omits a lot of potential instruction. In addition, the state has forwarded a proposal to the Board of Education requesting the removal of four education benchmarks connected to H.B. 1557. The state's Department of Education never responded to Reason's phone or email request asking which benchmarks regulators planned to remove.

The Miami Herald notes that an LGBT activist who attended hearings on this rule asked if teachers could teach 11th-graders about the Supreme Court decision that mandated legal recognition of same-sex marriages. Education Commissioner Manny Diaz responded that teachers would be able to talk about the case itself but would not be able to discuss "something else that is subjective and trying to expand on that."

There's a problem with Diaz's response. The contents of a Supreme Court decision are themselves not "subjective." There's a reason the decisions themselves are referred to as "opinions." Does discussing the text of the decision itself go beyond the rules? Does encouraging students to debate a Supreme Court decision violate the rules? Debate is an essential part of any self-respecting liberal arts education. But teachers can be punished and lose their license to teach if they make the wrong decision here, so an intelligent teacher will probably avoid these topics as much as possible. And that's the point.

The usual libertarian response to this kind of centralized meddling in public education would be to encourage dissenting parents to seek out charter schools that are friendly to their interests. However, Florida's conservative lawmakers are now trying to amend H.B. 1557 to apply to charter schools.

As for the old insistence that this was only about protecting kids up through third grade from overly sexualized content, DeSantis press secretary Bryan Griffin gave up the game when asked about the new proposed rule: "There is no reason for instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity to be part of K-12 education. Full stop."

"If 'Don't Say Gay' wasn't accurate when it was passed last year the state has worked to make it accurate after the fact."

Of course it was accurate then, and I explained how it was accurate--even more accurate than its official title--in response to criticism of the unofficial moniker.

Here's some really fantastic commentary on the policy and motives behind it. The thread is only moderately long (fewer than ten posts which can be paired up to embed them all here), but it's all text and so I've transcribed it below so that it may be read more easily.

Again, the delusion here, made even more ridiculous by the expansion, is that students in 2023 can somehow be shielded from the existence of these topics until parents deign to broach them. They can’t. They OBVIOUSLY can’t. It’s ludicrous.

This isn’t the 50s when you could reach adulthood without ever knowingly encountering a gay person in many places. Students will be openly gay and trans. Their parents and siblings and extended family will be openly gay and trans. This will not be Eldritch Knowledge.

So Florida’s law can’t and won’t stop kids from encountering gay or trans people. It will just teach them that the existence of those people—their families and the students themselves—is a shameful, taboo topic teacher can’t discuss when they have questions.

This is not a neutral move that leaves the topic to be covered at home. It is itself a lesson. The lesson is that some families—including the families of many students in class—are literally unspeakable.

Which, of course, is the point, but disingenuously framing it as a policy of state neutrality or abstention on a controversial topic sells it better with voters who don’t want to think of themselves as hateful, but don’t understand the social reality students today inhabit.

It’s also, I suspect, based on an awfully old-timey notion of how classroom instruction operates. Like the content of every class is wholly determined by a scripted lecture that the teacher reads and the students absorb. Do people just not remember what school was like?

Classes—good ones anyway—are conversations at least part of the time. Students connect history or literature or art to current events, to their own lived experiences. This stuff will absolutely come up, whether or not it’s on the lesson plan.

 

[UKMikey]

In deliberately trying to ignore social realities for demagogic gain, DeSantis is acting the King Cnut here in every sense of the phrase.