Author: HP McLovincraft

Seeker of rabbit holes. Pessimist. Libertine. Contrarian. Your huckleberry. Possibly true tales of sanity-blasting horror also known as abject reality. Prepare yourself. Veteran of a thousand psychic wars. I have seen the fnords. Deplatformed on Tumblr and Twitter.

DHS warns ‘perfect storm’ of ‘violent extremist-white supremacists’ is imminent

A Homeland Security bulletin obtained by ABC talks about “violent extremists” and the July 4th holiday.

It warned “attacks” against a “range of potential targets.” With no warning, of course. Those “domestic violent extremists” – aka DVEs, the feds said, are motivated by “violent ideologies” and the “ethnically motivated violent extremist-white supremacists,” or those RMVE-WSs, were sharing information about “mass gatherings.” AND “law enforcement officers.”

“We have the perfect storm,” ABC was told by a “senior law enforcement official.”

So the network posted online: “‘Perfect storm’: Bulletin warns of extremist violence as pandemic restrictions lift.”

However, buried down in the report was the perhaps-significant comment that, “no specific plot has been identified for Independence Day,” but that the warning “ominously” said federal officials are seeing “evidence of planning” by radicals.

ABC said it obtained access to the warning “exclusively,” and that it includes that charge, that “34 states will have State of Emergency orders expire” soon, so that “mass gatherings and social distancing restrictions will be largely lifted.”

It expressed, too, that, “As of 16 June, Racially or ethnically motivated violent extremist-white supremacists (RMVE-WSs) were sharing downloadable links to a publication discussing targeting mass gatherings, critical infrastructure, and law enforcement officers.”

The law enforcement official told ABC, “It’s a very volatile moment and it’s about to be a more target-rich environment.”

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French food is now racist, according to professor who studies ‘food whiteness’ and ‘food privileges’

The Times U.K. reported that a video of Mathilde Cohen discussing the issue for a seminar outside Paris is upsetting folks in France, as the paper noted that the country’s cuisine is “seen as a cornerstone of the national identity.”

Cohen, who hails from the University of Connecticut School of Law, suggested that French eating habits reinforce the “dominance” of white people over ethnic minorities, the Times U.K. said.

An academic paper that was part of Cohen’s seminar asserts that France’s “eating culture … has been the central means of racial and ethnic identity formation through slavery, colonialism, and immigration. The whiteness of French food is all the more powerful in that it is unnamed, enabling the racial majority to benefit from food privileges without having to acknowledge their racial origin,” the Times U.K. added.

Here’s Cohen on video discussing “food whiteness in French culture,” which she said also can be defined as “the use of food to reinforce whiteness as a dominant racial identity.”

In the clip, Cohen says “the French meal is often presented as a national ritual to which every citizen can participate equally. But French food ways are shaped by white middle- and upper-class norms … the boundaries of whiteness are policed through daily food encounters.”

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‘I hate whiteness:’ Assistant Dean of university horrifies parents, comes out as a racist

In a four-paragraph diatribe posted to Instagram that champions critical race theory, an assistant dean at Massachusetts-based Brandeis University declared that “all white people are racist.”

She goes on to say in the post that “I don’t hate white people — I hate whiteness.”

The essay was authored by Brandeis faculty member Kate Slater, who describes herself on the social media platform as a racial justice scholar and educator. Her Instagram page has just changed to private status.

Slater, who earned a PhD in educational leadership and policy studies, also claimed that so-called systemic racism is a given and that “all white people have been conditioned in a society where ones racial identity determines life experiences/outcomes and whiteness is the norm and the default and that includes me.”

Slater concludes that “CRT does not create oppression; it names oppression that already exists.”

Tuition plus room and board at Brandeis runs to about $77,000, which is going to require a family to pony up about $300,000 (absent any scholarship funding) to enable their son or daughter to obtain a four-year diploma for education of this kind.

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‘Pretty Weird’: Facebook Now Sending Warnings to Users About Potentially ‘Extremist’ Friends

Facebook users have recently reported being sent warning messages from the social media giant relating to “extremists” or “extremist content.”

“Are you concerned that someone you know is becoming an extremist?” one of the purported messages read. “We care about preventing extremism on Facebook. Others in your situation have received confidential support,” it adds before offering the button to “Get Support,” which ostensibly leads to another Facebook page about extremism.

Redstate editor Kira Davis, who said was sent a screenshot of the message from a friend, wrote: “Hey has anyone had this message pop up on their FB? My friend (who is not an ideologue but hosts lots of competing chatter) got this message twice. He’s very disturbed.”

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AOC warns about ‘hysteria’ over rising crime just months after accusing GOP colleagues of trying to murder her

Ocasio-Cortez later agreed with far-left Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) who said during the video event that law enforcement should be defunded.

The progressive Squad member and Bowman have both been staunch proponents of the “Defund the Police” movement.

Bowman, however, despite his fiery rhetoric against “white supremacist” police, begged the Yonkers Police Department for increased police presence where he lives due to alleged “death threats” after the Capitol Hill riot on Jan. 6.

The pair discuss how to push the defunding police agenda further, despite the disastrous results it has produced. Ocasio-Cortez tells her congressional colleague:

“We are seeing these headlines about percentage increases [of violent crimes]. Now, I wanna say that any amount of harm is unacceptable and too much.”

“But, I also wanna make sure that this hysteria … you know, that this doesn’t drive a hysteria, and that we look at these numbers in context so that we can make responsible decisions about what to allocate … in that context,” she added.

Independent journalist Glenn Greenwald pointed out that just last month, Ocasio-Cortez had the power to stop $2 billion in additional funds for the Capitol Police that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wanted. All she had to do was vote “no” like Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Cori Bush (D-MO), and Aryanna Pressley (D-MA).

“Instead, she voted ‘present’ to get more police protection for herself,” he said.

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Biden to deploy COVID ‘response teams’ to low-vaccination towns nationwide amid Delta variant concerns

President Joe Biden’s administration is sending COVID-19 “response teams” to locations across the United States amid growing concerns surrounding the new highly transmittable Delta variant of the virus, according to a White House official, CNN reported.

Comprised of officials from the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the teams will focus on communities with low vaccination rates and a prominent presence of the latest strain.

A White House official said the administration has sent out similar teams before, but none that focused specifically on the Delta variant. The teams, led by the White House coronavirus team, will be tasked with conducting a sharp increase in testing, providing therapeutics, and deploying federal workers to ramp up vaccination distribution.

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Meet the Anti-MAGA Trolls

Trolling used to be the pastime of a subculture that considered itself apolitical, and that claimed to be interested in provoking everyone. But for Michael and Sloane, the jokes are part of how they practice their politics—the only fun part, they say. Similarly, many politically minded young people have come of age with an innate understanding of how antisocial behavior online can be used to win attention for and participation in a chosen cause. “Trolling has a long and noble history, and shitposting can be useful,” says Talia Lavin, the author of Culture Warlords: My Journey Into the Dark Web of White Supremacy. She took part in an attempt to troll Trump’s “Voter Fraud Hotline,” she told me, by submitting a long video in which she described being intimidated by the sexual attractiveness of an antifa operative at her polling place.

But trolling can have especially unpredictable results when it engages with hateful rhetoric and conspiratorial thinking. It might even help spread and amplify misinformation or extremist beliefs. Some r/ParlerTrick members, for example, created memes that, per Michael, had “some racist stuff” in them, or might have stoked “unnecessary hate.” The forum has struggled with this issue, he said. “It’s a thin line. You have to really pay attention to what you’re doing.”

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Microsoft exec: Targeting of Americans’ records ‘routine’

 Federal law enforcement agencies secretly seek the data of Microsoft customers thousands of times a year, according to congressional testimony Wednesday by a senior executive at the technology company.

Tom Burt, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for customer security and trust, told members of the House Judiciary Committee that federal law enforcement in recent years has been presenting the company with between 2,400 to 3,500 secrecy orders a year, or about seven to 10 a day.

“Most shocking is just how routine secrecy orders have become when law enforcement targets an American’s email, text messages or other sensitive data stored in the cloud,” said Burt, describing the widespread clandestine surveillance as a major shift from historical norms.

The relationship between law enforcement and Big Tech has attracted fresh scrutiny in recent weeks with the revelation that Trump-era Justice Department prosecutors obtained as part of leak investigations phone records belonging not only to journalists but also to members of Congress and their staffers. Microsoft, for instance, was among the companies that turned over records under a court order, and because of a gag order, had to then wait more than two years before disclosing it.

Since then, Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president, called for an end to the overuse of secret gag orders, arguing in a Washington Post opinion piece that “prosecutors too often are exploiting technology to abuse our fundamental freedoms.” Attorney General Merrick Garland, meanwhile, has said the Justice Department will abandon its practice of seizing reporter records and will formalize that stance soon.

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