Normal News/1

The Normal News & Rational Enquirer Is reality doing okay? - vol. 1 #1 - 2024-03-21 (maybe)

1: Saudi Arabia

Why are we "friends" with Saudi Arabia when they treat half their population so badly?

• 2017-12-27 Chess champion to miss Saudi Arabia tournament over women's rights

2: What the Right Thinks

2.1 about gay people

Why do "conservatives" think it's okay to assume gay people are child-molesters?

• 2024-03-12 Gay Widowed Dad Claps Back After Rightwing Commentator Attacks Him For Having Children

2.2 about totalitarianism

Why does the GOP say they aren't Nazis when they are actively supporting people who openly say they will turn the US into a dictatorship?

2.3 about the Constitution

Why do they say they love the Constitution, when they clearly want to override or eliminate it?

2.4 about trans people

Why do they think it's wrong for trans women to be surfers?

• 2024-03-16 Behind the Curl

Why does the UK's "conservative" government think it's important to prevent trans kids from having puberty-blockers while still allowing cis kids to have them? Don't they understand the harm this will do? Why is the Right claiming that these drugs are dangerous when they are not? If they're dangerous, why are they still allowing cis kids to have them?

• 2024-03-24 England Removes Access to Puberty Blockers for Trans Youth

One possible general answer to these questions: mstdn.ca/@TheBierFrau

3. Weird Spin

3.1 on climate change

Here's a bit of WTF:

• 2024-02-27 How a Solar Revolution in Farming Is Depleting World’s Groundwater
  • commentary: 2024-03-17 mastodon.social/@bruces

3.2 on Trumpaging extremism

Why did the New York Times say that "How Trump’s Allies Are Winning the War Over Disinformation" when what they clearly meant was something more like "Pro-Trump Disinformation Is Fooling Voters" or even "Trump World's Lies Are Conquering Inconvenient Reality"?

Also, why didn't the New York Times front page have anything about Donald Trump's speech in Ohio where he said that immigrants aren't people and "there will be a bloodbath" if he loses again in 2024?

4. What the Media Thinks

Why does the media think the government should enable people to profit off other people's needs and also ensure that those people can deny that support if they don't make enough profit?

• 2024-03-16 monads.online/@georgespolitzer

5. on climate change

Why do some people still not "believe in" climate change even when it whacks them in the face? https://crooksandliars.com/2024/03/swept-away-600000-sand-dune-built-protect (I can maybe-understand not really viscerally getting the science, but for those who prefer "gut feelings" in their decisionmaking, why isn't this impacting their gut?)

• https://www.rawstory.com/u-n-warns-planet-on-the-brink-after-warmest-decade-on-record/

Ongoing

• Why would any sane person vote for Donald Trump?
• Why are we still doing fracking? Why are we still trying to build new fossil pipelines?
• Do real people ask the right-wing questions on Quora, or are they actually generated by an LLM with the instructions "ask a question that echoes a right-wing talking-point as cluelessly as possible"? This week's examples:
  • «Why do you scumbag liberals always defend the criminality of the China bought and paid for Biden family?» [1]
  • «If Fox news is according to the left, such a discredited news source, how do you explain how they beat CNN and MSNBC in ratings for so many years in a row?» [2]

Internal Notes

Things to add:

• https://toot.wales/@fkamiah17/112134039104404452
• Why do some people insist on conflating leaders with the people they lead? (I mean, how would you like to be blamed for everything Trump did while in office?)
• anti-LGBTQ stuff:
  • https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2024/03/russian-bar-employees-arrested-for-promoting-lgbtq-extremism/
  • https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2024/03/alabama-advances-more-extreme-version-of-its-dont-say-gay-law-its-almost-like-bullying/