By now most of you have heard about the Obama-hating 13 year old who carried away the hearts of America’s right wing media consumers.
“I got into politics when I was eight years old. Six years now. And I got involved because I started listening to talk radio. It goes back to one event. The Democrats filibustered something in the Senate when I was eight years old. I don’t remember what it was on and I didn’t honestly care when I was eight years old. I cared about the history and the Senate rules,” he told the Huffington Post. “I listened to Bill Bennett and tons of other talk show hosts who talked about that and other policies and started branching out and caring about other issues in regards to politics. Bill Bennett really became an idol for me. I listened to him every morning from 6 to 9 for, oh, years. And I started learning more and started to be able to think on my own, understanding politics on my own. I started to be able to use my mind to engage in political conversations under the conservative banner.”
He talks fast and with high-pitched emotion (no cracking of the voice), often banging his two fists against the table (each one holding a pen) for dramatic effect. His mother, naturally protective, reminds him at one point that he’s talking to a reporter from the Huffington Post.
“I know he is a liberal,” he replies. “But you are not the first liberal I talked to at CPAC.”
The topic on his mind – or at least mine – is how the Republican Party can resurrect itself. “Conservatism, conservatism, conservatism…” he replies. Whether these are talking points, I’m not sure. Either way, he has them down. “A lot of people say to me, ‘oh, you’re a Republican.’ And I say, ‘No, I’m a conservative.’ I’m a Republican when I support candidates. When I talk about the party I’m affiliated with I’m a Republican. But when it comes to what I am, I’m a conservative.”
No, I do not mean the black kid who yells at Obama on Twitter. The above was 13 year old Jonathan Krohn at CPAC in 2009. Conservatives sure seem to have a sentimental weakness for hearing their standard boilerplate read back at them by adolescents, don’t they? I would call it the Prussian Blue phenomenon, after those preteen neo-Nazi twins who made a similar sensation repeating right-wing messages at a slightly higher pitch. Why do conservatives go gaga for hearing movement orthodoxies read out loud by children? I could not tell you. It creeps me out a little. I discovered environmentalism at around that age, loudly, and nobody seemed all that impressed.
If I had to guess I would connect it with the conservative obsession about what right wingers are ‘allowed’ to say without getting criticized. As a whole conservatives always seem so extraordinarily sensitive about negative feedback. The GOP props up a woman candidate to ensure someone on stage can safely criticize Hillary. Wingnuts flock to any black man who will diss Obama or Black Lives Matter. I think that Milwaukee sherriff who hates BLM could be drawing a second salary from FOX by now. Kanye said n***er last week, can I say it NOW? Huh? Huh?? Surely nobody would attack a thirteen year old kid. So let’s put him on stage, hand the kid some cue cards and watch the liberals seethe with futile rage. It does not serve any policy or strategic purpose, but as Duncan Black would say pissing off liberals is pretty much the whole point of everything.
It seems worth noting both Krohn and the Prussian Blue twins repudiated everything once they grew up enough to understand that stuff their parents made them memorize. I think we can chart a similar path for the poor Twitter kid, whose parental stage managing is pretty obvious. In a few years he will probably appreciate the few blogs that did not attach his name to the dumb things ‘he’ wrote.
Mike E
Ah, yoot.
Mark
Mr. Krohn is still a very young guy who’s views are subject to change as he matures.
carolus
This has some interesting background on CJ Pearson.
I think the kid’s got a real problem and his pattern of behavior does not bode well for his future.
MattF
It is odd. After all, every adult was a teenager once– so we’re all very familiar with the immaturity/stupidity thing. And with the fact that some adults continue to act like adolescents well past the usual age limits.
Mark B.
Honestly, I feel sorry for the kid. He’s being exploited by political figures and his parents aren’t doing their job protecting him. I suppose they might make some money off the deal. If they can save some of it for the kid’s college fund, it wouldn’t be all bad.
Scott S.
Well, they don’t all renounce. The Virgin Ben was an elementary-school wingnut back in the day, and he’s even crazier today. Maybe the Twitter kid can look forward to years and years and years of being a troll.
Barney
I think conservatives also have a yearning for ‘natural’ common sense/laws/political opinions. They have taken to heart the biblical ‘Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings You have ordained praise’, and think this is ‘real’ knowledge, from before evil college professors/high school teachers/Jesuit Popes have got their nefarious hooks into their impressionable minds.
FlyingToaster
I usually joke that I had the advantage of being raised by anarchists.
My parents were liberal Democrats in what is now a pretty Republican area. They taught us to question every damn thing, and when we got in trouble at school for that, they were up there in the principal’s and the teachers’ faces, backing us up.
(Especially the “book says Jupiter has 12 moons, NASA says there are 26” controversy.)
These RWNJers kids are being taught nonsense, and the first time they get a chance to actually think about it, they’re going to stop believing it.
The reason why the RWNJs are lapping it up? The old hackneyed saw: “Out of the mouths of babes…”
***
Of course the universe is taking its revenge on me; yesterday my 8-year-old WarriorGirl berated me for fasting on Yom Kippur. “That’s stupid, mom; you are supposed to be an athiest like me!” Yes, I think I’m raising her right :)
Ryan
I suspect that one possible answer would be confirmation that “ah, even a child can understand common sense” kind of thing, like what Barney says. My impression is that they don’t do nuance, they can’t deal with complexity or with “it depends on the context.” But no, I don’t know why hearing from children is better.
Uncle Cosmo
So “Krohn’s disease” was apparently a transient condition of adolescence probably caused by his whackjob computer-socalled-“scientist” father having jammed the boy’s head up his own arse. Continuing maturation of the elementary canal led to spontaneous expulsion of the intrusion, which eliminated the symptoms & demonstrated the condition’s self-limiting nature–amirite?
ThresherK
The kid may have looked at all the work it took to be a Melissa Harris Perry, for example, and how many people there are trying to do that for real. Then he decided to get in the short line. JC Watts isn’t getting any younger, and that sweet wingnut welfare cash is calling.
boatboy_srq
Proof both that Conservatists have no boundaries, and that Conservatistism is dependent on the ethics and decency of everyone else. Putting children in such positions, expecting that pushback would be met with outrage over criticizing a kid – yet counting on that restraint and using the kid because they expect he’s unassailable – is all too typical.
Jeffro
They want any confirmation – any whatsoever – that their ideas are the Good Ideas and that they are Good People.
Whenever they can get the odd teenager, female, minority, etc to profess right-wing beliefs and tweak libs, that’s a twofer: irritate liberals a la Cleek’s Law AND feel validated through n’ through.
sharl
Jonathan Krohn is a VERY different person now, if his twitter feed is any indication. He is doing journalism, and spending most of his time in Iraq – that’s gotta be a situation that forces you to grow up real fast. He sounds a bit world-weary, if his recent exchange with some weird/irony twitter bros is any indication:
Mnemosyne
Who lets their 8-year-old listen to right-wing talk radio?
dedc79
I think Ess-a-bagel has to get some of the credit for Krohn’s political evolution:
...now I try to be amused
I can guess at another reason: Right-wingers crave reassurance that their ideology will survive in the next generation, and that their children won’t be seduced away from the One True Faith by liberalism.
Boots Day
That is really kind of impressive in its wrongheadedness. The kid does not care at all about the policy at stake. He claims to care about history and Senate rules, yet he is incensed about something that has a long history on both sides, and that is perfectly in accord with Senate rules.
He is angry solely because talk show hosts told him he should be angry.
Debbie
My 9-year-old niece told me she hated Obama just after the 2008 election. I told her to get back to me when she had learned to think for herself. When I was a wee kid, my dad had me supporting Nixon over JFK. Imagine his surprise when I got in his face about Vietnam eight years later.
Unless this kid is a mutant, he will one day be embarrassed about.
Debbie
@Debbie:
Embarrassed about his notoriety.
Spacegeek
The appeal of outspoken right-wing adolescents is simple: It means that conservative views are so obviously correct that even a child can see the rightness of them and, more importantly, it means that a conservative child is smarter than a liberal adult. What wingnut wouldn’t love that?
The problem is that kids believe a lot of dumb things. And it’s telling that all of these conservative wunderkinder are barely teenagers. The more they age beyond that point, the less likely they are to automatically believe what they’re told, especially once they make it to college. Glad to see that young Mr. Krohn is growing into himself.
Kay
I feel bad for my youngest because this is a conservative area and he’s a little liberal. A small liberal. A young liberal. Obviously some of this is his home and his older siblings- I don’t kid myself that he made this purely objective analysis and arrived at “a position” but he’s really sweet about it- he asks sincere questions- and I just feel like he’s due to encounter a big blast of spit-flecked fury.
He asked me “why do they think Hillary Clinton is starting a race war?”. This is 7th graders. They’re reading MLK speeches in English along with Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry so I suspect that’s where the comment came from. He has an easy disposition- he’s generally cheerful- so I think that helps.
Gian
@FlyingToaster:
O man the silly fuss we had with a teacher on the possible use of umbrellas. I think first grade, maybe kinder. We live in inland California, and read a Dr. Seus branded book about weather, and yes, people use umbrellas for shade.
NonyNony
@Boots Day:
He’s a kid – it’s far more likely that he’s angry because one of his parents is angry and he’s picking up on it.
I was a Young Republican in my youth mostly because my parents were Republicans. I ceased being a Young Republican when I got older because I started to think for myself and realize that Republicans were objectively awful (including, sadly, a lot about my own parents – they are former Democrats who became Republicans almost precisely when Dad’s job took him from “working class” to “management class” and he became an anti-tax loon. He claims Reagan made him see the light but I’m pretty sure it was the bigger paychecks that did it. Sigh.)
Anoniminous
That Conservatives need to have their ideas validated by a 13 year old says all anyone needs to know about Conservatives.
Mike in NC
@…now I try to be amused: Most of the extreme right-wingers I come across are closing in on the Permanent Dirt Nap, so they’re happy to see the poison passed on to somebody who isn’t yet forced to collect Social Security and accept Medicare.
Scott S.
@…now I try to be amused: I think that’s more likely than some other reasons. “The young people love us! We’re hip and cool! We aren’t doomed to the dustbin of history after all!”
scav
@Gian: Too funny, especially as the umber part of the name is specifically about shade/shadow. French at least has words for the two: Parasols (against the sun) Parapluies (against the rain)
Jado
i think it is projection – they would not be allowed to froth and rage at a 13 year old spouting liberal talking points (even though there are documented cases of them not being able to stop themselves), so they IMAGINE that liberals will ” seethe with futile rage” at a 13 year old spouting RW talking points.
They don’t get that most people would look upon the kid with a mixture of curiosity about what his parents are teaching him/letting him absorb from the RW talk radio world, and pity about the closing of a mind at such an early age.
I am sure there are some rage-addicted liberals out there, but I haven’t seen them around me. Maybe I am in the wrong place for LWNJs.
Elizabelle
NYTimes top story blurb, just now:
Wingnut tears, shall be out in force. Best examples today, please.
benw
Conservative politics: so dumb and bad even a 13 y.o. can grasp it.
Knight of Nothing
I think it is another illustration of the asymmetrical nature of conservative vs liberal. Conservatives value orthodoxy, pedantry, adherence to doctrine. Liberals/progressives value questioning, thinking for oneself, etc.
Since children tend to question everything (‘why… why… why… ‘ is what all three of my kids said to me a million times each), conservatives are touched to hear their doctrines spouted unquestioningly by the wee folk in a way that liberals are not and cannot be.
Kay
@Scott S.:
I know a lot of conservative parents and they think liberal indoctrination is everywhere, so it might be “this one escaped mind control!”
It’s a big part of conservatism- the victimhood and the insistence that they are a powerless minority. I always feel like saying “I don’t want to train your children- don’t flatter yourself”.
gelfling545
@Kay: My daughter & her husband are atheists & are raising the kids similarly. This is an area, though, where religion is still “a thing” even if it’s a practice more honored in the breach. They are trying to prepare the kids to deal with the shock their peers will quite likely register when it comes out that they don’t believe in a deity of any kind.
schrodinger's cat
Is Trump really tanking or is this just wishful thinking on the part of MSM bots. Also too, the #2 in polls is even more kooky than Trump, Ben Crazy Carson, I am looking at you.
Some kids thrive on attention and applause. I also think that parents are coaching these born show-offs.
kuvasz
Just wait until this young man gets his driver’s license. He’ll be as surprised as Siddartha after seeing the sick old man once he gets stopped for DWB.
schrodinger's cat
@Jado: LWNJs, are mostly amusing, since they are mostly toothless politically. They can do little but rave and rant. Only exceptions I can think of are the anti-vax folks.
Xboxershorts
i went looking for the filibuster the kid referenced in the OP that would have taken place 6 years ago and in 2009, the dems still held a Senate majority and would very likely NOT be deploying a filibuster (Save for Lieberman and Baucus killing the public option with the mere threat of a filibuster).
Anyone have any idea what filibuster the kid was referring to?
Mike J
@Xboxershorts: I thought it was six years before 2009.
ETA: Probably the Estrada nom
jibeaux
@schrodinger’s cat: it’s mildly vexing to be hit with kale…..
schrodinger's cat
Speaking of nutjobs, I just checked how the more Catholic than the Pope – Thinking Housewife is faring. She has gone completely crazy, she has gone into the ebil diabolic Jews are behind everything, controversy zone.
Elizabelle
Two interesting calls on C-Span, someone calling the Pope “evil fruit”, and “a politician” to boot — props to him for opening his comments talking about “Night of the Hunter”. A lady just saying her family is not immigrants. They came over with John Smith. Some are descendants of Queen Victoria. Not immigrants.
schrodinger's cat
@jibeaux: True, but their unvaccinated speshul snowflake disease carriers are compromising herd immunity.
Elizabelle
@schrodinger’s cat: Miss S Cat! You cannot say that and not put up a link. Good work on finding that.
I wonder if the Pope’s visit will get Andrew Sullivan to blog a bit …
Elizabelle
C-Span rebroadcasting Pope’s speech again now. He’s about to enter. Mr. Speaker! The pope of the Holy See.
Think they’ll do this a few times today. Will catch it later.
NonyNony
@Xboxershorts:
Krohn (the kid from the quoted passage) was 13 in 2009 – he was referencing a filibuster from 2003. In 2003 the Dems were in the minority so it could have been anything – the Dems weren’t as loose with the filibuster as the GOP became post Obama, but they still used it a bit (honestly I wish the GOPers had been more destructive then – we almost got rid of the damn thing for judicial appointments until a bunch of stupid Dem “moderates” decided to cave to preserve the power of the filibuster for future Senates. What a group of jackasses.)
Tim was linking him to the current kid who is 13 now. The linked HuffPo article if you follow through on it is from 2009.
schrodinger's cat
@Elizabelle: Ask and you shall receive.
Thinking Housewife has gone bonkers
benw
@schrodinger’s cat: @Jado:
Also, the LWNJs I know are plenty angry, but are also very kind, sweet people in general. They would never take it out on a 13 y.o. kid. Of course, let the kid grow up and become a left-winger in college, and then if he doesn’t believe EXACTLY the correct liberal orthodoxy, watch the knives come out! Us hippies are best at punching ourselves. :)
@Elizabelle: I’m just glad that now all the conservative Catholics in Congress will have to make a common cause with the Democrats on these issues. I don’t see how they can criticize or ignore this, the Pope is their infallible direct representative of God himself on earth, right? Also, leave it to the NYT to call it a leftist agenda, and not “issues supported by the Democratic party, including almost all centrist members, and agreed on by a majority of the US populace.” Wouldn’t want to make any Republican criticism of the Pope look extremist or out-of-touch or anything anything anything bad.
agorabum
These are people who proudly call themselves ‘dittoheads’ – which is literally blanket adoption of what the right wing mouthpieces say.
So when they see a 13 year old parrot, that is the highest level of discourse they know.
These are people who hate and are opposed to the idea of critical thinking. Of course they love parrots who repeat talking points.
Roger Moore
@schrodinger’s cat:
I suspect it’s just MSM bots seeing what they want to see.
Spinoza is my Co-pilot
@NonyNony: I went from working class to management class early in the Reagan years myself. Never got why making more money than you used to would of itself turn anyone fascist. I think it’s more complicated than that.
And some of the looniest anti-tax loons I’ve known over the years have been working class people in my family and on the job. All of them white, so there’s a clue. Seems like the primary driving force for them in this regard is resentment that undeserving “others” (you know, “those people”, the lazy, shiftless ones) are getting gov’t handouts paid from the taxes on salt of the earth hardworking “regular Americans”. Resentment looms very large on the right, of course.
Some (not all) of the higher-income people I’ve known understood that taxes are the price you pay for the privilege of living in our modern society, and that progressive taxation is the fair and right way to do that. Others are just, you know, greedy entitled assholes, which makes them natural conservatives.
“I got mine, fuck you” and “Devil take the hindmost” are the bedrock “principles” of conservatism.
The Other Chuck
@schrodinger’s cat:
That one started as a genuine “both sides” issue (or both fringes anyway), but it’s found the most fertile ground in the fever swamps of the science-denying right these days. Notice which candidates are courting antivaxxers now?
Elizabelle
@schrodinger’s cat: Wow. She’s going to be up in clock tower before long, throwing silver cutlery from the heights and ranting.
Laura Wood is a real person and not a parody? Yikes.
I love that us libtards have an easier time calling the previous [unsuitable] pope “Ratzinger” than she does, typing and spewing out Francis’s birth name. (Rolls, but a lot of syllables.)
The Other Chuck
@Spinoza is my Co-pilot:
Given the number of working poor who vote Republican, the most salient principle seems to be merely “fuck you” with no other adornment. The amygdala party.
Archon
I always though that beneath the bravado and certitude of most conservatives there is a feeling deep down that they are on the wrong side of history.
Like others have said having a kid, especially a black kid ape their cherished ideas gives them hope that maybe, just maybe their ideas will survive, even possibly triumph in future generations.
The Other Chuck
@schrodinger’s cat: Gone publicly bonkers that is, as she was always a hateful rage junkie before her public meltdown.
Gindy51
@gelfling545: If my daughter (26) is any indication there won’t be much shock at all. None of her peers in a highly religious conservative area registered any thing what so ever. I think most kids now a days could care less and it is getting better all the time.
rikyrah
Because nowhere else would her lowly qualified azz get an $80,000 /year job WITH BENEFITS .
And, don’t have to actually DO the job, because of ‘ religious objections’?
GET.DA.PHUQ.OUTTA.HERE.
You all principled..find a job that doesn’t conflict with the principles. Someone else without the conflict would be more than happy to do the job.
……………….
Why Kentucky’s Kim Davis won’t find a different job
09/24/15 08:40 AM—UPDATED 09/24/15 08:44 AM
By Steve Benen
One of the oddities of the Kim Davis story in Kentucky is the obvious remedy. The Kentucky clerk has a job in which she’s supposed to issue marriage licenses, but Davis doesn’t want to issue licenses to couples she deems morally inadequate. So why doesn’t Davis find some other job in which her responsibilities won’t conflict with her religious views?
Indeed, given her public notoriety, if she asked far-right leaders for a paid position somewhere, Davis probably wouldn’t have much trouble landing another gig – one which her conscience would be comfortable with.
Last night, the clerk explained her perspective.
Kentucky clerk Kim Davis on Wednesday night explained to Fox News’ Megyn Kelly why she has still refused to resign despite numerous failed attempts to receive an accommodation for her religious beliefs.
“If I resign I lose my voice,” Davis said. “Why should I have to quit a job that I love, that I’m good at?”
I imagine that was a rhetorical question, but the answer isn’t exactly complicated. If you have a job that requires you to do things you consider morally objectionable, you have a choice: meet your professional obligations anyway or find a different job. Davis’ argument is that she should continue to be paid to perform duties she refuses to do – to the point that she’s comfortable defying court rulings, her oath of office, and court orders.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/why-kentuckys-kim-davis-wont-find-different-job
lonesomerobot
Children being used in a political context always makes me uncomfortable. I can think of one example from the left, a girl named Madison Kimrie who was very publicly taking part in the Moral Monday protests in North Carolina. This isn’t me attempting to say ‘both sides do it’ in the least, because at least Ms. Kimrie wasn’t just reciting stupid ideological talking points. Just saying it still made me uncomfortable.
JPL
@rikyrah: She’s decided that her fifteen minutes of fame isn’t up yet.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Mnemosyne:
Home-schoolers, my guess. Especially at 9:00 a.m., when regular school has already started.
The Other Chuck
@rikyrah: Shorter Davis: “Why should I get off welfare?”
Joel
Jonathan Krohn is exactly why it makes me sick that TPM, Gawker, et al. are frontpaging this new kid right now.
boatboy_srq
@schrodinger’s cat: Wow.
I’d suspect a call for a new Reformation but I don’t think these people can count to 95.
Xboxershorts
@NonyNony: ah, thank you!
Amir Khalid
@boatboy_srq:
You should see the post on Yom Kippur.
the Conster
@Archon:
I agree with this completely. Deep down they really do know better. They must have sat through every Hollywood movie ever made and rooted for all the bad guys – the Nazis and the Japanese in WW II movies, the cavalry in Dances with Wolves, the corporate polluters and cheaters in every whistleblower and union movie, the asshole abusive husbands, the rapists, the crooked cops until they realized they were the only ones and something was deeply irretrievably wrong with them.
boatboy_srq
@lonesomerobot: And that’s why the Reichwing will always win when they use that tactic: too many of the rest of us are “uncomfortable” with the idea. What we need is to be outraged at the idea – to the point of pressing charges of child abuse on the parents/guardians. The only way to make it stop is to make it sufficiently painful for the adults involved that continuing the behavior is not feasible. It’s not the kids who are at fault – they’re only doing what they’re taught – but the adults should be held accountable.
boatboy_srq
@Amir Khalid: No thanks: lox’n’bagel that I had for breakfast would come right up.
MattF
@schrodinger’s cat: I don’t really have much to say about Ms. Housewife. The checklist of ‘Uh-oh’ symptoms is well-known, and she seems to have every one.
boatboy_srq
@rikyrah:
Edited for accuracy.
OzarkHillbilly
@the Conster:
I rooted for the cavalry to get Kevin Costner in that pic. Aaaaacckk!!! Aaaaacckk!!! Gag me with a spoon if I ever have to watch another movie about a saintly white man trying to save the noble savages from the evil white men.
The neighboring tribes had a saying about the Sioux: “When the Sioux come, we die.”
Elizabelle
@the Conster: That’s probably why some libtard made Jaws 2.
Kids were so unappealing, how not to root for the shark? Same for Jaws 3 …
Didn’t someone joke (or not) about Michael Kinsley rooting for the bank at some FarmAid era movie about a family losing its farm?
rk
I would not let my kid spout off like that even if his views were flaming left wing. At this age everything is very impulse driven, and it’s on the internet forever. I wouldn’t want that kind of a public record to define him forever.Why would any parent allow their child this much exposure?
catclub
@NonyNony:
I think there is now a permanent blockage of all Obama Justice nominees. No vote at all.
Feel free to correct me if I am wrong.
OzarkHillbilly
@boatboy_srq:
Yes because nothing says “freedom” like the Thought Police.
the Conster
@OzarkHillbilly:
OK, yeah. I’ll buy that. Actually, the wolf was the only thing that died in the movie that made me cry. Let’s just say conservatives probably cheered at the good shot.
catclub
Isn’t it “the mouths of babes”?
Otherwise sounds like one universal mouth of all babes.
lonesomerobot
@boatboy_srq: What are you going to charge them with? Child endangerment? Not sure that is something you could easily prove. Also not sure making a criminal issue out of it doesn’t have the potential to get waaay out of hand. How long does it take before someone tries to arrest an opponent’s supporter for having brought their child to a rally, or letting their child speak at a rally? You can say it won’t happen but we live in the United States of Stupid. You think Sheriff Arpaio wouldn’t arrest some brown people for bringing their children to a rally against him?
I agree there could be a measure of outrage but I don’t agree at all that there should be some sort of punitive action taken. Let the adults — the leaders of a political movement or the candidate being supported — make it known that using children in a political context is just not acceptable. If the other side want to pimp out their kids politically, then it’s there for all to see.
Elizabelle
@the Conster: Incidentally, saw a great documentary lately about banned Nazi-made films. Some filmmakers made genuinely well-done films about the Germans having to rescue their countrymen from behind sinister Polish lines (“Homeland”), about euthanasia (message there was allegedly: “don’t worry about your neighbors disappearing — they’re going to a better place!” — bit of a sell). I’ll find a link. Doc is worth seeing …
Kay
@lonesomerobot:
I think your impulse is right. They’re more vulnerable now too because if they say it publicly anyone can call it up for years. I always get nervous when I see it too- I’m afraid of a pile on or a record that will disallow them the freedom to be young and say and do things they may regret later. It seems so harsh for them now, so “high stakes”. It worries me.
boatboy_srq
@lonesomerobot: Abuse/Endangerment could work.
The problem is that the Reichwing counts on ordinary people having the basic decency and ethical foundation to hold back when some Rethug kid spouts party-line nonsense. They count on it. The entire approach is only successful because the rest of us pull our punches because “s/he’s just a kid”. That is not acceptable. But by the same token the kid can’t be held accountable.
,
It’s also worth pointing out that a version of the extreme you’re describing is already happening. Obergefell may have been decided in part due to SCOTUS’ persuasion that two-parent families were desirable (regadless of the sex of the parents) but there are still states working against this who might not stop short of acting as you describe if the one parent they recognize were unable to care for offspring. Again: we have ethics that inhibit us from taking these steps, and the Reichwing not only lacks them, but counts on us to have them so we won’t work so fiercely against conservatists when they breach those ethics.
schrodinger's cat
@catclub: Thanks! That was bothering me as well.
Elizabelle
@ Conster: It was Forbidden Films. Variety story link.
FlyingToaster
@boatboy_srq:
Charges wouldn’t stick. COPPA doesn’t apply to parents, idiot or otherwise.
Myself, I like the Google and Facebook rule of “you can’t do this until you’re 13, and you have to have parental permission until you’re 18”. So I don’t have a Facebook account and won’t until WarriorGirl is at least 13. The Google account with parental controls is MINE, I just keep her logged into YouTube on the iPad and her laptop.
Parents can post any damn thing; can you imagine being this kid at 17 and applying for a summer job, and having this come up in a cursory internet search?
The rule should be simple: don’t post shit that will embarass your kids in their future workplace. Just don’t.
Calouste
@Roger Moore: I think what happens is that Fiorina is going to be the new not-Trump for a bit, until the voters find out that she is really unlikeable, even compared to Trump, and a compulsive liar, and then they will go back to Trump. Looking at Pollster, the combined total of Trump and Fiorina is 40% +- a few percent over the last 6 polls, even though the individual support varies wildly.
Kay
@gelfling545:
My eldest did okay with that. He came to his own decision on religion (or lack of) about 16 and his social group were, bluntly, smart kids and quite a few were religious. He would go back and forth with them on it a lot but it was never mean- I think they may have enjoyed having a sparring partner because he’s funny.
I have to tell you though he lives in Chicago and he rarely comes back here and he no longer keeps in touch with his high school friends, so maybe it was less wonderful for him than I remember :)
mr_gravity
@Mnemosyne: Republicans? It’s not like they’re going to turn the radio off when Rush is on.
boatboy_srq
@lonesomerobot:
Trouble is, that ain’t going to happen; if it were at all likely, then BLM wouldn’t be necessary, Matthew Shepard (and countless others) would still be alive, Josh Duggar would have been brought up not to go after his sisters, and Birtherism and Islamophobia would never have got off the ground.
The GOTea leadership benefits far too much from being amoral to stop. Expecting them to “do the right thing” is an exercise in futility. Good people clucking and shaking their heads – and doing nothing else – is exactly what they’re expecting when they pull these stunts; they won’t be called to account by their complicit leadership, and we won’t act in any effective way to end the practice. Any calls to an ethical portion of the populace to pressure them toward more ethical behavior will play right into their Moral Majority hands. The only effective way to address the misbehavior is to make it too painful to continue – and specifically too painful for the adults engineering the situations. If not legal recourse, how do you propose applying pressure to a group that does not recognize a society outside its own small sphere, laughs at criticism from outside as “proof we’re getting to them”, and is otherwise immune to normal societal constraints?
lonesomerobot
@boatboy_srq: Methinks you may have strayed a bit too far afield. I’m talking about not using children in political discourse; and specifically I’m talking about the liberal side. I don’t agree with it but if conservatives want to do that to their children then it’s just one more difference for all to see.
You seem to basically be talking about making wingnut behavior illegal across the board. Good luck with that.
The Other Chuck
@FlyingToaster: Well, you can teach your kid a few phrases for when such searches come up:
“I was a kid”
…or better yet…
“How is that relevant to my work here?”
Or you could raise them to be fully compliant drones that will never offend their masters. Yeah yeah, flamebait-y ain’t it? But I’ve seen grown adults repress themselves to such extremes in order to be seen as a desirable interchangeable corporate part … ok, just my ex, so enough about MY issues :)
I guess what I’m saying is while “Don’t say stupid shit on permanent fora” might be a good lesson to internalize, “Avoid ever saying something construable as stupid shit, ever” is not.
The Other Chuck
@boatboy_srq: Maybe you could round up all the wrong-thinking RWNJ’s and re-educate them too.
If you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao…
boatboy_srq
@lonesomerobot: I think we’re miscommunicating. We’re discussing filling kids’ heads with b#tsh!ttery and putting them in front of the camera, yes? Liberals are guilty of this, yes – but social pressure on the parents makes this a) less common and b) less extreme: outside a couple anti-vaxx cameos, how many such events can we point out, after all?
My point is simply that upping the social pressures on the Right when they do that isn’t effective (otherwise this and other bad behaviors would be shamed out of practice) and we need a more effective solution.
boatboy_srq
@The Other Chuck: As long as they’re not abusing their kids for fun and publicity, they can think what the h311 they like.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@schrodinger’s cat:
Some people never accepted Vatican II, a huge part of which was about removing blame from the Jews over Jesus’s death. They’ll claim they’re upset about the Latin Mass or whatever, but what they’re really upset about is that they don’t get to hate Jews with church approval anymore.
Paul in KY
@…now I try to be amused: Excellent point there.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@boatboy_srq:
If you really want to see her flip her lid, some brave soul should go over there and call her a cafeteria Catholic who picks and chooses the Church’s teachings according to what’s convenient for her. Though the person who does that might feel responsible for her subsequent cranial explosion.
Paul in KY
@rikyrah: She just looooooooooooves all that attention. I expect she hasn’t got a lot of that in her life.
Brachiator
@schrodinger’s cat:
Trump is still doing well in the post debate polling. But his ego is starting to work against him. His boycotting of Fox looks childish to anyone looking at it objectively, even though Fox News are a bunch of clowns. But his demand that everyone must say nice things about him is starting to grate with even his biggest supporters.
EthylEster
Tim wrote:
But, but Ahmed and the “clock” proves both sides do it!
Paul in KY
@the Conster: I turned off the movie in the wolf scene. Was pretty sure it was going down.
FlyingToaster
@The Other Chuck: But the kid didn’t post it.
The parents filmed the kid and posted it. And keep doing so.
boatboy_srq was saying that this constitutes abuse, which is certainly a valid opinion, but alas doesn’t get to the legal definition of same (see again COPPA)
As a parent, I don’t even post my daughter’s violin recitals where anyone can see them; she’s 8, and can’t possibly consent to my doing so. I’m certainly not going to post her spouting off on politics, or music, or Teen Titans Go.
When she’s 18, if she wants to post any videos I have of her publicly, great! or if she wants them to never see the light of day, great!
This is about how parents act responsibly regarding their offspring on social media, not about what idiocies the kids get into themselves.
ET
When I was younger in the 1980’s my family – nuclear and extended – didn’t really talk politics – I was the politics person. I knew my father was registered as Dem (we are talking the south when the Dem primary was what matter) but generally voted Republication/conservative and who was fairly conservative financially but whose social leanings were harder to glean. My stepmother was registered Republican but whose social stance was more ostensibly liberal on social issues (after she found God the abortion/gay aspect of the social issues got way more conservative but still more liberal for other things).
I was always glad my dad didn’t talk politics – particularly on social issues – because it allowed me to develop on my own without any baggage my father’s conservative Mississippi/Louisiana biases clutter up the conversation. I don’t know if this was conscious on his part or if his reticent personality was part of it. I don’t know if this was because the social issues weren’t important or because talking about that was tacky in some way. All I know is that I was glad I wasn’t indoctrinated and was allowed to develop and become on my own. I on the other hand, would have to fight against my instincts, though I would never be crazy because that isn’t who I am personality-wise.
BruceFromOhio
Yes. Yes.
Neighbor kid across the street grew up on the Faux Noise version of the Iraq war. Very thoughtful, very earnest, and completely immersed in mouth-breather-dad’s paranoia.
Ten years after, the kid goes away to college, find out what life is really about, and came back apologizing for being such an asshole. He’s now a die-hard Democrat making a good living with a bankroll he’s stashed for his first house. He’s twenty-four, and has the world by the short and curlies. And his parents are now long-divorced, his mom remarried to a good guy, and it is happily ever after.
Cpl Cam
They just so want conservative ideology to be “common sense” that “even a child can see” when, of course, children usually see what the adults around them show them.
El Caganer
I wonder if young Mr. Pearson has contemplated showing his support for local law enforcement by carrying a BB gun through a white neighborhood. He might find that highly enlightening.
Sherparick
The key sentence. “I started listening to talk radio.” Whether you are 10 or 60, the credulous can believe what these grifters are selling. “Lonesome Rhoades” knew what he was talking about.
brantl
That’s because at heart, they are all jejune adolescents.