Slashdot Mirror
Glen Beck Warns Viewers Not To Use Google
An anonymous reader writes "Glenn Beck has told his viewers to do research, but to not use Google, because 'Google is pretty deeply in bed with the government.' He points to the fact that Google is having some problems overseas, as well as Jared Cohen. Cohen is Director of Google Ideas, has worked with the State Department, and has played a role in the 2009 unrest in Iran. He also mentions social networking in sinister undertones, asking if it's government propaganda."
Seriously, this guy is about one step away from saving his urine in jars and going all David Koresh on a compound somewhere. Anyone who still takes that clown seriously is either already a paranoid schizophrenic or too stupid to be reasoned with anyway. You would have more luck arguing with a religious fanatic.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
If someone does a Google search, they may, just possibly, find out the truth about something.
And that possibility is what people like Glenn Beck find the most frightening.
I would look into all the people the State Department are working with; MSNBC, CBS, gosh, MTV.
Just say it, every news outlet but Fox, right? It's the only thing stopping you from busting out the "trust no one" hyperbole, right?
Maybe we should start watching those networks a little bit and seeing what their news coverage is like.
Why don't we watch all of them and judge them fairly against each other? Or do you just want scrutiny only on the networks you're not on?
Who are these groups? Who are they? Are they right, are they left, are they clean, are they dirty, are they front groups? I don't know.
Wait, wait, wait, so what are you accusing them of? Absolutely nothing? And if you don't know then why are you telling us to investigate them? Maybe because you know nobody will do it and instead they'll just continue listening to you? "Is Glenn Beck, good, bad, is he left, is he right, is he clean, is he dirty? I don't know. Maybe you should keep your eye on him?"
May I recommend, if you're doing your own homework, don't do a Google search. Seems to me that Google is pretty deeply in bed with the government. Maybe this is explaining why Google is being kicked out of all the other countries?
My god, would you please just make a statement instead of repeated leading questions?! How is Google any more "in bed" with the government than Microsoft or Yahoo?
Are they just a shill now for the United States government? Who is Jared Cohen? Is he private citizen or government operative? And isn't this the second Google guy we've found? This is the second Google executive now being exposed as an instigator of a revolution.
Your little pointer stick and board didn't do much to lead to conclusive evidence that Cohen has "instigated a revolution."
I couldn't get the MM site to load but the Youtube version worked for me and holy crap what a load of horseshit. I saw Glenn Beck on TV in a waiting room once and thought it was a joke. The amount of faulty, leading, incomplete logic here is just staggering, even in this video. Instead of wasting my time itemizing everything wrong about what he's saying and pointing out the obvious, I should have just taken Salon's advice and done something more constructive.
My work here is dung.
Well, it is kindof true. Google is very big brother in the way they gather data about their users.
For that matter, just about any large internet company is going to be in bed with whatever governments whose jurisdiction they operate within. It's called "compliance with law enforcement". It's very patriotic for corporations to work with governments. Of course, if you have nothing to hide, it's fine, right?
The other reason Beck might hate the internet, of course, is that the internet is just an outgrowth of yet another giant government project. We all remember ARPA and DARPA, right?
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I'm not sure Slashdot is that left-leaning. At least, not those readers who leave comments. Any time a discussion of the welfare state comes up, one can always expect a flood of Libertarian comments.
In other words, Glenn Beck is a professional troll?
In other words, Glenn Beck is a professional troll?
Yes.
The reason /. has a left leaning bias is because most honest and intelligent people are left leaning.
I can see you're not a true Scotsman.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Either he's right, and Google is also actively trying to discredit him, or he's an idiot.
From the sages of Monty Python . . .
"Well I feel very keenly that the idiot is a part of the old village system, and as such has a vital role to play in a modern rural society, because you see ... There is this very real need in society for someone whom almost anyone can look down on and ridicule. And this is the role that ... this is the role that I and members of my family have fulfilled in this village for the past four hundred years... "
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
It's not facts that are the problem. It's the illogical leaps from facts into craziness that are the problem, and stating opinion as fact. If you do that, you need a good reputation.
I pretty much *guarantee* that Google has to do whatever the federal enforcement says. It's called the law. To make the leap from that to "use another search engine" is an irrelevant and illogical conclusion unless you can provide facts that other search engines aren't similar affected by any government whose jurisdiction they operate in. And in terms of things this guy has said, it's nothing.
The only thing you can take away from someone else's opinion is reliant on their reputation. This guy believes and has said a lot of crap, quite publicly, and not denounced it until months after it's caused him a lot of trouble - including having to backtrack on quite clearly calling someone (the US president) a racist.
He has a self-confessed history of severe, long-term alcohol and drug abuse, suicide attempts, he's used miscarriage as a joke to play off the mother, he's had several high profile firings, several arrests, several cities, organisations, churches and advertisers have rushed to disassociate themselves with him and he has more conspiracy theories of his own than an X-Files fan club.
And, personally, he claims to have been saved from professional obscurity (and several other things) by God, and belongs to the church of latter-day-saints, which kinda rules him out of my personal "might have an brain in there somewhere" list.
Nobody really cares if the facts are wrong or right. It's his interpretation of them that leads him into ridicule. I *know* that if I drop my laptop, it will hit the floor. I don't explain it away as a government conspiracy that all laptops are subject to gravity in order that the US can drill holes in the Earth's crust and steal my laptop. The *fact* I stated is true, the opinion / explanation is almost certainly 100% bullshit and as "unproveable" as any other.
Seriously, from not knowing anything of the guy, within about 20 minutes of independent research, I've put him on my personal "Ignore anything he says" blacklist.
So, having a fiscally conservative, socially liberal, and generally libertarian viewpoint on government otherwise (i.e. I don't fit into a neat little political "color"), I felt the need to comment:
1. I agree.
2. I agree, although taxes punish everybody (Except those who don't pay any of course).
3. I'd say that a good number of problems we have in society today came from religion(s) in the first place. That said, I agree that government should not be attempting to legislate morality or good behavior. Their job is to enact and execute laws within the scope of their charter necessary to the function of society, and then provide for justice when such laws are broken.
4. Whose god? any specific one? Zeus? Allah? Odin? Jehova? Vishnu? Paladine? I am of the opinion that "endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights" basically translates in modern speech to "These rights are present from birth, by virtue of being a human being, and not given or privlidged by the government, thus not capible of being controlled by them". Given the religious freedom bent of early colonists, as well as the founding father's belief in a strong seperation of church and state, I have a had time believing that they'd be referencing any specific god when they mention "creator", which is of course probably why they used that exact phrase.
5. Once again, whose god, whose morality, and doesn't this contradict what you just said in point #3?
6. It's funny you quote that specific line, since it was originally "life, liberty, and the pursuit of property". Really it was, look it up. It was changed to "happiness" to be more general.
7. That is true, but as much as it sucks to admit it, the vast majority of them have a pretty good reason for hating us. We're dicks, really we are.. Sure there a few loonies that have been whipped into a fervor by charismatic madmen and by the media, but the real truth is that the US has used it's position of power in the world to basically be giant assholes when we want to be? Example. Did you know that after the Iran-contra affair, the US was convicted of war crimes against Nicaragua, but we used our position as a permanent member of the UN security council to veto every attempt to punish us after that conviction? That's just one example. Really a lot of the people in the world who are pissed off at us have a legitimate gripe. I'm not an apologist, I'm simply saying don't turn a blind eye to the complaints of the rest of the world just because they're not on your team.
"he doesn't want to you read about what he might have done back in 1990"
I googled this... it was a sex change operation. He used to be a man.
No No No .. you aren't doing this right. You can't come out and make a statement of absolute fact that can be checked. You need to allude to it and let your audience ASSUME that it was a fact. This is simple Beckism 101. What you should have said is:
I googled Beck looking to see if he had a sex change. Did he lose his balls in the past? I don't know. But you have to admit he acts pretty strange all the time, and I haven't seen him deny not losing his balls. But don't believe anything I say .. you have to make up your own mind over this.
And while you are pondering that let me tell you about [Fear mongering sponsor de jour] whose products I have been buying for years. If you don't have this [end of the world survival product] then you don't [love your family] ...
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
The majority of atheists are left-leaning because the right doesn't really play nice with atheism.
The majority of atheists are progressive/liberal because that is where the evidence takes you.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
How on earth can this tripe be paraded on a news channel, giving it a faux sense of authority over the facts.
I have no problem with political opinion pieces on tv but don't try masquerade it as news as that simply insults my intelligence.
You know, I was expecting your post to be modded up, but no. Alas, I spent my mod points yesterday.
Anyway, here is a funny thing. My country (Bulgaria) was building for many years a second nuclear power plant. The first one was almost completely closed because EU would not accept us with it (the reactors were dangerous bla bla..). So, since few years a massive debate about the second one rages across the media. Over time the two major opinions settled as such:
The so-called progressive, right wing, pro-western people are against it, because, they say it will need the Russians for the fuel and processing the waste. So we will INCRESE our energy dependence from Russia.
The left-leaning, pro-Russian crowd is for it. As you can guess their motives are exactly like the one above, only in their book this is a good thing.
There was of course the infinitely small minority of realists and nerds who were always for it, because of reality (let’s not go deeper into this – why nuclear power is back in the world and why did it take 50 years to realize the obvious)
And then Wikileaks came around. And one of the cables was dealing exactly with this power station. Now, pay attention:
According to the American diplomats in Bulgaria building the station DECREASES our energy dependence from Russia and Russian oil and gas tycoons intentionally crafted the anti- power station propaganda. The cable explains the logic behind this statement at length; I won’t reproduce it here.
I almost fell from the chair reading this cable. Why, oh why I don’t have the possibility to high jack all the media in BG and just shout, “Go read the cable, you idiots!”
The people still argue like crazy about the issue and none has read the wikileaks. What a bunch of idiots we humans are, no?