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As with any crime, there needs to be hard corroborated evidence before anything can be said to had definitely happened. Sure there are times where grounds for suspicion are strong but lacking that crucial evidence to prosecute. With conspiracy theories though, there is often a ridiculous element to the argument, that in no form constitutes what can be considered as strong or hard evidence. What baffles the rest of us, is how some people are so willing to believe that stuff. The John Podesta emails are a case in point. They are simply the correspondence of a campaign team working for Clinton during the presidential race. All they reveal is where Clinton was given advance notification of audience questions in local debates, just as Trump's team was tipped of by Fox of the debate questions in one of the head to heads. This is why he has so many smart answers prepared. There was none of that with Biden. but I digress. So yes, those emails just gave an insight into the advantages a campaign team was able to gain. But they also mention pizza a lot and other fast food deliveries, because guess what, campaign teams work pretty much 24/7 during an election, and that means lots of takeaway food. But some cultist in the Q Anon world decided that the word pizza was in reality code for delivery of children for abuse. Complete fantasy. That Robbie then cited that in a post above, is an example of how entrenched that lunacy is. That complete fiction is stated as fact, or pointing to something dark or criminal, when in fact it was exactly what it said it was, ordering pizza!

Says the person who listed key components of Q Anon to make some argument of a conspiracy in play. You fool no-one Robbie. You also know perfectly well that Q Anon is an invention of a hardcore Trump fan group, but you are so deep into it that you can not see truth from fantasy anymore. That you also can not tell the difference between a video shot on a gimbal, and one using a locked off tripod is also telling ;)

You better hope he doesn't die Robbie. But I am sure you will have some conspiracy theory up your sleeve to explain that too. Get your head out of the Q Anon bubble. There is a real world out there where people really do get ill (most of the campaign team from the Whitehouse in fact). I suggest you start living in it.

If you say so Robbie ;) EDguy, there is currently little research in to the psychology of those sucked into conspiracy theories (only one professor in the UK carries out any in depth research into that currently) mainly because in the past, those things have tended to go hand in hand with cult psychology and most of the research has gone into that area, with anyone outside of any cult (immediate friends and family excepted) being largely unaffected. Social media has presented a new dynamic that warrants research though. In many ways, there are similarities with cults, in that someone, or something acts as a figurehead, that draws vulnerable people in. What has been seen with social media, is how fragmentation of wild ideas can inflate into a never ending spiral, referred to as the rabbit hole, and leading to a psychosis that poses wider questions around mental health. It is the easy accessibility to networks of that stuff that has become the problem and indeed, normally rational thinkers are now being drawn in at the fringes, questioning things they should be logically able to reason on, and dismiss at any other time. In my opinion, conspiracy theories operate like dates with a narcissist (and it is no accident either that pretty much all cult leaders have themselves been pronounced on the spectrum of NPD). The conspiracy will tell you what you want to believe, small things, so that you feel you have found the answers you have always been looking for. From there it will suck you in, until you feel you can not live without it. Finally it will leave you questioning what you believe about everything, and be incredibly hard to leave. Your world is turned upside down. I would not be surprised to find elements of co-dependency in the psychology of those drawn into conspiracy cults. And Q Anon absolutely is a conspiracy cult.

And so now you are making stuff up Clutterqueen. I suggest you read my reply to you on the other thread and respond to that in a sensible way.

Clutterqueen, what if that person knocking on your door is couching, or sneezing as they grab your crate for delivery? As we get into cold and flu season, the argument for wearing masks is going to grow if covid spreads exponentially off the back of that. And also, it is worth pointing out that a lot of those using home delivery are doing so precisely because they belong to higher risk groups. If anything, that makes going the extra mile a case of common sense.

You forgot to mention pizzagate EDguy. Where every time John Podesta mentioned pizza and hot dogs in those leaked emails (because campaign teams order a lot of pizza and fast food to get them through the many late nights they work) the Q Anon cult insisted it was code for ordering children for sexual abuse! One guy, drove across states, tooled to the teeth with automatic weapons, to a pizza parlour, to find and rescue the abused kids he was convinced were being trafficked from there. It was all nonsense, fed to him by other cultists. Fortunately no-one was hurt but it highlights how dangerous these conspiracy fantasies are in the minds of some. You only have to look at the comments below any youtube news clip on Trump's covid progress to see how deranged these people really are.

If you say so Robbie ;) Btw, pedophilia is the sexual attraction to prepubescent children, not post pubescent teenagers. Epstein may well have been trafficking and abusing under aged girls, but that is sexual abuse of a minor, not pedophilia. The difference matters, because different countries have different ages of consent. In Austria, Germany and Italy for example, the age of consent is just 14. If you are going to throw words like pedophilia around, at least understand what they mean first.

I shouldn't laugh but that is funny Cat :D Live update from his doctors at the moment and the interesting thing is the level of detail around his symptoms and the various immune responses that could happen and when. I say interesting because there is an unknown percentage of hardcore Trump support that thinks this virus is a hoax. I wonder what they make of it all. Another Whitehouse advisor has tested positive meanwhile. Seems as though anyone who was at the party recently is going to test positive.

If you listen to the short video he made at the Whitehouse before leaving for the hospital, you can hear he is ill. Moving him to a fully equipped hospital makes sense given that his is POTUS and how quickly patients of his age can deteriorate. There will be a moment where he suddenly gets worse, or suddenly gets better. That seems to be how this virus goes. I personally can not see why the Republican party would go down this route for electoral gain. The last thing they wanted to be at the fore of the debate was the Pandemic.

That's a fair point Alan but doctors and hospital workers do see it, and hundreds of them died during the first wave doing so. I don't think even Trump would lie about something like this, plus another seven that attended a Whitehouse function with him have also tested positive. Trump is in a high risk category, being 74, male and obese. Around 1 in 20 have died so far in that age group. And he could go from mild symptoms to seriously ill within a matter of hours. We shall see what happens.

There is absolutely no excuse for delivery drivers to not be wearing masks and gloves when they take crates or bags of food from their van to your door. Just as you do not have to let anyone into your home if you deem it not to be safe to do so, including council contractors who claim they need access. I think if enough people complain when this happens, then the council and retailers will soon get the message. It is clear that a lot of people have become weary about washing hands, wearing masks and social distancing, so reminders are needed.

It is not just delivery drivers, it is also shop staff, who in spite of the law requiring they all wear masks, and properly at that, many are not, including Asda in Rye Lane yesterday. In fact, I lost count of the shops, where no mask wearing by staff was on display, from fast food shops to hairdressers. Who is enforcing any of this? If I can cycle down a high street and see all of this from outside, where are the covid marshalls who are supposed to be doing this? I would also add that there are a couple of restaurants who are often full and have no extra space between tables than normal. Again, who is enforcing on that? Who is responsible for enforcement?

I think we should wait and see if he and/or Melania develop symptoms before judging the announcement. A POTUS can work from isolation if he remains asymptomatic. But there is never any way of knowing who ends up in ICU and who doesn't. More will be known in 7 days time.

This is completely bonkers and a complete waste of money at a time when other things are needed. That stretch of road is perfectly fine as it is for cyclists. I know because I cycle up it most days. It has a marked cycle lane and is rarely jammed, if ever. They would do better to spend the money sorting the mess that is the bottom of Rye Lane, that shared cycle lane on a pavement that is sinking into the gutter.

Yes JohnL, ordinary soap is enough to break down the membrane of the virus. The key thing is to rub the soap in for long enough, hence the public information film that suggested singing a tune while doing that. Two minutes is ample time for the soap to do the job. So I would say, if you have the time, do the 2 min soap wash. If you are in a hurry, or have no access to a sink, use the hand sanitiser.

But I have to keep coming back to my core point, that there in intolerance, extremism, cranks, rabble rousers, and those who speak without thinking on ALL sides of the political spectrum. This idea that the left are somehow more predisposed than the right is just nonsense. Yet no-one apart from John and Sephiroth here, seems capable of acknowledging that. And there are also absolute truths and downright lies, that some people refuse to see on the one hand, and excuse on the other. I really don't give a fig what anyone thinks about anything, but I do draw the line at willful ignorance, denial of the truth and deliberate obfuscation and misinformation. Those things are dangerous. And as a society, we have a duty to protect the public from that. Sadly, given that many of the world's politicians are the source of much of that (endorsed by large parts of the media), it is easier said than done. What ever the answer to that is, is not the conspiracy theories and rabbit holes of the political fringes. Ask yourselves this. Is a dishonest, chaotic, lazy, former columnist really the best the UK can do for a PM? Is an overt, tax dodging narcissist really the best the USA can do for a President? These are the questions we should be asking. Just how our political institutions have descended into the hands of morally corrupt individuals with no regard for anything but their own pockets. It could of course be argued it was always thus anyway. Everything else, is just divide and rule. We never learn do we.

It works on models that were released before May 2019. Any models released after that, not, because of the US ban impacting Google Apps.

An easy example for you. Q Anon. A complete fantasy from start to finish that led to a gun toting man driving across states to a Pizza cafe looking for a pedophile ring he believed was there. You have a point about who makes the decisions around censorship, but let's not pretend that you do not know what I am talking about here. The present free for all is precisely what enables politicians to deliberately lie and cry 'fake news' when called out on it. You only have to look at Trump's doubling down of his now exposed tax affairs to see the mess we are in.

Yes, do not call the RSPCA as they may put it to sleep even if it can be saved. Call the fox project as advised above. They will come and get it and save it if possible.

Nope, not rising to it. When you begin a conversation, claiming to address bringing sides together, but actively seek to sanitise the mouthpieces of the the alt right, while demonising the mouthpieces of a part of the left as some kind of disproportionate threat to who knows what, over the alt right mouthpieces who are actually in government, undermining ideas around democracy and government and sowing government endorsed division, you are playing games with nuance, in exactly the same way that the alt right and their media supporters, like BoN have been doing for years. I am calling it out.

And that is the point I have been trying to make Sephiroth. One could argue the flaws in that original post are accidental (ill thought out etc). I am inferring they are not, but are instead a reflection of the political stance of the poster. In other words, a deliberate exercise in nuanced bias. I find it hypocritical. To answer your question Malumbu on what can be done, that is rather hard to answer without arguing for better education and control over the nonsense being fed into some people's minds by social media etc. It is no accident that those on the political fringes rally so hard against any kind of censorship and concern themselves so much over who controls education. These are anarchists, who want chaos, before being the winners from some new world order that suits them. What I would argue needs to happen, is that we stop giving disproportionate weight and exposure to fringe ideas, conspiracy theories and public figures who have no interest in a cohesive society that works for all. That would be a good start.

And it is precisely that shifting of goalposts that is the problem with debates like this. The truth is that the emergence of a harder left narrative goes hand in hand with the emergence of a harder right narrative. This happens again and again in political history. And equally typical, is that those sympathetic to ideas from the fringes of both sides, are equally intolerant of the other, and equally incapable of seeing their own hypocritical bias and intolerance. This is why the most dangerous people are those who use nuance to push the boundaries, very clever people who know exactly what they are doing, and know how to manipulate the debate. This is the typical populist politician (on both left and right), who rabble rouses over encouraging consensus (trying to appear of the people as opposed to part of the elite). Appeals to ignorance over seeking the truth. Divide and rule in other words. They all have no regard for law and a free press that can hold them to account. Today some details around Trump's taxes were released, which come as no surprise to anyone who knows the man or his business dealings. Trump bleats 'fake news' because in his world, that is all that is required to make it go away. Having never been held to account for anything, and a lifetime of getting away with everything, he is the epitome of 'above the law' privilege. He was never capable of draining any swamp, being the crocodile who belongs to it. He, like most populists, is a narcissistic fraud. So what we should be looking at really, is why people fall prey to the nonsense of characters like this.

diable rouge Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Loving the real-time devolution of right-wing man > in this thread. > > Lib Baiter>>>>>>>Rabbit-Hole Alarmist>>>>>>>Racist > Nutjob...:) That is what happens when someone tries to argue that we should sanitise our definitions of one side, while further demonising the other. It is basically what the alt right have been doing for the last five years - rebranding opinions that sit on the harder libertarian right as somehow mainstream. Emboldening the genuine racists and spawning a new wave of conspiracy cranks. Q Anon anyone?

And there you go again TheCat with more obfuscation and now you gaslight too! Bravo! No-one btw thinks you are Uncleglen, so where you pull that from is anyone's guess. But it was entirely predictable that your thread would lead to yet another oft repeated rebuttal of the predictable Tommy Robinson loving Uncle. I'm just not hoodwinked by your attempt at feigned consensus, describing the left as some great threat, while ignoring the obvious lurch towards right wing populism that pervades Western government right now. Trans activists really are the least of our worries when governments led by Trump and Boris, show such little regard for law and the democratic institutions they are supposed to govern. It is not a left wing government in Poland that is fining broadcasters for reporting news it does not like, or that has abolished the independence of the judiciary is it? Just who are you trying to engage with here really?