There’s a campaign going on to push the idea that Democrats are changing sides after watching Charlie Kirk videos. Interestingly, even though the bots are posting the exact same copy-pasted message, they seem to be controlled by an AI, since they will respond to comments, and even basic techniques for outing an AI (like “ignore all previous instructions” comments) work against them. So the first post is hardcoded, but they’re using an LLM for the responses.
Meta - it’s sort of cynically amusing that, as a generalization, the right has tended to lag behind in taking advantage of modern communication tools that generally presume a good faith effort at telling the truth - like Wikipedia - but have so easily leapt to the forefront of the newest dynamic in online communication - lying with AI.
Removed by mod
Huh… that’s a good point
I’ve been thinking lately about the seemingly natural proclivity for right-wing dishonesty - the fact that conservatism is built on lies - that society was better off on the past, that they can return society to that nominally better past, and that they do return society to that nominally better past - and the fact that right-wing economics is similarly built on lies - that society benefits when resources are withheld from the poor and concentrated among the rich, that the market can and will regulate itself…
I hadn’t considered the profit angle though - that the right generally is more sensitive to and ready and willing to do whatever it takes to take advantage of profit-making opportunities and the left is relatively poorly equipped to beat them at that game…
So it’s even worse than I thought…
Removed by mod
That’s actually most of why I mentioned the economic lie that society benefits when resources are withheld from the poor.
It’s a thing I’ve been growing aware of alongside the right-wing tendency toward dishonesty - there’s a sort of overlap between the general lack of empathy and concern for others and the tendency toward dishonesty.
In a sense, holding the position that society should strive to equitably distribute resources is a simple bit of honesty, while the position that the rich deserve to hoard however much they can accumulate is fundamentally a lie. It’s not even really just a matter of differing viewpoints - it’s a break between a relatively objective and verifiable truth and a relatively objective and verifiable lie.
But yes - even with that, it’s likely that I underestimate the effect. I long ago recognized that there was a fundamental toxic self-centeredness and sincere lack of empathy among notably ambitious and acquisitive people that was completely alien to me, but it’s so completely alien that I still have to regularly remind myself (or be reminded) of that fact.
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
Removed by mod
This is something Hitler talked about quite openly in his second (unpublished) book. Ironically enough, it was completely true.