Robertson, Of Duck Dynasty Fired For His Personal Opinions - Regarding Sexuality...


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Rand was talking about government censorship, which she expressly distinguished from the actions of individuals or private organizations such as A&E. She'd say you are laying a sophistry on us.

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Rand was talking about government censorship, which she expressly distinguished from the actions of individuals or private organizations such as A&E. She'd say you are laying a sophistry on us.

Yes and I am quite cognizant of that statement by Ayn.

However, and this is the point of my thread, have we now reached a pivotal point wherein "suppression" of opinion is the norm.

Secondarily, if the FCC and other agencies are pursuing "regulations" that suppress free expression, when do we notice that the line exists and we are not on the "allowed" side of the line?

A...

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I look at this from a marketing and persuasion perspective.

I believe the gay advocacy groups (and Progressives) are getting a big surprise at the backlash of A&E firing Phil Robertson. What's more, I predict the Duck Dynasty is not going anywhere in our culture. In fact, I suspect it is going to get bigger than ever.

And here's my reasoning.

A while back, I was watching an interview with Victoria Jackson, a former comedian on SNL, who is a conservative with some VERY conservative views (for as strange as that might appear). As she was discussing her religion, etc., she got on the gay marriage issue. To partially explain why she was against it, she mentioned she read about marketing evil by David Kupelian.

Say what?

Marketing evil?


My antenna wiggled.

I loved the concept (from a marketing angle), so looked Kupelian up on YouTube. I saw some of his videos and saw that he knows his stuff. The full name of his book is:

The Marketing of Evil: How Radicals, Elitists, and Pseudo-Experts Sell Us Corruption Disguised As Freedom by David Kupelian

btw - Kupelian has another book called:

How Evil Works: Understanding and Overcoming the Destructive Forces That Are Transforming America

I bought these books and only skimmed them so far. They are primers on propaganda--and good primers, too.

My problem reading them is I don't share Kupelian's deeply Christian perspective (in fact, his own Christian propaganda in the book causes him to shoot himself in the foot) and I am very uncomfortable calling homosexuality evil or corruption.

But, I have learned, if I want good marketing and propaganda information, I have to look in places that do it and analyze it well, often places that make me uncomfortable due to their excesses.

(Alex Jones is a great example of someone who comes up with great stuff, but has an exaggerated paranoid side that makes me grit my teeth and want to tell him to just shut up at times.)

So I look at a lot of stuff. Like I said, Kupelian knows what he is talking about marketing-wise.

One part of his theory is that (1) there was a formalized propaganda effort (also called public relations and marketing) back in the 1990's to sell the gay agenda in America, (2) that the plan was laid out in a book, and (3) that this book was followed to a "T." He claimed that the current surge and success of the gay marriage issue was due to this.

I found the book and he is right. The odd thing is you cannot buy it new anymore (except for a few copies from old inventory or collector's items where the price is through the roof). At the time I started looking, it was really hard to find, even on Amazon. Now, you can find a few used copies for sale, but they still go for about 50 bucks a pop.

After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the 90's by Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen

I got this because it was so difficult to find and I couldn't stand not having it. :smile: (This is a persuasion urge: we all want what nobody else has, and I'm just as much a sucker for this urge as anyone. :smile: )

I have only skimmed this one, too, but the marketing of the gay agenda?

It's all there.

All of it.

How to talk about homosexuality on all the different media types. How to frame homosexuals as victims instead of aggressors. How to communicate in all kinds of situations. This book is a treasure trove of very specific marketing and propaganda tactics. Just on the skim I have done so far, I recognize things I see in the culture as stemming from that book. It is a motherlode of how-to propaganda like no other I have seen so far. And the guiding premise is that to drive a wedge into the culture, you have to drive in the thin side first.

btw - I don't want to convey the impression that I am against this book. I am all for it. I wish it were reprinted and made into a formal object of study in schools. It's not often we get to see a single book appear that is this powerful in cultural impact.

Also, the way a campaign like this works is that the general public does not need to read the book (although it did have a bestseller run back in the 90's). The interested media and advocacy people do--the ones who concoct and convey public messages.

Here is the Table of Contents so you know what I mean:

INTRODUCTION: THE PERMANENT CRISIS OF AMERICAN HOMOSEXUALITY


PART I: PROBLEMS: THE STRAIGHT AND NARROW

1 - A FIELD TRIP TO STRAIGHT AMERICA

Up Against It

What Straights Think of Gays
- They don't
- "There aren't many homosexuals in America"
- "All gays are easy to spot: there are telltale signs!"
- "Why gays are gay: sin, insanity and seduction"
- "Gays are kinky loathsome sex addicts"
- "Gays are unproductive and untrustworthy members of society"
- "Gays are suicidally unhappy because they're gay"

How Straights Treat Gays: Three Classes of Behavior
- Class 1: Preventing homosexual behavior
- Class 2: Denying gays their fundamental civil rights
- Class 3: Venting public disapproval of gays

Our Field Trip Concludes: An Agenda for Change

2 - THE ROOTS OF HOMOPHOBIA AND HOMOHATRED

Prejudice: Why It Exists in Social Mammals

The Intellectual Baboon: How Homohatred Arises in Man
- Bending the twig: How the mechanism of prejudice develops in the child
- Blueprinting the gearbox: How the "engine of homohatred" functions in the adult

Pushing the Wrong Buttons: Senseless Attempts to Derail the "Engine of Prejudice"
- Argument
- Fighting
- Shock tactics

Pushing the Right Buttons: Halting, Derailing, or Reversing the "Engine of Prejudice"
- Desensitization
- Jamming
- Conversion

But Can It Be Done?


PART II: SOLUTIONS: DRIVING THE WEDGE

3 - STRATEGY: PERSUASION, NOT INVASION

Good Propaganda: The Idea Behind "Waging Peace"

Outreach Strategies of the Past: Why Only a Media Campaign will do

Eight Practical Principles for the Persuasion of Straights
- Don't just express yourself: communicate!
- Appeal to the skeptics
- Keep talking
- Portray gays as victims of circumstance & oppression
- Give potential protectors a just cause
- Make gays look good
- Make victimizers look bad

4 - TACTICS FOR EATING THE MEDIA ALIVE: A SOUND-BITE HERE, A SOUND-BITE THERE

Making News in Improving Public Relations

Advertising Tactics for the Campaign

The Big Five Media: Which Are Right For Us?

Getting Into The Major Media: Can't Get There From Here

The Gloves Come Off: A Portfolio of Pro-Gay Ads

5 - GETTING OUR ACT(IVISTS) TOGETHER: UNITY, ORGANIZATION, FUNDRAISING

Why the Gay Kingdom is Disorganized

Paying our Dues: Why Nobody does it

Fundraising for the Media Campaign: The Buck Starts Here


PART III: NOT IN OUR STARS, BUT IN OURSELVES

6 - THE STATE OF OUR COMMUNITY: GAY PRIDE GO WITH BEFORE A FALL

Our Purpose in Writing This Unpleasant Chapter

Reading You the Riot Act: How Gays Misbehave
- Lies, lies, all lies!
- The rejection of morality
- Narcissism and self-centered behavior
- Self-indulgence, self-destruction
- Indulging our privates in public
- Misbehavior in bars
- Misbehavior in relationships
- Emotional blockage and anesthesia
- Reality-denial, nonsensical thinking, and mythomania
- Gay political fascism and the oppression of P.C.

Cleaning Up Our Act
- A social code
- Back to Plato: A modest proposal to resurrect the "traditional gay family"

Coda: Rights and Responsibilities

Jumping to Conclusions

The whole purpose of quoting this is to highlight the fact that a media campaign has been the source of the change in public policy regarding gays, not a change on a deeper level with the mainstream public.

People became more tolerant, but that does not mean they suddenly adopted the vision of the gay community. A media campaign alone cannot do that. The tolerance became more like, "Live and let live," added to "We don't want to hurt anyone's feelings."

This all runs smoothly until a collision on a deep level happens. And it just did with Paul Robertson.

I believe the gay activists (and Progressives, too) made a serious mistake imagining that the success of the media campaign replaced certain religious and/or traditional values in the mainstream--enough so that people would accept the crucifixion of a beloved media personality who reflects deeply held beliefs and values, especially in a harmless, comical, homey kind of way. I'm talking about the general image the Duck Dynasty created over seasons, not the specific words Robertson used in one interview.

The activists went ballistic and made a frontal attack on Robertson rather than try to find a better way to handle his artless form of expressing himself (don't forget that the wedge goes in thin side first). But I don't think their perspective right now allows them to see it. The power from recent successes about gay marriage, getting Obama on board, etc., is already going to their heads.

I, also, don't think they are going to like the result of the push-back. It's a shame what's coming, but I see the causes. Changing a culture for good is more than a media campaign or enacting a law. It involves education and peaceful coexistence between formerly hostile parties over decades. More hostility is only going to cause a setback.

I hope this will not get really, really awful, but I predict it is going to get ugly.

Michael

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False controversy. If you ran a store and your employee was openly espousing communism or fascism, would you allow the employee to continue speaking his piece?

Agreed.

It's hard to get too worked up about this Redneck Controversy. And yes, hypocracy abounds at A & E.

Just another reason not to watch television.

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Remember when Martin Bashnir said something really nasty about Sarah Palin and all the hard-right-wingies rushed to speak up in defense of his right to free speech and expression? Remember how outraged they were at how he lost his job for expressing an opinion?

Yeah, neither do I.

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I have never seen the show because we do not have television coming in to the house, neither broadcast nor subscription. On my Windows machine, the homepage is set to CNN and on my Macintosh the homepage is set to Reuters. So, I know about this, just as I know about the existence of entities labeled "Paul Deen" and "Kim Kardashian".

As for Victoria Jackson, we all want to like her. But, SNL set her up with a cake on a platter when they had her sing "I am not a Bimbo." It was great... until the very end when she was supposed to recite the Pythagorean Theorem and she could not do it. She did not understand her lines, so she could not deliver them. Sorry...

Adam: As you and I have spent a lifetime with the works of Ayn Rand and the culture surrounding them and her, we feel a certain familiarity ... that does not exist... unless you were in her apartment with the other people who called her by her first name. I mean, do you call Wittgenstein "Ludwig"?

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Remember how outraged they were at how he lost his job for expressing an opinion?

Yeah, neither do I.

This is what you perceived from that interaction?

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Remember when Martin Bashnir said something really nasty about Sarah Palin and all the hard-right-wingies rushed to speak up in defense of his right to free speech and expression? Remember how outraged they were at how he lost his job for expressing an opinion?

Yeah, neither do I.

Kacy,

Do you ever discuss any actual ideas when these issues come up, or is your new thing just to play rhetorical games that are so cliché and worn out they yawn?

(Here's the substance of these games, just for the record:

A. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

A. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

A. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

... and so on.)

:smile:

Michael

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The Bashir and Alec Baldwin cases are not parallel to this one. Bashir and Baldwin made some quite vicious remarks; Robertson simply stated his personal opinion and his personal religious conviction. The employers were within their rights in all three cases, but they did the right thing in the first two.

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Oh how I wish I could cancel our cable television subscription. It's degenerated into such a wasteland of bleaching human refuse that I'm ashamed to admit I actually pay for, and therefore contribute to, its business model. Unfortunately, my wife likes certain programs on as background noise while she's doing her work and the $20 extra isn't worth an argument.

Whenever I now encounter these manufactured controversies involving people who are only on TV because they're famous and only famous because they're on TV (e.g., this "Robertson" individual), I simply avert my eyes and back away slowly and apologetically, just as I would if accidentally intruding upon somebody taking a shit.

Dumb people angry at dumb thing said by dumb person from show for dumb people. 'Nuff said.

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Robertson passed moral condemnation on an entire demographic. He also said that homosexuality is basically a gateway to bestiality and so forth, the same bullshit you hear at an average fundamentalist church (or Westboro Baptist).

Bashir stated his personal opinion too. How is it any different? (I mean.. other than the fact that's it's ok to trash those yucky gay people, and really mean to trash Sarah Palin.)

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Remember when Martin Bashnir said something really nasty about Sarah Palin and all the hard-right-wingies rushed to speak up in defense of his right to free speech and expression? Remember how outraged they were at how he lost his job for expressing an opinion?

Yeah, neither do I.

Kacy,

Do you ever discuss any actual ideas when these issues come up, or is your new thing just to play rhetorical games that are so cliché and worn out they yawn?

(Here's the substance of these games, just for the record:

A. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

A. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

A. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

B. No. You guys are poo-poo heads.

... and so on.)

:smile:

Michael

MSK,

Pointing out hypocrisy is bringing up an idea.

Notice no one else brings it up. Could it be that there's a bit more tribalism among the hard right than you would like to believe?

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Sorry, I fell asleep waiting for KacyRay's scintillating and inciteful contributions...

Did I miss something?

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MSK - You've made it clear that you don't like being pigeon-holed into the right-wing label, so I won't do that... but I will say that when that routine bout of hypocrisy comes rollin' down the pipe from the Tea Party darlings, the silence from the right is deafening.

My news feed has been filled today with meme's from my right-leaning friends about how unfair it is that poor old Robertson got suspended from that show for just speakin' his mind about them queers. They sure love their reality-show stars... poor old duck-call millionaire suspended from his reality TV show for making bigoted comments against the policy o the network he's signed to. But when a pundit makes a bit-too-strong comment in retaliation to something he found offensive - wow, nothing but crickets.

The outrage machine is in full force today. Just goes to show it isn't free speech they're defending... it's the expression of bigotry they seek to defend.

RB is being generous by saying "false controversy". It's a full-fledged outrage machine at work. Just watch Fox News on any given day and imagine if you had to give me a quarter for every time you heard the word "outraged". You'd be going bankrupt pretty soon.

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"Like tribal as epistemology"?

I'm afraid I don't follow. But for the record... I tend to avoid tribalism unless it's an issue of security. That includes tribal social tendencies.

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But for the record... I tend to avoid tribalism unless it's an issue of security. That includes tribal social tendencies.

Kacy,

No you don't. That's what you say.

Here's what you do, and I've seen it over and over again. Your first reaction to anything of this nature (left or right) is not to wonder what in human nature causes it. Your first reaction is always to take sides, point a finger in the opposite direction, and proclaim, "Well they do it. Hypocrites!"

It's a pure us against them reaction. One tribe against another.

And you do this within a space where people tend to discuss the human nature and philosophical causes of things and are critical of both tribes in your dichotomy.

Here's a conundrum for you. I'm being wicked because it steps outside the right-left dichotomy you so cherish. :smile:

Who is more bigoted? Alec Baldwin for his rants where he uses ugly gay-denigrating language to insult people he's mad at, or groups like Glaad who demand he lose his TV show because, to them, he's a proven homophobe?

Or is neither bigoted?

And if not, what is the real kerfuffle about?

Now be careful. Here you actually have to use your brain instead of a template, and that can cause some righteous headaches. :smile:

In other words, you have to analyze the ideas and premises and, maybe, even a little human nature, because there is no right-or-left-bashing automatic mental routine for this. There is no way to turn your brain off and coast on a feel-good snipe without substance against the enemy tribe.

:smile:

Michael

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Progressive: "That's EXACTLY what we're saying!!!"

SB,

That's a problem because Progressives always say one thing and do another. This includes Progressive liberals and Progressive conservatives.

Progressives are cancer. The stealth takeover of society by a dictatorship of technocrats is cancer. They progress and grow exactly like cancer, feeding off and strangling healthy cells. The irony is that when they get power, they always kill their host.

They have done this over and over, yet people keep getting fooled by them because Progressives always promise poetry. (But their game is always power.)

Michael

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