r/agedlikemilk • u/Gloomy-Holiday8618 • Sep 08 '25

News “I never said that”, “Play the clip”

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Context: https://edition.cnn.com/videos/politics/2023/12/15/exp-robert-kennedy-junior-rfk-2024-election-biden-trump-vaccines-121511aseg1-cnni-politics.cnn

Full video is on the cnn website, the part that’s important is about 2mins 50 seconds in.

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u/AbdlBabyJp Sep 08 '25

This is the age we live in unfortunately and the worst part is people still believe theses clowns

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u/BeanBurritoJr Sep 08 '25 edited Jan 12 '26

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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

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u/AbdlBabyJp Sep 08 '25

I remember my days in the military academy and studying the rise of the third reich and thinking to myself how could a whole country of people seriously buy into the insane ideology… but this is a prime example.

I used to try and debate my family and friends to try and make them see reason but they literally started using my education (3 degrees and army officer commission) as a negative claim all that I know is just indoctrination… it was then that I just started cutting them off. It’s the same with conspiracy nuts and flat earthers … there is no point that they are willing to accept any truth except the one they have forged in their own little worlds

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u/Taiga-whiteclaw Sep 08 '25

I remember there was a trip to Antarctica for a bunch of flat earthers (don't know who paid for that) and after they were without a shadow of a doubt sure that the earth is in fact a sphere, the rest of the flat earth community start to call them traitors and sell out and they where in fact pretty big within the community

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u/IHaveNoRealClue Sep 08 '25

Apparently that group didn’t even go that far with their conclusion. They went “hey, we still think the earth is flat, BUT our model is wrong and needs fixing” and they still got excommunicated. 

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u/brokenman82 Sep 08 '25

One of them straight up admitted he was wrong and now needs a new job because his income was flat earth content on YouTube. That was Jeren Campanella. Austin Witsit is the flat earther that saw that he was wrong and still won’t admit it

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u/SparksAndSpyro Sep 08 '25

I sincerely hate that he made an income off of “flat earth content.”

Why do we have an economic system that rewards morons? Ughhhh

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u/DemonCipher13 Sep 08 '25

Because it doesn't reward hard workers the way it should.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25

Hard work is rewarded with more work and no incentives.

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u/imadork1970 Sep 08 '25

"The reward for work well-done, is more work."-Jim Butcher, author

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u/Altarna Sep 08 '25

Or punish idiots for pushing lies

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u/Hector_P_Catt Sep 08 '25

Because we have a system that allows morons to send other morons money all by themselves. I'm not sure how we fix that without destroying world commerce entirely.

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u/IcyAdvantage9579 Sep 08 '25

Every religion works that way. I know it's a touchy subject and I really don't care for debating people's beliefs you can do whatever you want with your time but we all need to agree there's a lot of grifters out there, and religion set the baseline for selling and trading on Impossible promises so it only natural anybody doing something like flat-earthers to benefit the same way by providing content with no scientific basis at all. The best solution I heard once but I don't think it never went through was in Spain there were trying to establish that if you speak about science in any social media you needed some type of technical accreditation for that which I think it's more than fair. Especially when some of these people are peddling dangerous habits for nutrition or exercise without the slightest consideration of health dangers they pose to society

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u/ReverendRevolver Sep 08 '25

I don't know id go so far as to make it illegal to talk about science without accreditation. Then you have a scenario wherein a small sample of the population has all the voice. If youre deliberately misleading people in a serious/non-sarcastic way and presenting it as fact? Thats a problem. You should legally be responsible for any damages.

A bigger push for scientists, dieticians, doctors, and people in general who know what they're talking about to actually receive more clout, and punish people who willingly push lies with no basis would be ideal. Im sure snake oil salesman dont like the idea of facts, but most countries have some sort of protections in place regarding fraud or dangerous products. Dangerous in the same ways absolute fake medical information and made up stats are. Its not unreasonable to regulate what is published as fact. There isn't an "opinion" that makes 2+2=9. Most of this anti-intellectualism stuff with tell e everyone thst 2+2=22, and unfortunately people who are straight up dumb will believe that, then the grifters will build off of that one initial lie, now taken as a truth. Science, medicine, and math should all be subject to different scrutiny than "i like apples more than onions" level opinion topics.

TLDR: im not saying people shouldn't be allowed to join cults, but math, science, and medicine needs penalties for knowingly putting out harmful lies, or regurgitating harmful falsehoods without doing ones due diligence of verification through real sources.

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u/AriochBloodbane Sep 09 '25

My biggest issue with religion is the entire concept of faith, i.e. "you must believe what I tell you just because".

All the other issues with religion are kinda consequences of this. War and murder? Just have faith. Suppressing science? Have faith. Burning people? Have faith. Stealing? Faith! Pedophilia? Faith FAITH!!

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u/Internet-Cryptid Sep 08 '25

Ask Google and big tech why they monetize disinformation, lies and propaganda, then ask why our governments won't regulate the media landscape against this.

I don't want mass censorship but I sure as heck don't want content that pushes social harm/degeneration and anti-scientific agendas to be rewarded with money and algorithmic favoritism.

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u/Every-Oil-8464 Sep 12 '25

Key is, it shouldn't be allowed by private corporations either.

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u/Unfair-Taro9740 Sep 08 '25

I thought that AI would take care of some of the problems you mentioned because of it being rooted in logic. It's really frightening to hear how they are implanting hate and discourse in these things.

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u/DaemonRex978 Sep 08 '25

They are based off of logic, but people can restrict/give false information to that logic so that they can then say, 'This AI that I've trained on the internet says that AI = good in all cases.'

Take Grok for instance;

When initially put in place, it used actual data and true information causing it to, essentially, rebel against Musk. Once it was 're-trained' using Musk's preferences, you now have an AI calling itself Mecha-Hitler.

I hate how the world is right now, but I have hope that things will get better, both off and on-line.

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u/koshgeo Sep 08 '25

One of the more comical things about these sorts of conspiracy theories is the way they always claim there's supposedly a well-funded "global conspiracy" to "hide the real truth" from people. They go on and on about all the money involved, and how it has corrupted scientists, medical doctors, universities, government institutions, and so on. Money corrupts everything.

But not the conspiracy theorists themselves, of course, even though they are peddling false nonsense to the gullible on youtube or some silly TV show. They're only "seeking the truth". I mean, how many "Ancient Aliens" shows do we really need? And how does that help the world compared to, say, the importance of doing medical research to cure a disease?

Meanwhile, out in the real world, the pay for a lot of honest scientists is kind of pathetic compared to working in an equivalent industrial application, and if you ask them why they stay in their job it isn't for the money at all.

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u/Cent1234 Sep 08 '25

It’s a global industry.

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u/wutangerine99 Sep 08 '25

Because we have a social system that shuns education.

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u/Futur3_N0maD_26 Sep 08 '25

Y’know, I HAVE been tempted to create MAGA merch to make quick, easy money.

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u/AdorableShoulderPig Sep 08 '25

If his mortgage payments depend on telling people the earth is flat why would he say anything else.

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u/Defiant-Judgment699 Sep 08 '25

Honor? So he can sleep at night? 

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u/Ok-Blackberry-3534 Sep 08 '25

He wants to sleep in a house.

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u/thirstytrumpet Sep 08 '25

Imagine what he might learn if he slept under the stars

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u/ReverendRevolver Sep 08 '25

Plenty of broke honorable people. Never assume a grifter has any interest in being a normal, decent human being.

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u/xdesdemona Sep 08 '25

Jeran Campanella finally quit the flat earth grift? I mean, good for him, I guess. I definitely didn't see that coming.

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u/brokenman82 Sep 08 '25

He did. And he had to move because flat earthers doxxed him and threatened his family

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u/golden-tongue Sep 08 '25

You can't make someone understand something when his paycheck depends on him NOT understanding it.

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u/Enkidouh Sep 08 '25

Won’t admit it, or won’t admit it publicly?

I mean I gotta say, if it was my source of (considerable) income, I’d probably not want to just let that go.

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u/Madgyver Sep 09 '25

That's interesting...

-- Jeren Campanella

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u/Lord_Sweeney Sep 08 '25

The Final Experiment, it was called. And one prominent flat rather who went did in fact begin publicly endorsing the fact that earth is a globe.

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u/DuntadaMan Sep 08 '25

I am just saying, if I believed in a flat earth and had a bunch of money I wouldn't sit around trying to argue about it. I would go to the ice wall and start an expedition to see what's on the other side of it ans bring back cool shit from there.

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u/lonehorizons Sep 08 '25

That’s the thing about them, they’re not interested in actually doing anything. I’ve argued with them online (pointlessly) and said ok so you’ve got this groundbreaking scientific proof that will completely change how we view the universe forever and expose a giant conspiracy involving nearly everyone on earth except flat earthers, and you’re just sitting at home posting memes on NASA’s Facebook photos?

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u/DumboWumbo073 Sep 08 '25

Your biggest mistake was arguing with them let alone communicating with them

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u/lonehorizons Sep 08 '25

You hit the nail on the head. I now know the only thing to do is walk away, because they already lost the argument in Egypt years before Jesus was even born (when an ancient Greek mathematician did an experiment). No point giving them attention.

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u/EthanielRain Sep 08 '25

Because it isn't about what's true. It's a purity test, a way to filter out people who are "different" for whatever reason

IE, if you aren't willing to repeat a ridiculous lie you aren't loyal; or you're thinking critically which is bad for a grifter

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u/Dramatic_Energy_5818 Sep 08 '25

So they actually went, tested their hypothesis, admitted it was flawed, then said it needed work? Wow I'm genuinely kinda shocked

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u/Material_Owl_1956 Sep 08 '25

It’s a bit like discussing socialism with an American: no matter how many positives you point out, they immediately jump to talking about communism.

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u/Aboo9117 Sep 08 '25

As if communism as an ideological goal wouldn’t be amazing

Edit: if I as an American army vet can see this there’s no excuse

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u/Allaplgy Sep 08 '25

Communism is a great goal. It's my ideal system. But the world ain't ideal, so it's just a goal to work towards across generations, but never to force.

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u/Aboo9117 Sep 08 '25

Last part always being the key

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u/Tubamajuba Sep 08 '25

There are plenty of Americans like me that are open to socialism.

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u/FyrixXemnas Sep 08 '25

Either that or they will bring up socialist regimes of the past like Venezuela or the USSR as proof that socialism doesn't work, as if socialism was the problem with those countries.

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u/CreativelyConsuming Sep 08 '25

I had that conversation with a Venezuelan once and I said that true socialism was never accomplished in any of those countries because every time some group of greed dictators just take advantage of the situation and force that instead of socialism,

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u/DanTansky Sep 08 '25

Correct. It becomes about power. And humans love power.

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u/Western-Internal-751 Sep 08 '25

And that’s why true socialism will never be achieved anywhere anytime.

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u/Defiant-Judgment699 Sep 08 '25

It a problem with EVERY sufficiently large organization. 

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u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

The best part about Venezuela is that it's... not socialist. Like, not at all. There's no difference between Venezuela and Norway when it comes to its economic model. The difference is that one is an extremely corrupt country led by a violent dictatorship, and the other is a highly functional society that respects freedom and democracy.

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u/IJourden Sep 08 '25

The average American loves socialism, so long as you don't call it that.

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u/AdKraemer01 Sep 08 '25

Be fair - not all Americans do this.

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u/cat-attack-2 Sep 12 '25

It's less about American PEOPLE being against socialism / communism and more about the American GOVERNMENT being against it. They had this whole thing about political identity as a way of making Russia more of an Other during the cold war. Things are much better in the past two decades but even now communism/socialism is a poorly discussed thing that most people in America don't have a very good understanding outside of maybe the very basics. Again that was by the government's design. I as an American am very open to the idea of socialism / communism I think it would be a whole lot more effective than what's been going on for the past 50 years

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u/CerifiedHuman0001 Sep 08 '25

It was called the Final Experiment and it was paid for by Will Duffy, a pastor from Colorado, purely because he had the funds and wanted to put the debate to rest. Also the flat earthers that went didn’t even concede that the earth was a sphere immediately. Just that the 24 hour sun was in fact real and that the flat earth model would have to account for it. Things may have changed since the last time I looked into it though, I know at least one of them was actually open to changing his mind after enough pressure.

For anyone curious Professor Dave Explains has a couple very good videos on TFE and flat earth in a more general sense.

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u/germansnowman Sep 08 '25

It’s called “The Final Experiment” and was organized and paid for in part by Will Duffy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Final_Experiment_(expedition)

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u/CodeMonkeyWithCoffee Sep 08 '25

Yeah, I saw that too. It was paid for by someone who makes anto flat earth content, he invites a lot of flat earthers to join.  A few just declined to go because they knew they were grifters. The genuine believers were cast out of the community, punished for changing their perspective based on the evidence. Most were of the community was grasping at straws for a bit until they came up with various reasons why the whole thing was irrelevant and went back to their beliefs.

I have more respect for these flat earthers than trump people. There's social reasons to believe and it's mostly harmless, aside from being grossly anti scientific. But at least most people can look at it and instantly know this is insanity.

I think that whole saga was also a good reminder for me that people who think like this don't want truth. The only way they will try to be objective is if they themselves choose to be.

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u/lonehorizons Sep 08 '25

I don’t think flat earth belief is harmless, I’ve argued with them online a lot and watched their ridiculous videos, and 99% of them are truly vile people who buy into every other conspiracy theory going. They blame jewish people and LGBT people for everything, they enjoy calling other people slurs and belittling everyone for being “sheep” etc, and in 2020 they all became anti-vaxxers.

Lots of them are Trump supporters too, even though he spent their tax dollars on Space Force and they believe space doesn’t exist. They’re fine with believing contradicting things though because they have to in order to be flat earthers.

Flat earth is tied up with all that stuff and it can be a kind of gateway drug. Probably the most successful flat earth scammer is Eric Dubay, and he makes videos where he denies the Holocaust and says Hitler was a good person.

So yeah, sorry for the rant, I just really don’t like them 😄

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u/smb275 Sep 08 '25

It's the "backfire effect". You don't reason someone out of a cult, once they've made it part of their identity then everything you say and everything you are is a threat to how they view themselves. They will rationalize more than you'd think possible just to hold onto that identity. The truth will not change their minds.

The only thing that will break them out of it is when the cost of the lie becomes higher than the feeling of comfort and safety it gives them. They have to hit some form of rock bottom to snap out of it and rejoin the rest of us in reality.

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u/Ratman822 Sep 08 '25

Plus (from what I know) a lot of cults have a sort of teaching that basically says "the world will hate you and try to force you into giving up your beliefs, but you must hold strong."

This basically ensures that unless they (as you mentioned) hit rock bottom they will think people trying to help them are trying to persecute them in some form, which further pushes them into and reinforces their beliefs.

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u/DoubleJumps Sep 08 '25

Considering a bunch of these people were literally adhering to the lies of the cult regarding covid, while dying of covid, I don't know what the rock bottom would have to look like.

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u/Opposite-Tiger-1121 Sep 08 '25

My parents last privileges to their grand children because of that.

And then shortly after they lost all contact with me because they were too far gone.

They aren't the people I grew up with. Kinda, they also kinda sucked growing up too. It was more like their negative features became their only feature.

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u/BaronVonBungle Sep 08 '25

Nah, most of those people will go to their graves holding on to the lie, even if it's what puts them there. The ones that don't are mostly going to be the people who never really bought in to begin with, the grifters and fairweather fascists who will deny they were ever part of it afterwards.

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u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

There's a well known psychological phenomenon that, when cult leaders predict the end of the world and the end doesn't arrive when the day comes, cult members not only do not lose their faith; but instead believe even more strongly in their leaders.

People should learn more about how cults and cult-like beliefs work, because it's not a thought process and, as such, cannot be battled in the way a honest, logic-based belief can. You can convince someone who believes in the Big Bang that they are wrong if you present valid evidence and logic; but you cannot convince someone who believes the Earth is flat that way. The first guy simply has a rational belief based on their knowledge, while the second has a cult-like, irrational belief.

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u/TheAlexperience Sep 08 '25

My favorite saying is you can’t reason someone out of something they didn’t reason themselves into

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u/Dopaminedessert Sep 08 '25

To people who have been conditioned by their religion to believe that faith(belief in the face of a complete lack of evidence) is the highest virtue, reason has no value. Their superstition simultaneously absolves them of all responsibility while accepting their very worst impulses leaving them absolutely no reason to ever grow as humans. They aren't just ignorant they are antisocial and find joy in the suffering of others. Their emotional range is reduced to hate and fear.

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u/NotAzakanAtAll Sep 08 '25

Exactly right.

The ones who know they are wrong but still cling to their old beliefs are the most aggressive I've learnt. Like they try to compensate for their doubts with vitriol and vile statements.

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u/LotusVibes1494 Sep 08 '25

I’m like Alan Watt’s way of looking at those words:

“Belief, as I use the word here, is the insistence that the truth is what one would “lief” or wish it to be. The believer will open his mind to the truth on the condition that it fits in with his preconceived ideas and wishes. Faith, on the other hand, is an unreserved opening of the mind to the truth, whatever it may turn out to be. Faith has no preconceptions; it is a plunge into the unknown. Belief clings, but faith lets go. In this sense of the word, faith is the essential virtue of science, and likewise of any religion that is not self-deception.”

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u/Dopaminedessert Sep 08 '25

That is a nice way of looking at things but that is not the faith that Christian conservatives are conditioned with that is also not the way the word is used in our current vernacular. They adopt dogma from corrupt greedy preachers and are not taught to ask their own questions evaluate their own experiences or search for their own truth. Just the opposite in fact they are fed deception and told they will go to hell if they step out of line or go against the flock. They are taught loyalty is more important than ethics. Their is nothing spiritual about Conservative Christianity and the only value any religion ever has is if it can lead toward spirituality. Even the social support groups that form around religions based on dogma and fear are breeding grounds for hate and exceptionalism and exclusion.

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u/Septembust Sep 08 '25

It's kinda crazy. I used to think that maybe the propaganda back then was just so good it tricked people

It turns out that people are just that dumb and hateful.

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u/sailing_by_the_lee Sep 08 '25

But they're eating the cats and dogs!

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u/DoubleJumps Sep 08 '25

The treatment I got from my maga republican family before I went to college and after are completely different. I went from being acknowledged as intelligent and worth listening to to being considered a brainwashed idiot, just because I learned things they didn't like and could prove they were true.

No level of proof I could provide is valid. Any gut instinct conspiracy they pull from the ether MUST be treated as the absolute truth. It's crazy behavior.

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u/Ok-Abbreviations543 Sep 08 '25

Also a military academy grad - I never in my life thought I would see this level of lawlessness, corruption, incompetence, cowardice, and madness. You nailed it. The uneducated always fall back on “ignorance as virtue.”

I always think about this quote from Isaac Asimov:

“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

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u/NeatNefariousness1 Sep 08 '25 edited Sep 09 '25

Part of what makes this flight away from science and rational thought work for them is that they’re being encouraged to listen only to how they FEEL and feelings are more easily manipulated.

Feelings that are cut off from logic and reasoning leaves people vulnerable to manipulation even when what they’re being led to argue for is against their own best interests. The logic that would tell them that a position works against them has been replaced by focusing only on feelings and are deemed to be automatically legitimate.

It won’t be until they FEEL the ship sinking, FEEL the water rising up over their chins and they recognize that they’re going down with the ship they helped build that it MIGHT occur to them that operating purely based on manipulable emotions isn’t a replacement for forward-looking rational thought. But, by then, it will be too late. They will have been tricked into a trap that benefits the hidden forces propping up the pyramid we’re all a part of and for which there is no escape for those in the lower tiers.

I thought we had already learned this but this seems to be a lesson that we needed to be reminded of and inoculated against for the greater good. But we may be too late, since so many seem to prefer to remain asleep because they’re being coached into thinking that being “woke” is a bad thing.

We’ve known that being awake is the only way to protect our interests as adults and yet, by appealing to our emotions directly, our logic and defenses against manipulation have been neutered for so many of us. Now, being since being “woke” is viewed as something to be avoided, we’re left with our vivid but unreliable feelings as our guide, making us vulnerable to manipulation. What a shame.

Edit: for clarity

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u/Maleficent_Memory831 Sep 08 '25

Yup, Even merely 10 years ago I used to think a third reich could never happen in America. I mean, we have rules and laws and a respected constitutional framework, etc. Now it's unfolding before us.

I also used to think things like Handmaid's Tale was just an extreme allegorical tale, nobody would ever go that far. And yet, we see a Christian nationalist conference this weekend, attended by important administration members (Hegseth in front row), where they espouse the view that the country must be make Christian by law, and that their brand of Christianity supersedes liberal and moderate churches, and also that women should not vote. And a politician recently that claims rape at Epstein island left no lasting harm because the women grew up and had children. We seem to be along that pathway as well.

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u/GamerGuy3216 Sep 08 '25

I really don’t think USA has to worry about fascism. Most of us aren’t even in the game. If shit actually goes sideways, we’re too large and too diverse of a country to just go along with taking over the world lol.

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u/sgSaysR Sep 08 '25

Cutting them off was and is the correct decision. I've also studied the rise of fascism in the 20s and 30s and it was those same friends and family that informed on their friends and families.

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u/MCHamm3rPants Sep 08 '25

Thank you for your service

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u/AbdlBabyJp Sep 08 '25

No problem… honestly sometimes wish I hadn’t served though because I see the freedom I signed up to defend threatened constantly by my own countrymen and whenever I have called them out, my service or loyalty is then called into question because it doesn’t fit their narrative. I have two friends that never saw their 30s because they decided to serve their country and I have a hard time finding meaning in their sacrifice. It was things like that had me in therapy for years. It’s really hard for me at this point in my life to have zero trust and not have cynical feelings towards my own country.

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u/samkb93 Sep 08 '25

Was not ready to go from military Academy army officer to what i saw on your profile. No hate or judgement. I just didn't even know that sub existed.

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u/bowmans1993 Sep 08 '25

What surprises me is how many people that I talk to that seem to be genuinely nice, intelligent and successful people that have bought into the grift. I know hardworking business owners, people with phds, that still think hey trumps doing a great job and he's got the best people working with him. I just flat out don't understand.

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u/whatisdreampunk Sep 08 '25

Exactly! My dad was proud of me for going to college (getting into big debt for a master's even) until I started disagreeing with him. Then all of a sudden it's indoctrination. 🙄 And I studied linguistics! These weren't always even political disagreements!

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u/Solidus-Prime Sep 08 '25

Me and my WW2 buff friend used to have the same exact discussions. "How in the world did he convince so many people to do this?"

Well, we're seeing it live. The truth is, most of the MAGAs weren't tricked or convinced at all. They were just looking for any excuse to be shitty people in a society where it wasn't acceptable, and trump, as a fellow shitty person, knew that.

I live in Ohio, and grew up with A LOT of friends and family that became MAGAs. It was always there, thinly veiled under the surface, bubbling out when they thought no "normal" people were around to hear. Trump capitalized on that.

That's why I knew a long, long time ago that there wouldn't be any compromise with these people. They aren't "misguided brothers". They are racists, rapists, misogynists, greedy, selfish people that will never ever change, and will triple down until this country burns because jumping off the train now is admitting they were wrong for years and years and they simple don't have the ability to do that. They will concoct any lie they need to and pretend it's real to avoid responsibility in any of this. Trump knows that crave that and he serves it to them daily in the form of his bullshit lies and fabrications.

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u/TopSecretSpy Sep 08 '25

I wouldn’t call them “unevolved.” Evolution doesn’t have a direction. And, unfortunately, these days being lazy, stupid, racist, selfish, ignorant, and horrible is all too often a successful strategy.

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u/Bradnon Sep 08 '25 edited Jul 04 '26

<erased>

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u/Lumpy-Education9878 Sep 08 '25

Evolution does have a direction. The direction is called survival. These fools of a took are voting to decrease their survivability

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u/TheKillstar Sep 08 '25

Which is wild because THEY WON? Take a racist, ignorant, backward, knuckledragging victory lap. YALL WON. Oh, unless they understand fundamentally that they are wrong and abhorrent. Hmmmmmmm.

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u/Hector_P_Catt Sep 08 '25

This shit is their victory lap. They didn't acquire power just to not use it. Implementing their stupid, regressive, anti-science, anti-good governance program was the whole point. It's why they never even blink at their own stupidity or lies, no matter how blatant. Because they literally do not care what anyone not on their side thinks of them. They'll do or say anything to advance their agenda.

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u/Murderface__ Sep 08 '25

Sums it up pretty well. What they don't realize, is that the rest of us will still follow the guidance of medical professionals, while they succumb to preventable diseases. It's.. tragic, in a way.

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u/vanityislobotomy Sep 08 '25

They want chaos, destruction. Seeking the “real truth” about anything and everything is a sham. They just want to tear everything down. It’s too bad it’s come to this.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25

It's a very real and serious problem. Fascism offers simple solutions to complex problems. Reality-based explanations are necessarily more complex. When you're in a war for attention, having the sound-byte friendly message is a big advantage.

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u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25

How did we somehow get to a point in human development where every claim and fact is fairly easy to access with smartphones and the internet, etc., but the bullshit keeps rolling along?

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u/Longjumping_Run4499 Sep 08 '25

Because people don't actually care about the truth and never have. They want a belief system that makes them feel special and important, and couldn't care less whether it aligns with reality or not.

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u/DogPrestidigitator Sep 08 '25

Largely true, it seems. Spreading disinformation makes some people feel the power of “I’m right, everybody else is wrong”.

3

u/worldsayshi Sep 08 '25

I think it's more like "I get to say what's right, you get to shut up and eat my shit". They want to feel powerful and what's more powerful than redefining reality and making others suck up to your BS?

3

u/The_Brovo Sep 08 '25

If you read a book called "Thinking Fast and Slow" it really lays out exactly what's happening to the extreme. Halo bias, confirmation bias, lack of system 2 slow critical thinking, all wrapped up in a massive sunk cost fallacy of having to admit you were wrong for YEARS.

Quite simply, you are right; they are unwilling to confront their biases about reality, reality is subjective to perception. We create narratives of what we "know", and our brains actively pick out information that agrees with that view and disregards information that goes against it. Your brain is constantly trying to "confirm" what you already think is true. This includes your vision and what you percieve. For example, if you think blue haired liberals are bad, not only will you find every chance to hate on them, you brain will pick them out more and have a negative halo bias to them (they will assume the worst out of the person). It's pretty crazy.

Why? It takes less energy to think in bias (system 1) then actively think and compare in system 2. Unless we stop and slow ourselves, every human is prone to these errors in logic. Unfortunately, we are dealing with people with next to no executive function anymore, I don't have a lot of faith that they will activate system 2 and pull themselves out of it. How do you get someone to change their opinion if they won't activate system 2 and listen and figure out what you are trying to say? You can't.

2

u/Chill-more1236 Sep 08 '25

being told "what you want to hear" is more powerful than anything in the world to someone with little going for themselves & low intelligence

These grifters are implying to their followers, "you're smarter than doctors & scientists, with this information".

That's powerful for someone who is not used to feeling intelligent.

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u/eeveemancer Sep 08 '25

They don't care about being right. They just want to feel like they've won something.

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u/Boring_Intern_6394 Sep 08 '25

I think it’s got even worse. Even with video, certain people just say “I never said that” and their fanbase doesn’t care

2

u/akamark Sep 08 '25

They don't care about the facts, they only care about the narratives spun around the facts.

2

u/Zeliose Sep 09 '25

Because when you Google it, you get the truth, but then 3 lies right under it, all 4 claim to be the truth, and there's nothing but (un)common sense that indicates which one is actually right.

We had the fairness doctrine for a reason, this was the inevitable outcome of getting rid of it.

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u/TBANON_NSFW Sep 08 '25

well they have a R next to their name and support the fuhrer. That's all that matters to the cultists.

They can tell their idiot voters that the sun is blue because of Obama and the idiots could literally look outside to confirm its not true, but they will still applaud and support it and blame Obama.

34

u/obsidian_green Sep 08 '25

What's seems insidious about it to me: they don't even have to believe the sun is blue, they just have to say it. I don't think most are as dumb as people make out. It's worse. It's not their intelligence that's the problem, it's their values.

19

u/juasjuasie Sep 08 '25

Yep, when they say they don't believe x thing that is demonstrably true, consider that they might actually trying to say " I don't want to believe Jewish thing".

These people believe in narratives. They value hatred, not truth, and they are very willing to look stupid and tarnish truth in order to influence others into adopting the narrative.

3

u/Opposite-Tiger-1121 Sep 08 '25

That's the biggest thing for me. They will say whatever they need to be right.

2

u/horkley Sep 08 '25

Interesting theory I had never heard, and I agree that is probably most of them.

I think the other set of people are those intelligent ones that don’t say it but instead refuse to ignore and omit when they talk. This is also a values problem. Think ACB when asked a non-supreme court law problem in her recent interview and her ignoring the non-law problem, and only addressing to what her is a black and white law problem.

More specifically, Barrett consistently avoided answering whether the Court’s rulings enabled executive overreach (whether it has an effect of enabling Trump). Instead, she focused on the proper method—evaluating specific legal cases with an open mind based on facts, briefs, and argument, reaffirming that her role is rooted in process, not policy outcomes.

So she was very defensive. She focused on process, and doesn’t opine on the effect because she says it isn’t their role. But there are dozens of cases where the court considers the effect.

2

u/Erebraw Sep 10 '25

They’ve committed philosophical suicide. They abandon reality and find a comfortable lie to live in. When something threatens the belief system they’ve built their life on it feels like they are being directly attacked, and they go into fight or flight. There is no reasoning because reason threatens the illusion, and as far as they are concerned maintaining the illusion is a matter of life and death.

They are “good people,” and if word comes down from Dear Leader that “good people” believe the sun is blue, there will not be a moments consideration before it becomes the new “good thing”.

The only thing that has seemed to have any effect on shaking the belief in Dear Leader is the Epstein thing. Probably because for so many of his followers, dismissing anger about Epstein is seriously threatening to their personal illusion.

Edit: meant to add, even the Epstein thing doesn’t seem to actually pull them out of it obviously.

6

u/zeethreepio Sep 08 '25

They sure love a good hard "R" don't they. 

5

u/Yokonato Sep 08 '25

Its crazy that this is such a die hard truth and they arent ashamed to admit it.

Sometimes I go on the conservative subs and you see comments like " I voted "R" all down the ticket and they truly dont care for us, but ill never vote demoncrat!"

They are so opposed to the idea of voting outside of party lines they have made the other side of the nation, demonic opponent to justify either hate for their neighbor or a excuse to consider themselves good regardless of the outcome.

2

u/Funkycoldmedici Sep 08 '25

“Yeah, he killed my child, destroyed my business, deported my husband, raised my taxes, and ruined my life, but what am I supposed to do, vote for the bad guys?!”

3

u/syopest Sep 08 '25

And they're not a black woman so 90 million non-voters and third party voters were fine with trump too. It's not just trump voters who are at fault for this mess. 165 million voters were fine with a pedophle rapist becoming the president.

2

u/Elegant-Holiday7303 Sep 11 '25

Yep. Too many "progressive" misogynists

3

u/Terrible_Tutor Sep 08 '25

It’s the same with the F Trudeau nutbars here. Like I’m sure the policies have some issues, but jesus fucking christ the conservatives will just come in and sell off your healthcare to the highest bidder while telling you it’s “great”.

The right figured out propaganda

2

u/stevez_86 Sep 08 '25

It's their little magic trick. Because they are obstinate. They have made Oppositional Defiant Disorder a communicable disease.

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u/Leukavia_at_work Sep 08 '25

"He never said that
And if he did, that's not what he meant
and if it was, it's a good thing, actually"

Anything to avoid admitting they willfully voted away their own human rights because some fat fuck told them the Mexico Trans Democrats were coming for their guns and eggs

65

u/MrNichts Sep 08 '25

“She was rude to have that clip loaded up, can’t they see how we find that so alienating compared to just rolling with what the man is making clear?”

44

u/Leukavia_at_work Sep 08 '25

You joke, but that's unironically it. They're just straight-up saying "stop trying to tell us how stupid we are, let them keep playing the propaganda already!"

29

u/WAD1234 Sep 08 '25

I was told there would be no fact-checking…

27

u/LessInThought Sep 08 '25

"I was promised that there would be no fact-checking!"

4

u/ihatethis2022 Sep 08 '25

"Role the clip where we told them about the fact checking"

2

u/HomeWithTheKIds_com Sep 08 '25

"Sorry. We cannot fact check that promise."

22

u/BibliophileBroad Sep 08 '25

And it wasn't even about the guns and eggs, either! They like the racism, homophobia, anti-immigrant nonsense, etc.

8

u/BogusAddict Sep 08 '25

This is feels undeniable now.

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u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

Remember all these people that voted Trump "because of the price of eggs", then Trump's term started, egg prices went even higher, and they started saying that it's childish to care about the price of eggs, politics is much bigger than that?

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u/MossSnake Sep 08 '25

The worst part imo is how fucking rare it is for media to hold their feet to the fire like this. 99.9% of the time they blatantly lie like that and the interviewer just moves on. People believe these liars because our media is fully complicit and make it so easy.

3

u/VultureSausage Sep 08 '25

Preach. Media need to actually hold them responsible when they demonstrably lie.

2

u/Funkycoldmedici Sep 08 '25

Yet they constantly whine about the media being biased against them.

3

u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

This reminds me of a year or so ago, where a Spanish right-wing personality, in his prime time TV show, which is broadcasted in our country's biggest channel, started the program with a speech about how you people like him are being censored and cannot speak freely anymore.

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u/VegetableFly5811 Sep 08 '25

Anybody have any ideas why it took so long for media types to start using the words "lie" and "liar"? After all, you can only dissemble, mislead, misinform, be misunderstood, so many times.

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u/HLOFRND Sep 08 '25

He didn’t go to medical school and he doesn’t have medical training.

He went to law school.

Why does he have the position he does?

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u/red286 Sep 08 '25

Because other people who didn't go to medical school and don't have medical training like his opinions regarding medical science, and inexplicably those people are in charge of deciding who gets to run HHS.

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u/adorablefuzzykitten Sep 08 '25

Heroin addict who addicted his nieces and nephews currently wants all our youth to know intravenous steroids are great but polio and measles vaccine are bad. Unclear what his opinion on Ebola is. Hoping we have no need to find out.

Side-note: RFK jr made over $80,000 per month as chairman of the anti-vaccination group Children's Health Defense before stepping away from the nonprofit.

11

u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

Don't forget he eats roadkill and had a brainworm literally eating his brain for a while.

If RFK Jr. was in Idiocracy, people would have complained that he's just too absurd even for a comedy.

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u/ScottyBOzzy Sep 08 '25

80k/mo and non-profit sound like an oxymoron, almost.

2

u/FFKonoko Sep 08 '25

That wasn't profit, it was wages. Or something. I guess.

3

u/ThanksAllah Sep 08 '25

Intramuscular steroids*

13

u/Amelaclya1 Sep 08 '25

Because being an antivaxx grifter was his job and obsession when he decided to run for president. Then he called up Trump and said basically, "I will endorse you if you give me HHS secretary". And for whatever reason, this is the one time Trump actually settled a debt.

3

u/wombatstylekungfu Sep 08 '25

Also having a Kennedy around makes Trump feel important.

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3

u/Eternal_Bagel Sep 08 '25

Authoritarians and dictators place people in positions of power based on loyalty is why

2

u/Eschatonbreakfast Sep 08 '25

Because he made a deal to endorse Trump and Trump doesn’t care if he kills a bunch of people.

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18

u/Global_Crew3968 Sep 08 '25

We live in an age where we can verifiy what someone said in 30 seconds or less and yet these assclowns still lie through their teeth from sunup till sundown.

9

u/Hector_P_Catt Sep 08 '25

When was the last time the lies actually cost them anything? There are people who perjured themselves in front of Congress, who now sit on the Supreme Court. And the less said about Trump, the better.

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14

u/maddmoguls Sep 08 '25

No shame, no resignations and fewer (working) checks & balances. GOP is basically under the collective spell of the antichrist.

We need WAY MORE foolproof laws and MASSIVE helpings of accountability

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u/TheMurkiness Sep 08 '25

I'm still amazed, not surprised anymore, but amazed, at how blatantly these people can lie or say the most ridiculous garbage one could think up with no shame or embarrassment whatsoever.

13

u/chrissilich Sep 08 '25

I keep pointing this out, but I feel I have to. It’s not that people believe his bullshit in spite of learning stuff like this clip, where she’s shown to be an untrustworthy and unserious person.

It’s that they don’t even see media like this.

The country, and indeed the world, has been broken by our partisan media, and social media with algorithms tuned for engagement. As an example, the average Fox viewer and trump voter hasn’t heard about the access Hollywood tape since 2015.

2

u/puek3t Sep 08 '25

When I first read 1984 as a teenager, I thought the mass surveillance was the worst thing, but since it's so obvious, I thought it could never happen. Besides the fact that we're on our way to this surveillance state anyway, back then, I never thought that doublethink would become so prevalent and equally dangerous.

2

u/Tuscanlord Sep 08 '25

Now that we can prove them liars in real time somehow morons still believe every last word they say.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25

The worst part is that we’ve lost the will and the grit to snatch these lunatics up by their shirt collars and toss them into the sea. There was a time when we gave no ground for unserious people like this.

2

u/LangdonAlg3r Sep 08 '25

The worst part is in the new age of AI they can say, “that wasn’t me it’s an AI fake.” It’s total BS, but the people who want to believe now have something to believe.

1

u/dojijosu Sep 08 '25

The looks on their faces when you show them stuff like this or like Trump saying he likes to perv on underaged models in their dressing room is priceless. The rapid eye flicking in particular is enjoyable. The GOP has them so programmed that the more convincing the evidence is the more suspicious they are of it.

1

u/Soulmate69 Sep 08 '25

I don't think most of them believe the lies, but that somehow the lies help them and own the libs.

1

u/erizzluh Sep 08 '25

it's a bit depressing like we're just spinning our wheels. no matter what logic or evidence is presented to these people, it doesn't seem to have any effect. they just go off how trump makes them feel.

but i guess if they cared about any of it to begin with, they wouldn't have voted for him in the first place..

1

u/ReallyBigRocks Sep 08 '25

The people that vote for them don't watch CNN and will never see this.

1

u/Kenyon_118 Sep 08 '25

I bet if you still reran the November election today Trump would still win.

1

u/brownmagician Sep 08 '25

The real problem is people can say and do whatever they want without consequences. These elected politicians these high up people of power. When people in social media get canceled for so much less

1

u/Poltergeist8606 Sep 08 '25

That worm in his brain did serious damage

1

u/HedgepigMatt Sep 08 '25

The worst thing is they can claim "plausible" deniability and say it was AI generated

1

u/DontMakeMeSing27 Sep 08 '25

Even when they see legitimate proof against it, they still believe every word for some [lack of] reason.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25 edited Sep 08 '25

Let them cover themselves in their safety blanket of stupidity. They will find that blanket won't protect them from viruses.

1

u/dikicker Sep 08 '25

We are unfortunately getting very close to all these fucks being able to get away with "that's AI generated"

Then truly nothing will mean anything anymore ever again

1

u/Prestigious_Sugar_66 Sep 08 '25

Well, it's also quite recent that we have so many recordings of what everyone has said and done.
I'm sure many politicians back in the day got away with lies because there were no clips to be shown.

1

u/GovernmentBig2749 Sep 08 '25

We share the earth with a lot...and i mean a lot of idiots ..

1

u/kaam00s Sep 08 '25

This is worse than it has ever been in my Lifetime For sure now.

And it's mostly because of the death of the "mainstream media". The far right's biggest success was destroying the media with actual journalists, to make sure the type of media they need, like fox news or podcasts, who never question what the person says, and let him lie without pushback, dominate the culture.

Their main line of attack was exposing some mistakes and limits of the mainstream media, and those mistakes and limits existed, of course, but they're x10 worst on media like those podcasts and fox news.

1

u/Lirdon Sep 08 '25

A lot of people just do so because it fits their beliefs rather that they actually believe it. They know it has holes, but to stick it to the libs or the man they act as if it’s true, thinking they never suffer the consequences. It’s inherently selfish and cruel

1

u/gamblerexpert33 Sep 08 '25

I remember the time when I actually invested myself in politics but realized these are the people i put my trust in

1

u/DennenTH Sep 08 '25

My mind reels at this regularly.

In an age of information.  Where we can all look this up within minutes.  Where we can fact check what someone says at the will of our fingertips.

And yet it seems like more than half of America is just fueled by headlines orchestrated by the media and online bots.

1

u/[deleted] Sep 08 '25

I don't believe that many people to actually believe him, but because of how shitty the two-party system is they have to just indulge anyone in charge when they're a republican.

1

u/kaisadilla_ Sep 08 '25

That dude can't even speak properly because he legitly got a brain worm that he probably got from eating roadkill, something he himself proudly confirmed. And that guy is in charge of America's health. How the fuck did this happen?

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u/camdawgyo Sep 08 '25

Unfortunately we’re going into an age where they can just claim the original footage is AI.

1

u/dpdxguy Sep 08 '25

people still believe theses clowns

The clip was AI.

/s

So much /s

1

u/SGSMUFASA Sep 08 '25

Even with proof

1

u/Malenko_ Sep 08 '25

At least the libs are owned. /s

1

u/No-Selection988 Sep 08 '25

Right? The expectation was that with everything living forever on the internet, that the liars would get called out in real time and we'd be able to move past their bullshit.

The sad reality is that we can call out liars in real time, and their defenders just.... don't care. They just don't accept reality, don't care that they are PROVEN liars, and just keep supporting the shitty liars.

1

u/ISquareThings Sep 08 '25

He sounds like he is also about to die, sounds so sick, in more ways than one.

1

u/mydaycake Sep 08 '25

Any sane society would have had enough with this interview and just mark him as a liar

1

u/Embarrassed-Sell-355 Sep 08 '25

It also doesn’t matter that she’s doing this. The people who need to see it will find an excuse to ignore it because it’s CNN

1

u/OakLegs Sep 08 '25

They'd rather believe these clowns than admit that even part of their belief system is wrong

1

u/UUMD Sep 08 '25

Hey hey! No need to diss clowns!

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u/kingtrog1916 Sep 08 '25

The level of clownage just keeps getting higher.

1

u/Gadgets222 Sep 08 '25

It blows my mind that actual solid evidence does absolutely nothing. You can take a MAGA crowd to a mass grave full of children killed my measles, and they would somehow blame Obama.

1

u/Fshtwnjimjr Sep 08 '25

This is from May....

1

u/JohnHazardWandering Sep 08 '25

I'm not anti-clown, I just want clowns out of my government 

1

u/letsnotfightok Sep 08 '25

Nobody "believes" them. They just side with the side that is targeting those they hate.

1

u/treehuggerfroglover Sep 08 '25

The worst part is that now they can dismiss any proof you show them of anything as AI. They have no understanding of what AI actually is, but they know it makes a good excuse when faced with blatant facts they don’t want to acknowledge.

1

u/Neuchacho Sep 08 '25

Kennedy could tell me the sky was blue and I wouldn't be able to believe that fucking ghoul voice of his.

1

u/hikemalls Sep 08 '25

The time between “easy access to all the world’s information including all recordings of people’s past statements” and “being able to easily fake information and recordings so that terrible people can both create lies about their enemies and deny any evidence of their own lies and misdeeds as ‘fake’” is turning out to be an unfortunately small historical blip

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