Let's Get Political!

[Nemo]

To shoot a man for sitting and openly discussing political topics, whether you agree with him or not, is a damning indictment of where politics is right now.

Gun assassinations have been a constant in US political life since well before Lincoln. The tone of US politics is pretty wild at the moment, but this has always happened, and people have always reacted sub-optimally. Social media just means we see a lot more of it in the UK (and people in the UK follow US politics more than they ever used to).

[Audrey]

Getting more and more difficult to speak your mind these days for fear of branded a ‘phobic’ of some description.

Free speech is under threat, no doubt. I remember a little while ago a woman getting arrested because she was silently praying outside an abortion clinic.

[horlock07]

Its shit, but the problem remains that its all politicised to fuck, with a hefty side order of media posturing and there are shit angles being taken left right and centre.

[Ardiles]

Horrible.  My condolences to his family and everyone who knew him.

I've had a bit of an education in the last 24 hrs.  My eldest was in shock yesterday, and almost affronted that I was only loosely aware of who Charlie Kirk was.  (I'd heard the name, but would have struggled to tell you anything more than that.)  Even Ardiles Jnr Mk II, also a teenager but much less politically aware, knew exactly who he was.

What bothered me most, though, is that within minutes of the shooting, both of my boys had seen the graphic content circulating online.  There used to be filters that prevented images like that from entering the public domain.  But now my kids have seen footage of a man dying violently from a gunshot.  My two little boys, who I spent years shielding from the worst excesses of the modern world - every parent does it - are exposed to all of this now.  Makes you feel powerless as a parent.  We all have to let go, gradually, as they get older.  And I don't like it.

[Nemo]

What bothered me most, though, is that within minutes of the shooting, both of my boys had seen the graphic content circulating online.  There used to be filters that prevented images like that from entering the public domain.  But now my kids have seen footage of a man dying violently from a gunshot.  My two little boys, who I spent years shielding from the worst excesses of the modern world - every parent does it - are exposed to all of this now.  Makes you feel powerless as a parent.  We all have to let go, gradually, as they get older.  And I don't like it.

It's not ideal is it. I don't really think that genie can be put back in the bottle especially easily. I haven't watched the video, but I've probably seen fifty or more links to it in the last 24 hours. Doesn't look to me like that Online Safety Act has achieved much...

[Pericardinho]

I stumbled across the video on X. A close up as well. It's absolutely awful.

X (or twitter) is terrible now. The amount of bots under every post. No age restrictions on graphic videos. Pornography everywhere.

Defo wouldn't be letting any kids under 16 on that app if possible.

[Nemo]

Oh and Mandelson's been sacked. Perhaps Starmer can go for the hatrick of backing people who will be unemployed by the end of the next day next week.

[Ardiles]

I think TikTok was the platform they were using.  I've been off Twitter since the start of the year myself.

[horlock07]

I stumbled across the video on X. A close up as well. It's absolutely awful.

X (or twitter) is terrible now. The amount of bots under every post. No age restrictions on graphic videos. Pornography everywhere.

Defo wouldn't be letting any kids under 16 on that app if possible.

Left Twitter ages ago, its become a cesspit since Musk took over. Don't they have age verification on there, I know Blue Sky do even just to receive DM's you have to prove you are an adult.

[horlock07]

Oh and Mandelson's been sacked. Perhaps Starmer can go for the hatrick of backing people who will be unemployed by the end of the next day next week.

Its been ever thus hasn't it, albeit possibly less so until recently as people were rarely sacked or resigned whatever they were caught doing.

[Ardiles]

Oh and Mandelson's been sacked. Perhaps Starmer can go for the hatrick of backing people who will be unemployed by the end of the next day next week.

How awkward for Trump (and Starmer.)  Days before a state visit, the UK Ambassador to the US is sacked as a result of having been too close to Jeffrey Epstein in the early 2000s.

[horlock07]

How awkward for Trump (and Starmer.)  Days before a state visit, the UK Ambassador to the US is sacked as a result of having been too close to Jeffrey Epstein in the early 2000s.

Yeah its going to be tricky after the US Ambassador to the US has been sacked for something relating to a document the US Government is saying is fake....

[Batch]

I think they are claiming the Trump bit is fake. Clearly the mandleson but wasn't!

What a mess

[Audrey]

Got to be the end of Starmer, too. Only yesterday he was giving Mandy his full backing even though he knew the full details of his association with Epstein.

Lost his Deputy Prime Minister last week to a scandal after backing her.

What a complete lack of judgement.

[adje]

So a "democratic" republican gets assassinated. Obviously some opponents of any politician, right or left(in this case presumably a left wing lunatic) literally want blood. I fear for the left in my dotage