Loading ...cutting back + reading suggestions
They say that in kicking a habit it helps to announce what you’re doing. Therefore I’d like to announce that I need to get more work done so I will try posting less (not stopping entirely). See below in comments for what I believe are some important suggestions.
I would like to agree with James Corbett that you should read material with which you disagree. I would further add that you are likely to attract more allies by calling yourselves “freethinkers” or “Getting out of our shells” or something like that than “conservatives”. A good goal is to try to discuss rather than win over.
Some of my suggestions for reading with NUMBER 1 LAST:
I personally try to study the huffpost daily and glance at some of yahoo’s offerings.
Since I come across so much antizionist material in both left and right sites, I make it a point to consult jpost.com (jerusalem post), which despite a typically mainstream slant, can have interesting material about the US as well as the mideast — just today, for example, the anecdotally interesting
https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/antisemitism/github-fires-jewish-employee-who-posted-about-nazis-at-the-capitol-siege-655330
(title of article, “Microsoft’s GitHub fires Jewish employee who posted about ‘Nazis’ at the Capitol”
http://www.jpost.com/israel-news/man-with-health-ministry-ties-sends-ex-wife-to-quarantine-4-times-655394
I have previously mentioned a far-leftist site I dislike, moonofalabama.org. Its proprietor is well-informed and I believe behind it all highly authoritarian (subtly stalinist-maoist). He deletes many posts and takes official lines on Covid, whether, as detractors have suggested because he is BND (German gov’t) or because he doesn’t want to get into trouble. There is much garbage in the comment sections, but the open thread sections in particular can contain lots of interesting material. Conservatives are tolerated more than liberals.
I try to look at antiwar.com daily. It was founded by rothbardian right-libertarians who I believe have ties to the founders of the American Conservative and all the Ron-Paulistic types. They feature vast quantities of material 6 days a week from far right to far left, definitely including the center. Their aim is to inform so as to diminish militarism and increase civil liberties no matter whom they need to cite or ally with.
For now the richest for opinion I believe is off-guardian.org. I think any of you with time need to go there. It’s left-libertarian in background, wildly crackpot by any mainstream standards. Some people commenting complain that it’s turning “alt-right”, I suppose because of all the rightist comments, because it doesn’t go with the Covid program, it doesn’t go with the election program, and it is friendly with James Corbett.
The comment section right now is like what you might have gotten from ZH at its prime if you had taken away all the insults and “fight club” stuff. There is a certain amount of fairly obvious bot-write as well as great stuff but with some misinformation or grotesquerie mixed in as if to discredit the site. One or two people post near 100% nonsense apparently to help wreck the comments section. In general the discussions are great for now however. The comments are from all over the place, often remarkably substantial, making them interesting.
I recommend the satirical piece “Are you ready for total…”. The piece “Trump impeached for…” is almost not worth reading because most of you will agree with it so much, but the comments section I recommend as highly stimulating (with the problems noted above). Comments are just starting on “2+2=5”, so I can’t comment on them. In any case, the site isn’t afraid to go with the concept that there might be entirely different perspectives than those that are presented elsewhere, even if one is considered totally batty or bad for presenting them (Covid, elections, 9-11, GMOs, whatever).