04.15.20
Discrediting True Information by Associating It — However Vaguely — With Cranks and Distortions
No, we definitely do not endorse this message
Summary: A note of importance, made ever more timely in light of inaccurate information that’s circulating/floating online and serving to reinforce the false idea that Bill Gates critics, collectively, are simply detached from reality
THE previous post contained a sort of “meme” a reader had sent to us about a day ago. Most of the meme has correct information about Bill Gates, but ‘added to the mix’ is a bunch of poorly-sourced or unproven (perhaps unprovable) stuff.
“Those things have raised concern in our IRC channels.”As readers are likely aware, Gates runs a PR campaign at the moment, piggybacking a global epidemic (or pandemic). People are very sceptical about a simulation he ran (models) and associated patents. Those things have raised concern in our IRC channels.
We do, however, often find the underlying claims and/or sources to be weak, or loosely supportive of key assumptions. This is why we never wrote about the subject and probably never will.
“In 2020 education systems are rotting and people are sinking down the hole or the abyss of misinformation (of which there’s no lack in sites such as YouTube).”About two dozen times a day people who associate with “Q” (or QAnon) link to our articles in Twitter. We can see that. But the “Q” folks are mostly deluded, one might say borderline insane. There are many articles out there explaining what the premises are. Wikileaks, which is often cited by “Q” as well, openly blasted this whole “Q” thing several times (only to receive hostile reactions, as one might expect). Recently, as per press reports, there were incidents of arson here and elsewhere because people were led to believe — perhaps because of cranks with a YouTube channel — that the massive pandemic is miraculously enough caused by high-frequency waves or 5G. One thing we know is that the high intensity of 5G towers/equipment can be detrimental to health (especially of those near the towers), but there’s no evidence to suggest a connection to micro-organisms.
In 2020 education systems are rotting and people are sinking down the hole or the abyss of misinformation (of which there’s no lack in sites such as YouTube). Any idiot with a Webcam can set up a channel, free of charge, and upload a bunch of nonsense. Sometimes, unfortunately, the more ludicrous the story, the better it’ll ‘sell’; there’s no lack of gullible fools out there and they can serve to discredit those who value facts, by means of associating with them (like a leech).
People who link to Techrights aren’t endorsed by us and we don’t necessarily endorse anything they say. I’ve often seen claims that Gates himself is a pedophile, citing Techrights, even though we’ve made no such claim (and the links don’t prove that, either). What we do know is that Gates works with and befriends people who prey on youngsters, even after he very well knows about the predation. That does not seem to bother him all that much.
“This may in fact be part of a well-planned strategy to discredit sites (or particular messages) by mere association that those sites do not and cannot control. Nor should they.”The bottom line is, please never judge a site based on who reads it and occasionally links to it. This may in fact be part of a well-planned strategy to discredit sites (or particular messages) by mere association that those sites do not and cannot control. Nor should they.
In addition, over the past year we saw a few attempts to associate us with sexism or racism or whatever, even though there’s no evidence to support that. Sometimes it was based on the observation that we condemned someone who is female (or minority group or from a country that’s not affluent). That seems to ignore the verifiable fact that perhaps 90% of the people we blast are “white” and male and rather privileged, i.e. roughly consistent with who occupies and dominates the sector. We don’t let these tactics get us down; it’s fair to point out and deconstruct these shallow tactics, which often simply backfire (not on us but on those who leverage them). About a year ago someone condemned me for berating someone called “Catalin” (in ZDNet); only to soon realise that this wasn’t a case of chauvinism and Catalin is in fact male… █
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