Is Putin's Grip on Russia Slipping?, NYT Censors Left-Leaning Journalist (It's Wrong), Vegas Re-opens Schools Due to Suicides, 33 Children Rescued in SoCal (The Five for 01/25/21)
Hey,
Before we begin, something you should know.
TWO CREATORS FEATURED IN THE FIVE WERE CENSORED BY BIG TECH LAST WEEK.
Rapper/YouTuber Ruslan was censored by YouTube…for a video defending YouTube’s right to remove users. I’m not kidding. Follow him on Twitter here.
Podcaster/radio host (and a personal friend) Chris Spangle was censored on Facebook for “violent" memes and has chosen to move away from Facebook and Instagram after being flagged for “violent memes” like this one. Chris is a passionate voice for non-violence and reform through legislation.
Censorship is getting very close to home. Here’s what I suggest:
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On to The Five.
[one]
History is (hopefully) being made in Russia as protestors flood the streets in support of Alexei Navalny, the chief critic of Vladimir Putin, Russia’s ummm “elected” leader who likes suppressing free speech, killing journalists (he’s murdered 21 and counting), and gay people and will straight poison you if you flee the country and tell his secrets.
Putin just had Navalny sentenced to years in prison…mainly for pointing out that Putin is a murderous psychopath. But Putin may have finally bitten off more than he can chew, as Russians push back en masse.
But protestors could wind up with prison sentences themselves. And, given Putin’s history, could even be denied a trial.
The AP Reports:
During Saturday’s protests, over 3,700 people were detained, according to OVD-Info, a human rights group that monitors political arrests. The group said the number was a record in its nine years of work. More than 1,400 detentions occurred in Moscow alone — also a record, according to Russian media.
Some of those detained were released without charges, but many others faced court hearings. In Moscow, courts have handed jail terms ranging from seven to 15 days to at least 30 detainees and fined 64 others.
Authorities also launched more than a dozen criminal investigations in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other Russian cities on charges of inciting unrest, involving minors in illegal activity, violence against police, blocking roads, hooliganism and damaging property. Navalny’s team said Russia’s Investigative Committee also is probing violations of virus-related restrictions.
Hopefully Russia is headed in a better direction.
Whatever happens next, I hope reading this reminds you to be grateful to live in a country where the government can’t murder journalists.
Free speech is our most precious right. Protect it at all costs. (That’s a huge part of why I write The Five).
[two]
The British Office for National Statistics has found that teachers are not more at risk of COVID (tons of stats here, if you care).
As cities and states return to in-person dining and end lock down procedures, there’s still a fierce battle about whether or not to open up schools.
In Chicago, schools have started to re-open and many teachers are calling in sick or openly refusing to return to work.
WBEZ Chicago reports:
On Tuesday, 145 staff are far enough in the discipline process to be considered “absent without leave” and will face these harsh consequences.
Unless the school district’s position changes, that is likely just the beginning. A quarter of staff required to return didn’t, according to the school district. Of those 915 teachers and staff, 678 didn’t have an excuse for not swiping in, according to CPS. The rest failed the health screener and were excused.
The Chicago Teachers Union is incensed, calling these actions “cruel and illegal.” They also said there is already at least one outbreak in a school that reopened. Jenny Delessio-Parson from McCutcheon Elementary said she was informed Sunday evening that a colleague tested positive and several staff members are quarantining. She said it was a chaotic first day.
In December, the Chicago Teachers Union called efforts to re-open was due to “sexism, racism and misogyny.”
Elsewhere, a district in Las Vegas is returning to in-person learning due to skyrocketing student suicides.
The Daily Wire reports:
The nation’s fifth-largest school district of Clark County, Nevada, will return to in-person education “as quickly as possible” following a “surge” of student suicides in and around the county’s central city, Las Vegas, according to The New York Times.The shocking news of a rash of student suicides in Nevada has school districts across the country rethinking the strategy of in-home and online learning amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and reconsidering their position that students might fully recover from a year spent out of the company of peers.
The spate of student suicides in and around Las Vegas has pushed the Clark County district, the nation’s fifth-largest, toward bringing students back as quickly as possible,” the NYT reported Sunday. “This month, the school board gave the green light to phase in the return of some elementary school grades and groups of struggling students even as greater Las Vegas continues to post huge numbers of coronavirus cases and deaths.”
Mental health, they say, is intrinsically linked to physical health — something few entities considered during the virus’ first wave — and even though the risk of contracting and spreading the novel coronavirus remains high in places like Nevada, the risk of losing a generation to isolation-driven depression and anxiety is weighing heavy on administrators.
[three]
A quick roundup of Big Tech and Big Corporate censorship growing:
Laura Wolfe was fired by the New York Times for tweeting she got “chills” watching the Biden plane land on Inauguration day, which caused a fervor of right wing criticism. First off…large ceremonies, from a royal wedding to major events at the National Mall, are chill-inducing., Second of all, thinking this doesn’t make her a bad journalist, or even a biased one. I got chills when I interviewed then-Senator Barack Obama because he was so charasmatic, and I’ve never voted for the guy.
Bad Twitter: the platform deleted 70,000 accounts for “QAnon” conspiracies, allegedly. Questions about this: A). who decided what’s a “conspiracy theory” (answer: probably entry level workers) B). If your account was deleted by mistake, can you appeal? C). Now that these people are deleted, do you think they’re just going to shut up, or will they go hang out in a darker corner of the internet?
Misguided Twitter: The platform launched a new feature called “Birdwatch” that allows the crowd to declare something misinformation…which will just result in partisan “review bombing,” in my opinion. Now, you can spend your time getting randos on the internet to gang up on something you don’t like. To be fair, I prefer this to deleting accounts.
Here’s my solution. The cure for bad speech is more speech, not banning.
With the exceptions of child pornography and openly calling for (or organizing) violence, I want everyone to be able to speak on the internet.
As for the people who say horrible/untrue things? Let them say it in the open, where it can be debated and defeated.
If you wanna see what happens when free speech is limited, go read the Russia story again.
[four]
The FBI rescued 33 children over the weekend.
USA Today reports:
A multiagency investigation recently found 33 missing children in Southern California, including eight who had been sexually exploited, the FBI said in a news release Friday.
Operation "Lost Angels" began Jan. 11 amid Human Trafficking Awareness Month and involved more than two dozen agencies in an effort to identify and find missing children, the FBI said.
Officials said two of the children were found multiple times at known locations for commercial sex trafficking and explained endangered children often return to such situations for various reasons as a part of a "harmful cycle" of abuse.
Several other children had been sexually exploited in the past and were considered "vulnerable missing children" before officials located them, the FBI said.
There’s a weird idea from some people that sex trafficking of minors is a myth.
It’s not.
I have friends in the FBI working on this stuff, and the stories I’ve heard would make you want to throw up.
Watch what your kids do online, including places like live video game chats.
Get a gun (or 10) and a gun safe (or two).
This is not a game. Keep those you love safe, especially those who are under-age.
[five]
The Mountain (who has a name, but it’s too hard to spell…Google it) from Game of Thrones made his boxing debut this weekend in Abu Dhabi. The strongman is 6’9” and tips the scales at 395 lbs.
I can’t imagine there are enough similarly sized opponents for this guy to have a real boxing career…but it’s an interesting collision of sports and pop culture, for sure. And, I do try to wrap these things up on a lighter note.
To understand just how huge the Icelander is, check out The Mountain vs. standard sized coffee cup.
I’m not sure if it would be more painful to get hit by that guy or be forced to re-watch the abysmal final season of Game of Thrones.
(Hat tip to Dave in the Discord for finding this story! Join my private social network here.)
Until the next one,
-sth