They're mental defectives whose literal unfitness to live is only masked by the thin veneer of advanced society.

Have you tried contemptuous laughter at their expense? It tends to probe the recesses of even the most hardened souls, which your friends certainly are not.

Another fantastic article, Ron. It was especially topical for me, as several of my friends have been thoughtlessly parroting the talking point that Steven Miller is a white supremacist recently. I’ve been considering showing them Unz.com for a while now, and think this article may be the perfect opportunity to do so. To be honest though, I worry that it and most of the content of Unz Review would be lost on all but a few of them. The rest are firmly stuck in the politically-correct envelope you mention, and have had their attention spans and critical thinking skills dulled by years of reading nothing but WaPo and NYT. Do you (or any other commenters), have any tips on introducing “normal” people to this kind of alternative media, or would it be best to just rip off the proverbial band-aid by linking them this article and seeing who is capable understanding it?
 

Yes, it’s a very difficult problem breaking through many decades of powerful media conditioning.

The approach I try to follow is somewhat analogous to how a virus will use its protein coat to pierce a cellular membrane, then inject its DNA into the interior.

For example, my American Pravda articles almost invariably begin in a highly innocuous manner, making claims and arguments that are extremely mainstream and respectable, ones that would hardly raise concerns in even the most nervous reader. This attaches to the existing membrane.

I often then try to draw upon ultra-respectable sources to raise a couple of very surprising points, but ones that hardly challenge the reader’s world-view or set off ideological alarms. This tends to soften the existing membrane.

Gradually the text begins to draw upon these same highly reputable sources to begin raising far more controversial issues, trying to inject these notions deep into the reader’s mental framework of reality, hoping that they “take” and multiply, or at least weaken the ideological defense system sufficiently that a later round might have that effect.
 

Replies: @Wizard of Oz, @Al Liguori

I share your frustration with people. I have spent a lot of effort in my life trying to wake various people up to the absurdities of the world, and only recently have I been able to console myself with the thought that the vast majority of normies, of whatever political persuasion, are basically unreachable and essentially deserve the country that they have.

I especially understand your reluctance to share information with your WaPo-reading friends; after all, if they are still reading those puppy training mats nearly 20 years after WMD lies, what hope is there?

On the other hand, I think many of us in the opposition feel a sense of urgency right now; that this is our last chance to wake up those we care about and that our failure to do so is going to be bad for all of us. A brilliant political strategist once said: there are decades when nothing happens, and there are days in which decades happen. It is in the latter situation when the people’s mindsets are subject to rapid change.

While I agree that Mr. Unz’s American Pravda articles are an excellent source of information and provide a credible first-person account of how a curious person comes to a different way of thinking, my concern with that approach is that it is brainy and unlikely to work with those whose attention spans are short and who are not already wrestling with doubts that they are seeking to resolve. The issue is: how does one insert those doubts and that curiosity that will make American Pravda and UR in general something they want to read?

I don’t know your friends, but when trying to overcome intellectual inertia, two approaches work best: inducing laughter and inducing anger. Using the former approach, you want to find a blind spot they have, something clearly absurd that they are hanging onto and allow them to laugh at the absurdity of the thing. Your mentioning that your friends think Steven Miller is a white supremacist leads me to think that they lean normie-left. So, maybe a start is to get them to wonder why the Dems have chosen a clearly senile old man as a nominee. Jimmy Dore is a voice solidly on the left who is great for this kind of stuff:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtspv72ApM0



In a similar vein, it is helpful to highlight in a light-hearted way the clear and obvious contradictions in “wokeness.” I think a good channel for this is this guy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGmTRfUdua0&t=71s

In a more serious tone, here is a good discussion that highlights the cringe-level hypocrisy of those who signed the letter trying to tone down the Cancel Culture movement. Once they are seeing the contradictions, it might help to reveal that Mr. Miller is a Zionist, not a white supremacist. Let them deal with that cognitive dissonance. Help them to realize that the woke Cancel Culture that they might sympathize with is going to come for them, no matter what they do or say, because they are white and/or gentiles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om59ivszwOE&t=0s

The other approach is anger. I won’t post more vids, but find videos of white men being brutalized by cops and/or black youths brutally assaulting white kids. Get them to see themselves in the white victims and make it clear that the system won’t care when it happens to them. Who are the voiceless again?

They need to understand: if you are a gentile, the system hates you. If you are a white gentile, the system wants you dead. They need to feel this in their bones.

Propose the UR articles when they have started to lose faith in their core beliefs and are seeking a new understanding.

Just some thoughts.

Replies: @RudyM, @DonaldKrump

... as several of my friends have been thoughtlessly parroting the talking point that Steven Miller is a white supremacist recently.
 

I recommend just sending them the link to Unzdotcom and let them figure it all out for themselves.

As far as I am concerned this is the best website available for informed news and comment.

At the end of the day when I am looking for some great reading material, this website is what I turn to. Nothing else compares.

Deep thanks to Ron Unz, all the contributors and especially to the excellent comments.

I suspect that you could give $100K to NYU's Sociology department and get a pretty good fix on the ratio of humiliations, beatings, cheating, lynchings, burnings, and insults to violent black-on-white crimes.

Having been with my black wife when we were assaulted, screamed at and had bottles thrown at us from cars, I'm guessing that the ratio is more like 1000:1

Replies: @schnellandine, @Alden

We who is we? I do not consider wars a part of mass murder. There is a civil war going on inside Syria for control of the country. I do not think the intention is mass murder for the sake of mass murder, all though many millions are dying. It is like saying all the millions dying in the WW s was mass murder.
There are fights over territory, religion, etc where people die.

I define mass murder as dropping a bomb on a civilian population with no declaration of war by a non state terrorist group, to achieve no other aim but the murder of innocents. I also consider the use of poison gas in warfare or bio weapons that inflict mass casualties on civilians.
The Iraqi war was wrong and was based on a false preemies. But really Saddam Hussein was responsible for a lot of deaths in his war with Iran, as well as the murder and torture of his own population. He was not an innocent figure, he really played games with the UN inspection teams, and refused to abide by weapons of mass destruction inspections.

I do not think anyone in any Western government would commit the kind of mass murder I listed above.

Replies: @Exile, @Anonymous, @Truth3

I don't know anyone who would commit mass murder. Maybe in James Bond movies.
Not even dictators. Well maybe Madeleine Albright. LOl.
Mass murder is in comic books, not real life.

Replies: @Iris, @DonaldKrump, @Exile, @Anonymous