Misinformation for Fun and Profit | Renegade Cut

the world is currently under quarantine there are well over 2 million coronavirus cases and a tremendous amount of deaths 7% of those confirmed to have been infected with corona virus have tragically passed away the United States of America has by far the most coronavirus patients presently well above 800,000 at the time of this recording with total deaths nearly 50,000 apologists would say that this is only because of the high population of the United States and nothing else but if that were true countries with 4 times the population of the US would have roughly four times the amount of coronavirus cases but they do not India has 1.3 billion people whereas the United States has a population of only about 300 million nevertheless India has significantly fewer cases than the u.s. countries with similar populations to the United States like Indonesia Pakistan Nigeria and Brazil all have far fewer cases it's not even close the United States contains only about 4% of the total world population but 32 percent of the world's coronavirus patients coronavirus cases are not exclusively relative to population as other contributing factors are to blame this leaves the only explanation being that both the Trump administration and the country at large did not handle this well at all the Trump administration was slow to take action and even now has continued to make both honest mistakes and intentionally dangerous decisions after weeks of quarantine some Americans most of them white and conservative have begun to rebel against the quarantine staging protests and rallies to demand that the United States be reopened so that they can watch sporting events and get haircuts some have more legitimate grievances such as the inability to work but they have mistakenly blamed this on doctors and experts rather than the government's dizziness with their stimulus checks they're blaming the wrong people across articles and social media people have begun to label these protesters Cove idiots and Florida Mora suggesting that this behavior is a sign of a failed intelligence test according to Pew Research 32 percent of Americans are worried that restrictions won't be lifted quickly enough and yes that is not the majority but if roughly one out of three Americans are more concerned about staying indoors than people dying that is a significant number of people misinformed about the danger to be perfectly clear what these protesters are doing is dangerous they are wrong they should not be doing this and the United States cannot and should not be reopened before it's safe to do so however these protests and rallies are not the result of some people just being born dum-dums or inferior people that's some low-key eugenics talk let's not do that the misinformed opposition to the quarantine a wedge issue against a technocratic apolitical safety measure is the result of misinformation by far more powerful entities than these individual protesters right-wing politicians right-wing media and rich capitalists a wedge issue is a divisive political matter that provides a contrast between two political parties this has two effects a wedge issue manipulates the people into a culture war to galvanize voters said that they will show up on Election Day and vote for the politician who they feel is strongest on the wedge issue second a wedge issue often distracts people from their real concerns their place in stratified economic classes not all wedge issues are designed for this purpose but some of them definitely are both parties in the United States protect the system of capitalism but I have to say we're capitalists and we've got to get to a point where we celebrate capitalism with absolutely no intention of providing relief from that system the two parties need wedge issues to motivate their voters and distract them from the fact that both parties wish to maintain the system that has the most to do with their own oppression even matters that need not be politicized such as the widely understood necessity of social distancing is made a wedge issue to draw contrast between the Party's placing social distancing within the ideology of the Democrats and opposition to social distancing within the ideology of the Republicans even though neither have much to do with their respective party platforms president Trump from the very beginning of the crisis held rallies to show contrast between how he sees the coronavirus and how his political opponents see the coronavirus he told everyone that Americans are perfectly safe and that he personally had the situation under control and that everyone panicking is only trying to take him down right-wing media uncritically parroted his words because they're in the business of giving conservative predominantly white Americans the news and entertainment they desire information that reinforces what they have been culturally led to believe for centuries poor white conservatives have been passive participants in their own oppression due to a campaign of misinformation and a series of wedge issues designed by politicians and capitalists to distract them from said oppression in the late 19th century following the American Civil War white plantation owners feared emerging labor class unity a unity among the working class regardless of race and other factors is strong enough to collective eyes the plantation owners could not have that and ignited a wedge issue the idea that poor white workers could not trust newly freed poor black workers due to the latter's resentment of whites in general so soon after the abolition of slavery white plantation owners so soon after losing all their free slave labor did whatever they could to hold on to their position in the economic classes thus white plantation owners built a political coalition with poor white men to overthrow integrated reconstruction governments throughout the south rather than joining forces with the multitude of poor black workers to organize against their own exploitation poor white workers sited with rich white plantation owners choosing racism over class solidarity they mistakenly believed the misinformation about who their real enemy was one needs to understand the power dynamics of misinformation here rich white plantation owners could campaign hold rallies provides literature to those who could pay off politicians to side with them and use their wealth in other ways to help further their cause and their coalition with poor white workers poor black workers had no wealth no political influence the argument was rigged against them obviously the intersection of race and poverty presented black workers with greater challenges than white workers but in one respect they faced an identical challenge with white workers nevertheless in a campaign of misinformation versus a campaign that goes unseen the misinformation will win every time capitalists protect their interests by driving a wedge between workers making it impossible for them to organize moving on to the 20th century one specific example among capitalists and their corporately owned politicians is a misinformation campaign that redefined what capitalism is and redefined what socialism is at least in the popular American consciousness this created a culture in which the workers cited with capitalism and their own oppression capitalism was redefined in the popular consciousness of the United States simply as the American Way of life of hard work and dedication instead of what it is an economic system that depends on the vast majority of people being dependent on wage labor enriching capitalists who privately owned the means of production while the poor never see a share of that wealth socialism was redefined as a foreign influence and that adoption of such an ideology was treason anything that could potentially cut into the profits of rich capitalists was branded socialism and since this boogie man term was conflated with treason capitalism had the added side effect of being branded as patriotic this was not an accident it was the goal of capitalists to brand their hoarding of wealth their stealing of wages their greed their exploitation of the workers all as patriotic and in keeping with the values of the country capitalists and their bought politicians told workers that the threat was not the capitalists who exploited them but foreign socialists and workers were given the impression that they had more in common with rich capitalists in the United States than they did with workers in the Soviet Union once again due to misinformation the workers opposed the wrong people this tactic during the 20th century was the same used in the late 19th century following the American Civil War protecting capitalist interests by misinformation driving a wedge between the workers and creating a false solidarity between the capitalists and their workers while shunning actual class solidarity among the workers themselves this has continued to this very day it's why the effort mentioned protesters are calling the quarantined socialism or communism it doesn't make any sense until you recognize how words and ideologies are conflated due to misinformation from capitalists businesses being closed for safety reasons affects capitalists ability to earn even more money therefore closing a business is socialism in the eyes of many conservative workers a quarantine limits movement capitalist propaganda and misinformation labels capitalism as freedom less freedom under a quarantine therefore the quarantine is socialism in the eyes of many conservative workers closing the United States while capitalism in the United States have been propagandized as one in the same therefore closing the United States is socialism in the eyes of many conservative workers anything that conflicts with the vague concept of the American Way of life is socialism and if socialism is something to be defeated then capitalism is something to be protected conservative protesters are given the impression that they are out there defending the United States of America defending capitalism from socialism an ideology that they have mistakenly been led to believe is what is oppressing them and keeping them poor instead of what is actually oppressing them and keeping them poor capitalism poverty among the many is the inevitable consequence of capitalism capitalists and their bought politicians will always find some other reason why the poor and to a lesser extent the middle class are suffering it can never be the fault of capitalism so this century it must be the fault of immigrants immigration then becomes a wedge issue for voters a way to distract the from the people of wealth and privilege who are actually in power studies have shown that immigrants do not significantly affect low wages and it only takes a little common sense to understand that immigrants do not control wages capitalists who could easily afford to pay higher wages are why there are low wages capitalists have bought politicians who have in turn kept the federal minimum wage stagnant for over a decade at $7.25 politicians can't expose this and certainly can't blame themselves so the workforce is divided through this wedge issue immigrants are not keeping wages low capitalists are who do you think has more power billionaires with tons of political connections or people who just arrived in this country last week with nothing but the shirts on their backs capitalists and their bought politicians do it once again they create a false solidarity between poor white conservative workers and rich white conservative capitalists against the poor workers from Mexico and other Central American countries poor workers from differing countries have far more common class interests than poor workers and rich capitalists from the same country but poor white conservative workers don't see it that way they believe this because poor workers from Central America do not have the misinformation apparatus that rich capitalists do so poor white workers do not always recognize the actual class solidarity between themselves and poor workers from Central America the names and faces change but the strategy stays the same throughout the centuries under capitalism modern white socially conservative working class people will watch Fox News watch President Trump's speeches watch socially conservative pundits and assume that they are being given the truth about coronavirus that it's not as bad as the Democrats are saying even though really it's not the Democrats who are saying that it's scientists and doctors and people all over the world conservative white working-class people have been given a steady diet of misinformation carefully crafted to provide a counter argument if the kurz look elsewhere for real information president Trump constantly attacks the media during his speeches giving his base the idea that news media outside Fox News and other right-wing outlets cannot be trusted so when white conservative working-class people see the numbers from the New York Times or a study in The Guardian or CNN they will assume that those numbers and studies are the misinformation they will assume that the only real sources of information about the coronavirus are President Trump and his friends in conservative news media mainstream media has its own problems but that's a topic for another day in another video but repeating information from qualified experts is not one of them if the Trump administration conservative news media and others aligned with those two entities say things like coronavirus is no worse than the flu the bubble that white conservatives live in will not allow them to hear a counter-argument to be clear coronavirus is worse than the flu for one data suggests that coronavirus is more infectious than the flu the average patient infected with the flu will spread to 1.3 other people the average patient with carota virus will spread it to 2 to 2.5 additional people about 80% of coronavirus cases are mild to moderate about 20% of coronavirus patients are serious enough to get sent to the hospital that is approximately 10 times more often than the flu the mortality rate is also higher than the flu the total numbers are not as important right now as the rate of mortality because that is what is making those numbers skyrocket also there is a vaccine for the flu but not for coronavirus if someone is worried that their workplace may be hazardous they can get a flu shot there is presently no corona virus shot also with only a limited number of beds and hospitals and a limited number of hospital staff people with other injuries and diseases who would otherwise be treated are not going to make it based on the rate of infection rate of mortality packed hospitals and the fact that there is no current virus vaccine maintaining a quarantine to stop potentially hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths is the most sensible option so with all of this readily available information why do these conservative protesters believe otherwise it's not necessarily because they have seen the same information that everyone else has and have come to a less enlightened conclusion it's because they haven't seen the same information or they have been misled into thinking that information is not true this misinformation campaign about the corona virus benefits Trump conservative news media and capitalists for Trump it creates a wedge issue that galvanizes his base if he can affect anger among his most solid voting bloc white socially conservative working class people he can make them believe that the Democrats are the real problem during this quarantine that only he can fix this problem this has been a common refrain for Trump dating back to 2016 it's why he has gone on record saying the protesters are being responsible he is endorsing them he does not care that this will undoubtedly lead to spreading the corona virus and subsequent tragedies conservative media benefits from the wedge issue because it has always relied on contrarian ism to draw in viewers an atmosphere of we're all in this together is off brand and therefore unhelpful to their economic interests acknowledging the mainstream media scientists academics and apolitical government institutions that taxpayers fund are alright this time would seriously damage years and years of their own talking points that have attacked those institutions politicians are already beginning to reopen non-essential businesses amid the pandemic what's happening is their rich donors are demanding that they do this in spite of the danger it will cause so that corporations can rake in more money who do you think is telling the Las Vegas mayor to reopen the casinos the casino owners themselves the capital see the protests give the politicians an excuse to do this to see which way the wind is blowing then when people start getting infected at growing rates these politicians will find some distraction for their conservative base letting themselves off the hook politicians may even blame the protesters themselves for asking for an end to the quarantine even though it's the politicians who are influencing the protesters to ask for an end to the quarantine in the first place some random guy in a flag t-shirt does not have an equal amount of power to the President of the United States it's the oldest trick in the book but that also means that it's time tested anything to avoid acknowledging that capitalism puts business interests over human lives it's especially important for capitalists to obfuscate the harm capitalism causes in a time when people are finally starting to recognize this after all when right-wing politicians and pundits told people they should sacrifice themselves for the economy that may have opened some minds about the true cost of capitalism bear in mind that none of this excuses the behavior of anyone causing genuine harm we have to protect ourselves from individuals because individuals are the ones who will adopt misinformation into practice in dangerous ways this is particularly important in this case because some of the people protesting are not simply misinformed but are actively recruiting for dangerous causes nobody is congratulating anybody for their ignorance on an issue it's simply important to recognize where this is all coming from it's not enough to just say Cove idiots it's critical to recognize entities with more power and influence that are creating these divisions among the workers so that we can correct the public record when possible so that we can see them for what they are and potentially dismantle them and then I said supposing you brought the light inside the body you can which you can do either through the skin or in some other way or it knocks it out in a minute one minute and is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or

Channel: Renegade Cut

Views: 205,138

Keywords: renegade cut, coronavirus, coronavirus total, coronavirus pandemic, coronavirus totals, coronavirus protest, coronavirus protester, coronavirus protesters, covid 19, covid-19 virus, covid-19 protest, covid-19 protester, covid-19 protesters, trump, donald trump, president donald trump, president trump, trump press conference, fox news, cnn, the guardian, capitalism, pandemic, coronavirus news, republicans, democrats

Id: fVYrTfdkYU8

Length: 20min 6sec (1206 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 26 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/Heatth]

Still watching, but I have to say, this video has a very bad start. Comparing the number of cases in the US with those of similar population is inevitably faulty if you do so with poorer countries. Here in Brazil, for example, we are doing very little testing and the real number of cases is likely much greater. I would suspect the same thing is happening in Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria.

I have no doubt the overall message of the video is good, but it is a very poor start for a video on misinformation.

[u/SplinterOfChaos]

I like this video and think it raises a number of good points, but also presumes that the answers most convenient to the author's opinions are the correct ones. While misinformation has a tremendous amount to do with why COVID has hit the US so hard, other countries may lack resources for testing even more than we do (as u/Heatth said in https://www.reddit.com/r/BreadTube/comments/g8h20q/misinformation_for_fun_and_profit_renegade_cut/fonixbd/ ) and many of the other countries listed do not have the same levels of citizens returning from other countries or visitors in them. I'm sure there are also many factors I'm not aware of.

My criticism isn't that the video doesn't go into depth on other causes, but I did feel like it claimed the only rational explanation was conservative propaganda and I do think there are multiple factors. This argument also discounts the misinformation present in other countries.

[u/JouleS88]

It's not because they've seen the same information that everyone else has, and have come to a less enlightened conclusion.

But that's exactly what it is! Trust me, you can explain the situation to these people, you can go into detail on the virus (or any other social issue of your choosing), you can even bring out the fucking graphs and charts. They'll smile, nod their head the whole time and go right back into saying what they said before. They do not want to be convinced.