Tuesday, December 19, 2023

Even parasites have the right to free speech


So, recently a couple of friends and some students had asked me about whether or not I was upset—one actually asked if I was “outraged”—about Alex Jones being allowed back in X. I am certainly not outraged, I told them, and not even upset. I had written about this a while back when Jones had first started getting deplatformed from social media. Actually, I am kind of hurt that they didn’t read my old posts about Jones. But in all seriousness, I told them that as someone who tries to be as much of an absolutist about free speech as possible—calling for specific violence, genocide, and murder must be a line any decent person should draw, however—I will defend Jones’ reinstatement on X as strongly as possible. However, I will also use my own freedom of speech to keep pointing out what a morally bankrupt dirtbag he is.

 

As I had also written numerous times before, as I did in one of my recent posts below, Alex Jones is a parasite. He’s a bloodsucker feeding off the grief of others. He has been once since the 1990s when he took advantage of terrorist attacks like the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and the Oklahoma City bombing to spin his yarns about the New World Order perpetrating fake terrorist attacks, or “false flag” operations. Of course, the day that must have been the highlight of Alex Jones’ life was September 11, 2001. The murders of 2977 people gave Jones the opportunity to build his conspiracy empire into a multimillion dollar cash cow.

 

Luckily, after he pushed past the bounds of decency one too many times with his lies about the Sandy Hook shooting being a hoax and the families of the slain children being crisis actors, Jones was found liable for defamation and now owes $1.5 billion to these families. Justice was done!

 

But is this any indication that Jones had been changed by the Sandy Hook incident at all? Of course not. He has been spreading his same noxious conspiratorial garbage on his Infowars webpage since then.

 

With that being said, however, I need to hold my nose in disgust and approve of him not being cancelled on social media, but only out of principle. This way more of the world can see the utterly unconscionable garbage he likes spewing and more people will continue speaking out against him. Alex Jones is a cockroach that needs the light shined on him rather than be made a martyr through cancellation. He’s not a truth-teller, not a “dangerous” man who threatens the system, not a maverick and not a rebel. He’s just a cheap hustler.

Monday, December 11, 2023

A modern crime classic on CineVerse

I’ve been behind on Cineverse updates—and I have several other things so say about other stuff, too, in updates coming soon—but check out our recent discussion of The Untouchables right here. Helmed by Brian De Palma, with a screenplay by David Mamet, The Untouchables quickly became a hit after its theatrical debut in the summer of 1987, drawing inspiration from the real-life endeavors of Elliot Ness and other law enforcement agents who banded together to take down infamous gangster Al Capone during the violent Prohibition era in Chicago. The film, produced by Art Linson, boasts a star-studded cast featuring Kevin Costner in the role of Ness, Robert De Niro as the notorious Capone, and Sean Connery (who won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor), Andy Garcia, and Charles Martin Smith.


This picture skillfully blends historical events (it’s more of a “based on” than an accurate retelling) with compelling storytelling, delivering an engaging narrative that vividly captures the essence of the bootleg era and the battle against organized crime.