FROLITICKS

Satirical commentary on Canadian and American current political issues

May 29

When It Comes To Domestic Gun Violence, The U.S. Leads The Way

by bcurry

This May, the New York Times noted that, according to the first comprehensive federal tally of gun commerce in two decades, the U.S. is in the middle of a great gun-buying boom.  The data shows no sign of the boom letting up as the annual number of firearms manufactured has nearly tripled since 2000 and spiked sharply in the past three years.  No surprise there, even during the pandemic.  According to a 2018 survey conducted by the non-partisan Switzerland-based Small Arms Survey, there are today around 400 million guns in the U.S.  Again, according to the Small Arms Survey, the per capita number of guns in the U.S. has continued to rise to about 1.2 guns for every person by 2018.  According to the Congressional Research Service it had roughly doubled from 1968 to 2012, from one gun for every two people to one gun per person.  The majority of these guns are manufactured in the U.S.  However, historical surveys from the University of Chicago research center NORC show that the percentage of American households that own guns has decreased from about half in the 1970s to about a third in recent years.  Otherwise, certain households possess multiple weapons, and it is those households that support gun ownership with few if any government restrictions.

Recent tragic mass shootings have once again raised the issue of so-called ‘gun control’ among supporters of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and those wanting increased restrictions on the sale of guns, most particularly assault-style long guns.  However, assault weapons are rarely used in the crimes, where the weapon of choice is a handgun.  Nevertheless, the ability to purchase an assault rifle has become easier, especially after the 1994 federal assault weapons ban was lifted in the U.S.  What is crazy is that many on both of the two sides tend to support increased background checks on persons purchasing guns, hoping to reduce the chances of guns getting into the hands of persons with known violent or radicalized behaviour. 

Still, gun makers like Daniel Defense, the manufacturer of the assault rifle used in the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting, continue to aggressively market their products using its direct-to-consumer business model.  The approach is aimed to make it easier to buy military gear by simply ordering it from Amazon.  Their on-line marketing is geared to appeal to young people, especially teenage males who are “Call of Duty” video game enthusiasts.  Starting off initially with contracts to produce weapons and accessories for the American and British militaries, by 2009 Daniel Defense had expanded to make guns for consumers.

However, according to the New York Times, the aggressive marketing by the gun industry has hit some companies.  Earlier this year, gunmaker Remington settled a $73 million (U.S.) settlement with the families of children killed in 2012 at the Sandy Hook school in Newtown, Connecticut.  The families claimed that Remington marketed its assault rifles improperly, including weapons appearing in the “Call of Duty”, which both the Connecticut and Texas school killers often played.  One can only assume the parents of the latest school mass shootings will most likely take Daniel Defense to court under tragically similar circumstances.

What is so sad is the fact that buyers have openly capitalized on the loosening of gun restrictions by the Supreme Court, Congress and Republican-controlled state legislatures.  The Republican Party is clearly aligned with the interests of gun lobbyists and the NRA, as evidenced by the appearances of former President Trump and Republican Senator Ted Cruz at the NRA’s totally inappropriate convention in Houston, Texas, just a few days after the May 24th school shooting in Uvalde, Texas.  Not surprisingly, they defended gun rights, all be it with some obvious misleading claims about the efficacy of gun restrictions, gun ownership trends and school shootings.  Unfortunately, after every mass shooting, driven by fear and calls for increased restrictions on gun ownership, gun sales often go up in certain states.  As I’ve blogged in the past, this is a cycle that tragically never seems to end.

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May 17

The Role of Conspiracy Theories in Radicalizing North American White Folk

by bcurry

As the recent tragic shooting and killing of innocent blacks by a young white supremacist in Buffalo, New York, demonstrates, there is the growing role of conspiracy theories.  The racist ‘replacement theory’ has become a common far-right ideology and has been connected to multiple mass shootings carried out by white supremacists, including the 2018 Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, 2019 mosque shootings in Christchurch, New Zealand, a Black church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015 and the 2019 shooting of Hispanics at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas .  Unfortunately, its central ideas are now promoted not just by violent extremists, but by right wing media personalities like Fox News host Tucker Carlson.

The conspiracy theory’s more racist adherents believe Jews are behind the so-called replacement plan.  Broadly speaking, the roots of this ‘replacement theory’ are deep.  In the U.S., one can point to past and current efforts to intimidate and discourage Black people from voting.  The antagonists’ view this as replacing” white voters at the polls — dating to the Reconstruction era after the 15th Amendment made clear suffrage couldn’t be restricted on account of race.  More recently, white nationalists marching at the Charlottesville, Virginia, rally in 2017 chanted “You will not replace us!” and “Jews will not replace us!”

There are Americans and Canadians who believe in conspiracy ideas about immigrants being brought into the U.S. and Canada as part of a political plot to increase non-white voters in support of so-called ‘liberal’ and ‘left-oriented’ political parties.  Besides Fox News, many of the followers prefer watching right-wing networks such as OANN or Newsmax.  Access to such networks is readily available on both sides of the border, often via the Internet.  Extreme nationalist groups in turn promote such conspiracy theories on their on Web sites.  Thus begins the radicalization of young whites, men in particular.  Regrettably, like other conspiracy theories, the ‘replacement theory’ has even been taken up by some right-wing politicians.  The fact is that such theories have no place in the traditional conservative thinking, and certainly not in their platforms.  In the U.S. in particular, one needs Republicans in particular to disavow such theories.

Don’t think for a moment that this theory is only believed by a small number of Americans.  In a poll released last week, the Associated Press and the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that about 1 in 3 Americans believe an effort is underway to replace U.S.-born Americans with immigrants for electoral gain.  The attention paid by many Republican politicians to what they see as a leaky southern border along the U.S. has been interpreted, at least by some, as a nod to the concern of white people who worry about being “replaced.”

However, while the majority of followers of replacement theory do not overtly promote calls to arms, there are smaller groups of white supremacists who are inclined to support violent tactics.  Indeed, they consider those behind the above noted horrific mass shootings as being saints in their eyes.  They sadly don’t hesitate to use such theories as a means to justify the use of violence.

The question for governments and societies is how to combat the spread of such conspiracy theories and the resulting climate of hate that they support?  There are no easy answers.  It may not be enough to just treat the associated violent behaviour as hate crimes, after the fact.  What is most likely needed is to confront and outright disown such theories and the resulting disinformation, especially emerging from certain media sources.  Political and spiritual leaders have to step up on a daily basis to speak against such divisive conspiracy theories and to promote unity and mutual respect among our citizens.  This will take a massive effort, particularly as hate mongering has simmered in our society for decades.  Much more has to be done to de-radicalize our youth in particular.  De-radicalization is the on-going process of hopefully changing a person’s belief system through such means as peer group and family intervention and various education schemes.

Canada Extremism Extremist Groups Extremist Groups Racism Racism Terrorism US

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May 9

The Internet Was a Blessing Until It Became a Curse

by bcurry

A judge just threw out Donald Trump’s lawsuit against Twitter that challenged his ban from the social media platform.  U.S. District Judge James Donato rejected Trump’s claim that Twitter violated his right to freedom of speech guaranteed under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.  He simply declared that Twitter is a private company, and ‘the First Amendment applies only to governmental abridgements of speech, and not to alleged abridgements by private companies.’  When Trump’s account (with over 88 million followers) was suspended by Twitter, he went on to set up his own platform Truth Social which apparently has not done very well.  Now, the question arises over whether Twitter’s takeover by Tesla CEO Elon Musk will offer Trump a possible return to the social media platform.

Marshall McLuhan, a well-known Canadian philosopher whose work was among the cornerstones of the study of media theory in the late sixties, coined the expression “the medium is the message” and the term “global village”.  He is credited with predicting the World Wide Web (WWW) almost 30 years before it was invented.  Little did he know, having passed away in late 1980, of the incredible eventual impact on our daily lives of the Internet.  The Internet is this generation’s equivalent to the telegraph, the telephone and the fax machines that allowed us to communication instantaneously and broadly across the globe.  However, as a marvellous communication tool, the Internet has also proven to be more susceptible to the spreading of misinformation and disinformation than any other means in modern times.

When one talks of ‘misinformation’, one is normally referring to suspect, invalid and often poorly researched information passed on by persons to other persons via social media for example.  Often such information is transmitted without real malice, but simply and inadvertently by persons accepting the information as being valid or such that supports preconceived views, referred to a ‘confirmation bias’.  ‘Disinformation’ on the other hand is where someone is deliberately providing false information in support of their causes, goals or conspiracy theories, similar to what we would view as propaganda.  Unfortunately, we are seeing a lot more disinformation being conveyed via the Internet then ever before.  States or organizations that want to control the flow of information for their own purposes are notorious for facilitating the spread of disinformation, especially as a form of mind control within their borders.  One needs to go no further for examples than Russia, North Korea and Iran.

Unfortunately, during the Covid-19 pandemic, certain groups within the U.S. and Canada began disinformation campaigns against the public health measures introduced by many governments to deal with the tragic consequences of Covid on our lives.  The information was used to justify anti-vax, anti-mask, anti-lockdown and other public health mandates, regardless of their evident effectiveness in controlling the spread of Covid and reducing the number of associated deaths and hospitalizations.  These campaigns of course led to numerous protests in both countries easily and quickly arranged via social media, often tying up scarce government resources.  In addition, groups have used the Internet to spread ridiculous conspiracy theories, the most notable being that which promoted the belief that the results of the 2020 Presidential election were affected by corrupt voter fraud.  This culminated in a mob of Trump supporters attacking the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, after Trump repeatedly said that he would never concede the legitimate election.

We must do a better job of educating future generations about the potential pitfalls of relying on one or two sources for information, particularly those who rely on non-verifiable and suspect origins.  We need to be much more suspect when assessing the accuracy and validity of our Internet sources, be they found in social media or on websites.  I might suggest strongly that we include mainstream news media and websites provided by objective professional organizations as an integral and regular part of one’s information sources.  Perhaps this is easier said than done.  After all, access to information via social media in particular is quick and dirty.  Regrettably, this is what the purveyors of disinformation and misinformation are counting on.

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May 5

Impact of Robotics on the Workplace Increased With the Pandemic and Won’t Stop Any Time Soon

by bcurry

For some time now, I’ve been following the use of robotics when it comes to various forms of employment.  Obviously, we have seen the emerging use of robotics in manufacturing and assembly operations, such as in the automotive industry.  However, now we are increasingly seeing the use of robotics in the health care sector, the retail sector as depicted by Amazon’s newest warehouses, the construction industry, and even in the restaurant sector.  The pandemic resulted in even more robotics use as a means to better ensure the health and safety of workers from contact with other workers, patients and air-born viruses in workplace environments.  Experts see organizations adopting robotics increasingly to perform otherwise unsafe or stressful workplace tasks, such as caring for patients in a hospital who are in quarantine or isolation.  They also argue that the use of robotics is not about replacing employees who would traditionally be performing certain tasks, but rather providing an overall enrichment of safety in these environments.  For example, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), over the past two years, more than 1 million American healthcare workers were infected with COVID-19 and more than 4,000 of them died.

Now, enter the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) and its application to the field of robotics and automation.  AI will allow various forms of user-friendly robotics, including for example advanced remote-controlled humanoid nursing robots in the health care sector.  AI will enable the robot to learn repeated tasks.  Once a robot has repeatedly performed a task, such as removing a blanket from the patient’s bed or retrieving specimens, it will be able to do these tasks without being given step-by-step instructions.  Advances in robotics and AI will see other uses in not only so-called blue collar work, but also in various forms of white collar work.  In the past two years, automation and AI tools have become sophisticated enough to influence professionals and white collar work.  Administrative assistants, radiologists, financial advisers — and now lawyers — have all become the targets of such software.  McKinsey & Company, a global management consulting firm, estimated back in 2017 that 35 percent of all professional tasks can be automated these days.  JP Morgan has already marshalled an army of developers to build software that can do in seconds what it took lawyers 360,000 hours to do previously.

The fact of the matter is that future workforces will work hand in hand together with robots and processes using artificial intelligence.  The implications for workers are varied and enormous.  The current and next generations of workers will have to fully educated, trained and comfortable with this new reality.  As in the past, along with new technologies comes a demand for new skills and knowledge.  There is no sector that is immune to advances made in robotics and AI, some obviously more than others.  As we are already seeing shortages of skilled workers in certain sectors, there will be greater pressure placed on organizations to compensate through the use of automated processes.  Also, whether by design or accident, many of the countries with the most rapidly aging populations already have the most robots.  According to the International Federation of Robotics in 2016, the nations with the highest density of industrial robots included South Korea, Japan and Germany.  At that time, the U.S. ranked eighth among the countries.  With their ageing populations, the use of industrial robots will no doubt increase in both Canada and the U.S. if they are to effectively compete on the global scene.

The pandemic has increased our awareness of our vulnerabilities when it comes to maintaining productivity and private and public services.  One can certainly expect that most sectors will be examining the future ways to avoid the negative impacts of pandemics and climate change on their workforces.  One means to dealing with the changing labour force demographics will be to investigate potential other uses of robotics and AI.  It’s happening now, and there is no stopping the changes that will come about.  Emerging demands will require fresh, dynamic solutions.

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