Respect. It is something that many people claim to have and understand yet many of them do not in reality. What do I mean by this? When trying to have a discussion with someone on a Discord server about the ILLEGALITY, or lack thereof, about shouting fire in a theater, I cited the Daily Wire. Now unaware to me that the article I selected was behind a paywall, I should have known but ignorance is not a full defense. The disdain in the tone of the person’s text about citing it, and then the subsequent piling on by others, I found laughable. Why?

            I found it laughable because people cannot get over their own biases. They will not accept a source because of their view of the source. To some people the Daily Wire is a great source of news and information about current topics, as well as a great source of entertainment with their movies they have been producing. To others, the Daily Wire is a fascist propaganda rag of online pseudo-journalism. And for people like me, it is a source of information that needs to be reviewed, applauded when necessary for accurate work, and called out when doing something egregious. With that said though, I do not cite the Daily Wire or most of their hosts because there are other sources out there.

            That, however, is a problem of me condoning the actions of the people who do not trust the Daily Wire. If I am unwilling to use them more when they are correct because of how other perceive them, then I am akin to accusing the Daily Wire the same as they are. So how do I change that?

            Well from where I see it, I really only have three choices. One, I subscribe to the Daily Wire. This way I can get direct access to their content and can freely critique it when needed. Two, I could just keep the status quo and not cite their articles but instead cite their videos. Or three, I could find a friend that has login credentials and use theirs.

            Now in two of these options, the Daily Wire gets money for their services either directly from me or from a friend of mine. This, to some, is bad and should not be tolerated. Funding them is akin to funding (insert terrible human rights violating government or terrorist organization here). And to others this is just people getting paid for their work.

            Going back to the main topic of respect, here I am laughing at these people for their opinion, how is that respectful on my part? Well, frankly, it is not in the context of me laughing and finding their opinion funny. The respect is in that I have respect for them AND their opinion. They are entitled to their opinion as am I to mine, but where they would choose to label people who watch, subscribe, pay for, or consume Daily Wire content as fascists or some other derogatory term, I would not.

            People who choose to cite sources, or even consume media in what ever form they do, does not inherently make them anything other than a consumer. Now I am not saying this person is wrong in say that some of the consumers of the Daily Wire are fascists, but those same fascists will also consume the likes of ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, and CNN so does that mean that all the consumers of those sources fascists as well?

            No, of course not. It just means that demographics can and do intermingle. We should not paint with broad strokes or with wide brushes lest we want to create the enemies we think we see everywhere.

            Another example of respecting another person’s differing opinion is the tirade that Owen Morgan (a.k.a. Telltale Atheist) went on Twitter with about guns. If you’ve read my previous posts or know me from AT2 Productions YouTube channel, then you know my stance on guns and the Second Amendment here in the United States. Owen came out with a tweet, that is actually in the middle of a multi-day tirade, on October 23, 2022, that states “Guns shouldn’t be in the hands of the general public. I don’t even give a shit. Australians manage just fine with massive gun regulations. If you disagree than it’s because American gun lobbyists have convinced you otherwise through ridiculous propaganda”.

            Now I could have, and still can, jump in there and counter his points, continue the pointless arguments he is making with others and otherwise be disrespectful to the both us by wasting our time. Or as I have chosen to do, I have read through most, if not all of the gun threads and noticed a pattern. Now is not the time for him and he needs to take the advice his friends and followers are telling him, take a break.

            Attacking people instead of their arguments is not a way to when them over to your side. Yes, there are instances when someone hold a belief that you just shake your head at, and we ALL slip into these patterns, especially dealing with flat earthers, but that does not mean it should be our go to tactic, even if you have heard all of the other side’s “talking points”.

            As I have been writing this, I have been considering why people would consider outlets like the Daily Wire as a fascist or fascist sympathizing organization. One point about that initial discussion on Discord was that made me think about this is the person whom I asked about the citation stated that the paywall prevents people to read the article unless they want to give known fascist money. To which I asked whom is and they replied with everyone at the Daily Wire is.

            So I did a search “Is the Daily Wire fascist” and the first non-ad result, Media Matters (www.mediamatters.org). Well this does not bode well as they are fundamentally biased against conservative media. Now this does not mean we ignore them outright; it means that we need to take what they say with a HUGE grain of salt in their opinions of conservative media. The next article was from the Daily Wire itself, and from Matt Walsh confirming he is a “Theocratic Fascist”. The amount of sarcasm in that article (not behind a paywall [ https://www.dailywire.com/news/theocratic-fascist-matt-walsh ]) is enough that I need hip-waders just to finish it.

            It is not until the second page of my search that I get a purported “unbiased” fact checking site that is rated 100/100 by Newsguard, that claims that the Daily Wire is not as truthful as they may say they are. That however is not the point I have been trying to make here.

The point I am trying to make, and I think was missed with my original citation of the Daily Wire is that sources, even biased ones can be valid when having a conversation. The blind dismissal of ANY source because of where the source comes from is foolhardy. It is not to say that the source cannot be wrong, misleading, or even outright propaganda, but until verified as such, a source should be treated with a basic level of respect. I wouldn’t trust the propaganda that comes from Nazi German, but I would still research the veracity of it before ruling it out. The same being true for information coming out of the former USSR or Maoist China. Hell, even the media coming from credible sources like the Associated Press should be scrutinized for the veracity of it. Yes, less so than the Daily Wire, but not blindly assumed to be true.

All media can be and should be thought of as propaganda, even this blog/Substack wherever you read it from. It is how the author intends the piece to interpreted as to whether it is full blown propaganda. It is sad that the bygone days of when we could rely on the media to know its biases and still try to stick to the facts are long behind us all for the sake of to be first with a story. Perhaps that will be the next topic for this writer.